Reporting You!

Sweat poured down the old man's face as he let out a low hiss. The thousand layers of clouds beneath his feet churned, and his own Spiritual Realm trembled as he forcibly suppressed the rioting 'Flesh and Blood Plague' within him.

It was a close call, but he managed it in the end.

He coughed up a large mouthful of blood, clearly injured from forcefully activating his [Spiritual Realm]—Huang Qiuxian's current body simply couldn't handle such immense mental power.

Under the influence of the rampant Flesh and Blood Plague, he had even lost his Second Refinement, completely falling back to a First Refinement Martial Artist.

How could a body of First or Second Refinement wield the Spiritual Realm? Every time he called upon it, his own body would be injured, just as Zhang Fusheng had coughed up blood when he briefly brought the Spiritual Realm down upon the hotel.

Huang Qiuxian raised his head, staring intently at the mysterious old man, and spoke with difficulty:

"What is the meaning of the name you just uttered? Why did it cause the Flesh and Blood Plague to riot?"

He was gasping for breath, yet he forcefully straightened his back. The sea of clouds surged beneath his feet, and from the mist behind him, over a thousand armored soldiers carrying bows and sabers emerged.

These were all once 'real' people.

"Do you come from the West Cult?" Huang Qiuxian asked. The thousand armored soldiers uniformly reached behind their backs for their quivers and nocked arrows with three fingers.

Huang Qiuxian was prepared to 'strike a stone with an egg.'

"My name is Zhong Shan," Zhang Fusheng said, inwardly terrified but outwardly calm, stating plainly, "I have no connection to the West Cult."

Huang Qiuxian breathed a sigh of relief:

"Then—"

Zhang Fusheng continued:

"Are you asking about that name just now?"

He paused, then said lightly:

"It is the name of the so-called God of Plague."

Huang Qiuxian's head exploded. He stumbled back several steps, a look of despair flashing across his face in his terror:

"Did you discover His true name? Or was it actually the West Cult that discovered it?"

Zhang Fusheng:?

Was his reaction really that big?

What was the mystery behind this?

He considered for a moment before slowly saying:

"Discover? It's something that was already known, why would it need to be discovered?"

Huang Qiuxian froze. It was already known?

He couldn't understand, but he could roughly tell that it wasn't the West Cult that had discovered the God of Plague's true name, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

After a long pause.

Huang Qiuxian asked cautiously:

"Who exactly are you?"

"Gaotian Association, Zhong Shan,"

Zhang Fusheng answered calmly.

"You can also call me True Person."

Huang Qiuxian's eyelids twitched. True Person was not a title that could be casually used.

He fell silent for a long time, still cautious:

"Can you truly remove the Flesh and Blood Plague from me?"

The old man leaning on his wooden staff nodded calmly, his expression unwavering. He simply reached out and lightly flicked his finger.

Two illusory, red, ball-like objects floated between his fingers.

The Flesh and Blood Plague.

Zhang Fusheng closed his five fingers, and the two materialized blobs of Flesh and Blood Plague disappeared as if summoned and dismissed at will.

"Those who enter the Gaotian Association can have one wish fulfilled, and I can also cure this great illness for you."

"I am willing to join," Huang Qiuxian said without hesitation.

But the old man shook his head:

"I need to see your sincerity. It is too early to speak of this now, wait a while, just wait."

He turned and left calmly.

It wasn't that Zhang Fusheng had changed his mind at the last minute, but rather that he had just discovered something very serious.

He was running out of Star Beast Meat.

He retracted his Spiritual Realm and then used his mental power to interfere with reality, distorting the light so that he could not be seen by the naked eye. Only then did he walk straight out of the Martial Arts Academy.

He left the area entirely.

"I miscalculated!"

Beneath a bridge pier along the Jiangzhou River.

The air distorted, and Zhong Shan's figure slowly materialized.

"Accelerating the Pact's progress twice, a total of 124 days. The first time consumed 35 grams of Star Beast Meat, and the second, also 62 days, consumed 39 grams."

Zhang Fusheng felt a bit helpless. Although the transaction with the middle-aged man for forty years of Contemplation Time meant the Pact only had a one-month cooldown, the Pact seemed to be becoming 'saturated' with Star Beast Meat, or more specifically, Giant Rhinoceros meat. The effect of the Star Beast Meat had plummeted drastically.

