In that brief hour, everyone on the Douluo Continent truly witnessed what it meant to possess wealth rivaling a nation.
On the street ahead, Lin Jing walked with light steps, taking whatever caught her eye.
She stopped before a stall selling ancient, incomplete arrays. Simply because she liked the patterns on a broken Array Disc, she casually tossed out a crystal radiating five-colored light.
The stallholder trembled with excitement at the sight of the crystal and nearly dropped to his knees to kowtow on the spot.
Passing a lavishly decorated pill pavilion, Lin Jing went inside and emerged less than half an incense stick later, carrying several jade bottles filled with high-grade spiritual pills.
When paying, she did not even blink, casually tossing a few more drops of that spiritual liquid containing terrifying energy onto the counter.
This almost extravagant way of shopping left not only Dai Mubai, but also countless Douluo viewers outside the Sky Screen, watching with parched mouths.
Inside the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect.
Ning Fengzhi, reputed to be the Douluo Continent's greatest tycoon, stared dumbfounded at the little cloth pouch swaying at Lin Jing's waist.
"Just how much wealth does that tiny pouch contain...?"
Ning Fengzhi swallowed, his vaunted composure utterly vanishing at that moment.
"If the energy in a single drop of liquid she casually takes out could be absorbed, it would probably be enough to produce ten Titled Douluos!"
"Compared with hers, the wealth our Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect has accumulated over centuries probably doesn't amount to even a hair off nine oxen."
Hearing his sect master's lament, Bone Douluo Gu Rong sucked in a cold breath, though a trace of doubt flashed through his deeply sunken eyes.
"But Sect Master, this makes no sense."
Gu Rong frowned, carefully studying Lin Jing in the Sky Screen.
"An innocent man invites guilt by possessing jade. In this Great Thousand World, even roadside wolves can kill Soul Masters instantly. It's clearly a place where the strong devour the weak to the extreme."
"This little girl gives off no powerful energy fluctuations, yet she dares parade through a bustling market carrying such staggering wealth."
"But not a single merchant or passerby around her dares harbor any thought of robbing her?"
Spirit City, the Pope's Hall.
Bibi Dong sat upright on her throne, a cold sneer likewise appearing on her face.
"That stupid tiger probably doesn't even know how to spell death."
She turned her head slightly toward the Spirit Hall elders below, who were watching the Sky Screen.
"Why do you think a flock of wolves would leave a sheep covered in gold completely untouched when she walks among them, and even treat her with the utmost respect?"
Chrysanthemum Douluo Yue Guan bowed slightly below, his soft, feminine voice carrying a measure of gravity.
"Your Holiness, there is only one possibility."
"This sheep is either a dragon wearing sheep's clothing, or..."
"The wolves know that the shepherd behind this sheep is a supreme being they aren't even qualified to look up to."
Hearing this, Bibi Dong nodded in agreement.
"Exactly."
"The people of the Great Thousand World aren't fools. Yet Dai Mubai, whose brain contains nothing but muscles and women, wants to sidle up and take liberties with someone even they dare not touch."
"He's simply seeking his own death."
Yet there were always people in this world willing to blind themselves and believe only what they wished to believe.
Inside Shrek Academy.
Listening to the increasingly changing tone of the teachers' discussions around him, Yu Xiaogang could not help snorting coldly.
He still stood with his hands behind his back, adopting the air of the sole sober man in a world of drunks.
"You're worrying too much."
Yu Xiaogang pointed confidently at the Sky Screen.
"In a Higher-Dimensional World like this, the more prosperous an ancient city is, the stricter its laws and rules."
"Those merchants don't dare rob her because attacking within the city would bring punishment from the city guards."
"This little girl is probably a rebellious heiress who sneaked out of some great clan, stealing from its treasury to squander outside."
"Mubai only needs to follow patiently until she leaves the bustling market and reaches somewhere unrestrained by rules."
"With Mubai's strength as a rank thirty-seven Soul Elder and his White Tiger Martial Soul, wouldn't capturing her be as easy as reaching out his hand?"
Hearing Grandmaster's analysis, Tang San nodded in deep agreement.
Indeed, how could there be so many peerless experts pretending to be pigs to eat tigers in this world?
But for some reason, he kept feeling that something was a little off.
Meanwhile, in the Great Thousand World.
Dai Mubai naturally knew nothing of those arguments on the Douluo Continent.
By now, his eyes had grown somewhat red and bloodshot.
Every treasure Lin Jing casually tossed out caught him off guard.
"If I could get that Universe Bag..."
