Fu Qingyang sat before his desk, logged into his account, and entered the virtual meeting room. Six elders representing the three major branches attended this meeting. For the Songhai Branch, it was Elder Dog and Fu Qingyang; the other four elders had no appetite for administrative affairs.
The mild-tempered Elder Dog had quietly shouldered most of the workload over the past few years, only gradually finding leisure once the ambitious Money Prince rose to power.
There were still five minutes left before the meeting was scheduled to start, and the elders of the three branches were logging on one after another.
Once everyone was present, Elder Cinnabar Sword of the Hang City Branch cleared his throat and spoke:
"Ten days have passed since the clash between the three demigods. In these ten days, there have been over a hundred incidents triggered by those items—robberies, murders, thefts, rapes, and all manner of crises occurring constantly. The victim count has surpassed a thousand, and that's despite the President having already retrieved those terrifyingly powerful high-grade items ranked among the top fifteen right at the start of the chaos.
"Everyone, the burden on our shoulders is heavy."
Pausing, his tone shifted as he smiled:
"Yesterday, headquarters compiled the data and found that the retrieval progress has improved considerably of late. The Grand Elder is very pleased.
"Yesterday, Secretary Li called me. Headquarters wants us to hold a meeting to hammer out a plan of action and strive to recover all the items before the end of the month. Here's the newly updated spreadsheet. Take a look, everyone."
With that, he uploaded a spreadsheet to the meeting room's chatbox.
The elders clicked open the file and were pleasantly surprised to find that while there were still fifty-four items unaccounted for six days ago, only thirty remained.
Under the tireless efforts of hundreds of official walkers, the three branches had averaged one or two resolved incidents per day, which would have amounted to at most ten items recovered over six days. Yet over the past six days, the tally had doubled.
Elder Cinnabar Sword sighed. "I'm ashamed to admit that our Hang City Branch hasn't made ideal progress. Did Songhai or Xie City kick things into high gear these past few days? Do you have some special method? Please, feel free to share."
That was also one of the meeting's objectives.
An elder from Xie City chimed in immediately. "Looks like it's the Songhai Branch. Elder Dog, Elder Fu, how did you pull it off? If you have a good method, please share."
Recovering items required first gathering intel, followed by investigations, arrests, and an entire chain of operations. Even with the powerful channels at the alliance's disposal, it remained a tedious and sluggish process.
Items with minimal hazard were difficult to detect, and among the ordinary mortals who found them, there were plenty of clever individuals who deliberately concealed them, leaving the officials virtually powerless.
This was why the recovery effort was so slow. With their staffing fixed, the Songhai Branch's sudden surge in results suggested they had developed some specialized technique for tracking down items.
Inside the virtual conference room, the elders waited in expectant silence for an answer from Songhai.
What they received instead was another document.
Fu Qingyang uploaded a report to the chat window.
The four elders from the Xie City and Hang City branches clicked it open with curiosity and anticipation.
"Case 1: Little Red Riding Hood! A young girl in a red hood appeared in Songhai's Inner Ring Tunnel, dragging all forty-two people inside into a special pocket space that remained anchored within the tunnel. That night, Yuanshi Tianzun entered the tunnel..."
"Case 2: Reproduction Sapling! This item landed in the campus park of Songfu University. It continuously emitted an aura of procreation, influencing nearly thirty students to engage in orgies within the woods and develop an addiction, unconsciously returning to the park each night. Fortunately, aside from reproduction, it caused no other harm..."
"Case 3..."
"Case 4: Hypnosis Phone! This item was picked up by a high school senior. Its function was to hypnotize targets, rendering them completely obedient to the wielder. Upon discovering the phone's miraculous effects, the student hypnotized his female neighbor, acting as her master and issuing multiple degrading commands. As his desires swelled, he proceeded to hypnotize female teachers and classmates at his school... The student has now been arrested by Yuanshi Tianzun. Given that he has reached eighteen years of age, the harshest penalties of the law await him."
"Case 5: Treasure-Hunting Cloak! This item allows its wielder to pass through walls, glide for short intervals, and drastically reduces their presence. Days ago, the holder infiltrated the vault of Ganyao Rural Commercial Bank, stealing 1.5 million in cash..."
"Case 6: Mutation Coat! This item originated from an overseas evil class and induced bodily mutations in its wearer. A delivery driver obtained it and gained the ability to shoot silk and crawl up walls. He fancied himself China's Spider-Man, believing that with great power came great responsibility, and patrolled the city at night. However, because public safety was too good, he couldn't find any criminals and ultimately became one himself. While being pursued by Yuanshi Tianzun, he accidentally crashed into the wall of an office building and died..."
"Case 7..."
"Case 8..."
Having finished reading through the document, the conference room fell into dead silence. None of the elders spoke for a long while.
After a dozen seconds or so, Elder Cinnabar Sword took a deep breath. "Every single one was retrieved by Yuanshi Tianzun?"
One man's results rivaled all three branches combined?
What kind of efficiency was this?
