Ancient Sea Oasis, Family Business

The Ancient Sea Oasis stretched for hundreds of kilometers in every direction. At its heart lay an enormous lake simply called the Ancient Sea — and it was from that lake the oasis had taken its name.

Sandy Rock City baked under a merciless sun. The heat was oppressive, the air thick and stifling. But the moment Lu Yuan passed through the oasis's edge, the temperature dropped noticeably. Towering trees rose from the earth — ten meters, a hundred, some reaching several hundred meters into the sky — their dense canopies filtering out the sun and casting cool patches of shade across the forest floor. Shrubs and wild grass crowded the ground between them. There were no paths here. The only way forward was to cut one through the undergrowth.

Approaching the oasis, Lu Yuan spotted clusters of small wooden stalls already assembled along its edge — traders with a head for business, setting up shop where the foot traffic was heaviest. The impromptu market was somewhat larger than the one at the Sandy Rock Underground Palace entrance. Gene Warriors moved through it in the thousands, some organizing hunting parties for the interior, others buying raw materials or selling Gene Armaments. Merchants with an eye for opportunity never passed up a crowd.

Lu Yuan didn't linger. He walked past the vendors' calls — the same chorus he'd heard at the Palace entrance — and pushed into the oasis.

He'd barely covered any ground, cutting through thorny shrubs with his heavy sword, when a sharp rustling burst from the undergrowth ahead.

He turned.

In the distance crouched a creature unlike anything he'd encountered in the desert: a serpentine thing, its entire body sheathed in white chitin, its face grotesque, its frame long and sinuous as a snake. From its forehead jutted a row of sharp reverse-barbed spines.

*Ancient Sea Spine Worm.*

Before he could take another step, the surrounding brush erupted. Dozens of the creatures poured out — then the sky went dark.

Their forehead spines launched like massed arrow fire, a blizzard of projectiles blotting out the light above him, too dense to dodge, too many to track. Lu Yuan's pupils contracted.

*Ding ding ding!*

The spines hammered into his Desert Ambush Battle Armor and his Black Iron Body, a rapid-fire cascade of crisp impacts. He felt little more than faint pressure — like someone brushing him with their fingertips.

He charged in, expression blank.

*Thwick!*

A sweeping stroke of the heavy sword cut through a spine worm's neck, severing it cleanly in two. The head hit the ground; the body thrashed and writhed.

The other spine worms shrieked at the sight.

Lu Yuan was already moving to the next one. One sword, one kill.

He cut through them without slowing down, expressionless, spine after spine clattering off his armor and skin. When the survivors broke and fled in every direction, he ran down several more before the rest vanished entirely into the undergrowth.

He began collecting his spoils. The thirty-odd kills had dropped around six Spirit Crystals each — roughly 180 total. He also harvested the spines from their foreheads, five to seven per worm, bringing in close to 200. Combined with the Spirit Crystals, a single wave had netted him nearly 400.

*Earning Spirit Crystals here really is too easy,* he thought, pressing deeper into the oasis.

Ancient Sea Spine Worms were pack hunters by nature — they appeared in continuous waves, one group rolling in after another, and were among the most common Feral Beasts the oasis had to offer. The interior held far more besides: Ancient Sea Giant Wolves, Ancient Sea Giant Pythons, Sand Crocodiles, spine worms, a host of creatures in substantial variety. All of them ran at 50% tempering or above. The Gene Warriors who hunted here were among the strongest Sandy Rock City had to offer. Sandy Rock Underground Palace had never been this dangerous.

*No wonder this is one of the city's most hazardous zones.*

Lu Yuan hunted with methodical efficiency, working through the interior of the oasis. When the Feral Beasts gave him a lull, he turned his attention to Black Steel Force.

The gains it offered were too significant to leave unattended. Over these days of hunting, steady work on its first level had begun to bear fruit — he could now channel roughly thirty percent of its full power.

Thirty percent might sound modest. But even thirty percent of Black Steel Force's first level was comparable to a weak ordinary Combat Technique. In practical terms, it gave Lu Yuan the effective equivalent of an extra Assault Type technique — a meaningful jump in combat capability compared to any other Gene Warrior at his stage.

After he'd cleared his twentieth-odd spine worm of the day, a faint sound reached him from the nearby brush.

