“He said they’ll be here in two weeks?” said Nyla, who was pinching her chin in thought. “Just to be cautious, we should assume they’ll be here within one week at the latest. There’s a chance he was just trying to throw you off in order to gain an edge on us.”

“You’d probably think differently if you were there.” She hadn’t heard the way that the man had been squealing, after all, or witnessed Nolan repeat ‘I still don’t believe you’ dozens of times before the unfortunate elder had finally made an admission that was contrary to his words up until that point. “I think we can treat what he said as true. But I also think that’s a good idea, so we’ll move forward under the belief that they’ll be here in about a week.”

“I could have been there if you didn’t sneak off on your own.”

Seeing Nyla cross her arms in a telltale sign of discontent, he got the impression that she was well aware of the fact that he had spent the day with May.

“Trust me, you wouldn’t have wanted to be there.”

“So what should we do?” said Sean. “We only stayed in this city to fight them, so if that’s going to happen either way then I say we set an ambush for them.”

Through a mouthful of chicken, Lyra said, “That’s obviously what we’re going to do.”

“Yeah, but it’s how we’re going to do it that I’m getting at.”

Nyla glanced at Nolan as if immediately seeing through his intensions. “You want to use that sealing formation, don’t you?” When he nodded, she nearly rolled her eyes. “We’ll need to teach everyone how to use it. That might take more than a week in itself. Our safest bet is to continue cultivating, and hope that we can each make one or two more breakthroughs.”

“She’s right,” said Ian, “I say it’s about time we eat those divine fruits.”

As the most treasured of the group’s cultivation resources, Nolan and his friends had only sampled tiny pieces of the divine fruit. Even these had shown tremendous and impressive effects, proving to them why Uncle Grey had been so ecstatic to have found them. Not only did they contain an immense amount of Origin Energy, but it was purer than any that Nolan had ever encountered. This allowed for instantaneous filtration into inner essence and immediate assimilation into one’s inner essence channels, with the added benefit of no harm coming to the consumer regardless of the amount eaten. Any excess energy simply remained docile within one’s stomach where it steadily fed the dantian a seemingly endless amount of energy.

As everyone began to agree with Nyla and Ian, Nolan nodded along in agreement. “One hundred percent, that’s what we’ll be doing. But we’ll still be setting up the formation, only it’ll just be me and Nyla doing it.”

“Won’t it take a long time if it’s just the two of you?” asked Esteban. “Me and Sean learned a bit of it. We can help.”

“Us too,” said Aine, indicating toward Alicia with a hand. “We listened to his first lecture on it, and we can at least deal with the first few arrayments.”

Both cheered and encouraged by his friends’ willingness to contribute, Nolan shook his head with a subtle grin on his face. “It’ll be okay. Two people should be able to activate it without a problem as long as there’s enough energy to supply it.”

Understanding in her eyes, Nyla bit her lip. “It’ll cost us quite a lot.”

“What’s a few barrels of heavenly dew when we’ve got over a hundred? Oh yeah, I’ve got a little gift for you guys.”

He told them about what had happened with the flying swords that he’d put up for sale at the auction, and of how they had fallen back into his hands after his encounter with the Falling Rain Sect’s elders.

“Since that’s the case, I figure we each get 300,000 stones, and the rest will be kept aside in case of an emergency. Otherwise, we’ll throw them in the fountain the next time we see the old ghost, and they’ll turn into superior spirit stones.”

“There’s 3.8 million stones left over, right?” said Esteban, his voice a bit shaky. “Multiply that by thirty-five…”

“You’re making that face again, said Aine, her voice embodying a sigh.

Alicia laughed. “His greedy face?”

“Leave me alone.”

Nolan contained a chuckle as he handed Esteban his share of the profits first, knowing that the kid loved wealth like a man loved his wife. He went on to distribute spatial bags to everyone else, including Delia, who raised an eyebrow before stowing hers away with quick hands.

“Alright, I might be able to sling you guys more in a little while. I’m going to see if Welson’s boss, whoever he is, is interested in buying up some of our heavenly dew. If he doesn’t have enough money to buy all of it, then we’ll see if anyone else in his faction wants to do business with us. We’re basically saving Welson’s ass here so I really doubt he’ll refuse, not to mention that they’ll probably need that dew pretty bad if there’s about to be another conflict on North island.”

“Wait,” said Esteban, “you’re saying there might be a war on North Island soon? But we’re going there.”

“It shouldn’t matter to us. By the time that we finish up with things here, enough time will have passed for us to go on a little training trip. By the time we get back, we’ll be strong enough to travel through the island without much trouble.”

Nyla let out a tired sigh. “Is there anywhere in this world that isn’t at war? Seems like we’ve been running into one conflict after another since the day we left Redfox Village.”

“Which we did because we were fleeing a conflict,” chuckled Nolan. “I know, I’m sick of it too, but as fucked up as it sounds I’m pretty used to it by now to be honest. Like, I literally murdered three people before dinner today.”

Sean nodded along in a manner that spoke of sympathy. “That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to make a peaceful life for ourselves.”

“On that note…” Nolan summoned a handful of divine fruit and directed one to everyone present. “While it’s kind of a waste since these would give us the same margin of growth even if we were in the Soul Strengthening stage, they’re no use to use if we’re dead, and we’ll have plenty of time after we leave Tallgate to find more valuable resources. So, I’m thinking we all go on a one-week retreat—or however long it takes—and refine these babies so that we’re apex as possible when Tems and his people come around. Is everyone cool with that?”

“No complaints here.”

“Yep!”

“I’ll be in my room, then. Nobody bother me unless it’s important.”

Sean, Esteban, and Lyra were the quickest to leave their seats and speed off to their rooms, the doors closing before anybody else spoke up. Delia left without a word, leaving only a momentary, conflicted glance in her wake. Alicia and Aine expressed their heartfelt thanks before hurrying to their quarters, soon followed by an eager-eyed Ian. Suddenly left alone with May and Nyla, Nolan felt an odd intensity to both of their stares that made him want to hurry away so as to avoid any uncomfortable discussions, so he did exactly that.

Standing up in a nonchalant way, “I’ll see you girls in a bit.”

Neither of them looked too impressed, but he still wasn’t sure about how to deal with their mutual affections and wasn’t in the mood for the endless strings of passive aggressiveness that they directed toward each other whenever the three of them were alone together.

As he slipped into his room with quick feet, he heard May open up a conversation that he was already happy to have avoided.

“You look nice in that dress. Were you planning on going out today?”

“Thank you. No, I just didn’t want to wear anything too constricting. I’m still sore from…well, you wouldn’t understand.”

The door let out a click as Nolan shut it with a delicate hand.

Phew. And that’s the end of that.

He wasted no time in taking a small bite of the little translucent grape that he had taken out for himself, opting to rely on the Ancestral Body Technique to pull in as much of the energy as possible at the fastest rate that he could manage. The moment he swallowed the little piece of fruit, he was overcome by an extremely pleasant feeling of warmth and comfort, as if he’d just lowered himself into a perfectly heated hot spring. His inner essence channels were filled to capacity within moments, though they didn’t suffer the slightest bit of strain. Rather, the remarkably pure Origin Energy was strengthening them in real time while simultaneously filling up his dantian at an unprecedented rate.