Chapter 977: Recoup and Recuperate

Vigilante A’s farm villa.

Zheng Dao looked at the bare farm and empty villa, and sighed quietly in his heart. Once upon a time, this place had bustled with life, said to be the safest place in the world; housing prices once soared to hundreds of thousands per square meter.

However, now, the only signs of life left were the green garden pants and the farm crops.

As a butler, he was the last to leave as he arranged for the others to move to Vitality City, or send them into the Draconic Arcane Realm as he stayed behind and took care of the rest.

The Venerable Dragon God still patrolled from above the Earth every day, but when had it all come to a point where evacuation became inevitable?

Zheng Dao looked up to the wide, blue skies, enshrouded in shadows.

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Probably when the dead rose up and started hunting down the living. In that case, no matter how efficient the Venerable One was at slaying monsters, it would still be impossible for him to return the world into what it was like before.

Man could never measure up against the Order.

That said, he was somewhat reluctant if he were to go back to the old technology era. After all, while that era was safe, it lacked opportunities.

Reincarnations and immortality were all myths and superstitious talk in the old era; an idealistic worldview. In reality, life was just a process, it was limited; this was the materialistic view.

With such thoughts weighing on mind, Zheng Dao entered the study and began sorting out the rest of the documents.

The minute he had finished packing a stack of documents, he felt a sudden wave of dizziness and blood bled from his nose.

He instinctively wiped his nose with his hand. When he looked down, he saw a small puddle of red before his eyes.

In the palm of his blood covered hands, an eerie grimace appeared, smiling ominously at him.

“Wicked devils begone!” His entire body shook, as a surge of white energy appeared.

The grimace reluctantly faded away.

In the next moment, Vigilante A suddenly appeared by his side.

A ray of golden light shrouded him.

Surrounded in the bask of the golden light, Zheng Dao fainted restfully.

…

System Notification: [Zheng Dao was attacked by malevolent forces and is on the brink of death. Follower “Zheng Dao” has received critical damage, “Thousand-mile Assistance” activated. The System uses “True Bodhi Tactics” to treat Zheng Dao. The System is currently administering treatment… ]

Fang Ning burned with rage the moment he saw the notification.

“Despicable, those wretched things, they actually dare to lay their hands on our people!” He spat through gritted teeth.

“It’s a good thing you saw this coming and sent the others away earlier on, Rich-man Host. Had it been any other ordinary staff, they’d probably be dead now.” Sir System said in a tone of relief.

Through the System View, Fang Ning observed the still unconscious Zheng Dao; he could not help but ask worriedly, “How’s he doing now?”

“Fortunately he’s been studying the “Atmospheric Morality Technique”, his resistance against evil attacks is pretty high, with my treatment, he should recover with a few days rest.” Sir System explained.

“That’s good to know, at least he didn’t die like Old Qiao. Who knows when that guy will be revived, it’s not an easy task to collect a billion Dan units.” Fang Ning sighed.

He knew his enemy was not above such underhanded tactics, that was why he had arranged for his father-in-law and family to move inside the Draconic Arcane Realm.

Only he had not expected them to go after his subordinates as well, which made him seethe in anger.

“This can’t go on, we need to take the initiative to attack, and vanquish these malevolent spirits!”

He paced around in the System Space with clenched fists in an imposing manner.

“Well, then you better come up with an idea? Even that second-rate Heavenly Axiom can’t find its whereabouts, I can’t do anything either!” Sir System said indignantly.

“We’ll go ask the Grim Reaper first. He’s a neutral party so he should have a solution.” Fang Ning said cooly.

“Um, that guy’s good, but he charges a lot… My instincts tell me that it’s hopeless.” Sir System said disappointedly.

In the sounds of Sir System’s whining, Fang Ning had entered the System Hotel in search of the Death.

“You want to find out where the Shadow King is? That’s easy enough,” Black Water reached out and produced another nine bubbles in a row, “Fill these nine bubbles up, and I will personally use the “Omnivident Eye” technique to find him. He won’t be able to hide from my senses even if the old Heavenly Oracle is shielding him. Of course, if you’re willing to provide another four or five bubbles, I could also use Death’s Eye and get rid of him for good… ”

“…” Without a single word, Fang Ning hastily left.

