Chen Xiaolian rode on the afternoon train back to Jinling (Nanjing).
Before leaving, he had considered leaving some money for Da Gang. However, he recalled how Da Gang had rejected the money he gave the day before… thus, Chen Xiaolian decided against it. Despite his dim-witted appearance, Da Gang was a very assertive person. With his strong level of self-esteem, Chen Xiaolian’s attempt to give him money may end up being seen as an insult toward him.
Instead, Chen Xiaolian gave Da Gang his mobile phone number. He told Da Gang to call him if anything were to happen.
It was already afternoon by the time he reached Jinling. The first thing Chen Xiaolian did was to call up Qiao Qiao.
However, the call was left unanswered.
This caused Chen Xiaolian to feel a slight unease.
He then made a call to Soo Soo; but her phone was turned off.
Qiao Yifeng’s face appeared within Chen Xiaolian’s mind.
Perhaps Qiao Qiao’s father had returned home and engaged in a discussion with Qiao Qiao. Who knew what had happened during the course of their discussion.
“It seems this matter is getting more complicated,” Chen Xiaolian scratched his head in distress.
Arriving home, he saw that Xia Xiaolei was the only one inside. This fellow was seated before the computer inside the study, playing LoL. Not surprising, he had logged in using Chen Xiaolian’s account and ended up being severely raped. The win rate of the account fell to below 30 per cent.
Chen Xiaolian could not help but smile bitterly when he saw that Xia Xiaolei had, in merely two days’ time garner himself an infamous nickname:
Nicknamed: Prince of Feeders. [1]
…
In a certain location, Han Bi dragged his exhausted figure out from a stretch of forest.
There were some scars on his face, especially on his eyebrows. A scar had cut his thick, brush like eyebrows apart.
Han Bi slumped onto the ground and exhaled.
“A failure…” Han Bi leaned his back onto a tree.
Pulling out a cigarette, he shakily lit it up – his arms and legs were trembling.
“After leaving the group, I can no longer do anything?” Han Bi raised his head up and looked at the grey skies in dismay. “I will not accept that! I will never accept that!”
As he continued trembling, he swallowed a Healing Type Beast Blood. After a moment, Han Bi slowly stood up, determined his location and stumbled away.
“I will not accept it!”
…
In the airport, Lun Tai and Bei Tai walked out side by side, a pair of sunglasses on both their faces. Both of them carried only a simple backpack behind them. They had no other luggage with them.
Walking out from the airport, they saw Chen Xiaolian and Xia Xiaolei standing by the exit, waving toward them.
“Did you enjoy yourselves?” Chen Xiaolian looked at Lun Tai. Lun Tai curled the corners of his lips and laughed. “It is a pity you did not go. Even if you have Qiao Qiao and you do not want to look for a woman, you can always have fun in the casino.”
Chen Xiaolian shook his head. “I am not fond of those things.”
Bei Tai had already reached out and placed his arms over Xia Xiaolei’s neck like a hook and laughed out. “Little kid, next time, I will bring you together so you can get a taste!”
“Do not teach a kid those dirty stuff. He has yet to come of age,” Chen Xiaolian laughed and pulled Xia Xiaolei back.
Bei Tai looked around for a while and asked. “Where are the others? Haven’t Roddy returned?”
“No,” Chen Xiaolian frowned. “I cannot reach his phone. Who knows what the Hell he is up to.”
“Where is your girlfriend?”
Lun Tai looked at Chen Xiaolian.
Chen Xiaolian pursed his lips and answered. “There is something going on at her home.”
Noting Chen Xiaolian’s hollow answer, Lun Tai smiled and slapped his shoulder. “Let us go. This is your neck of the woods. The accommodation and lodgings of us two brothers will be on you. Oh, right. This time’s Las Vegas trip, we ended up blowing away all our money. After buying the ticket, we do not even have enough money to eat instant noodles.”
Chen Xiaolian laughed. “Let us go. I will bring you guys for a feast.”
…
Both Lun Tai and Bei Tai also came to stay in Chen Xiaolian’s home.
During the next one and a half days, the four young adults lived under one roof. Frankly though, there was nothing for them to do.
The only thing they did was drink alcohol and play some games.
On the evening of the second day, Lun Tai and Chen Xiaolian engaged in a discussion.
“We cannot simply hang around like this. We would be wasting this time,” Lun Tai sighed. “We had to put our lives on the line to fight and kill in order to survive the instance dungeons. Could it be simply for the sake of drinking and playing games every day?”
