After seeing Vegadov off, Chen Chuan took the chest, placed it on the table before him, and opened it.
Inside, nestled within thick, dense, soft fabric, lay an embedded golden seal and a jade disc.
These items were imperial credentials of investiture bestowed nearly two hundred years ago by the Former Imperial House upon the First People's Quezatec Eastern Dynasty.
In truth, the Former Imperial House had always wished to bring the dynasties of the First People on the Ying Continent under its domain as vassals, but conditions had been immature in the early days. Later, as more Youno immigrated to the Ying Continent and their momentum grew, the dynasties realized they were powerless to resist on their own and finally decided to seek the East Continent's backing.
Yet something went awry. It was said the vessel transporting the credentials had encountered a storm and sank midway. Around the same time, the East Continent descended into internal strife, leaving no room to concern itself with matters across the sea on the Ying Continent.
And so, the affair ended without a conclusion.
According to Vegadov, the items had been salvaged from a shipwreck. Certain members of their faction specialized in recovering lost wreckage from the ocean depths; following a lead, they located the site of that long-lost ship and brought this up.
These two objects held little practical use for Chen Chuan personally—possessing at most some historical and commemorative significance. Yet if involved in bilateral relations and political diplomacy, they could serve as a valuable card to play.
For at the very least, they proved that the Ying Continent had once agreed to become a vassal state of the East Continent. Did that not give him the standing to have a say in matters concerning the Ying Continent's land, populace, and resources?
Naturally, even with nominal legitimacy, everything ultimately came down to strength.
He set these aside. Apart from them, there were other articles kept in the same container and recovered together.
Looking them over, he found a cloak belonging to General Tianwu, likewise bestowed by the Former Imperial House upon the Quezatec king of that era.
Upon closer inspection, however, he realized it was a "boundary-meld armament," just like the saber and armor he had obtained earlier.
His heart stirred. A massive spectral hand reached out from the void behind him and seized the cloak. Radiant light flared from the garment, and as the giant hand slowly faded away, the cloak vanished along with it.
He shifted his gaze. Beside these items sat yet another chest.
This contained cultivation resources Vegadov had specifically requested from within the faction after learning during their last conversation that Chen Chuan was advancing toward a higher tier.
Chen Chuan inspected them. The quantity was genuinely generous, and the quality exceptionally high. He had hardly expected to obtain so much here from the Federation's Purist Faction—resources exceedingly difficult to acquire within Great Shun's Purist Faction.
Yet circumstances differed between the two, so a straightforward comparison was not entirely fair. Furthermore, the Federation's Purist Faction merely offered this as a token of gratitude and goodwill, a one-time gesture.
Domestically, since they were now willing to support him, it would not be a one-off; more would follow, provided he applied through proper channels and acted in ways that aligned with the faction's philosophy.
Looking at the items before him, this trip had undeniably yielded a rich harvest.
He closed the chest and set it aside for now. After recording the day's events on his boundary credential, he went to wash up. Returning, he began to mentally replay the day's battle.
The corrupted nature spirit itself was unremarkable; it had only displayed such prowess by siphoning energy from the world across the rift.
What he did discover, however, was that the Two Great Stances had proved unexpectedly effective in those conditions.
The Grand Radiant Light Forms melted and warded off the opposing power, while the force field of the Grand Firmament Forms played an even greater role—not only constraining the creature's presence, but also repelling the power of the psychic realm and forcing it to abide by the rules of the material world.
In that case, once the Two Great Stances grew even stronger, could they briefly forge a material domain within the opposite world?
That ought to be possible.
He felt capable of achieving it even now—and not just for a fleeting instant, but sustained over an extended period.
If coordinated with his spirit visage, he would no longer be a mere infiltrator in that other realm, but perhaps a captor.
The utility of the Two Great Stances went far beyond what he had imagined.
At this thought, he could not help recalling the other secret lore in his possession, "Pure Spiritual Light." In theory, it was a secret art on par with the Two Great Stances, and might also possess significant utility, though that would only become clear once he mastered it more deeply.
Apart from the aid provided by secret lores, the spirit visage had played a crucial role in that battle. Without it, taking down that creature today would not have been nearly so straightforward.
Considering he would very likely encounter similar beings going forward, he felt the urgent need to advance his cultivation to the stage of "visage unbinding," thereby further elevating the spirit visage's might.
With these thoughts settled, he picked up the chest, stepped into an adjacent private room, and commenced his cultivation without losing a moment.
***
Meanwhile, around the time Chen Chuan had entered the mine earlier, Marionette had returned to the convergence zone from the laboratory's outpost.
