System Rewards Arrive

"What the hell are you doing?"

"Playing both sides?"

Watching "Brute Bull" lunge at him with a savage grin, Zhang Yu cursed Li Dagang—the one who'd arranged this brute—to high heaven in his mind.

What kind of unreliable piece of trash did he find?

"Heh heh, no choice. I'm a man of my word."

Brute Bull explained with a cheeky grin as he charged, "Since I took money from both families, I've got to handle both jobs. That's called... the Spirit of Contract."

Spirit of Contract, my ass. He's clearly after a pretty face.

Zhang Yu cursed inwardly, but his body retreated swiftly.

The cell was tiny, though, and he was soon backed into a corner.

In the next cell, Xiao Sheng, the Heir of Prince Jing, saw this plot twist and nearly jumped up in excitement. He slapped the bars and whispered, "This is way too thrilling!"

The Zhang family members were stunned for a moment when they saw Brute Bull turn his attention to Zhang Yu.

Then Zhang Wanning was the first to react, shrieking, "Hahaha, Zhang Yu, this is karma. You harmed Xiao Heng, and now it's your turn. Serves you right—you've shot yourself in the foot."

Qin Xuehua had just been revived and was leaning weakly on Nanny Zhou. Watching the scene, a flicker of complex emotion passed through her eyes.

Though Jiang Luohan was disgusted by what had just happened, seeing Zhang Yu about to suffer too, she felt a hint of satisfaction. She even subconsciously shifted her feet to block a young constable behind her who wanted to step forward.

Zhang Qingyue frowned deeply, finding the scene increasingly distasteful, but after glancing at her mother and sister's attitudes, she merely pursed her lips and turned her face away. Rational as she was, the scales of family loyalty still tipped.

Even Zhang Heng, who lay "unconscious" on the ground, cracked his eyes open a sliver. Seeing Brute Bull pounce on Zhang Yu, a burst of wild joy and venomous glee lit up his gaze. He cheered the brute on in his mind: Go, finish him off, make him worse off than me. He even thought Brute Bull's "playing both sides" move, reckless as it was, somehow... had a twisted sense of "honor"? At least it avenged him.

The constables leading the way exchanged glances, wanting to intervene, but the Zhang women subtly blocked them. What were they, small fry, to force the issue?

Zhang Heng and the others all knew Zhang Yu's cultivation talent was abysmal. In three years at the Marquis Estate, he'd barely scraped together a Martial Dao First Rank cultivation, earning him the title of "Capital City's Martial Dao Waste." Brute Bull, on the other hand, was a Sixth Rank Body Cultivator.

The outcome was a foregone conclusion.

Zhang Yu's fate would likely be even more miserable than Zhang Heng's. Zhang Heng, at Fifth Rank, had managed a few feeble struggles. Zhang Yu, at First Rank... probably didn't even qualify to struggle.

Zhang Yu pressed his back against the cold stone wall, nowhere left to retreat. His mind raced, searching for any instant-use life-saving measure among the system rewards, or whether Li Dagang had arranged any backup plan... It seemed not.

Just as Brute Bull's filthy hand was about to grab his collar, at that critical moment—

[Ding! Detected that the host has spent a full day within the "Ministry of Justice Heavenly Prison." Rewarding one year of Martial Dao Cultivation infusion. Beginning infusion...]

The system's prompt rang in Zhang Yu's mind like a heavenly melody, yet also like the last straw.

Hearing "one year of Martial Dao Cultivation," Zhang Yu first felt a surge of joy—was he saved? Then came a crushing wave of disappointment and helplessness.

He'd trained hard for three years and only amassed a First Rank's worth of Internal Energy. Even if this system-infused year of cultivation was more efficient, at best it would push him to Second Rank.

Useless.

But then, the next moment—

Boom—!!!

An indescribably terrifying torrent of heat erupted without warning from the depths of his dantian.

The Internal Energy was so vast, far beyond Zhang Yu's imagination—more than ten times the pitiful amount he'd accumulated through three years of bitter training.

As that surging Internal Energy swept through him, it felt like a thin membrane in his mind was suddenly torn open. A cool, mysterious, indescribable sense of power emerged.

It wasn't Internal Energy, but more like an absolute mastery and insight over his own strength and the surrounding environment.

Martial Dao Sixth Rank!

And his foundation was solid, his internal energy pure to the extreme, and his physical body and spirit had initially merged—a true Sixth Rank!

What's more, because the cultivation quality infused by the system was so high, it directly pushed him to the Sixth Rank Peak, just a hair's breadth away from the Seventh Rank!

His physical body's strength had surged more than tenfold.

"What... what's going on?"

Zhang Yu was utterly stunned, roaring inwardly.

Didn't it say one year's worth of cultivation?

Is this one year's worth of cultivation?

Which martial artist's one year of cultivation could be this terrifying?

Which martial artist could leap from Subordinate First Rank straight to Sixth Rank Peak in just one year of training?

What kind of joke is this?

As if sensing Zhang Yu's extreme shock and confusion, the system sneered:

"'One year's worth of cultivation'—do you think a village fool practicing the Basic Breathing Technique gets the same result as a peerless genius cultivating a Saint Grade Cultivation Method?

Moreover, the one year's worth of cultivation the system provides isn't limited to internal energy; it also includes body refinement and soul cultivation."

The system's words were like a sudden enlightenment, and Zhang Yu instantly understood.

That's right!

One year and one year—how could they be the same?

A waste training for one year, and a genius training for one year—how could they possibly be the same?