Dai Mubai panted heavily, his sinister double pupils fixed on Lin Jing's slender waist, too delicate to fill a hand, and the exquisite little cloth pouch hanging there.
"With those resources, why would I need the Star Luo throne?"
"I could even establish an empire larger than Spirit Hall!"
"And this little girl is so fresh and lovely. If I could have her writhing beneath me, offering her pleasure..."
Lust clouded judgment.
Greed and desire completely devoured Dai Mubai's reason.
He followed her the whole way, patiently waiting for an opportunity.
Finally, Lin Jing seemed to tire of browsing those noisy stalls.
She turned, cradling the sleeping Void Thunder Cat, and leisurely rounded a corner into a secluded bluestone alley, humming an unfamiliar, lilting tune.
As the two ventured deeper, the surrounding clamor gradually faded.
A tranquil grove of purple bamboo appeared ahead. A breeze brushed through, rustling the leaves with a secluded serenity cut off from the world.
Seeing this deserted setting, Dai Mubai was wild with joy.
"Even heaven is helping me!"
No longer concealing his movements, he surged with Soul Power and blocked Lin Jing's path in a few bounds.
"Miss Jing, where might you be going?"
Dai Mubai stood at the entrance to the Purple Bamboo Forest, a sinister smile curling his lips.
Lin Jing stopped.
There was not the slightest panic in her clear eyes. She merely tilted her head slightly and sighed helplessly.
"Uncle, you're really annoying."
"You've followed me all this way. Aren't you tired?"
Exposed so directly, Dai Mubai dropped the pretense.
He sneered, and a series of explosive cracks rang from his bones.
"White Tiger, possess me!"
With a low tiger's roar, Dai Mubai's golden hair instantly turned black and white, and the character for "king" appeared on his forehead.
His hands became sharp tiger claws, his muscles bulged, and three Soul Rings-yellow, yellow, and purple-slowly rose beneath his feet.
"Since you refuse the offered wine and insist on drinking punishment, you can't blame me."
Dai Mubai narrowed his sinister eyes, sweeping his gaze brazenly over Lin Jing.
"Hand over that bag at your waist, then obediently serve me. If you please this prince well, I might let you live."
"Otherwise, out here in the wilderness, no one will come to save you even if you scream your throat raw."
Faced with such naked threats, many commoners on the Douluo Continent had already closed their eyes, unable to bear watching what came next.
Yet Lin Jing merely watched Dai Mubai release his Martial Soul as though watching a monkey show, even covering her little mouth to give a dainty yawn.
"Scream my throat raw?"
Lin Jing blinked, seemingly finding the phrase interesting.
Just as Dai Mubai thought the girl had been scared witless and prepared to seize her belongings.
A man's voice, tinged with languor and mockery, suddenly drifted from a pavilion deep in the Purple Bamboo Forest.
"Little Jing, I sent you into the city to buy a few pots of good wine."
"Why were you gone so long, and why did you pick up a sick cat with ringworm on the way back?"
The unexpected voice made Dai Mubai stiffen.
He abruptly turned, his gaze passing through the sparse purple bamboo leaves and landing inside the secluded pavilion.
Two figures sat casually inside.
The man on the left wore luxurious dark purple robes. His features were devilishly handsome, and his brow held a wicked charm and domineering air enough to rob heaven and earth of their color.
A white jade game piece rested between two slender fingers, and he looked over with a faint, ambiguous smile.
Opposite him sat a man built as powerfully as an iron tower.
This man had wild red hair like burning flames. Even just sitting there, he made the surrounding air faintly distort, like an ancient volcano ready to erupt at any moment.
These two were the Martial Realm's second and third leaders, who had fought their way up from a Lower Plane alongside Martial Ancestor Lin Dong, shaking the Great Thousand World and establishing a supremely fearsome reputation.
Marten Venerable, Lin Diao!
Flame Venerable, Lin Yan!
But at that moment, Dai Mubai had no idea what heaven-destroying, earth-shattering beings those two seated men actually were.
He probed them and found that neither gave off the slightest fluctuation of Soul Power, as though they were two utterly ordinary mortals.
That trace of wariness in his heart consequently vanished like smoke.
"Where did you clueless fools come from, daring to meddle in the Star Luo Empire's affairs?"
Dai Mubai snorted coldly. The purple Soul Ring beneath his feet abruptly lit up, and blades several inches long extended from his tiger claws.
Then he raised his chin and arrogantly pointed at Lin Diao and Lin Yan in the pavilion.
