Chapter 247 – Casting Time for Your Skill

“I heard you were injured recently?”

In a bright and spacious room, Song Cong and Su Zhaohui sat opposite each other.

Outside the enormous floor-to-ceiling window was a bustling galaxy of shuttles, seemingly endless and ceaseless.

Song Cong nodded and said lightly, “The Sea of Vine Whales is the sub-legendary secret realm closest to the legendary level secret realm. Getting injured is normal. Coming out unscathed would be strange…”

Su Zhaohui, dressed in casual black denim with an open collar, appeared even more laid-back today. He picked up the square glass of liquor beside him, took a small sip, and sighed, “Old Song, we’re getting on in years. Why push yourself so hard? Why not just wait for retirement like I do?”

“I’m not like you. I still want to break through to level SS in my lifetime…”

Looking out the window, Song Cong spoke softly and somewhat despondently, “Actually, this time in the Sea of Vine Whales, I almost managed to condense a mental light, but…”

He shook his head, leaving the rest unsaid.

Su Zhaohui’s eyes flickered briefly, and after a moment of silence, he suddenly said, “Did you know the nine legendary secret realms are about to open?”

Song Cong’s expression shifted slightly as he nodded, “I’ve heard.”

“I’ve got news that the organization is placing great importance on this legendary-level secret realm exploration. It seems it involves something very significant.

The Joint Task Force might even use a cooperative competition mode for this. Aside from the rewards of the secret realm itself, those who rank highly in the competition will receive additional rewards…

The Distant Star Federation has always been ahead of us in their research on mental light. If you can get your hands on their breakthrough techniques, it might be very helpful for you.”

“Would they really share such Core Legacy?”

Song Cong couldn’t help but frown.

Su Zhaohui replied nonchalantly, “The condensation secret technique for a level one mental light hardly qualifies as a Core Legacy… It’s essentially just an exchange of resources. This legendary secret realm exploration will likely produce a large number of high-level powerhouses…”

Understanding dawned on Song Cong as he nodded, “I get it.”

“Old Song, do your best. This is all I can do to help you. If you become a Flying Bear, don’t forget to give me a boost!”

Su Zhaohui raised his glass and made a “cheers to success” gesture toward Song Cong, half-jokingly.

After a while, he seemed to remember something and casually asked, “By the way, about that Zhou guy I asked you to recruit last time…”

“Zhou Ling.”

“Right, Zhou Ling, the white bear. Did you manage to get in touch with Lord Tong through him?”

Song Cong said nothing. With a composed expression, he opened the contact list on his communicator and handed it over to Su Zhaohui, showing the chat history with one of the contacts.

As soon as Su Zhaohui glimpsed the name “Divine Blood Lu Yuan,” his pupils contracted slightly, and he instinctively sat up straight.

“Impressive, Old Song. You’ve got some skill, getting in touch so quickly and being addressed as ‘senior’!”

Su Zhaohui gave Song Cong a thumbs-up, genuinely impressed.

Song Cong lightly curled his lips into a restrained smile and said, “It was just good timing. Lu Yuan wanted to enter the Wailing Ruins for training, and it happened that Xie Jun was assembling a team to go there. So, I asked Xie Jun to take him along…”

“Xie Jun’s really hit the jackpot this time…”

Su Zhaohui couldn’t help but click his tongue in amazement, “If he knows Lu Yuan is Lord Tong’s subordinate, taking him along just once would earn him a lot of favor from Lord Tong. He’d be over the moon!”

“Let me finish.”

Song Cong exhaled lightly, with a tinge of regret, “Xie Jun didn’t want to babysit anyone, as it would hinder his tasks. And Lu Yuan, well, he’s quite proud… So it didn’t work out in the end.”

“Damn!”

Su Zhaohui lightly slapped his thigh and said, “That’s a relief. Xie Jun, that guy, has average skills but is notoriously bad-tempered. Seeing him get lucky feels worse than me having bad luck… Xie Jun’s really hopeless; even when given a chance, he can’t hold onto it…”

Song Cong looked at Su Zhaohui, who had a schadenfreude expression, with a sense of bemusement.

After getting his fill of gloating, Su Zhaohui turned back to Song Cong and chuckled, “But even though it didn’t work out, you still put in the effort. Lord Tong will definitely praise you for it. By the way, who did Lu Yuan end up entering the secret realm with?”

“He went in alone.”

“Lu Yuan went in alone? For the first time?”

Su Zhaohui’s eyebrows raised slightly, and his eyes flickered with a few emotions before his expression turned serious.

“Did you tell Lu Yuan about the restricted area within the Wailing Ruins?”

“Of course.”

Song Cong nodded, “I specifically warned him multiple times to stay far away from it.”

“That’s good.”

Su Zhaohui’s expression relaxed a bit but then became somewhat complex.

“The Wailing Ruins… I remember Old Zhao died in that restricted area. Later, the higher-ups sent three Flying Bears in, but only one came back…”

Su Zhaohui seemed lost in past memories, his voice filled with sentiment.

Song Cong also nodded with a complicated expression, speaking softly, “Fortunately, the restricted area has shrunk now, and the entrance method has become much more complicated. Unless someone is extraordinarily unlucky and stumbles in by accident, most people can’t get in even if they try…

The danger levels in other areas are comparable to a typical level S secret realm. Given Lu Yuan’s strength, he might have some difficulty navigating, but he should definitely be able to keep himself safe.”

“That’s a relief.”

Su Zhaohui took a sip from his glass, lightly sighing in reflection.

…

“Hu—”

With his arms whirling like windmills, Lu Yuan’s figure traced a dragon-like path through the dense death energy, leaving a trail of crimson in the pitch-black void.