Back in the break room, he asked tiredly, “Sir System, you can afford that, right?”

“Nope.” Sir System gave a straight and blunt answer.

“You should be able to.” Fang Ning insisted.

“I really can’t…” Sir System said depressedly, “Here, last time we were in the World of Spirits and Souls, I earned 513 billion experience points, used 5 of Death’s bubbles, but spent over 60% of the pills we have in inventory, all to instantly recover magical energy. Now, he wants 9 of them, how am I going to afford that? Divine skills may be useful to give that extra boost across levels, but consumes a lot as well.”

“Damn it, I thought you were rich, looks like you’re still a broke System after all.” Fang Ning cursed.

“It depends on who I’m up against. With the other powerhouses of my level, I’m definitely loaded, but now we’re talking about going up against an Ocean-level, possibly a God-level expert that’s millions of years old, I’m definitely dirt poor.” Sir System replied frankly.

“That makes sense. Let me think, we can’t afford Death’s services, so we can only rely on ourselves. What about Bodhisavatta?” Having thought of this, Fang Ning sent a message to the Bodhisavatta Spirit King.

However, no reply came even after a long time.

“Looks like he isn’t back from the World of Spirits and Souls yet. After all, he is a senior powerhouse, even if he’s dealt a great deal of damage, he’s still able to hang on in that devastating environment; unlike us, who could only run away with our tails tucked.” Fang Ning heaved a heavy sigh.

“Not us, just you. I’ve never thought of running away.” Sir System quickly remedied.

“Cut the crap, my head hurts.” Fang Ning sat on the sofa in the break room, rubbing the edge of his eyes, seemingly in deep thought.

“You’re asking for too much, how many years have we been training? Look, the ones you’re going up against are either Gods or descendants of Gods; if it were not for me, you wouldn’t even be able to be the dirt beneath their feet. Back inside the World of Spirits and Souls, you said ‘we should only take the risk once we’re strong enough’. Now, with just a bit of provocation, you’ve forgotten your own words.” Sir System scorned.

To Sir System, there were no wrongs or grievances to speak of.

All the emotions in his language were all just to better extort his host. The perfect case of the “everything is constantly changing, but the heart remains the same.”.

Hearing this, the weight in Fang Ning’s heart disappeared. They say bystanders are clear-headed, and they were right. He had only had the System for about four years max, and he was already capable of beating other fighters of his level to a pulp.

With Sir System’s special attributes, his bank of knowledge reached almost that of an Axiom’s, and he could use the God’s incantations, take on evil Spirit Generals of Ocean-levels and above; these alone left others dumbfounded in awe.

This was the reason why outsiders had no doubts of Vigilante A’s True Dragon form.

Only those possessed by a True Dragon of the Upper Realm had such accelerated recovery powers.

Who could have ever thought that Fang Ning was a mere native?

After only training for four years, he was already far superior than those of his same generation, and could easily slay powerhouses in the Upper Realm.

“Oh it’s true when they say even fools sometimes speak to purpose,” Fang Ning tried recollecting himself, “We should recoup and recuperate for a while and concentrate on increasing our powers; it’s not enough to reach Ocean-level, we need to reach Galaxy-level, or even Planet-level, only then we can rest assured.”

“That’s the spirit, right? We’ve moved most of our assets inside the arcane realm, you should think of a way to increase the production of herbs and pills; cultivating evil spirits is the way to go.”

“How many malevolent seeds did you manage to get last time we were in the World of Spirits and Souls?” asked Fang Ning.

“Uh, you do know me. All of the malevolent spirits I killed left behind a bit of their core souls that can be regenerated and killed time and time again. The quality of their souls is right at the top, carefully selected after millions of years in the World of Spirits and Souls, enough to last a few samsaras.”

“Good, then we’ll split up and work on our jobs.” Fang Ning nodded.