A World Worth Protecting

The crowd wasn’t only shocked by the fact that Wang Baole had just refined supreme-grade Spirit Illusory Liquid, they were also shocked by how short a time it took him to accomplish it… the entire refinement process took but thirty counts!

The latter in itself would have blown anyone’s mind. But he hadn’t only managed to complete the refinement within a short period, he had managed to refine supreme-grade Spirit Illusory Liquid!

The feat had overthrown everything they had known about refinement. Amidst their incredulity, they had forgotten about Li Chen’s presence and gasped aloud in shock.

Li Chen himself was placed in a rough spot of embarrassment. He was equally shocked as well. He too might have been able to refine Spirit Illusory Liquid with only a ten percent wastage, but he would’ve taken three days.

Long Nanzi, on the other hand, had managed to accomplish the feat within seconds. The level of their foundational abilities was worlds apart!

That was a hard pill to swallow and a burn to his pride. He found it hard to control his rage and humiliation. Before he could say anything though, Wang Baole shook his head.

“I’m still unfamiliar with this since it’s my first time doing it. That’s why I had ten percent wastage…” He sighed, appearing dissatisfied with his results. With a wave of his right hand, Wang Baole flung the Spirit Illusory Liquid to Li Chen. What others treated as precious, he seemed to treat as mere trash. Then, without sparing Li Chen a glance, he found an unoccupied chamber in a deserted area and went over.

Wang Baole’s words were like a divine power, landing a direct hit on Li Chen. It was an attack that inflicted collateral damage, no one around him was spared. The area descended into sudden silence.

People parted as Wang Baole walked towards them. It was as if they were in the presence of a deity. They stepped back with utmost deference and cleared a path for Wang Baole. They had witnessed his refinement and heard his words, and he seemed to exude the aura of a mighty cultivator, a presence that everyone could sense distinctly, one that was immensely powerful.

Wang Baole disappeared as he entered the chamber, but the public square remained steeped in silence. It was a while before the sound of breathing was heard. As for Li Chen… his chest was heaving heavily, his face pale one moment and dark the next. He finally lifted his head and started yelling at everyone around him.

“What are you all doing? Get back to work!

“Someone, take this Illusory Theft Pillar… to Senior Brother Long Nanzi!”

“This Fallen Star Compass, and that Phoenix Feather, and that Stone Ink Beast… send them all to Senior Brother Long Nanzi!” Li Chen said with a thunderous look on his face. Exploiting his authority, he chose more than thirty components that were clearly the most challenging to repair and got them all sent over to Wang Baole. He thought viciously, So, you’re great at this, aren’t you? Fine, let’s see whether you can repair these components then!

Everyone lowered their heads and went about carrying out the orders given. No one appeared to have any opinions about what was going on. In their view, this was a fight between two powerful cultivators and not something they should be involved in. They followed their orders and took the materials, as well as the Dharmic Artifacts requiring repair, to Wang Baole’s chamber.

Other cultivators would have been extremely unhappy when faced with such bullying. Such repairs were considered part of their work and wouldn’t earn any additional rewards. After all, additional rewards were only given for repairs done for components identified on the list, outside of one’s normal scope of work.

Wang Baole wasn’t displeased though. In fact, he was extremely willing to take on the work. What he lacked was practice. The repairs assigned to him ensured that he didn’t need to worry about a lack of resources or materials for refinement. He welcomed each repair assigned to him and began repairing the parts at a furious pace.

His focus wasn’t on the repairs though, it was on dismantling the components and studying their internal structure. With his rich knowledge and experience in refinement, he became a sponge that soaked up everything he learned swiftly. That continued for the next few days. He also joined a team, which gave him the added benefit of being able to access more knowledge on refining artifacts.

The restoration of the battleship was of the utmost priority to the Holy Crest Sect. However, the sect was constrained by their lack of manpower. In order to increase the speed of repair, certain literature on artifact refinement, which would’ve been restricted to blood relatives in the sect, was now being made partially accessible to the members of the nine repair teams.

Time passed steadily. Three months went by. Wang Baole’s advancement in the area of artifact refinement during this period was astonishing. The merging and amalgamation of two different refinement systems from two different civilizations inspired many great ideas. He immersed himself in the craft, oftentimes forgetting about his intention to return to the Solar System.

