"Vmmm~"
The disc-shaped spaceship's hatch opened. A bald man flew out.
Not far away, an ordinary-looking black C-class spaceship was parked in the void.
Soon, a slender woman at Universe Rank appeared from the ship. She wore a mask, hiding her face.
Thor wondered who that kid Li Dui knew. Why all the secrecy?
The coordinates were correct. The spaceship and the woman at Universe Level Sixth Order were correct, too.
This area was the Void Zone. There were hardly any meteorite fragments, and no one would come all the way out here just to lie in wait and cheat someone.
Thor tossed over the World Ring. The masked woman caught it and gave a slight bow. Then she returned directly to her ship, started it up, and left.
From beginning to end, the two of them hadn't said a word.
Thor stretched a few times in the void. He'd spent more than half a year traveling here by spaceship. Along the way, he'd really worried something might go wrong and mess up his little brother's business.
Mostly because Li Dui had made it sound so serious. He wasn't allowed to mention the matter in the Virtual Universe.
Fortunately, the trip had gone smoothly, and he'd completed the job without a hitch.
Thor, now relieved, returned to his E-class spaceship and headed back the way he'd come to the Battle Axe Secret Realm.
Duhan Star Manor.
Li Dui opened his eyes.
He'd sent one of his clones with Du Ya. The C9 spaceship had reached the meeting point in just over two years, thanks to the clone teleporting most of the way.
Now that he had the goods, Li Dui could hardly wait.
The World Ring held a great deal of Universe Crystals, materials, and treasures. The most important things, of course, were the Sacred Blood and the Number 3 clone who'd gone along as a bodyguard.
With two clones there, they could take turns resting. Li Dui simply had them teleport back. The C9 spaceship would take about four years to return, which was far too slow.
By taking turns resting, the clones could just about maintain three teleports per second and make it back in less than a year.
Time passed quickly.
With Li Dui back and now spending his days holed up in 16001, rarely going out, the Battle Axe Secret Realm—which had been lively for a few days—returned to its usual quiet.
There were never any outsiders at the sprawling manor on Duhan Star. One only occasionally caught sight of the twenty Star Level Nine Spirit Readers.
One day, a black spaceship slowly entered Duhan Star's atmosphere and flew toward the Star Lord's manor.
The people of Duhan Star who saw it bowed to the ship of their own accord.
The new Star Lord rarely showed herself and was quite mysterious. But since taking over Duhan Star, she hadn't raised taxes or made the locals perform forced labor. She'd only organized a Manor Guard Army of tens of thousands to patrol outside the manor. And even they were paid.
As a result, the people of Duhan Star were deeply devoted to their Star Lord.
Du Ya handed the ring to Li Dui. He gave her a few instructions, then sent her out.
With her and Qila guarding the manor, its security wouldn't be a problem.
As for Li Dui himself, he now had three clones by his side, more than enough to deal with anything unexpected.
He took out the Sacred Blood and held it in his palm. He couldn't help thinking it was breathtakingly beautiful.
Should he fuse with it or not?
It really was a problem.
Thoughts raced through Li Dui's mind. If he didn't fuse with it, a hundredfold gene multiplier still wasn't weak by the standards of the universe.
He only needed to keep cultivating. Once he reached a higher realm, he could make up the difference in his gene multiplier. That was possible, right? There was no hurry anyway. Luo Feng would handle everything in the future. I'm not the protagonist. Wouldn't it be nice to just help out a little and keep a low profile?
The moment he finished thinking that, another thought swept it all away.
I got dragged into this world for no reason. Every day, I plan and scheme for the sake of safety and freedom. Nearly two hundred years have gone by. Day in, day out, I cultivate, gather resources, worry about this and that, and carefully reveal the so-called talent I have.
Isn't all of it so I can improve in every way and gain the confidence to stand up sooner and say what I want, do what I want?
Now I have such a huge opportunity right in my hands. And I'm scared just because fusing with it might kill me?
To hell with that. Where in the world is anything absolutely safe? Is my true body definitely safe just because it's hiding here? Even a super powerhouse like Giant Axe Founder can die. Even the God King of Jin can die. What's more, I'm just a little ant. A slightly stronger shock wave from a battle could wipe me out.
Besides, with my Brother Quan here, I refuse to believe I'll die. It's just a drop of blood from a Universe Master, isn't it?
Li Dui pressed two fingers to his chest and sliced it open, then grabbed the Sacred Blood and pressed it against the wound.
Without a sound, a terrifying will descended into Li Dui's sea of consciousness. In an instant, the entire sea was engulfed in spreading blood-red light.
Li Dui's will seemed to lose its foothold and was crushed to pieces, as if it had turned into countless strands of blood-red light and merged with the sea of consciousness around it.
He let out a long breath. No wonder that book said anyone who fused with the Sacred Blood would die immediately.
Which Immortal could withstand that? Of course, not me. I'm not an Immortal—I'm at Universe Rank, right? Li Dui was so overjoyed he was babbling nonsense.
If not for the Ring, Li Dui really would have died. He wouldn't have had the slightest chance to resist.
The blood-red light in his sea of consciousness slowly, little by little, began to fade.
It took a full day and a half for the light to disappear completely. Li Dui decided his earlier judgment had been right. Even an ordinary Universe Venerable wouldn't be able to withstand this.
With his extensive experience cheating his way through fusing with Blood Luo Crystals, Li Dui knew the real fusion was about to begin.
The surface of the Sacred Blood suddenly glowed a translucent red. Inside, a beast seemed to take shape, with a lizard-like body and a pair of horns on its head.
A blood-red thread emerged from one of the beast's horns and slowly burrowed into the wound on Li Dui's chest. Then the thread merged with Li Dui's blood and flowed slowly beneath his skin. It left no mark, but it looked as though it were drawing some kind of pattern.
The process was slow, and it was too early to tell what was happening.
Li Dui had fused with a hundred Blood Luo Crystals before. When he activated the Blood Luo Power, a fairly intricate blood-red pattern appeared on his chest.
But that pattern had emerged naturally after the fusion was complete, so this was different.
Li Dui had thought the fusion looked slow and might take several days.
He hadn't expected that, even after more than forty days, the lizard-like beast inside the Sacred Blood Crystal was still sending out red threads. By then, though, its color had already faded considerably.
For more than forty days, the threads had guided Li Dui's own blood in irregular paths across his chest. They must have been drawing an extremely intricate pattern.
At last, the final thread sank into Li Dui's chest. The Sacred Blood Crystal silently crumbled into powder and drifted gently to the ground.
It had worked. Li Dui activated the Blood Luo Power. As expected, the method was the same. As expected, an extremely intricate pattern appeared on his chest—far more complicated than he'd imagined, and far more complex than the paths the threads had traced with his blood.
That made sense. The threads might not have been drawing lines as they moved. For all he knew, they could have been stamping a pattern.
Li Dui quietly sensed his affinity with the various Origin Laws. How many times had it increased?
He had no idea that, without realizing it, he'd broken the gene multiplier limit. In this regard, he was enjoying the treatment of a Universe Master.
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