"Mm."

Ye Lingchen gave a noncommittal reply, obviously distracted.

With a sudden growth in his strength, his training turned into a slow grind. Anyone would be frustrated given that situation. 'Where did I go wrong? Could this be a bottleneck?'

Ye Lingchen considered carefully.

In the beginning, he was able to master his theoretical knowledge of the techniques using the system. That allowed him to train his body with the optimum postures. With time, his physical attributes improved greatly, much more effective than going to the gym. After that, he used his popularity points to upgrade the techniques to the next level and was able to obtain training methods as though he had gone through decades of training. That allowed his training to be especially effective, resulting in his exponential growth in strength.

Right then, his training methods were still the best, but the biggest difference was that he needed to consume a large amount of spiritual energy to compress and transform the inner Qi force in his body to innate Qi force.

Since the training methods and posture were optimal, then the problem naturally lied on the conversion of spiritual energy. Could it be that the spiritual energy around him was too thin?

That was very likely. After all, martial arts were in the decline. Along with the large scale pollution, the air he absorbed was probably haze instead of spiritual energy.

'F*ck!'

'It's time to find some medicinal herbs to try. Should I ingest that thousand year old ginseng?'

'Would it be too wasteful? Will that even work?'

Ye Lingchen was stuck in a state of indecision.

"Hey! Ye Lingchen!" Hao Yun shouted after seeing Ye Lingchen staying silent for some time, ignoring her.

Ye Lingchen rubbed his ears, then gave her a confused look. "Yes? Is there anything?"

"I said the Stick Nation has surrendered!" Hao Yun rolled her eyes in frustration. 'You didn't even listen to anything I said.'

"Oh. That's it? Isn't that what we expected?" Ye Lingchen waved nonchalantly.

His virus was not merely made to teach the Stick Nation a lesson. First it was their disrespect, then slander, and finally the invasion of those hackers. 'How dare they target me.'

All that could be summarized in one statement. "Hehe, courting death!"

'You really think I'm that much of a pushover? Consider yourselves lucky for not being crippled.'

However, Ye Lingchen still took a look at his phone.

Even the news within China was revolving around Hacker Y lately, generating countless topics. News about him was being updated constantly with countless comments.

[According to our research, the Y-virus' invasion into the Stick Nation is spreading at greater speed. More and more users are affected. Based on the analysis of our internal experts, the Y-virus has two forms. One was in change of spreading, attracting all the attention while the second form would go into hiding. It's extremely destructive and spreads easily. Moreover, the most terrifying part of this virus is its ability to latch onto something and remain hidden. It could merge with all sorts of websites, making it impossible to wipe it out, much less find it. At the moment, there are no antivirus that would work on the Y-virus.]

[Just what kind of person is this Hacker Y? His computing skills are amazing. He's definitely not some nameless grunt.]

[Shocking news. According to the news from reporters in the Stick Nation, they have already begun banning all forms of internet access, with numerous computers being infected.]

Just a Y-virus was able to stump all the computing experts of the world.

China's media, news, and internet was filled with such articles, garnering the cheers of many people for Hacker Y!

There was too much news of that kind. Ye Lingchen merely took a quick glance and finally landed his gaze on the newest, and most popular news at the moment.

First was the Stick Nation's entertainment industry making an announcement, [We are deeply sorry for Hyun-Min Kim's actions in China. We hereby offer our sincere apology to the Chinese people. Hyun-Min Kim's actions are his own and do not represent the Stick Nation. For his horrible actions, we hereby officially exile Hyun-Min Kim from the entertainment industry, banning him forever!]

Another major news was sent from the hackers of the Stick Nation, nicknamed 'Big King', [I'm Big King, the leader of Team Poker. It was our team that attacked the Chinese network. I hereby offer my apologies to all Chinese nationals. Hacker Y, you're the world's top hacker. I hope that you can relent as there are many common folks here who are suffering great losses. They are innocent. I hope you can forgive our mistake.]

Banning Hyun-Min Kim, the root cause, and then an apology from the leader of the hacker team!

That was definitely a huge compromise. One should know that the announcement was issued to the whole world. Surrendering like that was extremely shameful.

However, they had no other choice but to surrender as their losses were too great.

The entire world was waiting for Hacker Y's response.

China was already filled with celebrations, with all its people flushed with excitement as they shouted victoriously everywhere!

That was so comforting. Such an awesome feeling. For all those years, they have never felt so overwhelmed with happiness.

That was a true victory.

Some took a screenshot to commemorate the moment while some shared the news. Everyone had their eyes glued on the live stream.

Many celebrities were also sharing the news as they had their accounts hacked by the hackers from Stick Nation previously. They were still holding a grudge and naturally wanted revenge.

[Wahahaha, wahahaha…]

[Damn, I thought they might have some backbone. Giving up so soon?]

[Where's your arrogance now? Sending hackers against us, bullying us for the lack of talents?]

[Wow, Team Poker eh? The world's famous elite hacker group. So amazing. Rumor has it that Big King is ever elusive, yet he's still beaten to submission by our Hacker Y.]

[Lalala, at this time I just want to sing a tune. Lonely is the peerless.]

[You dare challenge China with just that level? You're asking for it!]

[You're apologizing now? Tch, not accepted!]

[They should've banned Hyun-Min Kim right from the start. Just what is he? They're finally showing some sincerity.]

[Hacker Y, continue the attack. Our hero! Amazing!]

Digital warfare was normally unseen by the regular folks. They were unable to see it even if they wanted to. Winning or losing was not an issue. So what if one side was better? They could just run away. Since there was nothing the other party could do with everything happening digitally.

Unless the incident was blown out of proportions, for example the great hacker warfare recorded in international history, or like Ye Lingchen's achievement to have the Stick Nation's hackers to issue a public apology.

Within the Stick Nation, many of its citizens felt their faces turn dark and gloomy.

They naturally saw the announcement made by the entertainment industry. In that instant, they were filled with frustrations and felt a hot burning shameful sensation on their faces.

Such an apology was obviously a shameful thing, something done in desperation.

A terrible loss!

They felt humiliated as they felt the apology was forced. However, they were outmatched and could only endure it.

Ye Lingchen watched over the network and felt nothing. If it were in the past, he might have continued to toy with the Stick Nation for some time. However, now that he learned of the existence of Hell's Gate, he suddenly felt that such squabbles were meaningless and lost interest.

[I've received your apology.]

Ye Lingchen issued a reply, then uploaded all the dark secrets of Hyun-Min Kim and the entertainment company he worked at to the major websites in China and the Stick Nation…