chapter 11

Wang Jianxin understood that Zhang Lie fully intended to sever the relationship between them, and that objecting would only repulse him further. 

"Zhang Lie, this is my fault, so if you insist on buying the property, something like five hundred thousand will be more than sufficient. I know how difficult it is for you to make money, and Hanxiang will have quite a few expenses ahead, so consider the rest a sponsorship on my behalf."

"Thank you, Uncle Wang, but I still can't accept your generosity. I'll figure out a way to eke out a living for both me and Hanxiang. Please, sign!" Zhang Lie once again rebuffed Uncle Wang's offer and handed him the contract and black card.

Wang Jianxin frowned, criticized Wang Xiaohua, and "reluctantly" accepted the card and signed the contract. With this new contract in place, the old rental agreement was naturally invalidated.

Zhang Lie's part in the matter would be finished as soon as he handed over the contract to his lawyer. And from then on, that rundown property in the slums would belong entirely to the two of them.

Of course, this was only the beginning. Given Zhang Lie's abilities and growth potential, he swore he would bring his sister into the special-class—or even royal-class—residential areas. They would have more and more properties, and even a dojo of their own.

When the contract was finally signed, Zhang Lie huffed a sigh of relief. "Uncle Wang, regardless of your actual intentions, thank you." He bowed respectfully, then briskly turned to leave. From start to finish, he never looked at Wang Xiaohua again.

Only when Zhang Lie had vanished around the corner did Wang Jianxin pull Wang Xiaohua back into the manor. "Xiaohua, you were far too impulsive—now look at what you've done!"

Wang Xiaohua still looked a little aggrieved. "And yet you still hit me twice, Dad, just to put on a show for that piece of trash!  I really don't understand why you're so polite to an idiot with a  crippled sister. Why?!"

Wang Jianxin folded his arms in front of his chest. "You don't understand how wily their father is. Given how much treasure he amassed before going missing, it's quite possible that he left something for his children. What's more, haven't you always claimed that Zhang Lie was at the bottom of the gene leaderboard, that he's nothing but a weakling? In that case, where did he get all this money?"

Wang Jianxin held the black card up in front of his daughter.

Wang Xiaohua was equally flummoxed. Given Zhang Lie's appearance and living conditions, he certainly didn't look like the type of person who would be able to pull out two million dollars on a whim.

"I'm surprised too, Dad. He spent three months only killing white grubs, so how did he get so much money in a matter of days? But don't worry, as long as he's still in the Blacksteel settlement, I'll have an answer for you quickly enough." 

Wang Xiaohua's eyes glinted. In her mind, Zhang Lie was like a stinkbug that she could crush with her shoe.

Wang Jianxin advised her, "Don't do anything to him—he doesn't look as easy to handle as you think."

"Don't worry, Dad! No matter how tricky he is, he's a total weakling." Wang Xiaohua grabbed the black card from her father, smiling. "I'm going shopping!"

"Newsflash! At 10 AM today, another monarch-class hunter has risen from the ranks of humanity. Congratulations to Yan Tianjun, the ninth monarch-class hunter of humanity, soon to be heading toward the fifth realm!"

Zhang Hanxiang had just pulled up an article when she noticed Zhang Lie returning. "Brother, you're back!"

"Mm." Zhang Lie put down the bags of food in his hands and responded distractedly. He was completely focused on the Chinese man currently being interviewed by reporters on the news.

"A newly birthed monarch-class trying to enter the fifth realm without any disaster-grade gene fragments... is he trying to kill himself?"

A true monarch-class hunter was one who had reached his disaster-grade gene capacity in the fourth realm before heading to the fifth. 

Monarch-level hunters were incredibly dangerous hunters who were able to damage the very skies with their attacks, and humanity shouldn't have had more than three true monarchs at this point in time.

He had deliberately lowered his voice to avoid being overheard by his sister, but he hadn't accounted for how sharp her ears were. Zhang Hanxiang asked curiously, "Brother, why do you say that monarch-class hunters shouldn't enter the fifth realm?"

"Many people know about the fourth realm: the final battlefield between mankind and genetic lifeforms. But do you know about the fifth realm?"

Zhang Hanxiang shook her head. "I'm not a fifth-realm god-class hunter, so how would I know what it contains?"

"Hell!"

Zhang Hanxiang was stupefied. "Isn't information about the fifth realm restricted by the world federation? How do you know about it, Brother?"

Zhang Lie rolled his eyes at her. "After all, I'm a hunter myself. Isn't it normal that I would know a little about this sort of stuff? The information's only restricted for regular citizens, not hunters."

In truth, most hunters knew nothing about the fifth realm, not even lord-class hunters who were about to ascend to the fourth realm. At this point in time, there surely weren't more than a hundred hunters in the fourth realm.

