Breaking Free of the Tail, Setting Sail

What let Jing Chen breathe a little easier was that he encountered no obstruction when leaving the city.

The city guards must have been notified too. Jing Chen keenly noticed the strange looks from the city gate guards.

Compared with before, their gazes carried an unnecessary degree of attention. Shrek Academy had likely instructed them to keep watch on his comings and goings.

After leaving the city, Jing Chen ran toward the Star Dou Great Forest, intending to use the forest to shake off his followers.

"Why is this kid heading in that direction?" One of the two middle-aged men following Jing Chen asked.

They had kept nearly a thousand meters between themselves and Jing Chen. After following him for a while, they had more or less figured out where he was going.

Within the city, there were plenty of obstructions, so they had not kept such a great distance from Jing Chen.

"I can't make sense of this kid's actions either. His strength may be decent, but going alone to the Star Dou Great Forest—isn't that courting death?" the other man said.

"According to what the Academy learned from the city gate guards, this kid seems to leave the city often. Sometimes he returns after just a few days, sometimes after half a month or even a month."

"Could it be that he goes to the Star Dou Great Forest every time he leaves?"

The entirety of Shrek City belonged to Shrek Academy, so it was relatively easy for them to obtain information within the city.

For instance, after Shrek Academy's dean, Yan Shaozhe, ordered an investigation into information related to Jing Chen,

records of his entries and exits from the city had been compiled into documents and delivered to Yan Shaozhe within a few hours, then passed on to these two trackers.

The moment those words were spoken, both men froze. They looked at each other and saw surprise and delight in the other's eyes.

"I'm actually curious what this kid wants to do in the Star Dou Great Forest," one of them said, his curiosity piqued.

The other nodded, equally intrigued. This tracking mission was going to be interesting.

Both men were professionally trained trackers. In this open terrain with few obstructions, they followed him with great care.

They were also confident, convinced that a child like Jing Chen could never possibly notice them.

Little did they know that Jing Chen had discovered them shortly after they began following him in the city.

He could already detect them sharply in that environment, let alone in this open terrain.

Especially since it was only dusk, and the sky was not yet dark enough to hinder his senses. It was truly difficult not to notice them.

I hope you lose me, Jing Chen thought. That outcome would be better for both them and himself.

Otherwise, if they kept following him, he would have to consider being more ruthless and dealing with them directly.

That would offend Shrek Academy, but there was no helping it. If he was left with no other choice, he would have to do it.

Even if he killed the two men and disguised their deaths as the work of soul beasts, it would still bring trouble.

It was not as though people would believe whatever you disguised something as. They had brains and would consider every possibility.

By the time Jing Chen arrived outside the Star Dou Great Forest, night had fallen.

Jing Chen entered the forest with practiced ease. He had come here so many times that it almost felt like returning home.

Less than a minute after he entered, the two trackers followed him into the forest at a faster pace.

They had reached the forest now. The trees were dense and the terrain complicated, so they had to keep closer.

"Where did that kid go?" After entering the forest, the two quickly searched around, but neither found any trace of Jing Chen.

"Let's split up and look. He couldn't have gotten far in such a short time. Send a signal once you find him," one of them said.

The signal he meant was a relatively weak soul tool signal that could be received through a device.

"Alright." The two split up and searched in different directions.

An hour later, they met up again. Neither looked pleased, and the moment they met, they both shook their heads.

"Did this kid vanish into thin air or something? Otherwise, how could he have left no trace at all?" one of them said irritably.

The other was in just as foul a mood. He secretly swore that if he found that kid, he would show himself and give him a hard spanking. This was infuriating.

After grumbling for a while, the two began discussing what to do next.

"Let's head back first. It's not as though we absolutely have to keep track of this kid this time. Since we lost him, let's just leave it at that."

"This kid must come to the Star Dou Great Forest often, and he makes it back alive every time. The next time we follow him, we need to be more careful."

After reaching an agreement, the two headed toward the edge of the forest, discussing where Jing Chen could have gone along the way.

No matter how hard they thought, they could not understand how they had lost him. They were intensely curious about Jing Chen's whereabouts.

How could they have imagined that they had passed by Jing Chen several times at close range?

The instant Jing Chen entered the forest, he had sprinted at full speed before entering the Time and Space Divine Tower.

The Time and Space Divine Tower was no bigger than a grain of sand and had landed in a patch of dirt beside a tree root. There was no way those two could have found him.

The place where the two discussed leaving was far from the Time and Space Divine Tower, so Jing Chen still did not know they had already departed.

He was still leisurely staying within the Time and Space Divine Tower, preparing dinner and conducting research, intending to come out the next morning.

If he came out and, through bad luck, was spotted by those two again, then there would be no helping it. They would have to die.

The next day, Jing Chen emerged from the Time and Space Divine Tower and slowly walked out of the forest, carefully sensing his surroundings along the way.

After close observation, he found no one following him. That allowed him to relax. It seemed he had shaken those two off.

After leaving the forest, Jing Chen headed north before turning northeast, his destination being the sea in the northeastern part of the continent.

A few days later, Jing Chen successfully arrived at the northeastern coast of the continent, near the Far North.

Since this sea lay close to the Far North Icefield, its waters were relatively cold, with temperatures only in the single digits.

Floating chunks of ice could occasionally be seen on the sea's surface, while a pale white haze hung overhead, caused by frost mist that never dispersed.

After arriving, Jing Chen took out a single-person boat he had purchased in a nearby city the day before.

The boat was just over two meters long and nearly a meter wide. It could be propelled by Soul Power and required no oars.

This time, Jing Chen planned to take Yi Yi a thousand kilometers out to sea in order to test Yi Yi's combat ability in the ocean.

In waters near the shore, Yi Yi had performed well in battle. This had already been proven when Jing Chen obtained his second soul ring.

What he needed to determine now was whether Yi Yi could perform just as well in the deep sea.

Relying on this one-person boat, Jing Chen began his first voyage at sea, with no specific destination in mind.

The core reason he dared set out in such a small boat was the Time and Space Divine Tower. When necessary, he could enter it along with the boat, minimizing the chance of the boat being destroyed.

Of course, even if this boat broke, he had a second one. For this voyage, he had prepared three boats alone.

Second chapter of the day. The new book is setting sail—please bookmark it and vote with recommendation tickets.