A Year and a Half (Dear readers, please vote, invest, and keep reading!!)

The Snake-People Tribe wanted to migrate because the Tagor Desert truly was not suitable for their survival.

For one thing, the Snake-People Tribe had cold constitutions, while the Tagor Desert was scorching like a giant furnace. Whether for their physical condition or cultivation, it brought them nothing but harm.

When a warrior's level was low, the effects of the environment were especially obvious. Yao Lao had once said that the Tagor Desert was suitable for fire-element warriors like Xiao Yan to cultivate in. In contrast, for cold-element warriors like the Snake-People Tribe, it was not only unsuitable but even suppressive.

Secondly, the Snake-People Tribe's development was limited. The Tagor Desert was desert terrain, and deserts lacked vegetation. There were not many medicinal herbs to be found, and the variety of magical beasts was far less dense than in the Magical Beast Forest. Thus, it was even harder for the Snake-People Tribe to restore its former foundation.

Moreover, the Snake-People Tribe dragged long tails behind them, making their appearance highly conspicuous. They were not good at dealing with people, and the medicinal herbs and magic cores they gathered were often swindled away by human merchants from outside the Jia Ma Empire at extremely low prices. Their efforts and returns were far from equal.

Yet even after suffering losses, they could not completely fall out with those merchants. After all, the Tagor Desert had limited varieties of resources, and they still needed trade to obtain medicinal herbs and magic cores unavailable in the Tagor Desert. So they could only continue swallowing these losses.

Amid a series of clinking bells, a train of Sand Camel Magical Beasts slowly entered the Snake-People Tribe Holy City.

It looked more like a merchant caravan, except there was only one person in it: the youth leading the way, with a rein in his hand.

The Sand Camels behind him were linked head to tail by the reins, so there was no need to worry about them getting lost in a sandstorm.

The person leading them did not drag a long tail like the snake-people. Instead, he walked on two feet like a human.

Upon entering the Holy City, the youth at the front pulled off the robe draped over him, exposing his fair upper body. He casually tossed the robe onto a Sand Camel's back and could not help grumbling about the damned scorching weather.

Then he rubbed his bald head. Fortunately, without hair, he felt quite a bit cooler.

"Brat, did everything go smoothly this time?"

"You didn't get fleeced by those damned humans outside, did you?"

Along the way, quite a few snake-people smiled as they asked and teased him. Mo Yun answered them all with a smile, and their relationship seemed quite familiar.

The issue of the surrounding environment restricting the Snake-People Tribe's cultivation would likely only be resolved if the entire tribe migrated.

However, there had been fresh progress in the Snake-People Tribe's resource development.

More precisely, half a year after Mo Yun joined the Snake-People Tribe, the Four Great Elders proposed that Mo Yun take charge of external resource trading.

Although it was Mo Yun's first time learning about material trading and the market prices of medicinal herbs and magic cores, after studying them, the profits from every trade he made outside increased by fifty percent over the original amount!

It was not that Mo Yun had an exceptional head for business. The truth was that the prices the Snake-People Tribe had previously received when trading with humans had simply been pushed far too low.

Put simply, it was the result of racial discrimination.

The Snake-People Tribe discriminated against humans, and humans likewise discriminated against the Snake-People Tribe. So when Mo Yun replaced the Snake-People Tribe in external trade, although the prices were still on the low side, they were much higher than the prices offered to snake-people. Thus, over the following year, resource trading fell into Mo Yun's hands.

Mo Yun could now bring tangible benefits to the Snake-People Tribe, so he was naturally accepted by its members more quickly and formed good relationships with many of them.

Although he bore the heavy responsibility of external resource trading, with the Teng Snake Cultivation Method, Mo Yun's cultivation had not fallen behind by much. In a year and a half, his strength had risen from a five-star Great Dou Shi to a one-star Dou Ling.

And so, inevitably, he went bald again!

After shedding his skin, his new skin became even fairer and softer, and it would not be harmed by the scorching sunlight. Even if he went bare-chested in the Tagor Desert, he would not get sunburned.