Three figures stepped out from behind the shrubs where he'd been fighting: Elf warriors, slender-limbed and quick, moving with the unhurried confidence of experienced hunters. They'd been watching.

"That human's defense is incredible," one said quietly. "The spine worm swarm was like a massage for him."

"Where was he operating before? Yellow Sand Canyon? Blade Edge Gobi? Why'd he suddenly turn up here?"

"With strength like that, if he'd been working this area before, we'd know his name. He must be new."

"Who knows? Tell the others — don't provoke him. No point inviting trouble."

With that, the three moved off with practiced speed, leaping through the canopy and vanishing into the deeper oasis.

On the afternoon of the third day, Lu Yuan was still drilling Black Steel Force techniques in the Land of Origin when the Light Gate pulsed and restored itself. He stepped through, returned to the real world of the Ancient Sea Oasis, and headed for Wild Wolf Materials.

Xue Wang looked up as Lu Yuan dumped his haul onto the floor.

The man's eyes went wide.

"Holy — spine worm spines?! Ancient Sea Giant Wolf hides and fangs, Ancient Sea Jungle Python hides?!" He stared. "Lu Yuan, are you at the Ancient Sea Oasis right now??"

Lu Yuan smiled. "Something wrong?"

"Something wrong?!" Xue Wang looked like he might vibrate out of his chair. "Something *massively* wrong! How fast are you even improving?! You haven't even been Awakened for a month and you're already operating in the Ancient Sea Oasis — and doing *this* well?! Are you absolutely certain you're not some major family's heir?"

"I told you. Ordinary person."

Xue Wang shook his head slowly. "You are unhinged. Oh — also. I saw a post recently about a ruin that appeared at Sandy Rock Underground Palace in Sandy Rock City. I saw your name on it. Was that you?"

Lu Yuan nodded. "Yeah. Small harvest."

Xue Wang's expression turned wistful. "Ah. That's a shame — that Moonstone Spirit Dew apparently works as an additive in gene reagents, decent potency too. If you'd sold it, you could've made good money."

"Used it all up. That's the only reason I could improve this fast."

Xue Wang perked up immediately. "Still have any Moonstone Spirit Dew left? I'll buy it."

"Used it all."

"Done calculating? How much?"

"Woof woof woof! You jerk! Cold-hearted man!" Xue Wang announced. "Materials are excellent this time — two million, three hundred seventeen thousand, three hundred twenty-six yuan. Not a single yuan short!"

The transfer notification arrived. Lu Yuan allowed himself a small smile.

"Why are you always in such a rush?" Xue Wang folded his arms. "Don't you want to sit and chat? We're this close now. We're basically friends."

"I'm busy."

"Tch."

"Alright. I'll come find you next time."

Xue Wang gave him the finger. Lu Yuan walked out without a change in expression.

He'd barely stepped outside when a black hover-car rolled to a stop along the street.

He noticed the emblem on the car door — a snarling dog's head, rendered in jagged, fierce lines. Looked familiar, somehow.

The door opened. Three men stepped out: black suits, black sunglasses, moving with the quiet precision of professionals. They gave Lu Yuan a single indifferent glance and walked past him into Wild Wolf Materials.

Lu Yuan paused, glancing back at the shop entrance. *Should I go see what's going on?*

The answer came before the thought finished.

*BOOM.*

Something hit hard inside Wild Wolf Materials. A moment later, one of the suited men came sailing backwards through the entrance and crashed to the ground.

The other two emerged immediately after, moving fast — hauling their heavily injured companion between them. They loaded him into the hover-car without a word and drove away.

Lu Yuan stared at the doorway for a moment, then looked at Wild Wolf Materials and shook his head.

From things Xue Wang had let slip in past conversations, the man appeared to be his family's young master of some kind. Those men had come for something connected to that.

*Since it's family business,* he thought, *I'd better stay out of it.*

He walked away.

He returned to the Land of Origin.

This session, he spent seven full days inside — one more than his previous stay. The Black Steel Force drills continued until the Light Gate cycled again, and he stepped back out into the real world.

In the days that followed, he hunted continuously through the Ancient Sea Oasis. The daily Spirit Crystal income far exceeded anything he'd managed at Sandy Rock Underground Palace — close to five thousand per day, in both variety and volume. Whatever he didn't spend on cultivation or keep in reserve as Spirit Power, he fed directly into the Evolution Cube.