An Eight-Year Plan

There was still one year until graduation from Tianlan High School.

The Bocheng Disaster was drawing ever closer.

People still went to and from work as usual every day, and students still went to and from school as usual. No one realized what would happen a year later.

Their closest loved ones and best friends would all be devoured by demons.

The city would be left in ruins.

To prevent all of that from happening, Jiang Yuan, Mo Fan, and Zhang Xiaohou stood at the entrance to the Demon Hunting Alliance.

"So, what are we here for today?" Mo Fan asked in confusion.

"Yeah, Brother Yuan, why did you call us here today? The captain didn't notify us about any mission either." Zhang Xiaohou was equally puzzled.

As for why he was calling Jiang Yuan captain, it was because Jiang Yuan had recruited him into the City Demon Hunting Squad some time ago.

The City Demon Hunting Squad had originally been full, but the results Jiang Yuan and Mo Fan had achieved on their missions were simply too remarkable.

To outsiders, it looked as though Xu Dahang's squad had nearly cleared away more than half of Bocheng's demon-related incidents.

In truth, only the squad members themselves knew that more than ninety percent of the credit belonged to Jiang Yuan and Mo Fan.

The two of them tirelessly accepted missions, and their strength was extraordinarily formidable. They had yet to fail a single time.

Thus, the impartial Xu Dahang had considered letting Jiang Yuan form a Demon Hunting Squad of his own, and he said nothing about Zhang Xiaohou joining.

He simply treated Zhang Xiaohou as one of Jiang Yuan's future squad members.

"I need your help with something," Jiang Yuan said.

"What kind of help? Just say it. We're brothers, aren't we?" Mo Fan said, thumping his chest.

Jiang Yuan gathered his thoughts. "I want to carry out a sweep through Bocheng."

"What kind of sweep? Don't tell me you mean sweeping out demons?" Mo Fan asked in surprise.

Sweeping out the demons hiding throughout the city would definitely be a difficult, massive undertaking.

"Not entirely. Hear me out first." Jiang Yuan shook his head and continued explaining. "You should know that the demons inside the city all emerge from underground. Their exits are either sewers or holes they dug themselves, and they're extremely well-hidden."

"Mo Fan, you've seen one of those holes before. Last time we went to the cafeteria at Xin Xia's School, that was the hole the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat crawled out of."

"Mm-hm." Mo Fan nodded, while Zhang Xiaohou looked completely lost.

Even now, they had no idea what Jiang Yuan wanted to sweep through.

Jiang Yuan did not beat around the bush any longer. "By sweep, I mean finding as many holes in the city as possible where demons might emerge, then recording all of them."

"Then, once we're strong enough, we can find an opportunity to destroy all those holes. Demons won't appear in Bocheng anymore."

The reasoning was sound, but there was still something Mo Fan did not understand.

"Then why don't we destroy them now?"

"It's simple. With our current strength, we can't eradicate them completely. Even if we seal them up, the demons will dig new holes elsewhere, and those will be much harder to find."

"For now, it's better to locate the holes and monitor all of them. That will greatly reduce casualties."

With Jiang Yuan's explanation, Mo Fan and Zhang Xiaohou understood.

"I didn't expect your awareness to be this high, Jiang Yuan. You're already thinking about how to eliminate future threats to our Bocheng," Mo Fan said with a smile.

If you knew what would happen to Bocheng in the future, you would have the same awareness.

Jiang Yuan did not voice his thoughts.

The Bocheng Disaster had always been a regret for people like Mo Fan and Zhang Xiaohou, who had survived Bocheng.

Jiang Yuan had made this plan eight years ago.

When he devised it eight years ago, it was to spare Mo Fan and the others the pain brought by the disaster.

Now, he himself had lived in Bocheng for a full eight years and had long since grown attached to the place.

Therefore, this plan was also to protect the city where he had lived for eight years.

Mo Fan suddenly remembered something and asked, "I remember you started recording the coordinates of those holes a long time ago, right?"

Jiang Yuan nodded. "I did, but I've only covered about one-third of Bocheng. Doing this alone is far too slow, so I came to ask you two for help."

"Oh, then no problem. But you'll have to pay me," Mo Fan said with a grin.

"Brother Fan, why are you asking for payment?" Zhang Xiaohou said to Jiang Yuan, "Brother Yuan, I don't need payment. Just teach me some magic experience."

"Get lost, get lost." Mo Fan shoved Zhang Xiaohou aside. "I was joking. Why did you take it seriously? What kind of payment do brothers need? Jiang Yuan, don't go teaching Xiaohou and leave me out."

Mo Fan desperately wanted Jiang Yuan to teach him how to connect his Star Track.

For so long, Jiang Yuan's Star Track connection speed had always been many times faster than his. Some time ago, Jiang Yuan had even achieved One thought star track.

One thought star track!

He had specifically gone to the library to look it up. One thought star track was actually a casting speed that only high-level mages could possibly comprehend.

Yet Jiang Yuan had learned it at the Beginner level. It was simply outrageous!

I'm so jealous!

"No problem. I've gained quite a few insights into magic recently. Once we finish recording all the coordinates, I'll teach you everything I know," Jiang Yuan promised. In truth, he had no intention of holding anything back.

A large part of his strength came from his Innate Talent, while only a small part came from the experience he had summarized through his solid foundation in magical theory.

After the three of them planned where to search for the holes, they began their ground-scraping search.

Days passed one after another.

The facts proved that Jiang Yuan had been thinking too simply.

There were simply too many holes throughout Bocheng, and they were far too well-hidden.

They had originally searched for holes outside the area Jiang Yuan had recorded, only to find that the density of holes within the same area was nearly one-sixth higher than expected.

When they went back to search again, they discovered that some extremely hidden holes in the original area had been overlooked.

No wonder so many demons had appeared throughout the city during the Bocheng Disaster, with demons emerging from everywhere.

There were simply too many holes.

While searching for them, they also encountered Giant-eyed Stinky Rats, One-eyed Magic Wolves, and some demons that were not even Servant level lurking within.

The three of them dealt with them along the way.

Had they not discovered them first, many people would likely have disappeared in secret.

And so, the three of them spent far more time than expected.

They searched from the first quarter of their senior year all the way to the end of the second quarter before finally finishing.

"Ah!"

"It's finally over!"

At Jiang Yuan's home, Mo Fan threw back his head and let out a long howl, seemingly shouting out all the exhaustion that had accumulated over this period.

"Yeah, Brother Fan!!!" Zhang Xiaohou shouted as well.

It had truly been exhausting.

Other than when they were meditating, they were either searching for holes or on the way to search for holes.

Seeing this, Jiang Yuan smiled and comforted them. "Exhausting as it was, our magical cultivation improved quickly too. It still counted as a form of training."

"You're not wrong." Mo Fan lay comfortably on the bed and closed his eyes, seemingly sensing his magical stardust.

There were many ways to increase one's cultivation speed.

Using combat to stimulate it was one of them.

Mo Fan's Fire element stardust had reached level three more than three months ago. Its size had also expanded to the limit, and it could break through to the intermediate level at any moment.

Originally, he would only have reached level three on the eve of his duel with Yu Ang, but now he had done so more than three months early!

His Lightning element stardust had also reached level three.

Zhang Xiaohou's Wind element stardust had reached level three a few days ago.