Waiting there until daybreak, he resumed his trek into the depths of the jungle, once again entering that martial artist's hunting ground.
Everyone knew this excursion was even more perilous than the last. No one could say whether that martial artist would have returned after a day's absence. But having accepted the commission, they could only wager that their adversary had not yet come back.
Having traversed the path once, the party moved with great speed. As they neared the final stretch, Marionette instructed the elder sent by the laboratory and the mercenaries to remain where they were, proceeding alone into the sector overgrown with mutated flora.
After he departed, the squad members watched his receding figure, and someone murmured unconsciously, "The boss won't run into trouble, will he?"
Brother Xuan shoved the back of his head. "What nonsense are you babbling? Even if something happened to you, the boss would be fine."
The man said aggrievedly, "I'm just worried about the boss!"
Brother Xuan scoffed, "What's there to worry about? Since the boss went in, he's definitely confident. Even if that martial artist is there, he'll find a way to get out. If he brought us along, we'd only drag him down. We just wait here for his word."
The old man let out a dry chuckle. "You lot certainly place a great deal of trust in your boss Blood Cane."
"You bet," Brother Xuan said, glancing sidelong at him. "You don't understand. Our boss isn't ordinary. As long as he sets his mind to something, it gets done."
The old man had intended to sneer, but seeing the mercenaries nodding in agreement around him, he swallowed his words.
The mercenaries' faith was not blind; it was forged through one successful mission after another in the past. Under Marionette's leadership, so long as the target remained in place, they had never failed once, inspiring an almost religious devotion in his subordinates.
Yet they had not realized that, beyond their past record, the mutated tissue within their own bodies had continually been sending them subtle signals, urging them to follow this man closely.
Bent low over his horse's back, Marionette galloped at a measured pace toward the area he had scouted before.
Before setting out, he had consumed all the drugs provided in advance. He could already feel his mutated tissue beginning to transform, though the progress was somewhat sluggish. His long-standing efforts to maintain balance had endowed the mutated tissue with formidable resilience over time.
Yet this resilience also rendered the transformation slow, even breeding a certain inertia that resisted crossing that threshold on its own.
Therefore, despite possessing sufficient energy, he still required stronger external stimulation to force the mutated tissue through that barrier.
In barely ten minutes, he returned to the clearing.
He reined in his mount and halted.
After scanning his surroundings, he dismounted, gripped his cane, and strode forward.
The wolf lay crouched there, its tail swaying gently. Seeing him, it shrank back at first, then unleashed a low growl—clearly retaining a vivid memory of him.
As Marionette looked at the wolf, a voice in the Federation tongue reached him from behind: "You're the one who beat my wolf?"
Marionette turned to see a middle-aged man with silver-white hair seated there. An old scar ran across his face, seemingly left unhealed on purpose. Despite the man sitting right in front of him, Marionette had not sensed his presence at all until now.
The middle-aged man said, "I want to know who you are and who sent you. Name the person backing you, and I won't make things difficult for you."
Marionette remained silent.
"Nothing to say?"
The middle-aged man nodded. His figure blurred slightly; when he reappeared, he occupied the exact spot where Marionette had stood. Yet his outstretched hand caught only empty air, for Marionette had sidestepped the instant he moved.
The man let out a soft exclamation. Even though he had not used his true strength just now, that move was certainly not something an ordinary fighter could dodge.
He remarked, "Some skill. No wonder you dared to come."
Even as he spoke, he swept his hand forward again. Marionette ducked low, slipping beneath his fingers once more, his feet churning the earth and sending dirt and sand flying.
The middle-aged man seemed intrigued. He flexed his fingers, and suddenly vanished from sight. This time he accelerated, intending to seize Marionette directly by the throat. But Marionette's reflexes remained sharp; his cane snapped up to parry first, intercepted with a crisp smack by the man's grip.
Marionette felt a jolt of fierce force surge through the cane. Simultaneously sensing movement below, he brought up his knee to block. The opponent's kick struck his leg; though the strength of his mutated tissue surged instantly, he still failed to hold his ground and was kicked flying backward.
It did not stop there. The moment Marionette flew through the air, the middle-aged man appeared above him, driving a ruthless fist downward. Marionette crossed his arms to defend, but was slammed into the earth below. His body bounced off the ground several times, tumbling outward under the residual momentum.
The middle-aged man touched down lightly. Grasping both ends of the blood cane, he snapped it in two with a sharp crack, then tossed the broken pieces carelessly to the ground.
Chapter 1215