Chapter 707: Neutral Lands (Part 1) [V7C024 – In Life and In Eternal Rest]
Regardless, Little Zhuji was an unexpectedly capable helper. It was just that she needed quite a bit of training regarding daily life.
Qianye stood in front of the controls, pulled out the flight map, and adjusted a new course. The silver airship soon drew a beautiful arc in the void as it flew toward the Western Continent.
Qianye had wanted to head to Evernight Continent at first, but after some thought, he felt that the plan wasn’t quite viable. Firstly, the airship had a limited flight distance. After all, this vessel wasn’t one made for intercontinental travel, and it would be quite difficult for it to cross over two major continents. Even if he did somehow make it to Evernight Continent, it would be too difficult to restock such high-grade black crystal fuel.
Additionally, Qianye had caused so much stir with his revolt that it was sure to spread across the entire country very soon. Some people from the imperial military would naturally have thought of setting him up in Blackflow City, waiting for him to walk into the trap. Qianye couldn’t help but sigh when he thought about Blackmoon and all of his other subordinates from Dark Flame. All he could do was hope that Song Zining would be able to make suitable arrangements.
Qianye sighed once more as he recalled Song Zining and then the three crates of blood crystals on the airship. These things couldn’t have appeared out of thin air, and no human would stock up on these things for no good reason. Perhaps Song Zining had already arranged for these crystals to be loaded onto the airship when Qianye rushed out of the Zhao clan camp.
The silver airship traversed the void in silence. Qianye sat in the control room, gazing at the unchanging void in front of him. This was the first time he had felt so lost. He had left the empire and everything he was familiar with, not knowing what the road ahead had in store for him.
At this moment, the cabin doors opened and in staggered Little Zhuji. In accordance with Qianye’s request, the little lass had finally learned to open doors instead of tearing through walls. She was holding a large food box and eating randomly from it, but she didn’t look all too spirited.
“What’s wrong? Is it not tasty?” Qianye asked.
Little Zhuji nodded with all her might. “I just don’t feel full eating these things!”
Qianye was startled for a bit. Zhuji had been going in and out for a while now, eating several boxes of food. These rations were made for long-distance flights—each of them weighed several kilograms and was easily capable of feeding ten men. Zhuji had eaten her own weight in food, yet her belly was bulging only slightly. Who knew what kind of belly she had grown?
“What do you usually eat then?”
“Meat and shiny crystals! They’re really tasty, especially the crystals. They’re both pretty and delicious.”
Qianye inquired further and finally understood that Song Zining had been feeding her wild beast meat, and sometimes even void beast meat along with their extremely rare crystal cores. These food contained an abundance of energy. Zhuji was still in her youth and didn’t know cultivation. The only way for her to increase her origin power was through food. No wonder she wasn’t full no matter how much of these ordinary rations she ingested.
It was just that beast meat and crystals were fairly expensive, be it on the Evernight side or the empire’s.
Qianye felt a sense of pressure on him. It would seem that raising this little fellow wasn’t going to be that easy.
At this moment, there was no way Qianye could help Zhuji procure the things she liked to eat. Beasts did exist in the void, but many of them were at the level of Chaos and Sky Demon, entities capable of contending against the Queen of the Night. Even the weakest among them possessed the power of a divine champion. With this little ship and Qianye’s current strength, the wisest course of action upon encountering such creatures would be to flee as far as one could. Who would dare have designs on their meat?
Hence, Qianye could only rub Zhuji’s head and ask her to endure the hunger.
It was at this moment that the cabin doors opened and Nighteye entered the room. Qianye walked over hurriedly and said, “Won’t you sleep a while longer? You haven’t recovered very well.”
Nighteye leaned into Qianye’s arms and placed her head on his shoulder. She snuggled against him for a moment before saying, “I can’t fall asleep, so I wanted to be with you for a bit.”
Qianye’s heart softened, and he let out a soft sigh. The two of them hadn’t stayed together very long since the day Nighteye had followed him to the empire. Qianye was embroiled in constant battles, moving from battlefield to battlefield and harvesting countless contributions. In the end, he had even tipped the scales at Indomitable with his own power. Unfortunately, things rarely went as one wished—all he wanted was a simple life, yet even that was but an extravagant hope.
Qianye inspected Nighteye’s injuries and found that they were slowly beginning to heal. Only then did he feel some relief and helped her into a seat. He himself went to adjust the airship’s course and inspect its status and surroundings.
Nighteye merely sat in silence, watching Qianye as he went about his business and carving all of it into her mind.
After half a day, the silhouette of a large continent finally appeared in front of them. Qianye seemed fairly anxious. He instructed Zhuji to inspect the surroundings while he himself compared the airship routes and steered the vessel toward a remote corner, all the while avoiding the local patrol squads.
In a fairly isolated region of the Western Continent, there was a run-down little town in the middle of the wilderness.
A faint whistle rang out suddenly in the air. An airship flew over and made a full circle around the town before finally making its landing.
Noticing the landing airship, the people lazing about on the town stood up in quick succession, their hands subconsciously moving to their weapons.
