The next day, around 7 in the morning, I was woken up by a bunch of knocking. When I opened the door, I saw Lin Yixin standing outside in a white sports attire and Chaos Moon in a blue sports attire. Stunned, I asked, "What are you two doing?"

Lin Yixin stared at me while answering, "Brush your teeth and wash your face. We’re going to jog around the city for a bit. Do you even remember the last time you exercised, huh?"

I shivered from head to toe. "Jog around the entire Bagua City? Please don’t scare me…"

"It’s just a figure of speech, but there will be some exercising. We can’t be too lazy…"

"Fine!"

And so I and the girls went out of the hotel and stood on the streets for a moment. It was really cold today, but luckily both Chaos Moon and Lin Yixin were very cold-resistant. Speaking of cold resistance, I spotted a beautiful stranger wearing a black mini skirt just 200 meters away from us. There was spring snow last night, so the current temperature was around 10 degrees Celsius at most. Just how tough were the women of Bagua City?

I swung my fists for a bit and felt like I was overflowing with stamina. I couldn’t help but smile at this. "I didn’t think I would be this strong when I play every day, hehe…"

It was probably because of the virus. In fact, it was the only explanation. It made no sense I remained fit despite remaining indoors all day otherwise.

Cheeks reddened because of the cold, Lin Yixin shook her head at my comment before saying, "Come on. We’re going to run at least 2 km before we come back…"

"Yeah!"

……

20 minutes later, at a street corner.

"Ahhhhh… I can’t do it any longer!"

Chaos Moon was leaning against a wall, lolling her tongue and covered in sweat as she said, "I’m so tired… I can’t run any longer!"

Lin Yixin was also leaning against a lamppost and lolling her tongue a little. "Ah, it feels nice to sweat like this. Once we get back and take a bath, we can grind the S3 instance right away!"

"Oh, are you guys challenging S3 already? Who are your party members?"

"Me, Lu Chen, Sister Eve, Beiming and Sister Mingyue!"

Chaos Moon smiled. "Wow, that’s five gods in one party! Yeah, there’s a good chance you guys will succeed, not to mention Lu Chen is outright broken, even against super bosses."

"Yeah. Shall we go back now?"

"Sure!"

……

I logged into the game after I returned to the hotel and did my business.

Swhoosh!

I appeared at Ice River Canton Ruins. Not far away, the NPC Mona was commanding the NPCs to build the walls with the stones I and the Godkiller had collected for them. Since all the stones we had brought were top-notch, I bet the camp would be much harder to breach after they were complete.

Besides that, tall buildings that would serve were watchtowers or archer towers had been built inside the camp. Ice River Canton was in a weird spot where it bordered the China server, Japan server, India server and Korea server all at once, meaning that it could be attacked at any moment. It was probably why Princess Karinshan had stationed some of her troops here. It even looked like she was planning to develop this temporary camp into a much more permanent fortress. If that was true, it was wonderful news for all the unaffiliated players of Iron Skull Wilderness.

The girls hadn’t appeared yet, so I accepted and completed a quest that would put me exactly at 100 glory points. Finally, I could speak with the expert scammers that were the blacksmith, the item merchant and so on, repair my equipment and restock on supplies. Lin Yixin wasn’t unaffiliated, so she could just return to Sky City to repair her equipment and resupply. During this time, He Yi, Beiming Xue and Murong Mingyue all logged into the game.

We gathered at the edge of the camp. The S3 instance lay to the north of Ice River Canton and Purple Grape City. After Purple Grape City had fallen, the Japanese players’ growth had been suppressed to a point where no one even thought to challenge the S3 instance at all. Therefore, we could almost monopolize the entire instance to ourselves.

I didn’t summon the Ancient Divine Dragon as we traveled to the S3 instance. I simply enjoyed the walk with Lin Yixin to my right and He Yi to my left.

"Damn, I almost forgot something again…" I suddenly spoke up in realization.