Fu Qingyang said blandly, "Unfortunately, this method isn't something you can copy."
Elder Cinnabar Sword gave an emotional sigh. "A great reputation is never unearned. A brilliant prodigy outstrips ordinary walkers by a wide margin no matter what he turns his hand to. He was barely hit with severe punishment before turning around and earning two major merits in quick succession."
He was referring to the recovery of the item in the Sea of Yashan and this current spree.
The elders couldn't help feeling a pang of jealousy—not over the recovered items, but over the Songhai Branch itself.
First they had Fu Qingyang, and now they had Yuanshi Tianzun. The Songhai Branch's standing within the Five Elements Alliance was as solid as Mount Tai.
"It won't do for all the talent to gather in Songhai. When is headquarters going to break up the Songhai Branch?" an elder from Xie City remarked with a wry chuckle, before adding, "Since Yuanshi Tianzun is so adept at gathering items, could we put him in charge of that matter?"
Fu Qingyang frowned and shook his head. "Even the President couldn't find them himself. Yuanshi Tianzun is even less likely to succeed."
He knew what matter the elder meant. Of the top fifteen items, only two remained unrecovered: number nine and number three.
Elder Dog said, "When it comes to treasure seeking, no one in the world is better suited than the President. For the past ten days, his focus has been entirely on those top fifteen items. If even he couldn't locate number nine and number three, there is likely only one possibility."
Elder Cinnabar Sword said slowly, "Those two items have already been claimed by Spirit Realm walkers and stored in their inventories. Given their properties, it wouldn't be so bad if an Orderly class obtained them, but if they fell into the hands of an evil class... Sigh. Headquarters told me that the President has given up the search and disclosed their attributes, hoping headquarters can post a bounty on his behalf. As long as someone recovers those two items, he's willing to offer two Myriad Realms Firm vouchers."
With that, he uploaded a file to the chatbox.
The elders opened it, and after reading the properties of the two items, they fell silent once again.
Elder Dog gave a bitter smile. "As expected of the strongest member of the Void class. To think he possesses so many bizarre yet staggeringly powerful items. If an evil class got hold of them, it would be another disaster."
A disaster for the Orderly classes.
Fu Qingyang furrowed his brows. "The Myriad Realms Firm?"
Elder Cinnabar Sword replied, "It's a demigod-level rule-based item—or perhaps even higher. Its attributes and abilities remain unknown. The first time it was recorded in official files was when the Compass of Light appeared in the world and triggered a demigod-level melee. Relying on a single Myriad Realms Firm voucher, the President fought three demigods all by himself."
Fighting three demigods single-handedly... Fu Qingyang drew a deep breath. "I see."
Using that item surely demanded an extremely horrific price, or the President would have long since unleashed it against the Bacchus Club.
***
Inside a dim, secret chamber, the Great Protector of the Dark Night Rose stood by the window, listening to the phone.
"Great Protector, I've obtained something," came a subordinate's hushed report through the receiver. "Number nine... I've encoded its information in ciphertext and sent it to your mailbox."
The Great Protector of the Dark Night Rose turned around immediately, returned to the desk, turned on the computer, and logged into his email.
Opening the message from his subordinate, he found garbled characters mixed with twelve languages.
With a mere glance, the Great Protector accurately deciphered the true contents hidden within the chaotic, lengthy text.
After an entire dozen seconds of silence, he burst into sudden laughter—raspy and exultant.
The subordinate on the other end of the line didn't dare make a sound. He had never seen the Great Protector like this; while fits of rage were common, hearty laughter was an unprecedented rarity.
"You've done well. Very well!" the Great Protector said, laughing with a voice that sounded as if phlegm were caught in his throat. "Get ready, and find an opportunity to enter Qinfeng Academy. The long-cherished wish our leader has harbored for years might just be fulfilled by you. You should understand what kind of merit that represents."
Through the speaker came the subordinate's rapid breathing.
***
In Xin'an County, situated on the border of Jiangnan Province and Jianghuai Province.
Inside a dilapidated rented apartment, clothes lay in messy piles across the bedroom. The curtains were drawn, leaving only a tiny crack. A silhouette sat at the desk, looking down to inspect the object before him, letting out an eerie, cackling laugh:
"A sacred sect heirloom... Whose sect heirloom was left behind, only to be found by me? Heaven helps me! Heaven truly helps me, hahaha..."
Laughing in a neurotic frenzy, he suddenly paused, tilted his head, and chuckled, "No, this is a new era now. We must use the modern term—a Dominator-grade item!"
Sunlight filtered through the crack in the curtains, leaving half of his face cloaked in darkness and half illuminated by the light. His expression was both vacant and manic, one eye hollow and lifeless, the other rabid and deranged.
Over this past period, he had been repeatedly unable to suppress his urge to slaughter and his yearning to mend his fractured body, devouring the spiritual bodies of several Spirit Realm walkers in succession, along with the souls of over a dozen ordinary people.
Without the power of purification, this had undoubtedly worsened his mental corruption, driving him to schizophrenia.
