Genius Among Geniuses

Wandering Star Forest camp, inside a house resembling a giant mushroom, Jie Yuanshao sat while Jie Zilong stood writing.

After Jie Yuanshao finished recounting her experiences in the Wandering Star Forest, she waited for her third uncle's probing questions. However, Jie Zilong said nothing, only looking at what he had drawn on the blackboard, suddenly circling a few words.

Shelter, architecture, resources, next wave of attack, durability...

Jie Yuanshao didn't see anything at first glance, but slowly began to frown, her thick eyebrows squeezed together.

"See anything?"

"These words feel... a bit strange."

"Because these words are both new and old." Jie Zilong smiled, "They are new to us. When I was young, I traveled to the Liang, Zhou, and Qi kingdoms, and often set foot outside the region, but this is the first time I've seen such words; at the same time, they are old, there are no unfamiliar characters in them, and even if you see them for the first time, you can understand their meaning."

"Compared to Jiang Shi's performance in the Wandering Star Forest, the 'specialness' she embodies in her words is even more intriguing."

"For example, this." Jie Zilong circled the word 'Blade Warrior', "If you saw the Twin Blade General for the first time, would you give it this name?"

Jie Yuanshao thought for a moment and shook her head decisively, "No, its biggest features are its twin blades and heavy armor. Compared to Blade Warrior, Twin Blade General undoubtedly better summarizes its characteristics."

"Yes, Twin Blade General is the nickname we gave it based on its characteristics, while Blade Warrior... may be its name."

"Name." Jie Yuanshao murmured the word, as if chewing on its meaning, "Name..."

"Yuanshao, you also know that some humanoid demons in the Secret Realms can communicate to a certain extent, and there are even some readable books. Our exploration of the Secret Realms and our understanding of the Rare Treasure Relics are basically extracted from the demons' words and the Secret Realm's books, so our understanding of the Secret Realms and the Rare Treasure Relics is quite superficial—for example, three years ago, when the royal family was clearing the Fire Phoenix Blazing Plains Secret Realm, they accidentally triggered a hidden mechanism, resulting in an extra demon king in the Secret Realm, resulting in heavy casualties and a full retreat."

Jie Yuanshao immediately recalled the funeral that shocked Jiangnan City three years ago, and said in surprise, "Could it be that Prince Kuaiji died like this? Not from illness?"

"He escaped and died of serious injuries." Jie Zilong said, "At least the Rare Treasure Relic was preserved."

"Not only have we not thoroughly explored the Secret Realms, but we may not even really understand the Rare Treasure Relics—do you know that our family has a Third Rank Rare Treasure Relic that has not yet been fully explored for all its uses, and we don't even know how to use it."

"It can even be said that most of the Rare Treasure Relics you and I know are nicknames we have agreed upon, not the true names of the Rare Treasure Relics."

Jie Yuanshao vaguely heard the subtext of her third uncle, and her expression became more and more serious, "You mean Jiang Shi she..."

"The so-called genius is a person with extraordinary talent, with abilities, opportunities, or secrets that are different from ordinary people. There are many geniuses in this world, some are good at battlefield combat, some are good at planning strategies, and some are even good at subduing demons and controlling beasts, and Five Elements Mastery." Jie Zilong said, "But the top geniuses are always only one kind—that is, geniuses who are good at exploring Secret Realms. They explore secrets and possess extraordinary intuition, peeling back layers to discover hidden information, and can even directly see the truth of the Secret Realms. Compared with them, we are simply blind."

"Jiang Shi is a genius among geniuses."

Led by a servant, Qian Gongyu walked onto the second floor of the Shang Family's carriage, feeling extremely excited—not only because she could visit the interior of the wealthy family's carriage, but also because she was brought in by the Shang Family's servant under the gaze of many people!

She could even see Luo Weijin's expression distorted, and the faces of those who looked down on her family before were extremely ugly. Being able to become friends with the Shang Family's Fourth Young Miss, even if she was only from the Blue Belt Esteemed Class, she was the emperor among the Blue Belts!

