Knight

0-Ring Knight!

After forming a contract with the long-haired mongoose cub, Duke officially advanced to a 0-Ring Knight.

When practicing the Universal Blood Refining Method, fighting spirit would connect his meridians with the long-haired mongoose cub's through the contract, allowing them to blood refine together.

"Chirp!" The little cub enjoyed the feeling.

Duke also found it wonderful. He stroked the cub's head and said thoughtfully after a moment, "As my knight partner, you should have a name... I'll call you Little Dou."

It was fitting for a long-haired mongoose cub to be named Little Dou.

"I hope we'll improve together, that I'll advance to Great Knight soon, and you'll advance to Phantom Beast soon."

For knight cultivation, the most important thing wasn't the blood refining method itself, but the contracted partner.

The reason was simple: although the human body could open its Blood Sea, the Spirituality within the body was limited. Even with gluttonous eating, the amount of Spirituality that could be absorbed from food was extremely limited.

Therefore.

By utilizing the power of a contract to bind a spirit beast, allowing the spirit beast to share the required Spirituality, the cultivation progress of the blood refining method would undoubtedly increase significantly.

Furthermore, spirit beasts didn't need to eat voraciously; their bodies could naturally absorb the Spirituality floating in the air and water.

In essence.

A contracted spirit beast acted as a Spirituality intermediary, allowing knights to also absorb external free-floating Spirituality, thus rapidly strengthening their fighting spirit.

As for the Spirituality in the Spirit Sea, there were indeed Arcane Mages who had simultaneously opened both their Spirit Sea and Blood Sea, attempting to use the Spirit Sea to nourish the Blood Sea, but there were no successful cases.

Currently, the only auxiliary method for knight cultivation was the contracted spirit beast partner.

"There's also a crucial point: a spirit beast only has one chance to form a contract in its lifetime." Duke placed Little Dou on his lap, sat down cross-legged, and began cultivating his fighting spirit. "Once I complete the contract with Little Dou, no one else can have designs on Little Dou... This, to some extent, spares Little Dou and me a lot of trouble."

Little Dou lay on Duke's lap, fast asleep. It could passively receive the benefits of cultivation without needing to actively participate.

On its forehead, there was a dim red spot, seemingly emerging from beneath the skin.

This was the contract mark.

As the cultivation of fighting spirit deepened, this contract mark would gradually take shape and accompany Little Dou throughout its life as a spirit beast. As for Duke's contract mark, it would appear on his chest, near his heart. When both Duke and Little Dou advanced to 1-Ring, the mark would form a special symbol, equivalent to a "Ring."

Afterward.

Around this 1-Ring mark, a new nested ring would gradually grow as Duke and Little Dou continued to cultivate, forming a 2-Ring mark.

Once the two rings were nested, it would become a 2-Ring mark.

The 2-Ring mark would alter Little Dou's original evolutionary path, changing it from a 2-Ring Spirit Beast to a 2-Ring Phantom Beast, and Duke would advance from a 1-Ring Great Knight to a 2-Ring Phantom Beast Knight.

And so on.

When another nested ring formed around the 2-Ring mark, becoming a 3-Ring mark, it would signify Little Dou's advancement to a 3-Ring High-level Phantom Beast, and Duke's advancement to a 3-Ring High-level Phantom Beast Knight.

"It's a long road ahead, Little Dou."

After circulating the blood refining technique ten times, feeling utterly drained, Duke finally stopped cultivating and placed Little Dou back into its cardboard box. "Next, I need to find knowledge on how to open my Qi Sea."

There was no advantage to cultivating the Three Seas simultaneously.

But Duke wished to touch upon all forms of extraordinary power, leaving no regrets.

"Oh, Xiao Yi."

"Yes, Master?"

"How is the progress on improving the Desert Eagle?"

"Currently, Xiao Yi has preliminary improvement steps. Once the subsequent material applications are perfected, the first set of Arcane Artifact modification plans can be formulated."

