Volume 3, Chapter 78 – Entering the Game (Two-in-One)

With Guo Rongzhi’s reminders in mind, Bai Xiang changed directly into the G-305 “Demon Kite” battlesuit right there.

The suit was good, very breathable. Although it fit tightly once she put it on, it did not give that tugging sensation on her limbs, nor did it feel suffocating.

She turned in front of the mirror, checking her reflection, and realized it was not like wearing shapewear as she had imagined. Compared to those skin-tight outfits, this looked much more imposing.

She had read the manual and knew this was because composite bulletproof plates were installed at the chest and other areas, so the women’s version of the suit did not show off her curves too much.

Not bad.

It had a strong technological, almost sci-fi feel.

Bai Xiang then fixed the magnetic soles onto the suit’s boots, took out a filtration mask that looked like a black face mask and covered her nose and mouth, then pulled out a black hairband to tie her hair into a half-high ponytail. She looked into the mirror again and still felt like something was missing.

A coat?

The “Demon Kite” suit did not look especially revealing, but it still outlined her figure. There was no way she could just run around wearing only this; she definitely needed a coat on top.

In the other wardrobe hung rows of casual clothes in all sizes and in both men’s and women’s styles. Bai Xiang picked out a black leather trench coat. Once she put it on, it completely covered the battlesuit; to outsiders it would just look like she was wearing black trousers under the coat.

But that still was not the missing piece.

Her gaze swept through the wardrobe again. At last she paused, reached deep inside, and pulled out a canvas bag. From it, she dug out a black baseball cap with golden letters spelling “S-POP.”

That’s the one.

Threading her ponytail through the opening at the back of the cap, Bai Xiang lowered the brim slightly, picked up her longsword, and returned to the mirror. The person there now looked like a fashion-forward street trendsetter.

Baseball cap, black mask, long trench coat, and dyed white hair.

This look was anything but “low-key,” yet based on Guo Rongzhi’s description, she felt it matched the vibe of this place rather well.

She did not need the matching rifle. The magnetic launchers and other small components were already fixed to her belt. Bai Xiang went a step further and took out her phone, plugged in the “Demon Kite” suit’s connector cable to install the control program, and watched the progress bar creep to completion.

Once the program opened, more detailed suit data appeared.

Damage level, breathability, bulletproof performance, the exact positions of hidden batteries, as well as the “Demon King” mecha’s standby status and distance away. All of it could be checked at any time.

This thing probably would not be of much use.

Bai Xiang did not take the mech in the cargo bay very seriously.

If she had gotten this equipment right when she first arrived in this world, it would indeed have been tremendously valuable.

But now…

Augu God-Warrior Elend, piloting a far more advanced military mecha, had still been cut down by a single stroke of her sword. To her, this “Demon King” mecha was essentially a toy. She did not think she would ever have occasion to use these gadgets.

She glanced at the cabin door. There was still no movement outside.

This plane belonged to “Mingfei Airlines,” the airline Guo Rongzhi owned here. At the moment, she was not only the owner of this VIP MF-03 jet but also a shareholder and major stockholder of Mingfei Airlines.

So everyone knew their place very well. Even though the plane had been parked at the terminal for a long time, not a single person had come to rush her.

Time to go find Bolu.

Pulling open the door, Bai Xiang stepped into the central passageway and said to the black-clad man waiting by the hatch, “Take me to see the other one.”

The man was in a full black suit, his dark skin paired with a head of black-and-gray curls, a standard Nanman look. As soon as he heard Bai Xiang speak, he nodded at once and walked ahead to guide her.

When the plane had come to pick her up, Guo Rongzhi had already introduced him. His name was “Alai,” an aide Guo had recruited in Luohou.

“Alai is completely trustworthy. You can hand most of the trivial matters over to him.”

“But he is still a mortal, so remember not to assign him tasks that are too difficult.”

A mortal, huh.

Bai Xiang lowered her eyes to watch Alai’s steps. His pace was even, his stance steady, yet every step he lifted seemed to have a spring to it, giving the impression that even if someone attacked from behind, he could instantly twist around and explode into a counterattack.

Among people who did not practice the Sword Dao, this level of skill counted as quite good.

She had heard that in the Luohou region, a kind of body-hardening martial art was popular, similar to Muay Thai. After the invasion of Federal powers, it had combined with imported modification techniques to form a unique Nanman-style killing art known as “Tendon Fist.”

She guessed Alai had trained in Tendon Fist, and might very well be a top expert of the local martial world.

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Otherwise, how could he possibly keep the company’s assets safe in a place like this?

