Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
When Ren Baqian regained his consciousness this time around, the empress didn’t put him on the ground and was holding him in her embrace.
Before he even turned to look, he sensed something amiss in the surrounding atmosphere.
There were fewer winged cavalry warriors around him, and all of them had solemn looks on their faces.
“Your Majesty, what happened?” Ren Baqian adjusted his position and felt more comfortable.
This was perfect for a state of reverie.
The empress’s embrace was filled with charm.
Soon after, she put Ren Baqian down on the ground.
He lay on the ground and looked at her with his head tilted. She looked pretty gloomy.
However, he wasn’t the cause of it.
“Your Majesty?” Ren Baqian asked again.
“Nothing much.” The empress shook her head, evidently not wanting him to be distracted by other matters.
“Talk about it—maybe I can come up with some ideas!” Ren Baqian smiled.
“I’m the monarch of Dayao!” The empress was annoyed. “I can handle these small matters.”
After hearing what the empress said, Ren Baqian kept quiet and simply lay on the ground to rest. However, he curled his body into a ball after a few minutes, allowing the essence qi to circulate around every contact point in his body to recover from the onslaught of the chill.
He finally uncurled his body an hour later as his belly rumbled nonstop.
He had just started practicing this set of martial arts, but he had already had to use up a large amount of heat to combat the chill of the Earth Yin Spring.
The heat that was produced by the essence qi was continuously combating the chill of the Earth Yin Spring in his body and changing the state of his body.
Nevertheless, this was still the beginning, a phase that allowed his body to acclimate to the conditions of the spring.
When performing the third move, Ren Baqian had to open up his pores and let the chill scour his body repeatedly to take the state of his body to the next level.
He would then have to let his essence qi flow through every inch of his body, allowing it to merge with every cell on the surface of his body and preventing it from circulating back into his body.
During this process, his skin would undergo some changes.
It was similar to having a protective layer over his skin.
According to Ren Baqian’s understanding, this set of martial arts was similar to the legendary [Golden Shield, Iron Cloth Protection].
However, the [Golden Shield, Iron Cloth Protection] only required its user to endure repeated beatings and apply medication on his skin to increase its toughness.
Even though the chill of the Earth Yin Spring was similar to the repeated beatings of the[Golden Shield, Iron Cloth Protection], it was a never-ending stream of beatings that he had to endure.
Next, the essence qi in his body had to combat against the chill and repeatedly heal the injuries that he sustained.
Eventually, when all of the essence qi had merged with every cell in Ren Baqian’s body, even his face would be tougher than a wall!
Or rather, every inch of his body would grow significantly tougher.
Ren Baqian felt that there was a need for him to strengthen a certain part of his body.
Even though it was already very tough and even though the fictional Superman wasn’t as tough as Ren Baqian currently was, there was no harm in further strengthening it.
Two days later, Ren Baqian and the empress took a trip back to Earth.
The Messier 87 department’s laboratory was extremely passionate and fully committed to researching the water of the Earth Yin Spring and the corpse of the demonic butterfly that Ren Baqian brought back. Even though he had brought back quite a few things recently, he cared about these two items the most. This was also why the Messier 87 department regarded them as top-grade items, especially the demonic butterfly with a human face on its body.
Everyone was looking forward to examining it after hearing that it lived in its host’s body for more than ten years and that the face on its body was exactly the same as its host’s.
However, the research progress was slower than expected. After spending 21 Earth days, which was equivalent to seven days in the other world, and putting in their greatest effort, they discovered five new compunds from the water of the Earth Yin Spring.
Even though they had previously also discovered two new elements from something that Ren Baqian brought back, this spring water alone contained five entirely new elements.
Of these, two of the elements were particularly special. These two elements moved about in intertwined pairs as if they were reliant on each other for survival.
According to the researchers at the laboratory, these elements from Dayao were “seducing” them. Many of the researchers were impacted because they had become so engrossed in their research that they even needed to postpone their weddings.
The scientific names given to this pair of elements were different from the others that were made up of letters and numbers. The researchers gave them very meaningful names from the Butterfly Lovers[1.Butterfly Lovers: Chinese legend of a tragic love story of a pair of lovers] and called them Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai.
Apart from the discovery of these five new elements, there hadn’t been any other progress. Ren Baqian could only continue to wait.
Besides the research that was going on at the laboratory, something else had happened.
Ren Baqian received an invitation letter.
It was an invitation to a private salon, and the owner was the boss of the internet that he had met previously.
There were a few other bosses that were invited as well.
They were all ranked at the top among the richest and most powerful people.
Even though Ren Baqian was rather interested in attending, he had to regretfully decline the invitation because he had too many pressing matters at the moment.
“This man is pretty arrogant to reject Boss Ma’s invitation!” Shortly after Ren Baqian rejected the invitation, three holographic figures appeared in another room with one of them laughing.
This was the latest technology that Ren Baqian would definitely love if he hadn’t been so busy lately that he didn’t have the time to pay any attention to it.
What he loved the most was trying out all sorts of new technology.
“Not only did you not give me face, but I had also already placed your names on the invitation list.” Boss Ma laughed.
“This is pretty interesting. I have previously tried to find out more about this person. However, I wasn’t able to because the higher-ups made most of his information confidential. This man is indeed mysterious!” another man said.
“From the latest policies, we can tell what the government is currently up to! This man must play an important role in their plans. Have you guys heard about that new city?”
Everyone nodded. Even though the nation had already tried its best to conceal its plans, these plans were so major that it was impossible to keep them hidden from these people.
Furthermore, these people also sensed that the government was beginning to relax on the concealment of its plans.
This represented one thing, which was that the plans that the government was trying to conceal were almost complete or perhaps that the plans had progressed to a point where it was okay to let people find out about them
“This city should be part of the project that the country is planning, and this man is involved with it. Both his assistant and his younger brother have been to that new city recently.”
After hearing this, the other men started to ponder.
Even though it was just a new city, they knew that it probably contained a lot of secrets.
Even people of their status had to put in a lot of effort to obtain a tiny bit of information about this new city. It meant a lot that Ren Baqian could be a part of it.
“Boss Ma isn’t charming enough! This man is pretty young. Besides, even heroes have a weakness when it comes to the charms of a beautiful woman. You can probably try a honey trap on him!” One of them giggled.
“Haha! You must be joking!” Boss Ma burst into laughter.
Honey trap? Anyone who tried that would be in big trouble.
However, Boss Ma knew that this man was merely joking. If someone of their status were to use a honey trap on a younger person, then their entire reputation would be tarnished.
These men chatted for a bit and switched off their screens soon after.
All of them were busy people with their own busy schedules. They had to intentionally make time just to chat for a bit.
No one was actually mad at Ren Baqian for rejecting the invitation.
For people of their status, they would naturally have a certain bearing and wouldn’t react like ordinary people.
Ren Baqian made arrangements for some matters during the two days he spent on Earth and returned to Dayao immediately after.
Now that he was cultivating, every second mattered.
After all, there wasn’t much time left until the wedding. They had already spent two months to get to the Earth Yin Spring and still had a very long return journey to make.
Needless to say, they also had to return earlier to make preparations.
This meant that they could only stay here for a maximum of three months.
For the three and a half months they would spend here, Ren Baqian had to make sure that he could produce results from practicing this set of martial arts.
He was pressed for time.