Lin Yixin blinked. "What is it?"

"It’s a pet egg that I was planning to give Eve…" I explained. "Your ice dragon is super good, so you don’t need to change your pet yet. On the other hand, Eve’s pet is really weak at this stage of the game, so I was going to give her a pet egg I found at Frost Stained Canyon."

Lin Yixin giggled and placed an arm across He Yi’s shoulder. "You don’t need to explain yourself to me, especially explain a gift for Sister He Yi!"

Me: "..."

"What is it?" He Yi tilted her head at me smilingly.

It took a while, but I was finally able to locate the pet egg in my bag and passed it to He Yi. "Here. This is a boss pet with two forms. Its original form is a venomous snake king, and its second form is a human form with super high Attack and melee skills. It can even use skills like Barrier Break and Earth Shattering Slash!"

"Ohh, that’s amazing…" He Yi cheerfully accepted the pet egg. Light erupted from the egg after she dripped her blood and formed a contract with it. A moment later, a cute, cyan-colored snake about the length of a finger appeared in her palm. It looked incredibly cute, and it stared at He Yi with cute, round eyes while wagging its tail.

"Wow, it’s so cute!" Lin Yixin chirped.

Murong Mingyue nodded. "Yes, it looks pretty good. I wonder how it’ll look when it becomes an adult though. I bet it’ll be long and thick…"

"Long and thick…" I barely stopped the corner of my mouth from twitching. "Beiming, don’t ask me what she meant."

Beiming Xue blushed. "I already know the answer, so I won’t!"

Me: "..."

……

It wasn’t long before we arrived at the entrance to the S3 instance on foot. As expected, there wasn’t a single person around the area at all. After we confirmed our party members and registered our party, we got ready to enter the instance.

Suddenly, a player emerged from the distant forest at high speed. He was a mounted warrior clad in fiery red armor, and a 5-star red flag floated above his head. He was a guy I hadn’t met in a long time, Song of Ice and Fire!

"Hello!"

The warrior smiled good-naturedly at us. "I wasn’t expecting to see you all here. What’s wrong? Have Ancient Sword and Snowy Cathaya decided to focus on Purple Grape City?"

I replied smilingly, "What do you mean? We were already guarding this place from the beginning. You though, why are you here? Are God Bone and Ringwraith coming as well?"

Song of Ice and Fire laughed. "You are correct. God Bone is escorting Ringwraith and our priest over right now."

"Why did you come all the way here instead of just entering the S3 instance at Sky City?" He Yi asked.

Song of Ice and Fire shrugged helplessly. "We fought the first boss seven times in total, but weren't able to beat it even once. Worse, we were always just a hair away from succeeding. So, we decided to change entrance for luck. You can call it tinfoil, but who knows, maybe we’ll succeed this time..."

Lin Yixin’s lips curled into a smile as she replied honestly, "That is unlikely."

It was at this moment Warsky, Song of Cloud and Water, God Bone, Farewell Song, Laughing At The Heavens, October Rain and more showed up. I counted about a hundred or so people, and they were all Warsky Alliance or Soul Battle Robes players. It looked like the rumors that Soul Battle Robes were just a step away from becoming Warsky Alliance’s subguild were true after all. If it wasn’t for Song of Ice and Fire and God Bone, it would’ve become their subguild a long time ago.

……

Laughing At The Heavens was escorting October Rain when he saw us. He couldn’t help but let out a snort and said, "Heh, look. The conqueror of Iron Skull Wilderness, Broken Halberd Sinks Into Sand, has returned! What’s wrong, were the foreign lands too much for you, and you’ve decided that it’s easier to just be the king of civil wars?"

I abruptly plunged my sword into the ground and pointed my hand at him, ready to unleash the God Binding Art at a moment’s notice. "Who did you get your mouth from, Laughing At The Heavens? Must I kill you every time we meet?"