If the mountains were high enough, the emperor’s power felt far away. No matter how formidable Yuming was, it could not reach this far. All the problems here still had to be smoothed over by Alai.

“We’re here.”

Alai was very respectful toward Bai Xiang and helped her open the unlocked cabin door, revealing Bolu lying propped up on the bed.

“This.” Alai lowered his voice and handed Bai Xiang a small notebook. “It might be of some use.”

Bai Xiang flipped it open, glanced through it, and nodded her approval. “Well done.”

Inside was an investigative report detailing how Bolu’s master, Chan Master Liaokong, had colluded with a gang, organizing the trafficking and transport of people across multiple countries and regions.

Alai lowered his head and stepped aside.

Bolu’s hands were shackled with alloy cuffs. When the door opened, he looked up and recognized her from the color of the ponytail hanging down Bai Xiang’s back.

“There’s no honesty between us.” Bai Xiang walked in and sat on a stool two meters away from him. “Why did you lie to me?”

During the previous interrogation, Bolu had been quite cooperative. But the address he had given for the Tiger-Subduing Temple was in “Loki City.”

The address she had just received, however, was “western suburbs of Bako City.” That meant Bolu hadn’t had any intention of cooperating properly from the start.

“You killed Little Hu.” Bolu’s voice was hoarse. “Then you worked with those people to get my master and junior brothers killed.”

“I won’t lead the way for an ambitious schemer like you.”

“Give up.”

An ambitious schemer?

Me?

Bai Xiang narrowed her eyes unconsciously. From the perspective of a bystander, her taking over Shenming, connecting forces, and rising in Maozhou did indeed look like the actions of someone with great ambition.

But to her, it had all just happened along the way.

Everyone, every strand of karma, only clung to her because she was strong enough, because she had the power to control them.

So he had misunderstood.

He thought she had come specifically to absorb the Tiger-Subduing Temple, to bundle up the remnants of the temple in Luohou and fold them into the Shenming Sword Dao.

She could not deny that she had considered that idea, but it was not the main purpose of her trip to Luohou.

Bai Xiang glanced toward the door.

Alai, very tactfully, closed it.

The heavy thud echoed through the cabin. With the light from the corridor gone, the room dimmed at once.

Bolu started to feel nervous. He realized he could not even make out Bai Xiang’s outline clearly.

“The remnant demon age in your body was cleared away by me.”

A cold voice suddenly sounded in the darkness.

“You know I have methods of soul-harvesting. Do you really think keeping your mouth hard will change anything?”

At those words, Bolu’s face changed dramatically.

The thing he feared most was happening after all. This demoness, this fiend, was actually admitting it outright, admitting that she could extract divine souls and even gain power from them.

Bolu began to tremble uncontrollably. He knew that when the old man’s remnant soul had lodged in his body, he had intermittently received fragments of the other’s memories.

He did not dare be sure whether, if Bai Xiang killed him and harvested his shattered soul, she might also see his memories.

If she could, then his resistance was meaningless.

This was not a threat.

It was a warning.

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His chest heaved violently. Bolu asked, “If I cooperate with you, can you promise not to kill anyone?”

Bai Xiang refused to bargain. “I won’t give you any promises.”

“Why?” Bolu frowned. “You want us to return to Great Yu, don’t you? You’re here to win us over. Do we not have the right to make conditions?”

He had indeed become more clear-headed.

Bai Xiang had been watching him this whole time and had noticed that ever since the demon age and remnant soul were removed from his body, this big oaf’s thinking had become normal again. He even knew how to seize the chance to ask for benefits.

“Let’s do some accounting.” She waited a moment longer, giving Bolu plenty of pressure before speaking slowly. “You know all the details from the Demon-Subduing Bureau. I just want to ask: was I the one who came looking for trouble with you?”

Bolu gritted his teeth. “No.”

“Was I the one who went up to the ring looking to challenge you?”

“…No!”

“Then there’s no injustice.” Bai Xiang shook her head. “You ran into me yourselves.”

Bolu was deeply displeased, but he could not refute it. He could only wheeze heavily, breathing hard.

“Besides, I don’t absolutely have to take the Tiger-Subduing Temple under my banner,” Bai Xiang said. “You can completely refuse.”

Bolu could not understand. “Then what do you need me to guide you for?”

If it did not matter either way, why keep forcing him?

“I’m here to look for something, but I only know a rough area, and the surrounding information is very vague.” Bai Xiang spoke openly. “I need your temple’s elders to provide intelligence.”

So she wanted to get into the Scripture Depository too?

Bolu did not want to call her out.

What a deceitful demoness.

He closed his eyes, weighing whether to accept.

