Yu Luomian lay sprawled on the ground, gasping for breath.
He had never been this humiliated in his entire life.
As the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan's second-in-command and a level-95 Lightning Douluo, wherever he went, people fawned over him and treated him like a god.
And today, a metal rod that had fallen from the sky had beaten him until he was no better than a dead dog.
What was even more humiliating was that he hadn't so much as touched a hair on his opponent's head.
"What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?"
Qin Feng's voice came from the top of the wall again. There was no mockery in it, just a calm statement of fact.
"Looks like you understand the difference in strength between us now."
Yu Luomian's face turned beet red. He wanted to argue, but one look at the bottomless crater nearby and every word caught in his throat.
A difference?
The hell was this a difference?
This was an unbridgeable chasm!
"Y-You... who are you?" Yu Luomian's voice was hoarse, betraying a fear he didn't want to admit even to himself.
"Me?"
Qin Feng thought for a moment, then gave a very apt answer.
"An ordinary person who loves peace and is dedicated to changing the world through science."
Ordinary person?
Yu Luomian wanted to curse.
You called someone who'd nearly beaten a Titled Douluo to death with one swing of a rod ordinary?
Could an ordinary person treat ten thousand meters in the sky like their own backyard and throw whatever they pleased?
"All right, enough chatting."
Qin Feng's voice cut through Yu Luomian's grumbling thoughts.
"As a courier, you need to maintain a certain standard of professional conduct."
"In your current condition, if you die on the way, who's going to sign for my package?"
"Brother Wolf, send over a medical robot and give him a shot."
"A shot?" Yu Luomian's heart lurched. A sense of foreboding welled up inside him.
He didn't believe this devil would be kind enough to help him.
A few seconds later,
"Whoosh—"
A drone the size of a palm, shaped like a metal mosquito, flew down from the wall and hovered in front of Yu Luomian.
A silver needle finer than a strand of hair extended from the drone's front.
"What is this? Poison?" Yu Luomian warily edged backward.
"You could think of it that way."
Qin Feng's teasing voice came through the drone's tiny loudspeaker.
"It's called T-2 Nanobot Repair Fluid."
"Once it's injected, your broken bones and damaged organs will be good as new within three minutes. They might even be tougher than before."
"Of course, you can choose not to take it."
Qin Feng paused, then added the rest.
"Number three Rod of God is already loaded. Personally, I don't mind finding another courier."
Yu Luomian's face went white in an instant.
A great man knew when to bend and when to stand firm!
As long as the green hills remained, he'd never need to worry about firewood!
Yu Luomian frantically reassured himself, then tremblingly held out his arm.
"G-Go ahead."
"That's more like it."
Qin Feng smiled with satisfaction.
The drone moved forward, and its needle slipped precisely into a vein in Yu Luomian's arm.
A stream of icy liquid was injected into his body in an instant.
"Gah—!"
Yu Luomian let out a muffled cry of pain.
It wasn't the feeling of being poisoned.
It was... an indescribable agony, as if billions of ants were gnawing at his bone marrow!
He could clearly feel the injected "liquid" racing wildly through his body!
Like a swarm of tiny workers with minds of their own, they rushed toward his broken bones, tore through his muscles, and repaired his damaged meridians!
First destruction, then reconstruction!
This torture-like transformation from within was ten thousand times more painful than being blown away by the shockwave earlier!
"Devil... you devil..."
Yu Luomian curled up on the ground, his whole body convulsing violently as cold sweat soaked him through.
At last, he understood why the young man had called it poison.
This stuff was more agonizing than any poison in the world!
The three minutes dragged on like three centuries.
When the pain finally receded like a tide, Yu Luomian felt as if he'd been hauled from the water. He lay on the ground, completely drained.
But he soon realized something was wrong.
He tried moving his fingers, then his arm, and then... with a kip-up, he sprang straight to his feet!
"This... this..."
Yu Luomian stared at his hands in disbelief, feeling the surging Soul Power within him.
His injuries were completely healed!
Not only that, he even felt that the bottleneck that had held him back for more than a decade was beginning to loosen!
As the nanobots repaired his body, they had also cleaned out the impurities that had accumulated in his meridians over the years!
How was this poison?
This was a miracle cure!
Just as Yu Luomian was reeling with shock and delight, thinking he'd turned misfortune into a blessing,
Qin Feng's devilish voice drifted over once again.
"How are you feeling, Mr. Courier?"
"Does your body feel full of strength? Do you even feel like taking another couple of swings at me?"
Yu Luomian's heart jumped. He instinctively assumed a defensive stance.
"Heh, don't be nervous."
Qin Feng's voice was full of the playful mockery of a cat toying with a mouse.
"I just want to remind you of something."
"The nanobots I injected into you don't just repair things. They come with a few extra functions."
"For example, they've already fused perfectly with your nervous system and your Soul Power core."
"From now on, every heartbeat, every flow of your Soul Power, every thought that enters your mind will be transmitted to my database in real time."
"What?!"
Yu Luomian's face turned even paler than a corpse's.
He frantically used his Soul Power to examine his body, but found nothing.
The nanobots were so tiny that he couldn't sense them at all!
"Don't waste your effort."
Qin Feng's voice turned cold.
"To help you better understand your new identity, let's do a little test."
"Try gathering your Soul Power and attacking the rock in front of you."
Yu Luomian was skeptical, but he still raised his hand, gathering a ball of blue lightning in his palm.
But the instant he prepared to strike,
"AAAH—!!!"
A sharp, stabbing pain exploded from his heart!
It felt as if someone had clamped a pair of red-hot tongs around his heart and was twisting them with all their might!
Thump!
Yu Luomian's legs gave way, and he fell to his knees again, convulsing all over, unable to get a single coherent word out.
"See?"
Qin Feng's voice was like a final judgment.
"Now your body, your Soul Power, even your life, no longer belong to you."
"They're my property."
"Without my permission, you can't even kill yourself."
"If I let you live, you live. If I want you dead, you'll die even if you run to the ends of the earth."
"With a single thought, you'll become a dazzling firework."
"Welcome to Umbrella, Mr. Yu Luomian. From today on, you're my first living beacon inside the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan."
Yu Luomian collapsed on the ground, gasping for breath. Every trace of resentment and anger had vanished from his eyes.
Only an endless terror remained, one that had sunk deep into his bones.
It was over.
His life was over.
He was now just a puppet controlled from afar, a bomb that could go off at any moment.
"All right, the test is over."
Qin Feng's voice returned to normal.
"Now get lost."
"Remember your mission. Take my words to Yu Yuanzhen, exactly as I said them."
"Tell him I only want one thing from the treasures in his clan's vault. Once I get it, I'll leave immediately."
"Tell him to have it ready, wash his neck, and wait for me to come collect it."
"If he refuses to cooperate..."
Qin Feng paused.
"Tell him the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan will soon become the first of the Upper Three Sects to be wiped out on the Douluo Continent."
"That's a promise."
Yu Luomian staggered to his feet, utterly dispirited. Like a walking corpse, he dragged his heavy steps toward the way he'd come, one step at a time.
His retreating figure was filled with despair.
As they watched Yu Luomian disappear into the distance, Grey Wolf's curious voice came over the internal channel.
"Boss, after all that effort, do we really only want one thing from their vault?"
"Of course."
Qin Feng looked at the countless flickering dots of nanobots inside Yu Luomian on the screen and answered.
"I'm not interested in their Gold Soul Coins or their bits of junk."
"What I'm really interested in is the thing their clan has passed down for over a thousand years..."
"That dragon's genetic blueprint."
Before you continue