The Vanished Gu Ding Team

(Third update delivered, this chapter is a bonus update from yesterday~)

Lilo circled the five-star divine artifact-level armor several times, absolutely certain she wasn't mistaken—it was indeed a five-star divine artifact. Only then did she use her appraisal ability again, her eyes turning silver-white once more. This time, the silver-white color in her pupils lasted for several minutes before gradually dimming.

"Was this five-star divine artifact-level armor also obtained from the Oul Ruins?" Although Lilo could sense that the aura emanating from this armor was the same as that of the other items, she still asked with some uncertainty.

"Yes." Gu Ding could roughly guess what questions Lilo had in mind.

"But the Oul Ruins have never produced a five-star divine artifact before, and even four-star artifacts are extremely rare." Lilo looked at Gu Ding with a questioning look in her eyes.

"There wasn't one before because those people didn't have enough Merit Points to exchange for five-star divine items." While Gu Ding's words sounded arrogant, they were true. Previously, no one had accumulated over five billion Merit Points because, under normal circumstances, Insect Tide rarely occurred at the Oul Ruins. This time, the surge in Gu Ding and his group's Merit Points was inextricably linked to the Insect Tide outbreak. Without the Insect Tide, many people would spend most of their time searching for the insect swarm, making the process of killing it at least two or three times slower.

Lilo didn't ask any further questions, but instead gave an estimate. "This five-star divine artifact armor has a very wide range of applications. The starting bid is at least 500 billion Universe Crystal, which is 50 million source stones. If there are Peak-rank God vying for it, it could potentially sell for over 100 million source stones. Because even powerful Peak-rank God gods are worth fighting for a five-star divine artifact. Are you sure all of these items will be auctioned here?"

"If I don't want to sell, there's no need for me to bring these things out." These things are useless to Gu Ding, so it's naturally more convenient to get rid of them and make money as soon as possible.

"Alright then. I'll have someone spread the word about this five-star divine artifact and these Four-Star Divine Object as soon as possible. There are still about ten days until the final Final Auction, and Peak-rank God should be arriving by then." Lilo took out a temporary Storage Ring and put all the items into it one by one.

"Besides these few items, I have some other things here that I also need to auction off," Gu Ding said. He took out some of his previous spoils, mostly two-star divine artifacts, as well as divine thrones and other miscellaneous items.

"I usually only take orders for divine items of three stars or higher, but I'll make an exception and help you with this as well." Lilo glanced at Gu Ding, not refusing the items. Instead, she inventoried them and stored them in her temporary Storage Ring.

Gu Ding even handed over the Golden Eagle to Lilo in his own territory, putting it into that temporary Storage Ring.

After putting all the items inside, Lilo handed the Storage Ring to Gu Ding, saying, "Check it and see if anything is missing."

Gu Ding probed into it with his mental energy and scanned it. Everything Lilo had put in was there, not a single item missing.

"This is a password-protected temporary Storage Space. You can connect it to your Smart Watch and set a different password each time you open it. It can be a combination of letters, numbers, and symbols from any race. We will need you to provide the password every time we open it, and the entire process will be recorded. We won't take anything extra." After Lilo said this, the Sea Emperor immediately set the password, and Gu Ding returned the password-protected temporary Storage Ring to Lilo.

"There's one more thing I'd like to mention. Normally, our Auction House charges a 5% commission during the auction process. Your situation is a bit special, so we can reduce the commission to 2%," Lilo added. "If you need a VIP box, we can arrange that too."

"No need for the private box," Gu Ding waved his hand, preferring the lively atmosphere of the Auction House venue.

After all the items were handed over and Lilo reminded them of the precautions, Gu Ding and his group left the Auction House.

Gu Ding immediately entered Robert's domain for seclusion. With time accelerated twentyfold, five days outside was equivalent to one hundred days within Robert's domain. Gu Ding intended to use this time to consume the Black Iron Dragon Blood Marrow to strengthen his own bloodline.

Gu Ding had witnessed Elsa's transformation before. Her bloodline was already powerful, but with the activation of the dragon blood, she went from an ordinary prodigy to Forbidden King. This was enough to demonstrate the enormous influence of bloodline on strength.

Gu Ding, using a human body to cultivate the "Myriad Manifestations Emperor Body," could at most permanently enhance his physical body by a thousand times at the Devil Elephant Realm. However, according to the Sea Emperor, once he utilized the Black Iron Dragon Blood Marrow to elevate his bloodline level, the advancement to the Devil Elephant Realm would be even more terrifying.

