Extreme Dusk Cave was located at the northeast of Black Dusk Domain, the hottest area in the domain. There are only a few trees here and it's not even a desert, just a vast expanse of stones and hard, solid things. It was in this specific, hot location that lies the active volcano, Black Dust Volcano, which erupted approximately 300 years ago, its dark fog covering the entire Domain for 5 entire weeks. Because of this event, the Skymoon Empire just called the area where the volcano was homed as Black Dust Domain.
It was a sunny day, morning, the sun piercing the skin of slaves currently working at such an early hour. If one stood in a location of high elevation, one could see thousands of people going in and out of the Extreme Dusk Cave. The cave had a lot of openings, and it was extremely vast, going a lot deeper underground. The term Extreme Dusk Cave did not only mention one cave, but all interconnected caves in the underground of such a vast expanse of northeast area.
Jiang Ye stared at the tents of the officers currently giving quotas to slaves. Jiang Ye could see them sweating so hard due to the extreme heat the sun was giving, in such a lifeless land (other than human, of course). However, he did not feel any heat today. He feels great. He was quietly circulating the wind-attribute spiritual energy inside, cooling down his body but still leaving out his body's temperature for today's work.
Jiang Ye lined up with the other slaves and waited for a few minutes. The line was extremely long, as it was still early in the morning. A lot of the slaves had just woken up and started working. While Jiang Ye was waiting, he silently tempered his flesh and muscles as he circulated the wind-attribute spiritual energy according to the cultivation technique. He had memorized all of it now, that he could even burn it right now to remove any trace. But Jiang Ye did not do so. He still has some use to it.
After waiting for another few minutes, it was finally Jiang Ye's turn. He looked at the officer again, it was the officer he gave his collection of Spirit Stones yesterday.
"Name?" As usual, the officer did not seem particularly interested in what Jiang Ye looked like, as he was busy scribbling something on the paper.
"Jiang Ye, 800 quotas." Jiang Ye said in a matter-of-factly tone.
The officer nodded his head and searched for his name on the list. After a few moments, the officer finally took a glance at Jiang Ye and said, "You want to increase the quota?"
"Yes, please." Jiang Ye smiled as he nodded his head.
The officer frowned for an instant but just disappeared in the end. He then wrote something beside Jiang Ye's name and pointed at the collection of baskets beside him. "Go and take one."
Jiang Ye thanked the officer and took one bamboo basket. He cast one final glance at the long line again and saw him—Long Ziwu, giving him some malicious expression. Jiang Ye's lips curved into an unnoticeable grin and then proceeded to ignore him altogether.
At the same time, when Long Ziwu saw this, he muttered under his breath. "This bastard ignored me."
"We should beat him up," Long Ziwu's lackey, Yang Shan, who was behind him, suggested.
"Indeed," Long Ziwu sneered. "I will teach him a lesson."
Now that the overbearing old man was gone and in the custody of the Lord's elite guards, there was no one to protect that bastard Jiang Ye from his grasp. He will let him taste his own medicine by breaking his nose—no, not just the nose but his entire face, he will make sure of it!
---
Jiang Ye was now inside the cave, walking through the tunnels and just wandering. Today he has two goals; One is to complete the quota so that he can go back to cultivation, second is to use Spirit Stones for cultivation. The first goal was still possible, but it was hard to say anything to the second. After all, the officers will easily sense something full of spiritual energy like Spirit Stone. However, he doesn't need to leave the cave, right? He could just go deeper and deeper so that he could use Stones for cultivation while not being seen by others.
Of course, he did not forget Long Ziwu's malicious intent earlier and he knew that the bastard was scheming something, but Jiang Ye did not care anymore. He was not afraid of an ordinary person like Long Ziwu. He was, after all, a martial cultivator now. He was leagues past Long Ziwu, and he felt like he could rival Old Man Zhao's peak strength.
Jiang Ye was rather surprised to discover that despite being a martial cultivator, he felt that he couldn't overwhelm the old guy easily. This made him extremely impressed and he wondered how disciplined that old man was in terms of training his body. He remembered that every time the old man finished his quota—which was significantly faster than most of the slaves that only had 100 Spirit Stones quota—he always saw him exercising and training his body to limits. He often wondered how strong that guy's punch was. It was probably extremely explosive and painful. Maybe he can even break a skull in just a single punch. He did not know.
20 minutes had passed, according to Jiang Ye's estimate, and now he felt like he was extremely deep into the cave. He can also see Spirit Stone ores so he gripped the pickaxe tightly and started hitting it.
Thud! Clang!
As rubbles of stones go to the ground, the first 3 Spirit Stones fall Jiang Yput downwn the pickaxe and picks up those three stones. Looking at these Spirit Stones, they looked a lot clearer and purer than what one can find in the outer areas of the Extreme Dusk Cave. The texture of these Spirit Stones is also incredibly smooth. He could sense a lot of condensed spiritual energy within the stone.
Jiang Ye sat cross-legged and put down two Spirit Stones on the ground, focusing his attention on the one in his hand. He closed his eyes and began to circulate the spiritual energy inside him again. As per the instructions of the Wind Circulation Cultivation Technique, he began to absorb the spiritual energy inside the Spirit Stones, but instead of using his nose, he manipulated the spiritual energy inside and sent it all to his veins.
Jiang Ye suddenly snapped his eyes open as the energy flowing through his was so cold. Extremely cold. It felt as though cold water was flowing through his blood vessels. But Jiang Ye knew this was a good thing. He continued his rather painful absorption of spiritual energy from the stone and he noticed the light becoming dimmer as he absorbed more.
He also noticed that the spiritual energy was cleaning his veins. The toxins within his body are being purged by the spiritual energy. Even the unclean blood was being cleaned by it.
