“Grr.”

Qiang Sui was frustrated by the overwhelming domain power of Zhao Bao. He had believed that his golden domain to be invincible on this continent, but he actually had been unlucky enough to run into someone stronger.

Without a choice, Qiang Sui regrettably admitted defeat. He cupped his fist and bowed to the Buddha statue. Then, he turned around and left.

Seeing that Qiang Sui had retreated, Zhao Bao deactivated his domain and dispelled the Buddha Statue. On top of the wall, the monk smiled, “Buddha is merciful, benevolent, and kind. Don’t you think so?”

No one was around the monk. Yet, he seemed to direct his words to someone nearby.

100 meters behind the monk, on the rooftop of a wooden storehouse, a cat with two tails snorted and ignored the monk’s blabbering. She jumped off the roof and returned to the courtyard of Ju Shoufen, where the elder had built a home for Mao Xueyan and the fox cub.

Zhao Bao brightly smiled while his light element inside his dantian hummed, telling him that sowing good karma with the people in this city was the right choice. He nodded in satisfaction, “Fate has brought all of us together. Something great will probably happen soon…”

…

Meanwhile, Ma Ping was standing next to the other clan members, heaving a sigh of regret.

Qiang Sui used to be his best friend and comrade in the previous war against the demons. However, he had gotten drunk on power and had lost sight of himself, turning into an arrogant cultivator.

Ma Ping had felt the urge to step out to talk to his old friend, but Qiang Sui’s behavior was unbearable. He had ended up killing several of his friend’s underlings.

The elder gazed at the corpses. Currently, Ju Chen and the yin slaves with vampire bloodlines were busy extracting their blood. As for the other yin slaves, they spent their time collecting the spatial rings from the dead bodies and searched them for treasures and usable items. Even Ma Shoucheng helped the girls strip the corpses’ clothes to find more items in their pockets.

Ma Ping snickered. It seemed that his son and Cao Mao’s wives were getting along well.

“Oh well,” Ma Ping gazed at the direction where Qiang Sui had fled to. “I guess this is goodbye, Qiang Sui. The next time we meet, it will be on a battlefield.”

Ma Ping turned around and returned to his new courtyard, which was 100 meters away from the soon-to-be pylon tower. With the immense energy from the tower, he would soon restore his strength to his prime in a few months.

…

Ding

[You have overused your Heavenly Fate Power.]

[Your Heavenly Fate Power will be dormant for a year.]

Inside the ITS, Cao Mao was busy trimming branches of a copycat mandragora. The root of this plant was as large as an adult human, and it had the appearance of Cao Mao. It had even copied his erected asset down there.

Although Cao Mao felt weird looking at the mandragora’s root with the same face and body as himself, he continued to process the herb to prepare for his next concoction session.

But his hands stopped after he had heard the system’s warning. He tilted his head to the side, not understanding what had happened.

“Huh? I thought it was on cooldown. Why was it activated? I don’t remember using its power. What the hell?”

Ding

[The previously active one was the Heavenly Fate Piece that you’ve stolen from Ma Moxi.]

[The still inactive one is the Heavenly Fate Piece from Xie Tian.]

“Oh? There are two pieces! So, can I rotate its active time and keep at least one of them active all the time?”

[There is a limit to what the Heavenly Fate Power can do. The more you’re relying on them, the weaker they become. Please don’t overly rely on the fate’s power, or they will disappear. Their power is limited without the support from the high-ranked fate gods.]

[Also, someone has attempted to kill you in the real world. The power has protected you, for now.]

Those were two pieces of bad news. It reminded Cao Mao that no haven existed in this cultivation world. Unless he was strong enough to intimidate his foes, stronger cultivators would find trouble with him eventually.

Still, Cao Mao maintained his focus. He discarded unnecessary worry and continued practicing alchemy. He even ignored the keyword – “High-Ranked Fate God”.

He no longer had the leisure time to get sidetracked. Time was against him, and he had to improve his alchemy skills ASAP.

…

After the defeat of Qiang Sui, people who had fled earlier returned and reoccupied the previous spots that they had claimed.

The surviving 6th-stage cultivators also came back. They didn’t forget to salute toward the city, paying respect to the hidden nascent soul experts. Afterward, they resumed their position around the city, but they turned their backs to the city walls.

It appeared as if these rogue core pillar experts decided to return the favor to the nascent soul experts, they gazed at other cultivators as if telling them to also play the part of guard dogs, protecting the city while they were cultivating.

They also didn’t forget to take a bit of petty revenge by spreading the news to their masters, friends, subordinates, and families in an exaggerated manner, telling everyone how Qiang Sui had one-sidedly been defeated by the city protectors. Of course, they skipped over the part when they ran for their lives during the chaos.

Within half a day, everyone in Xuan City had heard about this outrageous development, including the other major clans.

Qiang Sui and the Qiang Clan quickly turned into a laughing stock. Everybody talked about how the Qiang Overlord had waged war everywhere, only to eventually lose all of his followers. And now, Qiang Han and his faction members had to clean up the mess that Qiang Sui had made.

The news reached the ears of Liu Bian and other major clans. And yet, nobody made a move. They simply sent their subordinates to gather more information about Siren City and their protectors.

As for the loser, Qiang Sui, he went into hiding. Nobody, including Qiang Han, had heard about him after that day.

In fact, Qiang Han not only ignored the ill rumor about his clan and the disappearance of his brother, but he also took this opportunity to establish his dominance and political power within the clan. He quickly gained the support of all clansmen and officers from other cities, who hoped to replace the clan lord.