The airship retracted its sails and landed rather violently. Soon, Qianye kicked open the cabin doors, lowered the ramp, and walked out.
A gust of sandy wind stung him as soon as he had gotten out of the airship, forcing him to cover his face briefly.
After the sandy winds had passed, a number of cloaked muscular men walked over. The leader, a bearded man, spat out the sand in his mouth as he sized Qianye up from head to toe. “Brat, we don’t welcome skinned bastards here!”
“Skinned?” Qianye didn’t quite understand.
The bearded man pointed at the imperial army insignia on the airship and said, “That’s what I meant. We in this place don’t welcome imperials, just as we don’t welcome Evernight people.”
Qianye quickly understood that this was a grey area, and people here disliked the colors of either faction.
However, Qianye was different from before—the moment he charged into the imperial stronghold, he knew that he would have to grasp his own fate thereafter. He took a step forward to arrive before that bearded man and said calmly, “Rules are made by people. Naturally, people can change them too. Now that I’ve arrived, I have no intention of leaving.”
The bearded man’s expression changed sharply. The origin power in his entire body surged as he said coldly, “No one has ever dared to act so unbridled here!”
He grabbed at Qianye, but he hadn’t even raised his hand when a heavy blow landed on his stomach. His body made a full circle in the air before smashing into the ground. The man wanted to clamber up, but Qianye tapped his back lightly with a still-sheathed East Peak, effectively smashing him deeper into the ground.
Qianye looked up at the others and said indifferently, “It looks like I’m going to be the first person to act unbridled here. Go bring your boss here. If he doesn’t come, I really don’t mind leveling this accursed place!”
The bearded man was far superior to all the others in this group, yet Qianye had dealt with him like he would a little kid. The others quickly understood that all of them combined wasn’t Qianye’s match. Hence, they immediately ran back into the town to report this matter.
Moments later, a middle-aged fatty rushed over with dozens of people in tow. He was startled upon seeing Qianye, and even his expression changed gradually.
A tall young man jumped out from behind the fatty, aimed an origin gun at Qianye’s head, and started cursing, “Who do you think you are? Why are you not kneeling after seeing our boss? I will blow your head off if you keep f*cking blabbering!”
Only after the string of curses had been delivered did Qianye move his wrist ever so slightly, flicking a stone into the air and whacking it lightly with his sword. This fist-sized stone screamed through the air at a speed faster than an origin bullet and blasted that young man’s head apart!
“I don’t like people aiming their guns at me, I really don’t like it,” Qianye said calmly.
The middle-aged man jumped up and shouted at the subordinates behind him, “Stop, just f*cking stop! Throw all your guns to the ground. This daddy will chop down whoever picks up their gun!”
Everyone was astonished. However, this middle-aged fatty’s prestige was beyond high, and all of his men threw their weapons to the ground obediently. The man was already full of smiles by the time he had turned back. He jogged to Qianye and asked cheerfully, “You’re… General Qianye?”
Qianye was somewhat surprised. “You recognize me?”
“Of course I do! How can I not!? Your name resounds through the empire. There might not be many people who can stand shoulder to shoulder with you in the future. How can I not recognize such a figure?”
Qianye smiled spuriously. “That makes things easier, but I think you’ll regret recognizing me after a few days.”
The middle-aged man’s smile froze momentarily but recovered just as fast. “You surely jest, general. What business do you have in such a small place?”
“I want to go to the neutral land. I heard you have a channel there?”
The middle-aged man was startled and left with a fluctuating expression. All his subordinates also looked at one another with odd looks on their faces.
At this moment, the fatty happened to see Qianye’s insincere smile and realized that this was a fierce person capable of slaughtering the entire town. Drenched in cold sweat, the man said with a bow, “Since General Qianye commands it, this lowly one will definitely accomplish this task no matter what. Please come and rest in town first, we must discuss the details.”
Qianye nodded. He called Nighteye and Zhuji over, and then followed the middle-aged fatty into town. Seeing Qianye only accompanied by a weak lady and a five-year-old child, killing intent emerged in some of the destitute and evil characters. However, the fatty seemed to have sensed the changes—he turned back and glared firmly at these people, forcing them to lower their heads.
There were also some among them with sharp perception. They felt that something was wrong in the way Zhuji was looking at them, yet they couldn’t quite put their fingers on what was out of place. Later on, a number of people recalled that it was the look of a predator looking at its prey. Nonetheless, they laughed it off in self-deprecation, feeling that they had gone soft in the head. How could such a young girl look at them as though she were looking at food?
After entering the town, the fatty led Qianye to the grandest courtyard in the middle of town and offered him a proper seat. Only then did he ask cautiously, “You said you wanted to go to the neutral lands?”
Qianye nodded.
“What identity do you wish to go with? Allow this lowly one to remind you that it won’t be wise to go with your imperial identity. Some of the major characters there hate the empire with a passion.”
Qianye frowned. “Then I’ll just go with a civilian identity.”
“If that’s the case, you won’t be able to bring your airship over.”