"Little Yu, you're here." Shang Xin Lei stopped writing and came over to pull her to sit down in the reception room, "How's the food from my family's kitchen? I quite like today's American Giant Head Shrimp."

"Too much." Qian Gongyu smiled, "There are only me, Jiang Shi, and Uncle Lin in my family. In addition to Shang Fourth Young Miss, Jie Young Miss also sent food over. Even though Jiang Shi ate half of it, we still have a lot left."

"Jiang Shi ate half?" Shang Xin Lei was stunned, she gestured to her waist, "I remember Jiang Shi's waist is even thinner than mine—she ate half?"

Qian Gongyu blinked, and said uncertainly, "She seems... some of the food disappeared in her hands."

Shang Xin Lei's face changed slightly, and she said seriously, "If you don't want to harm Jiang Shi, it's best not to leak this news. And you'd better advise Jiang Shi not to expose it in front of outsiders. Jie Yuanshao probably thinks that Jiang Shi's storage ability is only effective in the Wandering Star Forest. If others find out that Jiang Shi has such a large-capacity storage Rare Treasure Relic..."

She paused, and shrugged helplessly, "But Jiang Shi is already in a situation of being cooked in hot oil, so it doesn't matter if there's a little more attention like this."

Qian Gongyu was a little restless, her hands tightly clutching her skirt.

"Is it... that serious? It's just getting a high score—"

"It's much more serious than you think," Shang Xin Lei said, "Admittedly, the Liang Kingdom didn't pay much attention to the Wandering Star Forest before, but that was based on the premise that 'the Wandering Star Forest doesn't yield much profit'. Now that we've obtained such a high score, the individual treasure chest rewards at the end will naturally be much more generous, and the top ten treasure chest rewards nine days later will also rise accordingly."

"This is just the change brought about by the four of us. What if dozens of people could get high scores? What about hundreds of people? The Wandering Star Forest Secret Realm is extremely special. It has no limit on the number of people, and there are no thresholds. That is to say, as long as the imperial court is willing, it can pull together a team of tens of thousands of people to participate in the Wandering Star Forest at any time. When everyone's rewards are stacked up, I'm afraid it will reach a level where the Qi and Zhou Kingdoms have to unite to besiege the Liang Kingdom."

Qian Gongyu's legs trembled wildly, her teeth chattering, and she spoke with a trembling voice: "Is it, is it that serious?"

Shang Xin Lei looked at Qian Gongyu's appearance and couldn't help but giggle and cover her stomach, laughing so hard that Qian Gongyu's face turned red. The latter gritted her lower lip and stood up to protest: "Young Miss Shang, if you don't respect me so much, then there's no need to continue to associate with me!"

"No, no, it's my fault, sit down first." Shang Xin Lei pulled her back, "How about this, as an apology, you can call me Xin Lei directly in the future, don't call me Young Miss Shang so distantly."

Qian Gongyu's eyes lit up, but she hesitated: "Is that okay? I'm just a Blue Belt..."

"There's nothing wrong with that. I and Jie Yuanshao also call each other by our first names. And I don't have many friends, and I also want to be friends with interesting people like you, Xiao Yu." Shang Xin Lei smiled.

"Am I very interesting...?" Qian Gongyu was a little confused, but she immediately accepted this statement, the corners of her mouth upturned: "So I'm very interesting!"

"Then, what you said just now, Xin Lei, is it true? Or are you scaring me?" She looked at Shang Xin Lei suspiciously, and said with a puffed-up face: "I'm a Baiyun Person, don't lie to me."

Shang Xin Lei was really struggling to hold back her laughter, waving her hand and smiling: "Of course I was scaring you. Although Jiang Shi didn't reveal anything, I can see that when Jiang Shi upgraded the Shelter—she seems to have said that—she didn't use any props or incantations. She seems to be able to see things we can't see. This is a unique ability, and I don't think it can be copied or promoted."

"Jiang Shi is certainly extremely valuable, but not to the point of triggering a war."