30 seconds later, the Spirit Stone ran out of energy so he picked up another one and absorbed it. The rate at which fast he absorbed the spiritual energy inside the Spirit Stones was extremely terrifying. If others in the Flesh Refinement Stage saw this, they would be extremely shocked. After breaking through Jiang Ye used another Spirit Stone until—
Bang!
Jiang Ye opened his eyes and looked at his hands in disbelief. Did he just advance to Tier 2 of the Flesh Refinement Stage? Isn't that just too fast!? But on the other hand, Jiang Ye could understand. After all, the cultivation technique said that it was an Epic-tier cultivation technique. He did not know what that meant, but it sounded so strong when he heard it.
Whoosh!
Jiang Ye punched in the air, causing a whooshing sound that could only be made if an object moved extremely fast. And in this case, that object was his hand.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Jiang Ye continued punching the air, deeming the sound it produced to be extremely satisfying, and deemed it as an achievement for today. He grinned widely when he thought about how he will beat the shit out of Long Ziwu easily. He was deciding on what part of his body to punch first.
But then, he suddenly calmed down and stood up. He suddenly remembered his main goal, the mission he must do. And that was to save Old Man Zhao from the hands of authority. He was not aware of what happened after the incident yesterday, he did not even know if the old man was still alive. He just hoped that he was not too late.
As for Long Ziwu? Jiang Ye decided not to mess with him anymore even if the guy provoked him. He was not interested in doing a pointless battle. But of course, if Long Ziwu wants to exchange fists, he will give him that.
"I should go and mine Spirit Stones now." Jiang Ye muttered, as he approached the basket again and picked up the pickaxe nearby. Then, he started mining again.
---
Meanwhile, Long Ziwu and his lackey, Yang Shan, were currently in the cave where two patsplititt Extreme Dusk Cave further.
"Are you sure this was the cave Jiang Ye entered?" Long Ziwu said, frowning.
"Of course I do," Yang Shan smiled from ear to ear. "I am sure this is the place."
"Alright then," Long Ziwu nodded, his voice still filled with doubt. But at the same time, there was a hint of excitement rising within him. Excitement to finally have his redemption. To give Jiang Ye the taste of his own medicine.
For today's beating-up session, Long Ziwu and Yang Shan minimized their required Spirit Stons quota to 100. So even if this took a lot of time, they only needed 100 Spirit Stones. Even if they can't find anything, they could just extort it to other slaves.
Swish! Thud! Thud!
"Hmmm?" Long Ziwu suddenly heard the sound of something, like fast footsteps, coming their way. He looked at Yang Shan to which the latter both nodded and they simultaneously cracked their knuckles to give Jiang Ye a satisfying beating.
It was indeed Jiang Ye, who was running toward them. He had long since noticed them from the distance, about tens of meters away even though it was dark around these parts. Maintaining a distance of about 5 meters between them, Jiang Ye finally stopped running and just silently looked at the two.
"You are finally here," Long Ziwu stretched his arms, warming up. "And here I am beginning to think you have been in an accident."
"Of course not," Jiang Ye smiled. "I was a careful person since that day."
"You…" Long Ziwu became enraged upon hearing this. He suddenly remembered that one humiliating day when a weakling like Jiang Ye broke his nose—his beautiful nose!
Jiang Ye looked beside Long Ziwu. "Who is this guy beside you? Your backup?"
"Absolute no!" Long Ziwu angrily said, approaching Jiang Ye as he walked at a normal pace. "I can easily demolish you."
"Oh come on," Jiang Ye shrugged. "Like, why do you have so many anger issues? I am beginning to think you are some cardboard character. Do you even have life?"
"What did you just say!?" Long Ziwu naturally did not understand what Jiang Ye was saying but it sounded like he was mocking him, so he tensed the muscles on his thighs and then burst toward Jiang Ye.
Meanwhile, Jiang Ye ignored Long Ziwu and stared at Yang Shan. "Oi, you just gonna watch or what? Come, come, fight me."
Yang Shan rolled his eyes and ignored him which made Jiang Ye slightly embarrassed.
Finally, Long Ziwu was just tens of inches away from him and Long Ziwu released a punch, using every ounce of his power into that one single, explosive punch. It was extremely fast, of course, but that looked extremely slow to Jiang Ye.
"Meh!" Jiang Ye easily avoided the punch and due to Long Ziwu's momentum, he stumbled and fell to the ground. "I mean, you are alright. Being an extremely minor villain and all that but hey, you should be proud that you are my first enemy."
"Arrghh!" Long Ziwu groaned in anger as he stood up again and threw punches at Jiang Ye, all of which were extremely easy to avoid.
He punched to the left, and Jiang Ye stepped back. Punched to the right, Jiang Ye's kick was a lot faster and it hit Long Ziwu's legs, causing him to scream in pain.
"ARTGHFHFH!" Long Ziwu knelt, tears coming out of his eyes. He held the leg he just kicked and Jiang Ye noticed it was deformed. He was shocked that he could easily destroy Long Ziwu in a battle, even though he already expected this.
"Okay one down, one to go." Jiang Ye smirked and looked behind him, but then he saw Yang Shan already running away. Jiang Ye looked at him speechlessly before casting a pitiable glance at Long Ziwu. "Looks like your lackey abandoned you."
"You, you bastard!" Long Ziwu moaned while still holding his legs.
Pound! Pound!
"Ahhhh!"
Long Ziwu screamed in pain as Jiang Ye mercilessly stomped on the former's ribs calmly. "That's what you get for being a snitch. And for being a bastard."
Jiang Ye finally stopped bullying him and spat saliva straight to his face before losing interest. Long Ziwu can't even speak anymore, just bawling his eyes.
"Whatever, I'm done here." Jiang Ye walked away, holding a basket full of Spirit Stones.