Qiang Han also intentionally leaked the intel of their movements. Soon, it changed into propaganda to entice wandering cultivators to join their clan.

The unexpected development within the Qiang Clan was not the only interesting topic in the city. The seed that Cao Mao had planted long ago had begun to bear fruits.

As over 10,000 cultivators from around the continent had flocked into Xuan City, many men visited the local brothels and night bars. There, several prostitutes shared their favorite rumor that they had heard from Ma Moxi.

Liu Bian was practicing Necromancy!

The night-clubbers brought this piece of news to their clans and friends as usual. However, they didn’t openly gossip as someone from the Liu Clan might hear it.

With so many pieces of interesting news circulating in the city, everybody was looking forward to the start of the auction event.

They no longer wanted to see the precious items in the auction. They simply prepared a lot of popcorn and soda for the other show.

They wanted to see the carnage!

…

Outside the city, Eunuch Rang burst into laughter after his men had reported what they had heard from the local people.

The head eunuch had already suspected the crown prince when the latter had published a bounty for a certain corpse of a young man. He had guessed that Liu Bian might be practicing an evil art, but he had never dreamed that other people would have had the same idea.

As cunning as he was, Eunuch Rang chose not to relay this information to the prince. Instead, he visited his eunuch colleagues, so they could prepare something fun.

‘I should contact the guys from the Poison Pavilion. I wonder if there’s a mind-controlling pill or a drug that can make the prince a puppet. Well, if they can poison the emperor, they should also have one of those, right? Hehehe!’

…

A week later

The auction week had started.

Ma Moxi attended the auction event alone as Ma Ping and the others insisted on staying in Siren City, cultivating and looking after the orc babies.

As Ma Moxi’s liquor was sold early on the first day of the auction week, not many people paid attention to it. Yet, many auction participants bid a high price for each barrel of the unique golden whiskey.

Ma Moxi’s drink was not only delicious and strong, but it also contained mild yang essence, which was helpful to weak cultivators who couldn’t condense Qi strands into essence drops.

Still, it was insignificant in the eyes of powerful experts at the 4th-stage or higher. Only weak cultivators and elders from various 3rd-rate no-name sects ended up bidding for Ma Moxi’s items.

Ultimately, he managed to sell 200 barrels of whiskey for 200,000 refined stones, which was enough for Ma Moxi to invest in his new project, creating an army.

After his items had been sold, Ma Moxi stayed there with his friend, Tang Fan, to see if he could bid on a few items for himself. He also came here to sell some stuff that he had obtained from Head Eunuch Rang’s ring.

The auction event went on for six days without the presence of Cao Mao and his family. Only Ma Moxi stayed there to wait for his other items to show up on the auction stage.

Then, on the 7th day of the auction, a storm was brewing.

Today’s auction event was held inside a 5-story theatre, similar to a European theatre in the renaissance period. They were made of fragrant metal oak, coated with earth element Qi from a rank 5 alchemist. Its sturdiness could easily withstand any 4th-stage cultivator’s attack. However, they still needed to be reinforced with arrays as many monsters would be joining the event.

On the theatre stage, a pair of giant red curtains remained closed as the event hadn’t started yet.

Modern theatre seats had been arranged since last week. Tang Deming had arranged enough chairs and seats for 30,000 participants, but they still had enough space on the upper decks for the VIPs to enjoy their privacy.

Ordinary participants would be arranged to sit on the first floor while famous sects, clans, or factions, would be guided to the higher floors. These VIP customers would sit on the prepared balcony decks and watch the show from there.

Early in the morning, Ma Moxi joined Tang Fan at the host’s auction deck on the fifth floor. Their deck was directly above the stage, so they could see every participant and VIP decks from there.

But there were cons. They couldn’t see the stage clearly, and they had to rely on the broadcast treasure from the Tang Clan to see everything on the stage.

People slowly entered the auction theatre at 7 AM. Early birds picked the best seats in front of the stage on the first floor while the smart ones bribed their way into getting the seats in one of the VIP decks on the second floor.

Even though the auction would start at 9 AM, these people rushed here as if their lives were depending on it.

At 8 AM, more familiar faces began to show up.

As Tang Deming was a natural bootlicker, he had told his subordinates to declare the names of every VVVIP guests. As such, as soon as a powerful figure had shown up, the guards at the front door shouted.

“The Lord of Jiangdong White Tiger Sect, Sun Wentai, has arrived!”

Sun Wentai showed up first as he and his men had been resting at Ma Ping’s former courtyard. The Ma residence was close by, and it wasn’t hard to get here on time.

Tang Deming’s female staff guided Sun Wentai, his son, and the three followers to the fifth floor.

Any nascent soul cultivator would be instantly treated as a VVVIP!

Weaker cultivators on the first floor could only gaze at Sun Wentai in envy and respect. Some of them even stood up and saluted at Sun Wentai and his entourage, hoping to get their attention.

But there were more than one nascent soul participants today.

Soon, many 7th-stage monsters started to show up.

…

Among the crowd on the first floor, a man in a hooded cloak, black robes, and a black face mask sat in the middle of the theatre. He crossed his arms and ignored all the commotion as if he was dozing off.

The guy mumbled to himself.

“System, wake me up when the auction starts. I’m going back to finish another pill in the meantime.”

Ding

[The system shall wake you up in one hour in the real world.]

Cao Mao closed his eyes while he was leaning on a modern red theatre chair. The next second, lightly snoring could be heard from his seat.