Currently, my body is limited by my bloodline, like a small bucket. But once my bloodline is strengthened, the small bucket will become a large vat. The original permanent enhancement of a thousand times might increase from a thousand to ten thousand, or even a hundred thousand.

The advancement in the Devil Elephant Realm will also allow for a corresponding increase in the subsequent Emperor Body Realm, making him even stronger. Therefore, Gu Ding was eager to consume the Blood Marrow as soon as possible to complete this transformation.

Within Robert's domain, Gu Ding sat cross-legged on the ground, adjusted his own condition, and then took out the bottle of blood marrow.

Although the bottle containing the blood essence was only the size of a palm, it weighed over ten thousand tons because it had the ability to store space, containing the entire blood essence of a Black Iron Dragon.

Gu Ding uncorked the bottle, poured the black blood into his mouth, and began to swallow it frantically. The swallowing continued for more than an hour before it was completely finished.

When the last drop of blood essence fell into Gu Ding's mouth, the terrifying blood essence energy finally came into play, transforming into a giant black dragon within Gu Ding's body, which then ran rampant.

Gu Ding frantically circulated his Myriad Manifestations Emperor Body within his body, trying to pull the black dragon into his divine source cycle, but the black dragon was like a runaway horse, trampling everything in its path. In just half a minute, Gu Ding's body was in complete disarray, and even the energy cycle of the Myriad Manifestations Emperor Body was shaken and nearly collapsed.

Gu Ding tried his best to control the giant dragon, but he overestimated himself. His pulling and tugging couldn't even affect the dragon's trajectory in the slightest. Gu Ding only lasted for less than two minutes before he completely fainted. Under the dragon's rampage, Gu Ding's body was on the verge of collapse, and blood was seeping from all over his body.

The Sea Emperor grew anxious. He hadn't expected this vial of blood essence to develop rudimentary sentience. At this rate, Gu Ding would likely perish within ten minutes. His reason for supporting Gu Ding's consumption of the entire vial was that he was unaware of its sentience. Furthermore, he knew of a powerful black energy within Gu Ding, capable of annihilating any invading energy. Even if something went wrong, Gu Ding wouldn't be in mortal danger. But so far, that black energy hadn't appeared. Gu Ding's condition was critical.

Suddenly, a golden energy appeared out of nowhere, abruptly appearing within Gu Ding's body, like a streak of fire, chasing after the black dragon. The Sea Emperor had expected a fierce battle, but to his surprise, the black dragon retreated without a fight, seemingly terrified of the golden energy, fleeing frantically. Pursued by the golden energy, the black dragon ultimately had nowhere to run and disappeared into Gu Ding's Myriad Manifestations Emperor Body energy circulation system.

The golden energy completely dissipated, turning into countless specks that began to accelerate the repair of Gu Ding's severely damaged body.

For the next few days, Gu Ding remained unconscious, but the Myriad Manifestations Emperor Body within him never stopped operating automatically.

The permanent enhancement effect of the Devil Elephant Realm is also rapidly increasing.

One hundred and twenty times, one hundred and thirty times, one hundred and forty times...

Robert had noticed Gu Ding's condition earlier and was about to pull Gu Ding out of the domain when Sea Emperor stopped him. Sea Emperor knew that Gu Ding was currently cultivating and could not be interrupted at this time.

During Gu Ding's coma, the ruins finally closed, and most of the ruins' participants arrived on Ju Fu Star. News of the significant benefits Gu Ding Team had gained from the ruins spread quickly, making them the focus of everyone's attention.

However, no one has seen any members of this focused team on Ju Fu Star in the past few days.

Gu Ding was naturally in seclusion.

Robert continued tinkering with something in his room.

Dokter was spurred on by the ruins and entered a frenzied training mode. In terms of overall strength, he was now indeed the weakest member of Gu Ding's team.

Bigge was studying the newly acquired Four-Star Divine Object, the longsword, and aside from that, he would cook dinner once a day at a set time.

Tagore continued to eat and sleep every day, just like before, but he hardly grew any taller.

Liliath and Elsa seem to have temporarily lost interest in shopping and no longer go out, perhaps because they previously spent hundreds of millions of Merit Points on purchasing items.

Some people have also noticed that the Golden Eagle of the Gu Ding Team, is gone, so many people speculate that the Gu Ding Team must have directly entered the Great Boundary River by spaceship.

Many people also believe this is a wise move, because if the Gu Ding Team stays, it will only attract various rivals and could potentially lead to conflicts with other teams.

No one knew that the Gu Ding Team had simply changed spaceships, and the entire team was still on Ju Fu Star. The reason they hadn't been discovered was because they had all stayed inside the spaceship for the past few days and hadn't gone out.