He had handed it over.
He had laid everything bare.
Now it was time to get things done!
"Do we have a deal? Agree now and I'll throw in a gift. Otherwise, I'm leaving," Xu Yuan said.
"What gift?" Ming He asked.
"A property in the Mortal Realm! Yours free!" Xu Yuan said.
Ming He looked at him as though he had lost his mind.
"I was joking. Let's be serious now. You want the Crown's power, don't you?" Xu Yuan said.
"And if I do?" Ming He asked.
"You must want that power for something. So let me say this: if we work together, I can help with whatever you're trying to do," Xu Yuan said.
This time, Ming He fell silent.
She seemed to be weighing something.
Xu Yuan did not interrupt. He stood to one side and waited quietly.
"Come with me," Ming He said.
"All right."
They teleported to the Flesh Castle.
Ming He led him through the hall, the Banquet Hall, corridor after corridor, stairways and rooms, until they reached the castle's deepest chamber.
It was a tiny room containing nothing but an egg set on an Altar.
The egg was green and about the size of a basketball.
A powerful stench seeped from its shell.
"...It's been dead a long time."
Xu Yuan spoke.
"If you can restore it to how it was before, we have a deal. Otherwise, there's nothing to discuss," Ming He said.
Xu Yuan stepped forward, placed a hand on the egg, and asked:
"Roughly when was it still alive?"
"Ten years ago," Ming He said.
"Ten years...?"
"Yes."
Xu Yuan sucked in a sharp breath.
An egg that had been dead for ten years could still stink.
That was some egg.
"Can you do it or not?" Ming He