Chen Xiaolian’s expression remained calm. “What do you mean?”
“We should take advantage of this time,” Lun Tai said in a serious tone. “Last time, you mentioned that we would be establishing a base…”
Chen Xiaolian sighed.
Truth be told, this matter was constantly in his mind.
The matter with Qiao Yifeng had thoroughly shocked him.
Unquestionably, the guild that Qiao Yifeng was part of possessed a high level of strength. Everything that the super wealthy Qiao Yifeng possessed actually belonged to the guild. Their execution of this matter was truly masterful!
In fact, what Chen Xiaolian had thought of doing happened to resemble the path taken by Qiao Yifeng’s guild. However, he had not taken into account the issue of having an agent. He had intended to do it himself.
Presently though, he came to realize that things were not so simple.
First was the question of money!
Chen Xiaolian was not a poor person. The amount of royalties he received each month would go into the five-digits – compared to his peers, he could be considered a little plutocrat.
However, in order to establish a base of that magnitude, that amount of money could barely count as a drop in the bucket.
“There are many usages to a base of operations. First, we will be able to use the time not spent in instance dungeons for training.
“We do not necessarily have to depend entirely on the system for the enhancement of our body and the attributes of the body. Even among ordinary people, there will be a huge disparity in battle strength between one with a robust and healthy body and one with weak body.
“Although we Awakened can enhance our bodies through the system, the price for that is very high. The various body enhancing medicinal substances, equipment and training skills require a hefty amount of points.
“Thus, training ourselves is one of the basic methods to save up on points. Although the increment gained from our own training is very small, it is still better than nothing.
“Besides, even if one had an [S] class – Physique, if that person acts like a lazy bum and eat junk food, spending his days eating and sleeping, in one month’s time, their body will degrade.
“After spending so much to acquire such a powerful body only to have it degrade away, if that happens, we won’t even be able to cry.
“I do not wish to stay here in this world for a few months only to end up with a pot belly and a fat body.”
Lun Tai’s words were very direct and straight to the point.
“There is also combat skills,” Chen Xiaolian faintly said. “We can train up on basic combat skills there. Through training, we can also increase our proficiency toward the weapons we acquired from the system.”
“Overall, there will be benefits. Although it will not be obvious, constant drops of water will hollow a stone,” Lun Tai nodded his head.
“There is our equipment as well,” The military fanatic Bei Tai shouted out. “We will still have to test out the Thunderstorm Tank, no? If we do not practice using it, then, when we suddenly take it out in the middle of a battle, forget starting it up, I may not even be able to aim with it since I have never touched it before!”
Chen Xiaolian smiled wryly and said. “If we are to take out the Thunderstorm Tank, I fear that we will soon be in the headlines. Then, we can just wait for the army to come catch us.”
Forget a Thunderstorm Tank, even if they were to get their hands on an ordinary tank, they would still not be able to train using it.
“We also need to train with firearms. If we do not open fire for too long, our shooting instincts will become dull.”
Chen Xiaolian thought about it and made the necessary calculations.
We need a shooting range… a training field where we can train our bodies. It would be even better if we can get a shooting range that allows us to test fire the Thunderstorm Tank’s artillery.
All right, since we also need an armoury – if we can have that, it would be for the best. But if there aren’t, we can first place the weapons inside the Storage Watch.
Where should I go to find such a large place? It must be secluded so that outsiders cannot find it.
The amount of money he has inside his savings was only enough to pay for the down payment for a second-hand house.
“Money is not a huge problem. If the next instance dungeon is the same as the Tokyo instance dungeon, we just need to allocate some time to rob a bank and clear out its vault. That way, our financial problems will be mostly solved,” Lun Tai said coolly. “The issue however, lies in the fact that even if we have the money, we may not be able to buy up a piece of land. This matter is not simple and we will need someone to run around to help us with that.”
Xia Xiaolei who had been sitting silently beside them suddenly let out a sigh. “It would be great if we could live inside Zero City… there is everything inside.”
The three of them turned around to look at Xia Xiaolei. Chen Xiaolian laughed out. “What are you dreaming about? A place like Zero City is reserved for peak guilds.”
It was likely that not even Qiao Yifeng’s guild could qualify for permanent residence within Zero City. Otherwise, they would not have needed to get Qiao Yifeng to help them as their agent and to amass such a huge amount of assets.
“Is there a rough estimate to when the next instance dungeon will open?” Chen Xiaolian asked Lun Tai.