Aside from the increase in strength, after his repeated trips outside, Mo Yun had finally gathered a complete D-grade ape set.

After replacing and transplanting it, Mo Yun's strength would drop back to the level of a Great Dou Shi.

The panel after the replacement.

Host Information.

Name: Mo Yun

Gender: Male

Age: 14

Realm: Four-Star Great Dou Shi (+1)

Head: Azure Snake Three-Blossom Pupil, C-Grade Growth Type (Snake Python Enhancement 2/4)

Torso: Mount Tai Ape Torso, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Left Limb: Blizzard Demon Ape Left Limb, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Right Limb: Golden Monkey Right Limb, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Left Leg: White Baboon Left Leg, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Right Leg: Macaque Right Leg, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Skin: Hairy-Faced Short-Tailed Monkey Fur, D-Grade (Ape Enhancement 6/6)

Outer Body: Outer Body Black Snake Eight Wings, C+ Grade (Snake Python Enhancement 2/4)

Skills:

1. Berserk, D-Grade: Burst skill. Raises all physical condition by 10% for 3 minutes!

2. Spirit Drive, S-Grade: Exclusive skill of the Azure Snake Three-Blossom Pupil. Can enslave and command enemies through soul power. Its effectiveness depends on the host's soul power. Spirit Drive is 500% more effective against snake-type magical beasts.

3. Flight, C-Grade: Special skill. Grants the ability to fly and increases speed by 20%.

4. Ape Enhancement 3/6: Speed increased by 55% (highest bonus applies; cannot stack repeatedly).

5. Ape Enhancement 4/6: Speed increased by 75% (highest bonus applies; cannot stack repeatedly).

6. Ape Enhancement 5/6: Realm strength increased by 1 star.

7. Ape Enhancement 6/6: Indestructible Diamond Body. No matter how much or how powerful the damage received within 5 seconds, no injury will be sustained (24-hour cooldown).

Mo Yun had not replaced his only two C-grade body parts—the C-grade growth-type Azure Snake Three-Blossom Pupil and the C+ Grade Outer Body Black Snake Eight Wings. Therefore, his overall strength had not dropped below the level of a Great Dou Shi into the ranks of a Dou Shi, which was still within Mo Yun's acceptable range.

Furthermore, replacing and transplanting this set of magical beast body parts only required a thought from Mo Yun, and the replacement time was so short it could be ignored.

That was equivalent to gaining another means of preserving his life!

Upon reaching the Holy City's treasury, Mo Yun handed all the money and goods he had traded for to the Fourth Elder.

As Mo Yun went out to trade time and again, the Fourth Elder's expression toward him grew better and better, though the wrinkles twisting across his face when he smiled still looked ugly as hell.

In truth, after Mo Yun reached the Dou Ling realm, the Second Elder and Third Elder's attitudes toward him had also improved considerably. From time to time, they would greet him with smiling faces. Their smiles were no less ugly than the Fourth Elder's, but earning the favor of Dou Huang bigshots was still a good thing in the end.

As for the Great Elder, that old fellow seemed never to have treated him badly in the first place.

As for the entire Snake-People Tribe, Mo Yun was not sure about the tribes outside the Holy City. But within the Holy City, from the Four Great Elders down to ordinary snake-people, everyone's attitude toward him was changing for the better.

The only exception was probably Medusa Queen. Mo Yun had no idea what was wrong with that woman, but her attitude toward him kept getting worse. Now that his cultivation had reached the Dou Ling realm, surpassing even her personal guard, it would have been one thing for her not to show him a pleasant face.

But every time he returned from an external trade with a full load, he had contributed to the Snake-People Tribe, right? Yet the expression she gave him only became worse. The better he performed, the less pleasant she was toward him!

Maybe she had issues during her period, but it had been a year and a half already. Could it be that snake-people stayed pregnant for several years, and their periods were especially long too?

I should find time to ask Hua She Er. I wonder if she'll beat me up?

Just as he was leaving, the Fourth Elder stopped Mo Yun. "Go back and rest well. The Great Elder wants to see you tomorrow!"

After saying that, he revealed an ugly, strangely sinister smile...