Chapter 23

In a random area in the Spirit Ascension Platform, Huang Yu was standing in a sea of snake corpses as he was covered with snake blood.

His breath was slightly heavy from the exertion of using the King's Wisdom. He didn't have a powerful large area of range attack at the moment so it took quite a bit of them to dispatch those snakes.

A whirlpool of energy surrounded him as they were slowly absorbed into the spirit ringl he had assimilated inside his body.

He noticed something familiar about how the energy was nourishing his singular spirit ring. It seemed rather similar to how he healed himself with vital energy.

Hence, a thought made itself into Huang Yu's mind: Could vital energy age his spirit ring?

If it could, this was actually a massive breakthrough in the spiritual cultivation department. Although his main level of strength was independent from that side of cultivation, the power that could be gotten if he aged his spirit rings to a high enough level was not negligible.

Huang Yu summoned his white spirit ring that had been increasing rather quickly in age. In fact, the moment it was summoned, it broke through to reach the 100+ year old level, turning it yellow.

This was attributed to the fact that it had faced up against so many higher level spirit beasts that were also snakes.

Before trying out his experiment, Huang Yu's third eye glowed lightly as the light began bending around him, creating the illusion that he was trying to regain strength at the moment.

He formed a bit of vital energy in exchange for a small portion of his stamina. Then, he tried to send it to the spirit ring.

The sides of Huang Yu's lips curled upwards as he felt the sensations he was feeling from doing this.

Although it wasn't much, not even being able to increase the age of his spirit ring by a year, there was still an increment.

Ideas ran through Huang Yu's mind as he found out about this method of using vital energy.

If he used the vital energy that he made on his known, he could roughly calculate that it would be far too inefficient to age his spirit ring(s) this way.

However, what if he could take the vital energy from someone else to do so?

To take it a step further, what if he could use the vital energy from millions of people to do so?

From experimenting with Guang Biao, Huang Yu had found out that there was an amount of vital energy that could be taken from a person without harming them.

As long as he didn't take too much and harm the person's vitality, that small amount of vital energy would recover with time.

Now what would be the best way to gather so much vital energy then?

Guang Biao called him king right? Maybe he could make a kingdom?

Nah, to take vital energy without harming people, it has to be taken willingly.

In that case, how about a cult? Since cults had super fanatical people who were willing to lay down everything for it.

Maybe that could work. He would come up with the specifics with Guang Biao later.

Huang Yu retracted his spirit ring and stopped creating an illusion around himself via light. As he was about to leave the area he had done a massacre in, he heard the sound of birds.

Turning his head up, he was greeted by a flock of large, green birds. He could tell that their attentions were all on him with hints of… hunger in their eyes?

Well that's ok. Although he was a bit tired and they had an aerial advantage, they weren't a threat to him.

His senses suddenly warned him as he jumped out of the way of a strike that had been coming from his back.

When Huang Yu looked at his assailant, he found that it was a 100+ year old Man Faced Demon Spider.

Huang Yu was confused when he saw this. If the Man Faced Demon Spider was here, it had to mean that this was its territory. Yet why were there those snakes and bird beasts here? There was no way they would have migrated here out of fear of the Man Faced Demon Spider.

He would leave the thinking for later. For now, he had to take down the adversaries in front and above him.

It would be a bit challenging to beat them in his current condition but he still had the decisive advantage over them.

As he prepared to strike first, he was surprised when the Man Faced Demon Spider outright charged at him. This wasn't its original attack pattern!

Well that saved him a lot of time.

Activating Godspeed, he easily dodged the strike from one of the Man Faced Demon Spider's legs before moving to behind it.

Readying a move that could instantly defeat the Man Faced Demon Spider that was wide open, Huang Yu was forced to dodge as a bunch of the large, green birds flew down to try and… rip a bite off his body?

Wasn't this spirit beast supposed to harass with it's claws?

With a swing of his blade, the lives of the birds that had attacked him came to an end. However, the birds seemed not to care for their lives as they barraged at him, trying to rip him to shreds with their beaks.

At this time, the Man Faced Demon Spider also came to add on to the pressure on him.

