King and Savages

Outside the Dark Room, Liu Sishan leaned against the wall, holding the badge as she nervously waited for the result.

She waited for an entire hour.

Suddenly, the pearl on the badge glowed faintly, and then the old man's voice came through. "Sisi?"

"Captain, I'm here," Liu Sishan immediately replied.

The old man said, "From now on, Sisi, you and Manny will be responsible for protecting Zhang Ping in secret. The intelligence he provided is extremely important. As for whether he can be trusted, you will judge that for yourself. Bingbing will monitor your mental state. If anything goes wrong with it, I will order Jin Bo to forcibly remove you from Mingzhu City."

"Also... cooperate with Zhang Ping and determine the identities of every Heavenly Fox as thoroughly as possible."

"Captain, then what is Zhang Ping's status now?" Liu Sishan asked.

The old man answered, "The situation in Mingzhu City is still unclear. Although Zhang Ping has provided crucial intelligence, we cannot guarantee that this isn't a trap set by the enemy. For now, he will be considered an important informant. If this matter is resolved smoothly, we will arrange a separate reward."

"Understood." Liu Sishan nodded.

After ending the communication, Liu Sishan put away the badge and returned to the Dark Room.

The restraints on Zhang Ping instantly came undone. He stretched his limbs and asked, "Has it been verified?"

"Yes. But we can't determine whether your discovery of the Heavenly Foxes is a trap deliberately set by them, so sorry for the trouble, but you can only serve as an informant. Other than providing the locations of the Heavenly Foxes, we won't have further contact for now," Liu Sishan said with a nod.

Zhang Ping had no complaints about this outcome.

He had never intended to obtain anything from Liu Sishan or the organization behind her. As long as the Heavenly Foxes in the city were dealt with, with his abilities, he would eventually have everything he wanted. Why bother taking a roundabout path?

He wanted nothing, so it made no difference to him.

"For the next while, I'll protect you from the shadows. If you discover anything, you can contact me at night," Liu Sishan added.

Zhang Ping smiled. "Protection and surveillance? I understand. Don't worry, I'll cooperate with you properly. As long as we can deal with the Heavenly Foxes, everything is negotiable."

"Thank you for understanding." Liu Sishan relaxed slightly.

She had thought Zhang Ping would be angry over it. After all, most young people would be unhappy to learn they were being watched, perhaps even fly into a rage.

Zhang Ping's reasonableness gave her a much more favorable impression of him.

"However, I have a question. I hope you can answer it," Zhang Ping said then.

Liu Sishan pondered briefly before agreeing. "If I can answer it, I'll tell you everything I know."

"Why can't the High-Level Awakened in the city see through the disguises of low-level Heavenly Foxes?" Zhang Ping asked directly.

This was something he had never been able to figure out.

High-Level Awakened possessed a certain degree of resistance to the abilities of low-level Awakened and Mutated Beasts. Therefore, opponents of each rank generally only matched opponents of the corresponding rank.

Generally speaking, a high-level awakened one's rival had to be another high-level awakened one. It could not be a mid-level awakened one or a top-level awakened one.

The former was too weak and unworthy of being an opponent, while the latter was too strong and beyond one's qualifications as an opponent.

"We actually discovered this long ago. According to the captain's speculation, a King Tier Mutated Beast is very likely lurking within Mingzhu City," Liu Sishan answered.

Zhang Ping's eyes widened at once. "King Tier? You're not joking, are you?"

As far as he knew, there were no King Tier Awakened among humanity. If a King Tier Mutated Beast with intelligence no less than a human's had invaded Mingzhu City, what could humanity use to stop it?

"I knew you would doubt it, but King Tier truly exists. After becoming a top-level awakened one..." Liu Sishan thought Zhang Ping was shocked that King Tier was not merely a legend, so she began explaining.

However, Zhang Ping interrupted her halfway through. "No, there's no issue with King Tier existing. I only want to know whether we humans have any Kings."

"No. Even the captain is only a top-level awakened one." Liu Sishan was briefly stunned before answering.

Zhang Ping frowned. "Soldiers against soldiers, generals against generals. So even if I find the Heavenly Fox King hiding in Mingzhu City, what will you use to fight it?"

"You don't need to consider that question. What you need to think about is how to find all the Heavenly Foxes, while we will be responsible for eliminating them." Liu Sishan frowned. In truth, she was not certain either. The captain had not told her what they would do once they found it.

However, because of her usual trust in the captain, she did not question his decision.

Zhang Ping fell silent for a moment before speaking again. "So High-Level Awakened can't detect low-level Mutated Beasts because a King Tier Mutated Beast has influenced them?"

"The greatest difference between Mutated Beasts and human Awakened is that Mutated Beasts possess racial innate skills. Once a King appears among a species of Mutated Beasts, the racial innate skills of all Mutated Beasts of that same species within a certain range around the King will be strengthened by it.

"Generally, such strengthening can raise them by only one Level at most. But psychic types are an exception. Unless one's Mental Strength exceeds that of the King, it is difficult to see through the illusions, distorted consciousness, and distorted common sense created by psychic abilities," Liu Sishan explained.

Zhang Ping frowned. "Wouldn't psychic Mutated Beasts become invincible once a King appeared among them?"

