Jingliu and the Men in Black

"This is the food street. It has the best grilled soul beast skewers on the entire continent, and iceberry juice airlifted from the north. It's sweet, sour, refreshing, and thirst-quenching."

Meng Hongchen spoke as she joined a queue.

"That's the milk tea shop. It's made with fruit and soul beast milk, and they have more than a dozen flavors. My favorite is iced blueberry milk tea."

"There's also a place for street performances. Did you see how amazing they were? They aren't even soul masters."

Xu Tianming followed her around for a while, experiencing both the prosperity and liveliness of Mingdu.

He rarely went out before this. He had never visited a place like this even once, since he was the typical stay-at-home sort.

The streets were packed with people. Hawking cries, laughter, and music blended together, while the air was filled with the scent of food and the humming of active soul tools.

Meng Hongchen took them to watch films recorded by soul tools.

This was a form of entertainment unique to the Sun Moon Empire. Special soul tools were used to record images, which were then played through projection soul tools. It was much like the movies Xu Tianming had known in his previous life.

Films featuring soul masters and soul beasts were especially popular with the public.

After all, most people would never become soul masters in their lives, nor could they witness soul master battles firsthand. They could only rely on these films to satisfy their yearning for soul masters.

Meng Hongchen clearly loved such films, especially the romantic scenes. She watched with complete absorption, sighing from time to time.

"So romantic."

"The male lead is so handsome."

"The heroine is so happy."

Xu Tianming sat beside her, watching the screen with a calm expression.

The novels and films of Douluo Continent were vastly different from those he had seen in his previous life. They mainly depicted soul master cultivation, combat, and adventures, with a few emotional storylines woven in.

But Meng Hongchen clearly preferred romance. At such a young age, she was already interested in love and relationships.

Xu Tianming silently complained to himself but did not say it aloud.

Besides films, Mingdu's streets also had quite a few soul tool mini-games.

In Xu Tianming's eyes, these games were crudely made. They merely used soul tools to simulate simple scenarios, letting players use soul tool controllers to interact and attack.

But for outsiders and soul masters, such things were rarely seen, so they were extremely popular.

Xu Tianzhen played to her heart's content. She controlled a soul tool controller and sent one soul beast after another flying across the screen. Every time she knocked one away, a crisp notification sounded.

"Watch me!"

"This thing is mine!"

"Haha, I won again."

Xu Tianzhen was having such a great time that, if Xu Tianming had not dragged her away, she would have played all day.

In contrast, Ye Guyi was much quieter.

She did not enjoy films or novels, nor was she interested in soul tool mini-games.

What interested Ye Guyi most was the Soul Fighting Arena.

She pulled Xu Tianming to the nearest Soul Fighting Arena to watch the duels between soul masters and soul engineers inside.

Soul engineers fought in a manner completely different from ordinary soul masters. They mainly relied on soul tools. During battle, offensive, defensive, and support soul tools took the stage one after another, turning the fight into a dazzling exhibition of machinery.

Ye Guyi watched attentively, her emerald eyes fixed on the soul engineers in the arena as she occasionally offered her observations in a low voice.

"Soul tools are excellent, but they also place high demands on their users."

"When an opponent closes in for melee combat, soul engineers are at a disadvantage."

Xu Tianming nodded without saying anything further.

He knew what Ye Guyi was thinking. She was considering how to deal with opponents like soul engineers.

In the Sun Moon Empire, soul engineers were the primary fighting force. Understanding their combat methods would only benefit their future development.

Like Xu Tianming, Xiao Hongchen preferred cultivation and researching soul tools over shopping, watching movies, or playing games.

After walking half a street, he found a quiet place to sit down. He took out a metal fragment from his storage soul tool pouch and began engraving it with soul power.

Fortunately, this world had storage soul tools. Otherwise, Xu Tianming and Xiao Hongchen would probably have had to work as porters.

After all, girls being naturally inclined toward shopping was no exception even on Douluo Continent.

Meng Hongchen and Xu Tianzhen walked together from one end of the street to the other, holding all sorts of snacks and treats, their faces filled with satisfaction.

Time passed quickly, and in the blink of an eye, evening arrived.

The setting sun slowly descended, dyeing all of Mingdu gold and red as Xu Tianming's group walked down the streets toward home.

As they reached the edge of the noble district, a cold, sinister fluctuation of soul power suddenly came from nearby.

The fluctuation was extremely faint. Ordinary soul masters would not have sensed it at all, but Xu Tianming noticed that something was off.

He stopped and frowned.

"What is it?"

Xu Tianzhen noticed his unusual behavior and asked.

"There's something going on over there."

Xu Tianming pointed toward an alley within the noble district.

Meng Hongchen and Xiao Hongchen also sensed the fluctuation, their expressions changing slightly. Ye Guyi instinctively clenched her fists, feeling some repulsion toward that cold, sinister aura.

The group exchanged glances and headed into the alley without a word.

At the end of the alley stood a medium-sized baron's residence.

The residence gates stood open. Several corpses of men in black lay scattered across the ground before them, their bodies covered in a thin layer of ice, already transformed into ice sculptures.

Beside the ice sculptures stood a figure with silvery-white hair.

It was Jingliu.

She held an ice-blue longsword in her hand, its blade still emanating a chill as her silvery-white hair drifted in the wind.

A little girl stood beside her. She had red hair and looked about eight years old, her face streaked with tears as she glared hatefully at several men in black before her.

Those men in black had not yet fallen.

They wore black robes, their faces hidden beneath hoods. Each had Soul Rings emerging around them. Two possessed six Soul Rings, while the rest were five-ringed Soul Kings.

They charged at Jingliu simultaneously.

Jingliu's silver hair stirred without wind, followed by a burst of frigid air.

Before they could even approach, the bodies of those men in black were covered in frost. They swiftly turned into ice sculptures, frozen in place in their charging poses.

From beginning to end, Jingliu had not moved.

Xiao Hongchen's eyes widened.

There were two Soul Emperor-level experts, along with several Soul Kings, and they had all been killed in an instant...?

At that moment, Consecrator Liu came to Xu Tianming's side, looking extremely tense as he lowered his voice. "Your Highness, that person is extremely dangerous. We should leave quickly."