"Good disciple, my good disciple, your master has missed you to death, hehehe..." The eerie, grating laughter echoed throughout the rented apartment.
***
Wuhen Hotel.
The air conditioner blew powerful currents of cool air into the marble-tiled lobby. Behind the front desk, Zhang Yuanqing reclined lazily in Xiao Yuan's lounge chair, his legs crossed.
"I mean, how could a high school senior have such evil thoughts? Doing something so depraved to his female neighbor, his teachers, and his classmates! Back when I was in my final year of high school, I didn't even dare to hold a girl's hand. I blushed whenever I spoke to girls—I was pure as could be. Xiao Yuan, you've got to believe me."
With his legs crossed, he talked enthusiastically, recounting what he had seen and heard during his item-hunting spree over the past few days.
Wearing a wine-red blazer over a white blouse, Xiao Yuan leaned against the front desk, quietly listening to his rambling. Her cool, elegant face showed little expression, but a hidden warmth lingered in her eyes.
Kou Beiyue and Little Fatty leaned against the counter, listening with rapt attention.
The ways ordinary people reacted after getting their hands on magical items were thoroughly fascinating. Most would exploit the powers to indulge their personal desires, but there were also those who fancied themselves saviors, or believed they were the chosen protagonists of destiny.
"Still, what that high school student did was only run-of-the-mill bad. Aside from the Inner Ring Tunnel incident, the most egregious case I saw over the past six days was a curse-killing incident—more than twenty people died across an entire residential community. You guys will never guess why the caster killed them," Zhang Yuanqing said.
"Why?" Kou Beiyue and Little Fatty asked in unison.
"Every single victim had dyed blonde hair. The killer's wife had an affair, and he said..." Zhang Yuanqing gathered his breath at the tip of his tongue, as though incanting a sacred spell: "Every blonde guy must die!"
Kou Beiyue and Little Fatty were completely bewildered. "What does that even mean?"
"If you get it, you get it. If you don't, don't ask." Zhang Yuanqing waved a hand. "Look what time it is! Aren't you two supposed to be delivering food?"
"Holy crap..." Kou Beiyue snapped out of it, grabbed his helmet from the desk, and bolted out the door.
Little Fatty followed close behind.
"Wait a second," Zhang Yuanqing called after him with a smile. "I don't care whether you're following Kou Beiyue sincerely or not, but as long as you're hanging around him, behave yourself. If you ever dare harm him, I'll hunt you down and kill you no matter where you hide."
"Hey, hey, hey!" Though touched deep down, Kou Beiyue put on an expression of utter disdain. "You're not my dad! What're you meddling in my business for? Liangchen, let's go."
Little Fatty nodded slightly and departed without a word.
Once they were gone, Zhang Yuanqing stretched lazily in the chair. "Now that the third wheels are gone, we can finally have our private world for two!"
Xiao Yuan glanced at him sideways with a mocking snort. "Do you still have a thing for older women?"
Zhang Yuanqing had once discussed his preferences with her back when he was single, speaking on the topic with shameless abandon. But now he didn't dare.
"Not anymore," Zhang Yuanqing said, shaking his head.
Xiao Yuan murmured an "Oh" and turned her back, facing the hotel entrance.
Zhang Yuanqing swiftly pivoted with a teasing smirk. "But an older woman like Auntie Xiao Yuan? I adore that."
She didn't turn around, as though she hadn't heard him, but the corners of her mouth curved slightly upward.
***
On the seventh day, at nine in the morning.
After sleeping the night away at Wuhen Hotel, a rejuvenated Zhang Yuanqing traveled back to the capital. Taking a taxi into the old district, he navigated the familiar route and arrived at the entrance of the Wanbao House corner store.
Inside the shop, Transcendent-stage items and materials were piled about in disarray.
The striking shop proprietress sat beside the cash register, a cigar held between her fingers, puffing away with relish.
She wore the same outfit as when they first met: a black tube top beneath an open black leather jacket, showing off her firm, flat stomach.
A heavy indolence hung between her brows, lingering without fading.
"Proprietress, Hu Hansan has returned!"
Zhang Yuanqing walked over with a beaming smile, practically bursting with anticipation at the thought that he was about to forge a top-tier item.
Lian Sanyue glanced at him without moving from her seat, a faint smirk touching her lips. "I have bad news for you."
Zhang Yuanqing's heart dropped instantly. "What bad news?"
Lian Sanyue set down her cigar and leaned back languidly in her lounge chair. "The firestones are sold out. They're an absolute necessity for activating the Hundred Refinements Furnace, and only thirty pieces are produced each month. I had ten pieces left in stock, but yesterday, someone bought them all."
Zhang Yuanqing's expression darkened. "Are you messing with me?"
How could there possibly be such a coincidence in this world?
Lian Sanyue's smile remained unchanged, her posture as indolent as before. "Someone is messing with you, but it isn't me. I value my reputation above all else; not even a Saint-grade item—even a rule-based one—could make me throw my credibility away.
"However, someone definitely is messing with you."
Chapter 375