One King appearing was equivalent to a whole group of Kings appearing. That was far too unreasonable.

"Not necessarily. Psychic types are like this because their abilities themselves do not harm their targets. Once they actively attack an awakened one of a higher rank than themselves, their abilities may be seen through," Liu Sishan said, shaking her head.

Zhang Ping said thoughtfully, "So the stronger someone is, the less likely they are to be attacked by Heavenly Foxes."

"Not necessarily. If the Patrol Team has truly been completely replaced by Heavenly Foxes, then the Patrol Team's chief, Lin Kedi, has definitely already met with foul play, and Lin Kedi is a top-level awakened one," Liu Sishan said.

Zhang Ping took a deep breath and stood up. "All right, no more questions for now. I'll ask you again if I have any. How do I get out of here?"

"All right. I'll contact you tonight." Liu Sishan nodded.

The next moment, Zhang Ping felt a force pulling him forward. In an instant, his entire body rose off the ground, and in the blink of an eye, he passed through a pitch-black passage and returned to the small park.

He blinked, then lowered his head to look at the ground. The ground was still just ground, revealing absolutely nothing unusual.

A superpower?

Zhang Ping thought for a moment and formed a guess.

The Dark Room itself was probably a space created by a superpower, while the entire small park contained special passages leading into it.

He returned to Iron Soul, climbed in through the window, and sat on his bed as he reflected on what he had gained that night.

First, his safety now had at least a slight measure of protection.

Although Liu Sishan's protection also included an element of surveillance, he had done nothing shameful, so naturally he was not afraid of being watched.

Second, through Liu Sishan, he could pass intelligence to the organization behind her and let that organization handle the hunting of the Heavenly Foxes.

Finally, he had at last figured out the general outline of the enemy they currently faced.

"King Tier."

Zhang Ping sighed softly. The strongest member of the organization behind Liu Sishan was probably only a top-level awakened one.

Although he did not know what trump card they possessed, he could not shake the feeling that it was not reliable enough.

Not enough firepower.

Since their side had no King, it would be best to gather hundreds or thousands of Top-Tier Awakened to surround and kill the enemy King.

The next day.

Zhang Ping got up as usual and continued practicing the Dough-Kneading Forging Technique under Liu Tiefeng's supervision.

Unless a craft had a corresponding superpower to assist it, it could only be mastered through practice after practice, until the technique reached a level comparable to a superpower.

That was not an easy thing to do.

Zhang Ping discovered that the dough-kneading exercises of the Dough-Kneading Forging Technique offered many benefits. His hands became more sensitive to materials, and the kneading motions required him to exert force throughout his entire body. The training effect was no less than doing push-ups.

He could learn a skill and train his body at the same time, so why not?

Moreover, while kneading dough, he could divide his attention and continue deepening his control over the Fire Element within his body. It was simply killing three birds with one stone.

Once the kneading practice was over.

Zhang Ping continued learning how to distinguish various materials and understand their uses.

The materials room on the third floor was piled with all sorts of strange materials. Some were ores, some were plants, and the greatest number were body parts from Mutated Beasts.

This time, Liu Tiefeng took out a dog-paw-shaped material and said, "This material comes from a Mutated Beast known as a Corpse-Eating Hound. Mingzhu City practices cremation, so there are no Corpse-Eating Hounds nearby. But there are still many villages outside Mingzhu City. Some villages still follow ancient traditions and use burial, and Corpse-Eating Hounds may be lurking in such places."

"There are villages outside Mingzhu City?" Zhang Ping asked in surprise.

He had always thought Mingzhu City was a lone city surrounded by ten thousand li of uninhabited wilderness.

"Heh, of course there are. Those villages are often isolated, backward, and hostile to outsiders. Many even worship Mutated Beasts as gods. If you encounter a village while traveling in the wild in the future, you'd best avoid it directly. Don't let them capture you and turn you into a slave or a sacrifice," Liu Tiefeng said slowly as he smoked.

Zhang Ping pondered this and analyzed, "So most people living in those villages can be regarded as enemies?"

"Heh, they can't even be considered human. Adventurers like to call them savages. Sometimes, out in the wilderness, the most dangerous things aren't Mutated Beasts, but these savages. If you become an adventurer, the older hands will generally tell you these things." A trace of mockery appeared on Liu Tiefeng's wrinkled face.

There had once been naive Awakened who tried to communicate with the savages in those villages. The result was that they became sacrifices, while even the companions who tried to rescue them died at the hands of those savages.

The savages' customs and habits were entirely different from those of the civilized people in Mingzhu City.

They had their own set of behavioral logic. In their eyes, outsiders did not count as human at all.

"All right, enough of that digression. Let's continue with Corpse-Eating Hounds. The claws of Corpse-Eating Hounds naturally possess an earth-countering property. This property cannot be smelted, so it must be ground into powder and poured into the mold together with fire oil while the weapon is cooling. That way, you can create a weapon with a certain restraining effect against earth-element energy." Liu Tiefeng tossed the Corpse-Eating Hound's claw to Zhang Ping as he continued.

After saying that, he tossed the Corpse-Eating Hound's claw to Zhang Ping.