With one hand on each side, he firmly gripped the heads of two crow deity knights.

Bringing his hands together in front of him, he slammed their two-meter-tall hulking bodies into each other with a forceful impact.

“Boom!”

Lu Yuan watched as the heavy armor, condensed from death energy and worn by the two figures, shattered like porcelain under the collision.

He clasped his hands, and with a slight twist of his wrists, the helmets, encased in death energy, shattered between his palms.

“Crack-crack—”

Landing lightly on the ground, Lu Yuan spread his over-five-meter-long black wings behind his robust figure. The death energy roared around him like blazing flames.

His arms fell naturally to his sides.

As the two crow deity knights disintegrated, their bodies turned into black sand, which slowly slipped through Lu Yuan’s fingers.

Lu Yuan calmly gazed at the figure draped in a gigantic black robe directly in front of him, noting the two elongated, skeletal black arms protruding from beneath the robe, holding an enormous black book.

A series of eerie consciousness waves emanated from the figure.

Lu Yuan tried to catch them but couldn’t make out any of the syllables.

He could only discern that…

The figure was chanting!

“Giving you enough casting time for your skill…”

Lu Yuan remarked offhandedly.

Then he lowered his gaze and casually looked around.

He quickly spotted a greatsword lying on the ground.

It was a weapon that belonged to one of the two crow deity knights he had just slain.

Lu Yuan picked it up effortlessly.

The cross-shaped, two-handed greatsword was nearly two meters long, with a hilt measuring almost half a meter.

Broad and heavy.

The blade was marred with rust and chips, and the hilt seemed to have once been inscribed with text, now worn away by time.

Gripping the greatsword, he reversed it so that the tip pointed toward the black-robed man who was chanting.

His eyes narrowed slightly, and the muscles in his right arm, holding the hilt, began to bulge, with veins popping out like worms beneath his skin.

The black wings on his back disintegrated automatically, transforming into a stream of death energy that flowed over his body, converging into the greatsword.

Through continuous battles, Lu Yuan’s control over death energy had reached a new level.

He couldn’t yet form a weapon solely from death energy that could fully withstand his immense physical power.

However…

With a solid cold weapon as the core, it was possible.

As the black-robed figure chanted, an immense amount of death energy from the surrounding square gathered toward him, forming an enormous vortex.

The death energy within the vortex churned violently, as if some terrifying entity was about to emerge.

Meanwhile, the death energy in Lu Yuan’s hand also gathered, appearing to compete for control of the death energy in the space.

The original shape of the long sword in his grasp became indistinguishable.

A vast amount of death energy condensed around the greatsword, even faintly manifesting a crystalline sheen.

When Lu Yuan embedded all the death energy he could muster from his lv9 [Death Energy Entanglement] onto the long sword, his entire aura peaked.

On his back, covered by the dark blue combat suit, the Blood-red Lotus Eye wriggled and then suddenly snapped open.

Bang!

Lu Yuan’s body moved like a taut bowstring suddenly released.

On the [Master of Arms] panel, his lv4 [Basic Throwing] skill glowed brightly.

In an instant, Lu Yuan’s arm vanished.

The “black spear” in his hand—over three meters long and half a meter thick, enveloped in death energy—shot forth like an enraged dragon.

It left a long, twisting, transparent trail in its wake.

Finally…

Boom!

The chanting consciousness waves abruptly ceased.

The vortex of death energy above the square froze and then gradually dissipated.

Lu Yuan looked straight ahead and saw, about a hundred meters in front of him.

A black robe, pinned to a gray wall by the broken half of the sword.

The black tome fell from the black-robed man’s hand to the ground, and the figure disintegrated like paper burned to ashes, scattering quickly.

“I said I’d give you casting time for your skill, but I didn’t say I’d let you finish…”

Lu Yuan casually spread his hands and looked around as the battle ended.

The square was littered with the black sand remains of death energy monsters.

He lost count of how many death energy monsters he had shattered in this fight—he just kept killing.

Like mowing grass.

Until there were no more monsters emerging in front of him.

In this ruined city named Fenglu, the death energy monsters roaming inside were almost entirely cleared out by him.

Lu Yuan activated [Crow Language], summoning a large flock of undead crows to help him collect the black beads left behind by the death energy monsters from the debris.

As usual, he glanced at the panel, where his [Martial Artist] professional experience had increased by nearly thirty thousand.

The most satisfying part of a group fight is that the [Martial Artist] professional experience skyrockets.

But Lu Yuan had an inexplicable, strong feeling in his gut—

“The [Martial Artist] panel seems to be nearing its peak…”

This feeling was intense, akin to the “wall-hitting sensation” often described in novels when a person’s cultivation level is about to reach its limit.

“[Martial Artist] at max level… the next step should be a profession upgrade, right?”

Lu Yuan’s eyes sparkled as he silently speculated.

The undead crows quickly cleaned up the battlefield, eventually gathering a total of 231 black beads.

Including the three black beads from the crow deity knights and the black robed man, that made 234 beads in total.

An unprecedented harvest.

The black beads from the crow deity knights and the black robed man were noticeably larger than those from ordinary death energy monsters, about the size of a thumb, and their color was a deeper shade of black.

“How much will my intelligence points increase if I absorb all these beads?”

Lu Yuan pondered as he looked at the handful of black beads before him. After a moment of consideration, he decided to pick up just one of the large beads and gently crushed it.

A deep black, viscous liquid flowed down his fingers and seeped into his skin.

On the [Death Messenger (Extraordinary)] panel, the experience points for several skills surged dramatically.

At the same time, a flood of memories began to rapidly surface in Lu Yuan’s mind.

The continuation of the “main storyline” he had been anticipating… had begun.