After a pause, Shang Xin Lei said again: "It's her beauty that may trigger a war—she's breathtakingly beautiful even when she's not smiling, it's hard to imagine how stunning she would be when she smiles, I don't even want to stand with her."

Qian Gongyu nodded in great understanding: "Yes, yes, it's too much pressure to stand next to her. Sometimes when I can't help but be jealous of her, I forget that I want to be jealous of her when I see her face."

"But I think Jiang Shi cannot be replicated, others may not think so." Shang Xin Lei said: "The Jie Family may not think so."

Mentioning the behemoth of the Jie Family, Qian Gongyu opened her mouth, unable to say anything. Two days ago, she didn't even have the qualifications to interact with the Jie Family, let alone say auspicious words to the Jie Family, but now the Jie Family took the initiative to send a luxurious meal cooked by their kitchen to their door—Heaven have mercy, the table in her carriage couldn't fit so much food.

Qian Gongyu naturally knew the reason for these courtesies, but she didn't know how to deal with them at all. The Jie Family was too big, and she was too young.

"By the way," she suddenly remembered something, "Yesterday, Young Miss Jie mentioned the punishment for Jiang Shi..."

"Forget it, no one cares about this anymore, haven't you noticed that Luo Weijin has sneaked away?" Shang Xin Lei waved her hand casually, picked up a box on the desk, and put it in front of Qian Gongyu.

"Open it and see."

Qian Gongyu opened the box, and her pretty face was immediately surrounded by green light. In the box, there were five strings of Spirit Jade, each string of Spirit Jade was dyed dark green, and it was six strings of Hundred Jade!

Spirit Jade has a very magical feature, that is, when a large number of Spirit Jade fall on the ground, they will merge and stack up, and will not infinitely occupy space. According to the number of stacks, the green color of the Spirit Jade will become deeper and deeper. When it is stacked to the limit of one hundred times, it will become dark green Hundred Jade.

Ten pieces in a string, six strings of Hundred Jade is six thousand Spirit Jade, which is already the net profit of a small Secret Realm for a few days. For the Qian Family, who had never really controlled a Secret Realm, this was an unprecedented amount of money. In Qian Gongyu's memory, the most liquid assets on the books were only a few hundred Spirit Jade.

Looking at this large sum of money that could allow her to have a good year, Qian Gongyu's expression seemed very conflicted. After struggling for a long time, she closed the box and pushed it back to Shang Xin Lei, lowering her head and saying, "I'm sorry, I can't help Jiang Shi make a decision, I can't accept this money, but I can help you persuade her!"

Shang Xin Lei blinked and asked, "What do you think this money is for?"

"Isn't it the buyout money for Jiang Shi?"

"Come here."

Qian Gongyu obediently sat over, and then Shang Xin Lei pinched her cheeks and kept rubbing and pinching them into a ball.

"It's okay if you look down on Jiang Shi, how can you look down on the Shang Family—how can you think that I'm so stingy that I only want to pay this little money to buy Jiang Shi?!"

"I was wrong, I was wrong—"

"This is Spirit Jade for you. I saw that you stopped replenishing your spiritual power towards the end in the Wandering Star Forest, and I figured you might not have brought too much Spirit Jade with you, so I'm giving you some for emergencies." Shang Xin Lei said, "Don't overthink it. This is so you can perform better tomorrow. If you suppress a few more demons tomorrow, I won't lose out."

"Just that simple?"

"Just that simple."

"No other requests?"

"No other requests?"

Qian Gongyu carefully hugged the box, "Then is there anything else?"

Shang Xin Lei waved her hand, "There's nothing else, you can go back."

Qian Gongyu walked to the stairwell and couldn't help but ask again, "Really nothing—"

"I changed my mind, I want you to stay and belly dance tonight—"

"See you tomorrow!"

Shang Xin Lei opened the window, watching Qian Gongyu return to her carriage excitedly, chattering away with Jiang Shi, who was practicing footwork next to the carriage. She shook her head and smiled helplessly.

"I thought I could make her feel ashamed..." she muttered to herself, "It seems that her acquaintance with Jiang Shi isn't just luck... she really is an interesting person."