The feeling that his proficiency in refining artifacts was improving every day brought Wang Baole a sense of joy that was exhilarating. This sense of bliss was further enhanced when a casual attempt showed that he could now successfully craft a ninth-grade Dharmic Armament. He was no longer as lost when it came to the refinement of Divine Armaments. The revelation made his spirits soar.

He didn’t try to hide his improvement. Even if he had thought of doing so, it would have been a challenging feat. Everyone in Team Seven was familiar with his name. In fact… the work that he was churning out was the equivalent of the work the rest of the team was doing. Li Chen had given up on making life difficult for him a week ago.

He had finally realized that Long Nanzi and himself were worlds apart. Long Nanzi had improved vastly. Li Chen’s initial bullying might have had some effect, slowing down his speed and accuracy when it came to repairing the battleship’s components, but its impact had been temporary. Li Chen had been forced to rack his brains and select even more challenging tasks for Long Nanzi.

These tasks would make Wang Baole’s life difficult for the first few days, but after that, they would no longer pose a challenge to him. Li Chen would be driven mad with frustration and would furiously search for something else to make Wang Baole’s life harder. He had even gone to the extent of reaching out to other teams with the excuse of helping them out. However, anything that he threw at Wang Baole would only hold Wang Baole’s attention for a few days…

In the end, Li Chen had been the one to come away psychologically traumatized by the experience. He stopped making life difficult for Wang Baole, though the latter didn’t appear to be pleased with his sudden change of attitude. Wang Baole’s impression of Li Chen had grown increasingly more positive as the days went by. Li Chen’s antics were a blessing in disguise. If he hadn’t searched for challenging repairs across all teams, Wang Baole wouldn’t have improved as quickly as he had.

Wang Baole panicked when he realized that Li Chen had abandoned his antics. He approached Li Chen directly and had a serious and heartfelt conversation with the latter. That appeared to spark Li Chen’s spirit. Li Chen made a show of his extreme helpfulness and widened the scope of his search, going to extremes to help Wang Baole.

This aid… persisted for two months before Li Chen caved in. No matter how earnestly Wang Baole spoke to Li Chen, it was to no avail. Li Chen seemed on the verge of tears. He approached his master and requested to be transferred out of Team Seven…

Wang Baole was sorry to see Li Chen’s departure. When he found out that Li Chen had been transferred to Team Five, he happily went over to Team Five in search of Li Chen the next day. He began work there. He was once again showered with challenging repairs.

Two weeks later… Li Chen transferred to Team Three. Wang Baole happily followed his friend to the team.

Li Chen transferred to Team One a week later. Wang Baole became excited and followed hastily in Li Chen’s footsteps. Li Chen was stunned to find Wang Baole standing before him.

“Hi!” Wang Baole blinked and waved excitedly at Li Chen.

Li Chen left that day… this time, he left the battleship’s interior altogether. He went to work on repairs on the battleship’s exterior. Wang Baole was sad to see him go. If not for the “friendship” that he had developed with Li Chen during this period, he would very much have liked to kill him on the spot and take over the latter’s identity.

We’re friends. I can’t do that to a friend. Wang Baole sighed as he watched Li Chen leave. Then, he turned back and returned to Team One… In the following three months, Wang Baole continued to remain without a designated team. He went from one team to the next, to wherever he was needed!

His stellar performance in refinement had caught the attention of the Holy Crest Sect’s Grand Supreme Elder and the sect’s six Nascent Soul realm elders. The findings from repeated investigations concluded that nothing was amiss. In the end, they could only explain his sudden advancement in proficiency as the long-awaited growth of a late bloomer. This was a common occurrence in the Divine Eye civilization. However, none had displayed as drastic a change as Wang Baole.

It’s a pity that Long Nanzi hasn’t been able to reach a breakthrough in his cultivation. The Grand Supreme Elder sighed. He wondered, for the first time, if he should give Long Nanzi a helping hand, pay a small price so that Long Nanzi could forcibly enter the Nascent Soul realm.

The Grand Supreme Elder weighed the pros and cons. At this moment, Wang Baole had spent six months working with numerous teams and had familiarized himself with the internal structure of the battleship. His sights were now set on… the battleship’s core sector, the sector that could only be accessed by the sect elders!

Days later, Wang Baole made use of his essence technique and staged his breakthrough to the Nascent Soul realm. His sudden breakthrough caught everyone’s attention, and the news of Long Nanzi’s advancement to the Nascent Soul realm soon spread across the entire sect!