Martial Dao Pioneer Was Destined to Mean Perils at Every Turn

Yanghuo Valley.

In Yanghuo Town, a remote little town near Tai City, it looked like an internet-famous tourist spot on the surface. Its ancient buildings were mixed with a street full of barbecue stalls, milk tea shops, overpriced popsicles...

At a glance, the whole place reeked of an intelligence tax.

"Is this where the Great World Change is about to occur?"

Six men and women stood at the entrance of the town, all of them looking quite young.

They were the group members of the Spirit Qi Recovery—Martial Arts Pioneer Squad.

Lin Yiyi wore a T-shirt and long pants, her snow-white skin especially eye-catching amid the crowd.

Including her, there were four women and two men in the group.

At that moment, a short-haired girl tugged on her arm and asked.

"Yiyi, I heard you've been staying at your cousin's place lately. How is it? Have you gotten used to living there?"

Lin Yiyi nodded slightly. "It's fine."

"What's your cousin like? Is he handsome?"

The flames of gossip burned in the short-haired girl's eyes.

Her ID was Romanced and Scammed Out of 50 Cents. Though she looked pure and adorable, she was a goofy girl who loved handsome guys.

"More handsome than the pictures you save from the internet." Recalling her cousin's appearance, Lin Yiyi gave an honest assessment. "Anyway, he's not the milky-burp zero little femboy type."

"..."

Romanced and Scammed Out of 50 Cents felt that her taste in men had been insulted.

After living together for the past few days.

Lin Yiyi increasingly felt that this cousin of hers was actually quite ordinary.

In her memory, her cousin had always been an average student, his grades perpetually hovering around the middle of the class, neither high nor low. He had performed poorly on the college entrance exam and would probably end up at a vocational college.

There was nothing wrong with vocational college, but her cousin's personality was easygoing too. After living with him for so long, she had never seen him indulge in any bad habits. He slept on schedule and often went out to exercise.

He felt like just another utterly unremarkable ordinary person among the masses.

"Ah, is that so? I thought I could take advantage of being close by and try to hook up with my friend's campus-heartthrob cousin or something."

Romanced and Scammed Out of 50 Cents sighed.

If he were a little more handsome and capable, she really wanted to acknowledge Yiyi as her cousin on the spot and directly upgrade herself into her cousin-in-law.

"What kind of pipe dream are you having?"

The tall, regal-looking woman beside them sneered. She wore a short skirt, and her legs were longer than some people's lives.

This was the 81-year-old Beautiful Young Woman.

While they chatted and waited.

Beneath the shade of a tall tree not far away.

Fang Yi lightly waved an imitation antique paper fan he had bought from a roadside stall, leisurely fanning himself.

"Overall, my cousin's squad is pretty strong."

"She herself is Divine Axe Two Stars, which puts her above average. Her teammates aren't weak either; there's even someone at Divine Axe Three-Star among them."

"The weakest of the rest are also Two Stars, so they're fairly well-balanced."

With one glance, Fang Yi had grasped all of their strength.

Aside from Lin Yiyi, the Three-Star was a silent young man beside her. He had stood off to one side from beginning to end, seemingly deep in thought. He looked cautious and steady.

"By the way, isn't that person coming this time either?"

Lin Yiyi suddenly spoke.

The silent young man shook his head.

"She's busy. She can't make it."

Hearing this, Lin Yiyi said nothing. The other members also seemed used to it.

There seemed to be a member in this squad who was frequently absent.

Fang Yi came to that conclusion.

Suddenly, he stopped fanning himself.

After standing there for a while, the squad ahead suddenly started walking into the town.

Fang Yi followed them as well.

Keeping neither too close nor too far away, he listened as they discussed intelligence about Yanghuo Town's Great World Change.

"Do you have any other intelligence on this Great World Change?"

"This time, it's a Vine. According to the intelligence we've obtained, it often appears in different places at unpredictable times. This time, it has appeared in Yanghuo Town."

"Everyone who has seen it says it's a very strange Vine."

"It... hangs down from the sky. Some speculate that it's a treasure left behind by a god. Others think it's a high-level mutated entity. Some even say it is part of an indescribable existence above the heavens... No one knows where it came from, and no one can say exactly what it is."

"This is very different from the intelligence we encountered before. It's too unusual. With the high temperatures, lightning, even the magma Dark River from before, we could at least tell roughly what they were before receiving the news. Strange celestial phenomena, Earth Veins, even Anomalies—I could mentally prepare myself for those. But this Vine is beyond our understanding. It's simply too bizarre."

Romanced and Scammed Out of 50 Cents wore a strange expression.

Living in this turbulent era of change, they often experienced shocks to their worldview. This was normal during the Spirit Qi Recovery. After all, in the eyes of ordinary people, Pioneers absorbing spirit qi to cultivate themselves was already a form of mysticism.

This Vine was much the same in their eyes.

Mysticism.

Yes, those were the only words that could describe it.

It was clearly a Great World Change, yet it had nothing to do with the weather, nor was it a collapse and reformation of the earth's surface.

It was more like something that had appeared out of thin air, drifting everywhere without causing any damage. It did not produce any rare phenomena like lightning or blazing suns; it merely wandered from place to place.

If one ignored the fact that it had descended from the sky, it was merely an ordinary Vine.

But it was anything but ordinary.

"Actually... I'm a little worried about this operation."

"My intuition tells me that this will be the most dangerous operation in history. The intelligence we have is very limited. The only thing we can confirm is that it is highly likely to be an extremely high-level Great World Change, an unknown and entirely new kind of change."

"To be honest, several friends I know tried to approach this Vine before. They lost quite a few squad members."

"People died?"

Lin Yiyi's steps paused slightly, and her delicate brows furrowed.

The others also grew more solemn, turning questioning gazes toward her.

"Yes. They were all very powerful Pioneers, with considerable realms."

Romanced and Scammed Out of 50 Cents spoke in a low voice.

For Pioneers like them, who sought evolution.

Every Great World Change was a gamble.

The winners returned laden with rewards, while the losers left behind not even their bones, forever buried in these splendid mountains and rivers before the Spirit Qi Recovery had yet to arrive.

Moreover,

There were quite a few Pioneers like them.

Before the Xia Kingdom authorities fully revealed everything, all that concerned the Pioneers had to remain hidden from the light. Even if they died in a Great World Change now, everything would be buried together with the strange phenomena of heaven and earth.

Their bodies, their names, their futures... everything would be buried.

As fellow Pioneers, the others could not help feeling sorrow upon hearing this news. Everyone fell silent.

Fang Yi heard the news from behind them and fell into thought.

"Death is rarely seen in this city."

"But Martial Dao Pioneer was destined to mean perils at every turn."