“According to my experience, after having participated in an instance dungeon, there will be roughly one month’s time before the system selects us again,” Lun Tai thought about it. “Of course, if you want to immediately enter an instance dungeon, that is not impossible. Just find an acquaintance within another guild and enter their instance dungeon.”
Chen Xiaolian quickly recalled that incident right before he entered the Mausoleum of Qin Shihuang instance dungeon. Back then, other guild members aiming to fish in troubled waters had occupied the entrance to the instance dungeon.
“I’d rather not. There will be no shortage of instance dungeons in the future. Who would take the initiative to go inside?” Chen Xiaolian shook his head.
He considered the issue and said. “If we cannot accomplish our bigger goals, then we will just have to start with the smaller ones. Live-fire exercise for firearms and the Thunderstorm Tank is something we still cannot do. However, finding a place to do some simple body training is still quite easy. Hmm, Xia Xiaolei has the weakest level of strength. We can train him up. Since we know some martial skills, we can try to teach it to him. At least, it will be cheaper than us purchasing it from the system. Let him learn however much he can. It would be better than nothing.”
And so, the matter was decided.
Chen Xiaolian found a fitness centre inside the city.
The first time they went, they nearly gave the fitness centre’s coach a huge scare.
After Lun Tai went forward, the amount of weight he pushed up while bench-pressing nearly gave the coach a heart attack. Thankfully, Chen Xiaolian’s reaction was fast and he quickly stepped forward with some bluffs. In the end, the coach thought that he made an error with the equipment and let it go despite still having some scepticism about the matter.
Chen Xiaolian and his group quickly left. In the outskirts of the city, they finally found another fitness centre with dismal patronage.
It was a very dilapidated building. Originally a large-scale shopping mall, the lack of customers led to the entirety of the 3rd floor being rented to a fitness centre – however, there were still not much customers.
Chen Xiaolian observed that the area was large enough. There was also a training room for taekwondo. However, the signboard had been taken down. Supposedly, it was due to the fact that this place was not suitable. The name of the instructor was also not famous enough, leading to almost no one signing up. Thus, this taekwondo class was basically close to being shut down.
Using a small amount of money, Chen Xiaolian was able to reach an agreement with the other party.
He entered a subcontract for the taekwondo training room from three in the afternoon until nine in the evening every day.
At the same time, they could use the fitness equipment of the fitness centre for free.
The business here was scarce and the fitness equipment were shabby. There was also no fitness instructor around. However, that was a good thing for them, as it would allow them to avoid exposure.
Regardless of whom it may be, if they were to see a lean and fair faced youngster like Chen Xiaolian wave a barbell that weighed over a hundred kg around, they would likely end up getting a heart attack.
Unfortunately for Xia Xiaolei, he was in for bitter times.
The bored brothers, Lun Tai and Bei Tai made him their newest toy and put him through an intense session of training.
The fellow had no martial skill to speak of. Thus, Lun Tai began by teaching him unarmed combat skills. Then, Bei Tai would teach him how to use the military knife.
Although Xia Xiaolei’s body had already been enhanced by the Genetic Enhancement Serum, he had zero knowledge in the area of combat skills. In the next two days, he ended up being beaten to the point where his face swelled black and blue.
The various training for body techniques left Xia Xiaolei crying for his parents every day. If an uninformed outsider were to walk by, they would mistakenly assume that some criminal activities were going on inside.
Chen Xiaolian too began to assess himself.
Presently, his strongest martial skill was the Demon King of Confusion’s Three Axes.
However, the experience within the Tokyo instance dungeon had left him with a sense that the [B] class skill was gradually becoming insufficient. Its lethality was too low when faced against a strong enemy.
Additionally, Bone Crusher Axe had also been destroyed. Chen Xiaolian did not even have a weapon he could handily use.
So, he had Xia Xiaolei help him look through the Exchange System.
There, he found a weapon that appealed to him.
…
Fearless War Axe.
It would be more accurate to say that it was a short pole weapon.
The axe has dual blades the shape of a crescent moon and a tip. Its handle was one metre long, a medium length weapon. It would be best used when on foot and would likely be too short for horseback use.
It came equipped with a skill: Fearless Roar.
When triggered, the skill will allow the user to increase the cleaving effect by 50 per cent. The effect has a duration of 15 seconds (cumulative total). While it can be used repeatedly, once the cumulative total of 15 seconds had ended, the skill will disappear and enter a cool down period of 1 hour. [2]
…