All the soldiers immediately bowed and shouted out, “Yes, sir.” The troops then pulled back like a tide as the increased gravity in the room quickly returned. Just like before, Lu Yin felt a stifling restriction cover his body.
With the help of his five-lined battle force, Lu Yin managed to endure the 130 times gravity and politely greeted the middle-aged man. “My name is Lu Yin. Nice to meet you, sir.”
The middle-aged man looked at Lu Yin with fascination in his eyes. “I watched you on the live broadcast. You’re very powerful. Comprehending five-lined battle force at your age is incredible compared to others in the universe.”
“You’re being too kind, sir,” Lu Yin remained polite.
The middle-aged man gently knocked Lu Yin’s decorum aside. “I’m not being kind. The fact that you can still speak proves that you can withstand more than 130 times gravity, although your limit should be close. Don’t overdo it.”
Lu Yin nodded, agreeing with what the man had just said. Thankfully, he had tried entering this room first. If he had directly entered a room with 150 times gravity, then he might have been seriously injured. The higher the gravitational force, the greater the pressure that every part of his body would have to endure. He’d underestimated the toll this pressure took on his internal organs.
“Can you still walk?” The middle-aged man smiled as he observed Lu Yin’s condition.
Lu Yin grinned and took a few steps forwards. The 130 times gravity was difficult to bear, but not enough to cause any major problems for him.
The middle-aged man smiled. “130 times gravity is something that even Explorers find difficult to endure. The fact that you can do so as a Melder is astonishing! I now understand why the Ten Arbiters are so terrifying even though they are so young. With how quickly you’re improving, it looks like you won’t be any weaker than the Ten Arbiters in the future.”
“I hope so too. By the way, I trust that I’m not bothering you, sir,” Lu Yin said.
The middle-aged man shook his head. “I was just warming up, so there’s no need to worry. I thought that you just came in because of a mistake or something, so I was trying to push you out earlier. I assumed that no one else on this warship could endure this level of gravity, but I forgot that you were onboard.”
Lu Yin smiled, but did not respond.
The middle-aged man also stopped talking and continued warming up his body. Lu Yin looked at the man enviously. If he could move around freely under this amount of pressure, then that meant that this man was no ordinary Explorer. At the very least, he must have transformed his body four times already.
Over the next few days, Lu Yin went to the 130 times gravity training room multiple times to train. Gradually, he became able to endure the gravity with just four-lined battle force. During these times, he would chat with the pilot every once in a while, but most of the time, he listened on while the pilot talked about the astral wars.
Lu Yin was very eager to learn more about this topic. The Human Domain’s border wars were humanity’s most important battlefield, and the fighting there had never stopped. For countless years, far too many powerhouses had fallen here.
“I remember once chatting with a genius ten years ago. He also came from the Astral Combat Academy. We didn’t meet in the training room with 130 times gravity, but rather the room with 110 times gravity. He was very powerful and was a student leader at the Astral Combat Academy, but he never managed to return from the battlefield. He died there.
“There was also a pretty girl who talked to me. She told me that she was going to the battlefield for experience as she was going to marry the man she loved when she returned. Unfortunately, she was ripped to shred when a giant beast tore through the void. I nearly died at that time, too.
“The frontier wars are very cruel. Regardless of how talented and powerful you are, there are still millions of ways that you could die. So many geniuses have died there that I’ve long lost count. Truthfully, I don’t agree with your academy sending you all here. Commander Shui agreed to this for some reason, but he didn’t account for it in his plans. Of all the expelled students who come to the warfront, about a third of them end up dying. Of the graduates, about a fifth of them die at the warfront.”
…
“The person who I remember the most vividly is a young man who I met around ten years ago or so. He was very excited to fight in the war and was very kind. I sent him to the frontier, and then…” The middle-aged man hesitated at that point.
Lu Yin was balancing his body on just a single finger, but when he heard the pilot pause, he asked, “Did he die, too?”
The middle-aged man shook his head. “No, he became one of the Ten Arbiters.”
Upon hearing that, Lu Yin nearly fell to the ground out of shock. He looked at the middle-aged man in surprise. “You’ve met one of the Ten Arbiters?”
The middle-aged man smiled. “Of course! This warship frequently transports guests. That young man really was terrifying. Even in a training room with 150 times gravity, he was still able to move around like normal. He was a bit too tall for his frame, though he was very sturdy. And loud! It was so hard on my ears.”
“What’s his name? And his race?” Lu Yin asked curiously. All of the Ten Arbiters were shrouded in mystery, and even now, he only knew that, among them, there was someone from the Sword Sect who had inherited the Thirteen Swords and Nightking Zhenwu. Right, and there was also someone from the Phoenix Family. From what Big Pao had told Lu Yin, Hart was the younger brother of the Phoenix Family’s Ten Arbiter member. Other than those three people, he knew nothing at all about the rest.
Nobody dared to openly talk about the Ten Arbiters, which made Lu Yin even more curious as to their identities. Unfortunately, he had been dragged to the Human Domain’s warfront right after the Astral Combat Tournament. Otherwise, he definitely would have gone to the Council of Astral Academy to find out more about them.
The middle-aged man said, “I can’t tell you his name, because that’s forbidden. I don’t know what his race is, but I do know that he’s absolutely terrifying beyond a shadow of a doubt. I met him when I just became an Explorer, but even then, I felt my heart thumping whenever I sparred with him. Right, many people call him the War King.”
Lu Yin frowned. The War King? He’s someone who could even make an Explorer’s heart palpitate? “What was his cultivation level back then?”
“He was a Limiteer,” the pilot answered.
Lu Yin sighed in relief. Good, good. Lu Yin was already a peak Melder. If the Ten Arbiters had been stronger than his current level when they were at the Melder realm, then he really would have no idea of how he could possibly surpass them.
