Assassin Organization

Stepping out through the gates of the Ancient Ruins, Ling Li immediately felt dizzy. When he opened his eyes again, he had returned to the Black Domain Great Plain.

The shattered frames of carriages nearby, along with the stinking corpses of Horned Horses, told him that his location had not changed. This spared Ling Li the trouble of finding his bearings himself.

Using the crude map to roughly determine his direction, Ling Li raced toward Black Seal City. Without Little Doctor Fairy's weak strength to worry about, he pushed his speed to its limit.

After advancing to the Dou Spirit realm, Ling Li's speed increased severalfold again. With a single stride, he could cover nearly ten meters. Because he moved too quickly, his figure vanished entirely during each leap. Only the brief pause when his foot landed left behind an afterimage, which lingered for a moment before turning into black mist and slowly dispersing.

While traveling, the advantages of Ling Li's mid-tier Earth-class cultivation technique were fully displayed. If he were still a Two-Star Great Fighting Master, setting aside whether he could even reach such a speed, the terrifying expenditure alone would have allowed his Dou Qi reserves at the time to sustain it for at most fifteen seconds.

The double surprise of advancing to Dou Spirit and obtaining an Earth-class cultivation technique increased the amount of Dou Qi in Ling Li's body by a hundredfold. Coupled with the Earth-class technique's ability to intermittently communicate with the energy of heaven and earth, accelerating the recovery of Dou Qi, Ling Li could maintain his maximum speed for twenty whole minutes! However, after racing like that for twenty minutes, he would need a full twelve hours to replenish his completely depleted Dou Qi.

Ling Li had also studied the newly unlocked Shadow Transformation Skill. Put simply, it allowed him to merge into shadows and enter a strange state similar to a Soul Body. In this state, Ling Li's speed increased by nearly thirty percent, and so long as there was the slightest gap, he could easily slip through it. In a sense, he was no longer obstructed by buildings—or rather, he could penetrate everywhere.

However, maintaining the Shadow Transformation state consumed a great deal of energy. Without taking pills, Ling Li could maintain it for at most five minutes. Of course, pills that restored Dou Qi started at the third tier at minimum, and Ling Li could not afford to take them yet.

Furthermore, entering this state required the presence of both light and shadow. In an environment of absolute darkness like the Ancient Ruins, Ling Li could not enter the Shadow Transformation state.

After testing his limits at maximum speed, Ling Li began traveling while maintaining a rate of Dou Qi consumption equal to his cultivation technique's recovery rate. Even so, he was still much faster than a carriage. A journey that would take a Horned Horse Carriage around ten days took Ling Li only two.

"Phew..." Looking at the pitch-black city ahead, which resembled a giant beast, Ling Li let out a sigh of relief.

Black Seal City was similar to Black Rock City, both built from a type of black stone. However, judging from its city walls alone, Black Seal City was clearly far more dilapidated. Many sections of the walls were cracked or missing chunks, and several of the breaches looked quite fresh, likely having been made not long ago.

It seemed that even with a Fighting Emperor expert stationed in the city, plenty of people still had their eyes on it.

After paying the entry fee and entering Black Seal City, Ling Li found a tavern and ate his fill. In truth, after reaching the Dou Spirit level, he could already go without food; eating was merely to satisfy his appetite.

Once he had eaten and drunk his fill, Ling Li casually grabbed a passerby, held Dark Night to his throat, and had a friendly conversation with him. Along the way, he learned the location of the Eight Fan Sect.

The Eight Fan Sect and the Black Seal Auction were the largest forces in this city. Both belonged to the city's master—Yuan Yi. The immense wealth brought in by assassination and auctions, combined with Yuan Yi's own strength as a Two-Star Fighting Emperor, had allowed him to firmly occupy the tenth spot on the Black List for decades.

Because of the Black Seal Auction, Black Seal City was quite prosperous. However, its population had always been carefully controlled. So long as one did not provoke the Black Seal Auction or the Eight Fan Sect, no one would interfere with anything done within the city. As a result, the entire city was permeated by a faint scent of blood.

After turning through several streets, Ling Li saw the rather massive black building. A flag hung outside it, bearing the image of a circle with a drop of blood inside.

Strictly speaking, the Eight Fan Sect was not a force at all, but a place similar to a relay station. It accepted assassination commissions from clients and posted them on public lists for interested parties to see. Once an assassin completed an assassination, they could come here to collect the bounty, while the Eight Fan Sect took thirty percent of it.

In a place like the Black Corner Region, where trust meant nothing, such an organization should not have been able to gain a foothold at all. Moreover, because the lists were public, it was not uncommon for assassins who completed a job to be assassinated by other assassins, with one criminal preying on another. Yet Yuan Yi had forcibly made the Eight Fan Sect flourish through his own strength and the reputation of the Black Seal Auction House.

As for why this place was called the Eight Fan Sect, it was because the assassination lists were divided into eight levels according to difficulty and bounty, hence the name.

Here, there were only naked monetary transactions. So long as someone could pay the Eight Fan Sect enough Gold Coins, the organization dared to post any bounty—even those targeting the rulers of certain empires or the heads of certain factions. And when the money was sufficient, there would naturally be no shortage of people willing to risk their lives.

Ling Li slowly entered the black building. Inside stood eight enormous iron doors, each seven or eight meters wide, separating the lists of different levels. There were quite a few people viewing the lists, most wearing masks. A small number even wore badges bearing the Eight Fan Sect's emblem on their chests. Some carefully examined the contents of the lists, while others had already selected their targets and tore down the relevant notices to take away. Still others searched everywhere for partners, hoping to complete a bounty together, but such people rarely succeeded. After all, no one was willing to entrust their back to someone they had only just met.

Ling Li swept his gaze around. Behind the first door were the most assassins, making the area somewhat crowded. Most were low- to mid-star Fighting Masters, and the bounties on the list ranged from five hundred to no more than two thousand. The farther inward one went, the fewer people there were, the stronger they became, and the higher the bounties grew. By the time Ling Li reached the fifth door, fewer than a hundred people stood before the nearly ten-meter-long list. Great Fighting Masters were almost nowhere to be seen here; most had already reached the Dou Spirit level. Ling Li peered through the doors deeper within and found that there were still people inside, their auras even more terrifying!

Ling Li stood at the entrance to the fifth door. Before he could step inside, a deep, resonant voice sounded behind him. "Kid, you're blocking my view of the list."