"Very good. From now on, subsequent improvements to the Desert Eagle will be uniformly categorized as the 'Desert Eagle Development' series. The initial 1-Ring Desert Eagle will be called the 'Desert Eagle Original Version,' and the first developed version will be named the 'Desert Eagle Version 1.0'..." Duke pondered, giving the Desert Eagle improvement plan a scientific and rigorous naming convention, hoping this handgun would be perfect.

After all, the Desert Eagle, like Xiao Yi, was his "congenital" Arcane Artifact.

Time flew by.

June passed in a flash, and July was already more than halfway over.

Little Sam's Card Shop's business was booming, unaffected by Best's Card Repair Shop. On the contrary, with the addition of proxy purchasing and on-site services, it was becoming even more profitable.

The business of repairing cards was too fixed.

However, the scope of proxy purchasing was quite flexible. Some customers not only needed proxy purchases for spirit cards but also for spirit artifacts, daily necessities, and other items.

Snakehead Town, with its population of just over 100,000, lacked a comprehensive market, and not everything could be bought there.

Many items had to be purchased in Chen Jiao City.

With Little Sam's Card Shop's proxy purchasing service, it became much more convenient.

Therefore, in the more than a month since the proxy purchasing service was launched, not only did the neighbors around Second Vertical Street come to use the service, but people from First Vertical Street, as well as First Horizontal Street and Second Horizontal Street, also visited, wanting Little Sam's Card Shop to help them purchase items.

"Boss, I'm ready," said the apprentice, Levin, with a simple and honest smile.

This apprentice, who had taken over from Duke during Old Sam's time, was tall and sturdy, diligent at work, and never complained. However, he wasn't very bright, unable to even master the basic tasks of seam sealing and cover binding.

Murav, the Card Master, had complained several times and wanted to replace him.

After some thought, Little Duke decided to hire a clever new apprentice for Murav, and then transferred Levin to his side as an assistant to accompany him on the purchasing business.

"Then let's go."

With the big, clumsy Levin following him, Duke felt much more relaxed, no longer needing to carry the heavy bags himself every time.

The two arrived at the station and had just boarded the Black Beetle Car when an acquaintance greeted them, "Boss Little Duke, off to Chen Jiao City to restock again? Your shop must have made quite a bit of money recently!"

"Just earning a living," Duke chuckled, "The card repair business is too competitive, there's no other way."

"Is it that Best's Card Repair Shop giving you competition? I passed by last time and noticed that shop barely had any customers. I reckon it'll go out of business before long," the acquaintance said.

Duke replied, "I wouldn't know about that, I haven't paid much attention."

This was just polite talk.

In reality, he paid close attention to Best's Card Repair Shop's business situation, to the point of wanting to know Best's every move. The card repair business on Second Vertical Street was the core of Little Sam's Card Shop.

Of course.

He also wanted to see Best fail, to get back at him for the betrayal.

Based on his observations, Best's Card Repair Shop should soon be unable to sustain itself. Even though Best had copied the home service and purchasing business, he still had no customers.

First, he couldn't compete with Little Sam's Card Shop's reputation, and his actions weren't as swift as Duke's.

Second, people like to follow trends. Old customers were loyal to Little Sam's Card Shop's reputation, and new customers saw that everyone else went to Little Sam's Card Shop, so they naturally went there too.

Even if Best stood at his doorstep shouting every day, he couldn't attract many customers.

"Honestly, I never expected Old Sam to transfer the shop. Back then, he and I opened our shops in the market around the same time..." the acquaintance lamented. He was Winston, who ran a puppet parts wholesale shop on First Vertical Street. "Twenty to thirty years have flown by. Old Sam has retired to enjoy his blessings, while I still have to work hard!"

"Snakehead Town will only get better. By the way, Boss Winston, has there been any news about the Pioneer War?"