“Actually, I don’t really know how to deal with you either. Having five-lined battle force at your cultivation really is amazing,” the middle-aged man said while eyeing at Lu Yin.
Lu Yin shrugged. “Tell me more about the warfront. What do I need to take note of?”
“There’s nothing much you need to do, mostly because no matter what you do, the beasts will still appear all the same. Just fight as hard as you can and do your best to stay alive,” the middle-aged man answered nonchalantly. His words sounded relaxed, but Lu Yin could hear the bitterness and misery implicit in his tone.
There were many ways to wage war, but against the astral beasts, the humans didn’t have many options. There were just too many of the beasts, and they also had numerous species with strange innate gifts. No matter how powerful their technology became, the beasts could never be fully stopped. The only way to hold them back was by paying the price with human lives. This was also the cruelest method. The command center for the warfront wasn’t safe either, because there were many beasts that could tear through the void or even crush planets.
“Tell me about Planet Conan, sir,” Lu Yin suddenly asked. After all, his destination was Planet Conan.
The middle-aged man nodded before explaining, “Planet Conan is one of the thirty seven protector planets to the right of the Erudite Flowzone. It was originally a very ordinary planet, but all of the native humans were forcefully transported away to fight in the Human Domain’s border war, so all of them have since left. All that remains behind are the local creatures that have no intelligence, so that planet is basically destroyed. The zone’s most powerful guardian there is Mentor Qu Ao from the Erudite Flowzone’s Yihuang Academy. He’s the director of that academy and is also a Hunter. Planet Conan’s guardian is Nappa, who’s a very valiant Explorer…”
With the pilot’s explanation, Lu Yin developed a basic understanding of Planet Conan as well as the general situation surrounding the Erudite Flowzone’s frontier. Planet Conan was one of the thirty seven planets on the right side of the frontier, and there were another thirty seven on the left and a hundred or so in the middle. These planets were linked together into a huge net that acted as the Human Domain’s main line of defense against the Beast Region, and each planet had an Explorer guardian protecting them. Additionally, each zone in this defensive net had a Cruiser, or sometimes, even a Hunter protecting them.
These powerhouses had either joined of their own will or been forcefully drafted. Of course, there were also prisoners on death row and other similar captives. The troops on each planet were also split into two groups: rangers and ordinary soldiers. There was also the cannon fodder, who were even lower ranked than rangers, and they mostly came from planets that were undergoing their evolutionary trial.
If Earth had not been protected by Lu Yin with his status as King Zishan, then Earth’s cultivators would have suffered the fate of being conscripted into a battlefield as cannon fodder. It would have been either a battle between the Great Yu Empire and other organizations or the even crueler Human Domain’s warfront.
Multiple days passed. Then, one day, the pilot told Lu Yin, “In front of us is the intersection between the Tempest Flowzone and the Erudite Flowzone. After we pass through this flowzone, the warship will stop at a space station for maintenance before entering the Erudite Flowzone. We’ll be at the warfront in no more than a day and a half.”
Lu Yin suddenly had a thought occur to him. “Is there a Mavis Bank at the space station, sir?”
He shook his head in response. “Not at the space station, no, but there is one on a planet that’s not too far away from it. Places like this flowzone intersection usually have Mavis Banks. What’s up? Do you need to withdraw some money?”
Lu Yin nodded. “I used up all of my star crystals when I became a peak Melder, so I wanted to withdraw some.”
The pilot said, “I’ll have someone take you there.”
“Thank you so much, sir,” Lu Yin said gratefully.
Not long after that conversation, Lu Yin boarded a small spacecraft and left the space station. He was headed towards a planet nearby while guided by a Limiteer.
The Mavis Bank was always overt about flaunting their wealth. They casually hung universal currency bills in front of their banks that anyone could pick up, treating it like waste paper. However, in Lu Yin’s eyes, that was exactly what the bills were.
After entering the bank, Lu Yin initially wanted to withdraw all of the star crystals available to him, but then, he suddenly remembered that he might not have enough space in his cosmic ring for it all. The largest one that he had on him was the one with 500,000 star crystals in it, which was his reward for doing well in the tournament. That ring only had enough space for those 500,000 star crystals while Lu Yin still had a total of 711,000 star crystals that he could withdraw. It seemed that he would need to keep his crystals in more than one cosmic ring.
At this moment, a girl with an elegant appearance walked over to Lu Yin, offered him a drink, and greeted, “Hello, Mr. Lu.”
Lu Yin was confused. “You know me?”
“You’ve become a celebrity throughout the entire universe! We all saw the Astral Combat Tournament. It was very exciting!” She then smiled. She gave off a very refined aura, and she had a pleasant fragrance about her. One could not help but view her favorably.
“And you are?” Lu Yin enquired.
The girl reached out a hand and said, “My name’s Mandy, and I’m the manager of this branch.”
Lu Yin extended his hand and shook hers. “I’m Lu Yin. Is there anything that you need from me, Manager Mandy?”
Mandy produced a purple crystal card and handed it to him. “This is for an account that our Mavis Bank has opened for you. Please accept it.”
“It’s purple?” Lu Yin was surprised. He’d never seen a purple bank card before.
“The purple represents a star essence account. We don’t give them out in the Outerverse and only do so in the Innerverse,” she explained.
Lu Yin now understood. Star essence was formed when star crystals were compressed to a certain degree. After being compressed, the resulting star energy would be purified before condensing into star essence. In terms of purity and quality, they were far superior to star crystals. The two could even be said to be incomparable. It was like comparing a common metal to gold, and the exchange rate between them was astounding.
“Manager Mandy, I don’t have any star essence stored in my account,” Lu Yin remarked with a wry smile.