As soon as people started to understand the horrors of the fifth realm, perhaps no one would be willing to ascend. And without an influx of hunters as reinforcements, those monarch-class and god-class hunters who had advanced to the fifth realm would surely all perish.

Their death would represent the start of a new dark age for humanity: now too weak to protect themselves, humans would quickly be enslaved by more powerful aliens.

Zhang Lie knew about the fifth realm because he was once a fourth-realm hunter.

It was thought that monarch-class hunters would be able to stand against an onslaught of disaster-grade lifeforms. In hindsight, however, no force of humanity was yet strong enough to kill such creatures in bulk.

Hunters were only able to hunt disaster-grade lifeforms in earnest as the result of a series of remarkable inventions and discoveries over the next decade.

However, just because other hunters weren't able to do so didn't mean that Zhang Lie couldn't.  He murmured to himself, "Since I've come back in time, I'll certainly prevent the tragedy of mankind this time around."

Hanxiang smiled as she prodded her brother. "What are you mumbling to yourself, Brother?"

"It's nothing. Let's eat, and then I'll have to head out again."

Zhang Hanxiang pursed her lips. "Ah, right—did Uncle Wang agree to sell us the house?"

"Of course! Nothing would ever fail with your brother in charge!"

"Really? That's wonderful!"

"Haha, we have a house now! This house is purely ours!"

Zhang Hanxiang's tinkling laughter resounded in the small house.

After having an enjoyable lunch with his sister, Zhang Lie again returned to the settlement. The first thing he did was browse through the trading post. The five potbellied-toad soulshards had all been auctioned off as he had indicated, and he had earned a huge profit.

The main currency used within the settlement wasn't federation money, but instead the points that could be obtained by trading in the meat and flesh of genetic lifeforms.The five soulshards alone had brought him 13,000 points.

While fighting the potbellied toads, Zhang Lie had found himself lacking a multi-target skill, lowering his hunting efficiency significantly, and he hoped to rectify that deficiency now. 

Unfortunately, even after an exhaustive search, he had found quite a number of suitable fire-attuned techniques, but no water-attuned ones. Either the techniques themselves were lacking, or they weren't suitable for Zhang Lie's hunting style.

Since he couldn't find a suitable water-attuned technique, he would let them come to him instead. Moments later, he posted a new request on the trading post offering ten thousand points for a high-grade multi-target water-attuned technique.

Of course, he still anonymized himself; Zhang Lie didn't want to be noticed just yet.

Finally, he walked out of the settlement, preparing to return to the Bloodcrystal Valley to continue gathering blood whiskers.

Just like last time, however, he found himself surrounded by people once again: none other than Wang Xiaohua and her team, and now even her boyfriend, Qin Xiaotian, and his team as well. A dozen people encircled Zhang Lie.

A large crowd had gathered by the settlement gates, watching the commotion.

"Oho, it looks like there's no way out for our poor king of the dumps this time."

"Wang Xiaohua's a tricky hunter to antagonize, after all."

"Who's second-to-last on the gene leaderboard? He must be feeling pretty upset right now."

"Ha, he's already last! Zhang Lie hid his ranking on the gene leaderboard about a month ago."

"Eh? Who was the one who said that Zhang Lie was actually hiding his strength? Look at him now!"

Ignoring the crowd, Zhang Lie focused on Wang Xiaohua. "Wang Xiaohua, do you really have nothing better to do?"

"Ah! Xiaotian, look at how rude this fellow is!" Wang Xiaohua, as if shocked, grabbed the young man by her side coyly.

Qin Xiaotian smirked, then turned to Zhang Lie with a look of disdain. "So, you're Zhang Lie? Xiaohua told me you've been bullying her lately. How'd you get your strength? Some fortuitous encounter? Tell me and I'll give you a clean death!"

Qin Xiaotian was the younger cousin of Qin Xiao, currently third on the gene leaderboard. He was handsome in a boyish way, but was notorious for being small-minded and petty. Because of his cousin's strength as a hunter, there were few who dared to challenge him.

In truth, Zhang Lie didn't want to start a feud with him at this juncture, but there was little he could do now. Based on his ranking on the gene leaderboard, Qin Xiaotian had surely filled his mutated gene fragments to capacity, and Qin Xiao would surely have helped him get a few superior gene fragments too.

And his framework was, at this point, only comparable to a mortal-grade framework. The only advantage that he had over Qin Xiaotian was his superior-grade soulshard. Perhaps that would be sufficient to deal with Qin Xiaotian, but what about all his lackeys?

Zhang Lie couldn't take them all head-on. In that case, he had to avoid a direct confrontation—"Hah, you think I'll lose to you so easily? Try me on, you pieces of trash!"—but that didn't mean he had to suffer their insults without retaliation.