Night Yunqing's Memories

Ever since Bastian had told him that he'd signed him up for the Outer Battlefield, Xiao Si hadn't said a word, but Bai Muye could clearly sense its gleeful, over-the-moon happiness.

Bai Muye couldn't help feeling even more annoyed, and decided to ignore it for a few days.

But Xiao Si's tone sounded rather serious now. Bai Muye kept a sliver of his consciousness outside to stay alert and sent the rest into his Consciousness Sea.

"What happened?" Bai Muye asked gravely.

"I was bored, so I took a look at Night Yunqing's memories. Hey, guess what I found?" Xiao Si had somehow picked up this annoyingly smug way of talking.

"Why don't you guess whether I'm going to guess?" Bai Muye shot back irritably.

"Uh, fine." Xiao Si knew he was already in a bad mood, so it got straight to the point. "I just found out that this Night Yunqing is actually a traitor to what you call the human race..."

"What?" Bai Muye was astonished. "Show me."

Xiao Si tossed him the memories, and Bai Muye hurriedly skimmed through them.

Night Yunqing had been born on a remote planet in a low-level cosmic civilization within the Wild Peak Universe Kingdom. The planet's environment was harsh, and it was home to many Fierce Beasts, with beast tides breaking out frequently.

Only after reaching Planet Rank could the people on the planet leave and become citizens of that low-level civilization.

Night Yunqing's family had all died in a beast tide when he was very young. He had a decent cultivation talent, but no teacher, so he had to figure everything out by himself. After reaching Apprentice Ninth Tier, he couldn't find a way to break through to Planet Rank.

His breakthrough came courtesy of a Pioneer from the planet. The Pioneer had reached Planet Rank thousands of years earlier, then left the planet to explore the wider universe. By the time he returned, he had reached Universe Rank.

The Pioneer selected a group of talented youths from the planet and took them away. Night Yunqing was among them.

After leaving the planet, Night Yunqing and the others first trained at a camp. Most of them broke through to Planet Rank, while the few who didn't were never heard from again.

After breaking through, Night Yunqing was taken to another, extremely secretive training camp for even harsher training. They were also subjected to constant brainwashing. Through various illusions, the camp's instructors made them believe that the human race was a blight on the universe and should be wiped out.

The camp held regular tests. Anyone highly resistant to the illusions and difficult to brainwash soon disappeared.

After reaching Star Rank, Night Yunqing and the others began forming teams and carrying out missions, including raids and assassinations.

Successful missions earned them treasures to aid their cultivation, secret manuals, and other rewards. Failure meant brutal punishment.

Night Yunqing was highly effective at completing missions. With the various rewards he received, he soon reached Universe Rank.

Universe Rank missions involved more than raids and assassinations; they also included gathering intelligence and collecting all kinds of information.

By a stroke of luck, Night Yunqing once collected a highly important piece of intelligence. As a reward, he received a secret manual on Force Amplitude cultivation—White Elephant.

After cultivating White Elephant, Night Yunqing's combat strength increased rapidly. Once he grasped a domain, he applied to his instructor to fight for his life.

He figured that if he earned the title of Giant Axe Warrior through life-and-death battles, he might be recruited by the Giant Axe Arena. At the very least, it would be easy to join other major organizations, which would make gathering intelligence much easier.

In the instructor's eyes, Night Yunqing and the others were disposable pawns. Since one of those pawns had shown such initiative, the instructor naturally supported him.

And so Night Yunqing began his life-and-death battles. He won match after match, and for every hundred consecutive victories, he was rewarded with a treasure that aided his cultivation or strengthened his combat ability. The Trident he carried had been awarded to him after his three-hundredth consecutive victory.

Using those treasures, he not only cultivated White Elephant to mastery but eventually reached Domain Ninth Layer as well.

Until his final match, when Bai Muye killed him.

From Night Yunqing's memories, what he'd gone through was rather similar to Bai Muye's own experience—they had both endured grueling training, with their lives and deaths in the hands of others.

"They were pretty stingy. They only gave him one manual, and the rest were just things to help him cultivate. Night Yunqing used those up long ago..."

Bai Muye muttered, then took a dagger carved from an unknown beast's tooth out of his Space Ring.

The Space Ring measured ten meters in length, width, and height, making it one of the lowest-grade storage spaces. Besides some daily necessities, the only things of value inside were the Trident and the combat suit.

The dagger looked perfectly ordinary, but it was made from the tooth of a Monster Race beast called a Myriad-Tooth Earthworm. Each dagger was linked to its earthworm's main tooth, allowing messages to be sent across up to a third of a Universe Country.

Beyond that distance, the messages degraded until they became impossible to decipher.

"What are you going to do about it?" Xiao Si asked with interest.

To Xiao Si, the matter was entirely inconsequential. Humans, the Monster Race—any species with a soul was just "food" to it. Naturally, it wouldn't show that opinion in front of Bai Muye.

After all, it had been born free of the Cage. Even if it was only a seed right now, it still understood the ways of the world.

"Either ignore it or report it to the Virtual Universe System..." Bai Muye thought for a moment. "But I think I'll tell Samao and let him have the credit. That'll help repay some of what I owe him..."

"How can you report it without proof?" Xiao Si asked, puzzled.

"Easy. I'll just say I noticed something odd about the dagger while sorting through the storage space..."

The dagger was mainly used to send messages. After being specially refined, it could also store them, but accessing the information required an extremely complicated procedure, in case the dagger accidentally fell into the wrong hands.

Bai Muye had seen Night Yunqing's memories, so he knew what to do. He checked the dagger and found a few messages still stored inside.

Some were missions issued from above; others were replies Night Yunqing had sent. Those messages were enough to prove that he really had been a traitor to the human race.

After checking them, Bai Muye removed the complicated access procedure and changed the settings so that anyone holding the dagger could view the messages. Otherwise, he wouldn't be able to explain how he'd discovered anything unusual.

After thinking it over, he swiftly connected a sliver of his consciousness to the Virtual Universe.

In an ancient city steeped in the passage of time, passersby of varying heights and countless different races filled the streets.

Whoosh!

A two-meter-tall young man appeared out of nowhere in the street. His short black hair framed a pair of bright, alert eyes.

Bai Muye wore simple gray clothes, with a Little Sprite perched on his shoulder.

"It feels great not to be restricted..." Bai Muye looked at the crowded street and sighed sincerely.

He had been longing to find out what timeline he was in, but there was plenty of time for that. For now, he had more important things to do.

"Master, I've detected that you have an unlinked Cosmic Galaxy Bank account. Would you like to link it?"

"Link it."

"Linked." The Little Sprite on his shoulder chirped happily. "What else can I do for you, Master?"

"I want to send an email. How do I do that?"

"No problem. I'll open the email interface. You can write your message, enter the recipient's Virtual Universe number, and click Send."

Bai Muye stepped away from the middle of the street and stood by the roadside. In the email interface the Little Sprite had opened, he entered the message he had prepared, then typed in Samao's Virtual Universe number and clicked Send.

Back at his residence, Samao was still feeling rather glum. He was just about to have a drink when an email arrived.

Seeing the sender's name, Luoluobai Muye, he raised an eyebrow. "He's emailing me so soon. Is he thanking me?"

He opened the email, and the message that appeared before him made his eyes widen.