After the old man’s remnant soul had been drawn away by Feixiang Heaven, he had been seized by people from the Demon-Subduing Bureau and thrown into prison, where he had fallen gravely ill.

But once he recovered, his thoughts became clearer than ever. His control over his own body improved again. He would no longer slip into that state of muddled confusion, shambling around like a “walking corpse.”

The difference this made, and how precious it was, was something no one could truly understand without experiencing it for themselves.

So sometimes Bolu, staring at the prison wall, would let his mind wander and feel that, in a way, Bai Xiang had not killed him but rather removed a hidden threat. In that sense, she had done him a kindness.

“I can help you make introductions,” he finally said. “But you have to release the others… bring them back.”

“You blame us for executing your master, Chan Master Liaokong.” Bai Xiang’s tone left no room for doubt. “Setting aside the fact that his crimes were enough to warrant death, just speaking of what he did to you, do you really feel he was your benefactor?”

“Don’t you talk about him!” Bolu roared.

He knew very well that Chan Master Liaokong had never been as caring a master as he appeared.

That much was obvious. What master who truly loved his disciple would inject a demon age remnant soul into the disciple’s body?

Bolu understood, but he could not ignore the years of upbringing and care he had received.

And there was the promise his master had made him, saying that if he behaved well in Great Yu, he would help him find his parents, who had been seized years ago and sold off to Great Yu as cheap chattel.

He remembered all of that.

Just as he was about to lose his temper, something was thrown onto his body.

He grabbed it and saw that it was a small notebook.

“I’ll give you ten minutes.”

Bai Xiang stood, opened the cabin door, and left Bolu alone inside.

Senior Brother Guo’s eye for talent really was excellent.

She glanced at Alai, head lowered beside her.

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“How did you find this?” she asked, curious.

These transactions had taken place so many years ago. Even with good archives, it would have taken ages to find them, and that was in a normal country. In a place this dark and chaotic, they had actually kept records?

“Tiger-Subduing Temple and the Luohou royal family are very close,” Alai replied. “Because of their influence, this region was once a stronghold of Buddhism.”

It sounded off-topic, but it did answer her question.

This was the Tiger-Subduing Temple’s “dirty laundry.”

The Luohou royal family had also feared losing control over them, so of course they made a point of preserving records of their misdeeds as leverage to keep the temple in line.

The monks had changed.

Bai Xiang shook her head, feeling a twinge of emotion.

Tiger-Subduing Temple had been founded by Chan Master Jingling.

After he fought a great demon and died suddenly from severe loss of blood essence, the temple had passed into the hands of his disciple, Suizhen.

The branch of Tiger-Subduing Temple that had split from the main line back then had been led south by Monk Suizhen. It was under his leadership that they came to the southern regions and rooted themselves here in Luohou, which in ancient times was known as the land of Wetnu.

Although Monk Suizhen later turned to the Demon-Immortal Dao in his search for longevity, the pretext he had used for leading those people away had been lofty.

[The South Ridge may be at peace, but the turmoil of the world extends far beyond the South Ridge.]

Even now, that line was stirring to hear. Anyone who had been moved to follow him must have been a person of great integrity.

Yet those people, their descendants, generation after generation down to the present, had long since seen that integrity rot and sour in the retelling, until they themselves were participating in filthy trades.

This was not the first time Bai Xiang had felt this way. Chan Master Daokong, Monk Suizhen, Zheng Boqing, the Ghost of Southern Qi, and Patriarch Qingping, Qin Zhen, whom she had only recently learned about… Though their endings had differed, they were the same in one respect: what they had pursued.

How many heroes of bygone days, pressed by the looming shadow of death in their twilight years, had been unwilling to see their lifetime of dao-fruit swallowed by old age, or unwilling to become puppets of the court, and so had chosen “degeneration,” choosing to risk everything on opening a new path?

There were probably too many to count.

Truly, the human world was a sea of suffering.

No true longevity.

No true transcendence.

Once again Bai Xiang firmed her dao-heart, reminding herself that what she had achieved was still very small and that she must never grow arrogant or careless.

Yes, across the Nine Provinces, she was now capable of contending with the strongest.

But if her goal was longevity, if her goal was to “construct a complete cultivation system,” then she had only just set foot on the road.

Besides, there were the ancient demons…

Her brows knit slightly. Ever since the Demon-Immortal Dao, Right-Self Dao, and others had been lashed to Yao Qingyuan’s rebellious chariot, then scattered and went to ground when the rebellion was suppressed, they had been hidden away without a sound. It felt as if they were working on some plan in the shadows.