Originally, 1 gram could accelerate two days, but now, after consuming 26 grams of Star Beast Meat, he found that the Pact's cooldown still had five days remaining.

In other words, 1 gram of meat couldn't even speed up the process by a single day!

"It's good to give Huang Qiuxian a bit of a cold shoulder, lest he think I'm desperate for him to join. Well, I am, actually."

Zhang Fusheng muttered to himself:

"The immediate priority is to find another type of Star Beast Meat and figure out what's going on with the Pact, and also the West Cult."

He stood by the riverbank, silently reviewing his current situation. His meditation technique had reached Perfection, or the state of [He Observes as I Should Be], which was even more powerful than he had anticipated.

It allowed him to interfere with reality using his spirit, even turning the false into the real, and truly manifesting things conceived in his thoughts.

Of course, the consumption was terrifyingly high. Especially forcing a Spiritual Realm entity to descend into reality, even for a brief moment, was too much for his frail body to bear, leading to tearing, damage, or even collapse.

"If the spirit and will are 'me,' then the physical body is the raft. When 'I' become too vast and the raft is fragile, there's a danger of capsizing."

"Fortunately, as long as it's not a direct descent of a Spiritual Realm entity into reality, the consumption is within an acceptable range. At least it's more than enough to intimidate people."

He exhaled, extending his hand, freely manipulating light and shadow.

Then, he immersed his thoughts into his body. Under the interference of his spirit, his meridians were widened, and stagnant points were forcibly cleared. The accumulated filth hidden within the gaps of his bones and joints, and inside and outside his organs, was rapidly decomposed by the interference of his spiritual will, eventually transforming into a mouthful of black, turbid qi that he slowly exhaled.

In just this short while, Zhang Fusheng's 'roots and bones' rivaled, or even surpassed, many geniuses in the traditional sense – clean, pure, and spotless. A massive amount of Mysterious Factor surged into his body, circulating throughout him at a rate several, or even ten times, faster than before. In just fifteen minutes, he had completed a full cycle. Previously, completing a full cycle would take Zhang Fusheng seven to eight hours. The difference was outrageously large.

He recalled what Black Eyes had said when he and Chen Nuanyu entered Bar No. 19.

"Whether the meridians are clear or not, and its effect on the efficiency of absorbing Mysterious Factor, etc., are not actually [roots and bones]."

True roots and bones were like Black Eyes' Abyssal Black Eyes, or Chen Nuanyu's Unquenchable Heart. They each possessed incredible functions and were what drew an insurmountable line between people.

"Normal physical aptitude can be improved through acquired effort, but those true [roots and bones] are difficult to obtain later in life."

Zhang Fusheng's gaze was intense, but he was different.

"The effect of spiritual will seems to extend beyond this, but exploring it on my own is still too slow. Even after delving into the Spiritual Realm for decades, I've likely only uncovered one or two-tenths of its mysteries."

"Spiritual Realm, the path to the heavens."

His appearance reverted to his true form. He walked out from under the bridge and hailed a taxi, openly heading back to the Martial Arts Academy.

As soon as he got out of the car, that intense feeling of being watched struck him again. This time, he found the source.

Above. High in the sky, hundreds of kilometers up, was that low-orbit satellite?

Zhang Fusheng suppressed the urge to look up and smile, or perhaps give a middle finger. He calmly walked into the Martial Arts Academy but glanced back, looking towards a spot about ten kilometers away. It was the Jiangzhou Public Security Bureau headquarters building.

Three hundred years of mental accumulation allowed his thoughts to extend thirty kilometers to their limit. His spiritual will rapidly depleted, and a wave of fatigue washed over him. His nose felt hot, and blood was about to flow, but Zhang Fusheng forcibly pushed it back.

"It's actually this tiring," he felt like he might faint, sighing inwardly.

His body was still too frail. Otherwise, why would he be so exhausted?

At the same moment, at the Public Security Bureau headquarters.

Under the bewildered and horrified gaze of the Director of the General Bureau, the brief report he had just written on the paper in front of him slowly distorted. The ink flowed across the paper, rearranging itself into a new line of text.

[Eighth District, Ankang Tumor Hospital, colluding with the West Cult, breeding and spreading the Flesh and Blood Plague.]

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