Warsky hurriedly jumped off his mount and blocked in front of Laughing At The Heavens. "Calm down, it’s just a misunderstanding. What Laughing At The Heavens is really trying to say is that now that you’ve returned, you don’t have to worry about being hunted like a dog everywhere you go!"

October Rain facepalmed for a moment. "You might as well have not explained anything..."

After that, the archer walked up to me and shot me a polite smile. "Anyway, long time no see, Lu Chen. Are you aware that your foreign exploits are famous throughout the country?"

I laughed. "It’s nothing. Me and my beggars are just looking for a place to settle in Purple Grape City!"

Warsky asked, "Huh? Does that mean you’re still not returning to enter the China server?"

"I’m not returning until the truth about Tang Long is fully unveiled. Plus, Tang Long’s nephew, Amber Pupil, considers me his sworn enemy. I have no intention of going home just so that he can stab me in the back…"

"That’s fair. By the way, are you guys here for the S3 instance as well?"

"Yeah."

"Haha…"

Laughing At The Heavens slapped his chest confidently. "We just gathered a full set of S2 equipment, and we’re planning to challenge the S3 instance. Do you want to go for a bet and see who will overcome the S3 instance first?"

I smiled. "A bet? Interesting. What are the stakes?"

……

Warsky pondered for a moment before trying, "10k gold?"

October snorted, but didn’t say anything.

I curled my lips. "That is just boring. We all know that ten thousand gold is nothing to a tall-rich-handsome like you at all. How about we bet our guild resources? That’ll be much more exciting, don’t you agree?"

Warscar looked surprised. "Resources? That works too. How much are we talking about?"

I smiled wider. "Don’t worry, both of us will be able to afford it. The bet will be 5 million resources of each type, 20 million resources in total. The loser will immediately dispatch the caravans to the other person’s territory. What do you say?"

Farewell Song licked his lips. "Really? You call that ‘affordable’?"

He Yi chuckled. "What’s wrong? Are you afraid that you’ll lose?"

Warsky was a hot-blooded male who was weak to provocations, so he immediately clenched his fists and declared, "You have your bet, Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls! Just in case you don’t know, our party is a mix between Warsky Alliance and Soul Battle Robes. I, Ice and Fire, God Bone, Ringwraith and a priest will be challenging this instance together. You… well, there’s only five of you, so I’m assuming that this will be your instance party?"

"Yeah. In fact, we’ve already registered our party. Finish your registration now so we can enter the instance together!"

"Okay!"

……

And so the bet was on. Warsky thought he could win because he had a super damage dealer like God Bone, and that the full S2 set he was wearing would make him tankier than even me. All I had to say was that he was way overconfident. His evaluation would be fair had my equipment remained exactly the same as it was before the day I entered Iron Skull Wilderness, but now? My Purple Ying Sword had become an Ancient Divine Armament, and I had gained various god-tier pieces of equipment such as the Purple Cloud Ring, the Sunchaser Cloak and the Fire God Helmet. The Fire God Helmet especially increased my survivability by at least 25%, so I was tankier than ever before. He had no idea that the bet was his to lose from the start.

Moreover, my greatest advantage was the Fire War God Card, a super OP item that increased user’s Attack by 70%, Defense by 35%, and max HP by 80% for 500 minutes. All I needed to do was to distribute one to every member in my party, and our stats would inflate beyond Warsky’s wildest imaginations. Like I said earlier, how could we possibly lose with all these advantages, unless we lost on purpose? 20 million resources was enough to create 50 Dragonlight Cavalrymen. This was a win-win scenario no matter how you looked at it.

I couldn’t stop myself from laughing, so I laughed.

October Rain shook her head at my loss of control and said to Warsky, "You see that? I have a feeling that we’re going to lose…"

Warsky: "Nah, I’m sure that cunning son of a bitch is just pretending to make us doubt ourselves, as usual!"

Me: "..."

Lin Yixin: "..."