The demon clans, the demonized…

If she were in their place, she would at least use this Demon Pool calamity to do something. It was impossible that they would be completely inactive, vanishing as if from the face of the earth.

“Once I get the Meridian-Linking Method, I should head back immediately.”

Bai Xiang made up her mind.

Ten minutes later, Bolu emerged.

His skin was dark enough that Bai Xiang could not read much from his face, but she could still sense the turmoil in his emotions from his chaotic qi presence.

“Get in the car.”

The group walked out of the terminal building, passing all manner of Nanman locals in brightly colored odd clothing and foreigners in suits and ties. Bai Xiang was the first to sit in the black sedan Alai was driving, then turned her head to look at the dazed Bolu.

Bolu’s expression was blank as he got in. He had started to obey orders without protest.

The car pulled away from the airport. On the road, Alai took calls and gave instructions while also explaining the next steps to Bai Xiang.

“We’re in Diming City now,” he said.

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“Luohou has three major cities. Diming City here on the Great Yu border, Loki City in the central region, and Bako City, the capital, in the southwest.”

“They look far apart, but in reality, each of these ‘mega-cities’ only has just over a million people, and they’re quite close to each other. Flying between them takes just over an hour.”

“Not long ago, Luohou had a military coup. Prince Saiwei overthrew the old king’s rule and took the throne. But Luohou’s two neighboring countries, ‘Qinghuai’ and ‘Stansa,’ refused to recognize the legitimacy of the process. Prince Saiwei then declared war on both countries, and the entire airspace over Luohou is now under very strict control.”

“Because of this, we can’t arrange a direct private flight to Bako City for you.”

“There are two options for you next. One, you can rest here in Diming City and wait until there is a flight before heading over.”

“Two, you can move freely and go straight there yourself, crossing the jungles and rivers along the way.”

Alai did not know what level Bai Xiang was at, but since Guo Rongzhi had told him she was his “junior sister,” she could hardly be an ordinary person. Crossing wilderness should not be a problem.

Bai Xiang asked, “I can’t just fly over myself?”

Alai, hidden behind his sunglasses, felt his eyelids twitch violently at that.

Able to take to the sky by her own power… He was glad he had not dared show her any disrespect.

“It’s best not to,” he advised tactfully. “Things are complicated here. There are many satellites watching the skies. Any unauthorized airborne activity might trigger a military response. They tend to press the button first and explain afterward.”

“How did Yao Qingyuan handle it back then?” Bai Xiang asked again.

“The people he sent shouldn’t have been able to fly…” Alai replied. “And he had direct contact with the old king. Some rules simply didn’t apply to him.”

So Prince Saiwei’s coup was also related to the downfall of the old king’s backer, Yao Qingyuan.

Bai Xiang nodded, feeling a strange sense of unreality at how the global order here was being affected by her actions alone.

After chatting for a bit, Alai took another call.

“What did you say?”

“Why?”

“Alright… I understand. I’ll be there in about an hour. You follow protocol and call the police. Don’t do anything extra.”

“What happened?” Bai Xiang asked him.

“The company is haunted. A dozen people are dead,” Alai said. “It shouldn’t be a serious problem… It’s common for places to be haunted here. I’ll arrange lodging for you first, then go over and take a look.”

When they said “haunted” here, they actually meant a Demon Pool was acting up.

Dealing with Demon Pools required the Sword Dao, and there were very few Sword Dao cultivators abroad. By rights, Demon Pools should have been a huge headache, but Bai Xiang knew the reality was not so bad.

On one hand, once you left Great Yu’s borders, the number of Demon Pools gradually decreased.

On the other, the Federal nations were not without techniques for dealing with Demon Pools. The Augu God-Warriors were one of the research results in that field.

Luohou, like many small countries in the “gray zones,” had its economy and technology controlled by the Federal nations. Those greater powers were hardly kindly benefactors, but just as no one would dig up the roots of their leeks, they would not simply allow these small countries to be devastated by Demon Pool disasters and chaos.

They would intervene in secret.

They would keep the number of Demon Pools within a certain range.

Mingfei Airlines’ city offices were on one of the busiest streets, in an area that had always been a priority for Demon Pool control. How could a Demon Pool suddenly break through there?

Bai Xiang smelled something off.

“No need for all that trouble. Take me straight to the scene,” she told Alai.

“But…” Alai hesitated.

This was not part of the plan. If something went wrong, he did not know how he would answer to Guo Rongzhi.

“Just do it,” Bai Xiang said, fingers stroking the sword sheath lightly.

Feixiang Heaven had not eaten anything good in a while.

It was time to see what foreign fare tasted like.