As he slashed and swung his blade masterfully, he noticed the madness in their eyes. It was rather similar to Tang Wulin's eyes when he attacked him at the Class Promotion Tournament.

Huang Yu's eyes narrowed as he ripped through the spirit beasts like a hurricane of flesh and steel. Since spirit beasts exhibited traits like these towards him, did this mean that Tang Wulin was also a spirit beast?

His thought process was cut off when he heard wolf growls. With a sigh, he turned around to see a pack of Green Wolves.

Well, this would be challenging, but it wasn't impossible to win here.

A large visage of a ginormous bear suddenly appeared. Huang Yu grimaced as he saw this beast.

Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear!

This beast also had the same madness in its eyes. It was only now that Huang Yu could identify that the madness stemmed from hunger.

What the fuck?! Was this how Tang Sanzang felt when he kept getting besieged by beasts in Journey to the West?

Knowing this, Huang Yu sighed.

He had no choice now. Although he had a trump card that could instantly wipe out all the beasts here, it would create a lot of questions for the people watching outside the spirit ascension platform if he used it.

Hence, he had to employ his other secret technique—

Nigerundayo!

He blasted off from his spot with Godspeed still active.

What? Did you expect him to actually fight against all of them?

At the moment, without his final trump card, he was strong enough to have a good fight against the Duskgold Dreadclaw Bear when he was at his best.

How the hell would he win this battle when he was tired and facing a number of other beasts that were strong in their own right?

The only reason he didn't just eject himself from this place right now was because he wanted to fully absorb the energy he got from killing so many beasts.

His spirit ring was 400+ years old now. If he could have a bit more time, it would evolve into a 1000+ year ring which was unprecedented for a nine-year-old.

Although the other beasts were extremely agile, how could they compare with Huang Yu who was using Godspeed?

He easily outpaced them and left them in the dust.

Running through the forest, he eventually found Gu Yue who was being chased by a Crystal Bear.

When he came in range of them, the Crystal Bear shifted its aggro from Gu Yue to Huang Yu.

'Fuck' Huang Yu thought grimly.

When Gu Yue saw Huang Yu, her eyes widened. "Wha—"

[Inertia] + [High Frequency Vibrations]

She was cut off as Huang Yu instantly severed the head of the Crystal Bear from its body.

Gu Yue was left dumbfounded seeing this. Although she told herself that she wouldn't be surprised by Huang Yu's feats, she found him doing so time and time again. It was vexing for her.

During her momentary lapse of concentration, a layer of brilliant yellow light erupted from the headless body of the Crystal Bear.

Huang Yu tsked before jumping towards her and pulling her into a princess carry. With a jump, he got out of the radius of the Crystal Bear's last struggle.

Finally, Huang Yu ran out of steam. The third eye on his forehead forcefully closed itself as the King's Wisdom became unavailable to him.

He dropped to his knees, letting go of Gu Yue in his arms as he did so.

Gu Yue was dropped haphazardly to the floor. She winced before turning to him with a frown on her face. She opened her mouth but immediately closed them again when she saw his pale face.

"Are you alright? If you can't handle it anymore, just press the escape button." Gu Yue asked worriedly. No matter what had happened between them recently, the two of them were quite close friends.

Huang Yu gave a tired smile. "I'm fine. Just a bit tired from fighting a few beasts."

Gu Yue clearly wasn't convinced but she didn't continue to ask since Huang Yu didn't say anything more.

"Can you protect me for a bit? I need a bit of time to absorb the energy." Huang Yu asked innocently. However, in reality, he was testing her.

He had been trying to mend their relationship, however, he was slightly suspicious of her after the situation with Tang Wulin.

If she chose not to protect him, although it wouldn't be concrete proof, her reactions could provide him a few clues.

Gu Yue sighed. "Fine. We'll have more chances to come here later so I can protect you this time. However, I expect you to do the same for me."

Her answer was unexpected to Huang Yu, leaving him quite surprised. He had been quite sure that she would refuse.

Did this mean she didn't know about what was going on with him?

Or maybe she had realised something and was playing mind games with him?

Questions, questions.

Nonetheless, that answer had actually soothed his anxiousness a bit. He truly hoped that his friend wouldn't betray him.

Huang Yu's smile brightened. "Thanks!"