"I've taken a fancy to this woman, and I'm taking everything she has, too."
"If you know what's good for you, you two old fools will get out of here!"
"If you displease this prince, I won't mind tearing you to pieces to fertilize this bamboo forest!"
As his words fell, the Purple Bamboo Forest, through which a breeze had been blowing, suddenly went still.
Even the temperature of the air dropped by an unknown amount.
Inside the pavilion, Lin Diao's hand holding the game piece paused slightly.
He tilted his head, glanced at Lin Yan pouring wine into his mouth opposite him, and could not help chuckling.
"Second Brother, this feels familiar."
"How many years has it been since anyone dared speak to us like this, back in the Eastern Xuan Region?"
Hearing Lin Diao's soft chuckle, tinged with nostalgia.
Lin Yan, sitting opposite him, set down his wine gourd and wiped the wine from the corner of his mouth with his broad palm.
"The Eastern Xuan Region..."
"Second Brother, now that's a name from long ago."
Lin Yan grinned, revealing a mouthful of white teeth.
Then he slowly turned his head, fixing his gaze on the arrogant Dai Mubai outside the pavilion.
More precisely, it fell on the black-and-white White Tiger Phantom behind Dai Mubai.
"Big Brother, I didn't quite catch that."
Lin Yan raised his eyebrows and pointed at Dai Mubai, his tone full of oddness.
"Did this bug that crawled out of who knows where say that his whatever-it-is Martial Soul is a White Tiger?"
Lin Diao gently waved the Folding Fan in his hand and nodded with an ambiguous smile.
"That's what he said."
"Ah, after spending so long in this Great Thousand World, every stray cat and dog dares call itself a tiger."
Lin Yan shook his head helplessly, then slowly rose from his stone stool.
The instant he stood up.
Although not the slightest Spiritual Energy leaked out, the air throughout the Purple Bamboo Forest seemed to have been sucked dry.
An indescribably heavy pressure descended out of nowhere.
Outside the pavilion, Dai Mubai suddenly felt his breath catch, as though an invisible mountain were pressing against his chest.
But his laughable scrap of pride would not allow him to back down before Lin Jing.
"Old fools, putting on a supernatural act!"
Dai Mubai gritted his teeth, a vicious gleam flashing through his sinister double pupils.
"Since you insist on spitting on the face I've offered you, die!"
"Second Soul Skill, White Tiger Fierce Light Wave!"
Dai Mubai shouted, and the second yellow Hundred-Year Soul Ring beneath his feet abruptly flared.
He opened his mouth, and a dazzling sphere of white light rapidly condensed inside.
With a tiger's roar, the sphere tore through the air with a shrill whistle, blasting straight toward Lin Diao and Lin Yan inside the pavilion!
Meanwhile, on the Douluo Continent.
Inside Shrek Academy, many students could not help cheering at the sight.
"Boss Dai's White Tiger Fierce Light Wave is amazingly powerful! Even a defensive Soul Master of the same rank wouldn't dare take it head-on!"
Yu Xiaogang nodded slightly as well, a trace of approval flashing through his eyes.
"Mubai is very clever."
"He noticed those two had an extraordinary bearing, so he chose to probe them with a ranged Soul Skill instead of fighting at close quarters."
"Even if they really are hidden experts, at this distance, Mubai has plenty of time to retreat or defend."
"Advance to attack, retreat to defend-that is the essence of a Soul Master's combat."
Listening to Grandmaster's analysis, Flender, Tang San, and the others secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
It seemed that as long as they kept their heads, the people of the Great Thousand World were no invincible gods.
Yet what happened next on the Sky Screen nearly made them cough up a mouthful of blood.
The White Tiger Fierce Light Wave charged into the pavilion's bounds with an air of destruction.
But faced with such an attack, Lin Diao remained seated, toying with a chess piece without so much as a glance at it.
And Lin Yan, who had risen to his feet, did not even raise a hand.
He merely looked at the ball of white light hurtling toward him, then blew a breath with a somewhat bored air.
"Whoosh."
It was this light, airy breath, like one used to blow dust off a table, that made contact with the White Tiger Fierce Light Wave.
"Crack!"
The wave of light containing all of Dai Mubai's Soul Power actually shattered on the spot, dissolving into tiny specks of light that filled the sky!
"What?!"
At this sight, the arrogance on Dai Mubai's face instantly froze.
His eyes widened into perfect circles, his face filled with disbelief.
The full-powered strike of a distinguished level-thirty-seven Battle Soul Elder like me had actually been blown away by a single breath from him?
How was that possible!
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