Chapter 323: Looking for a Donkey While Riding the Horse

The three candidates for master of the arcane realm returned to the land.

The other people kept their faces straight as if they had seen absolutely nothing.

Even Alex who bullies Valery regularly because of his strength held back.

He knew, he should never undermine each other in the presence of outsiders.

A comedic scene was turned into a dramatic one abruptly.

So, the farce that involved faces hitting the bottom of the pond looked more like a necessary ritual before a contract.

It was not known if it will become a tradition in the future.

Claude, Black Cat Tom, and Valery began running through the procedure of entering into a contract.

The procedure to enter into a contract with the Source of Yin was familiar to them.

First, they had to let out their own spiritual sense’s Breath of Origin to connect with the shallow pond, the Source of Yin, and communicate with it.

After outlining their rights and obligations, a contract Maxim would have formed as they exchanged their Breath of Origin.

They would follow it by leaving part of their own spiritual sense in the Source of Yin.

The Source of Yin would also brand its own Origin of Breath into their spiritual sense.

After that, the contract was sealed and was considered unbreakable.

That was equivalent to human agreements where they had to sign and stamp the same contracts.

However, this specific type of contracts had more potent effects, the cost of breaking a contract was dire.

The arcane realm could be considered a tiny Heavenly Axiom. It could be speculated the severity of the consequence if the agreement was broken after it was set up.

Claude closed his eyes and focused as a blood red aura flowed out of him and onto the ground. Oddly, it did not carry any mud and just kept flowing into the pond.

Black Cat Tom opened its mouth. A peculiarly pink aura swirled out of its body and toward the pond.

Valery raised his Black Hammer as an ocher aura spilled out of the Black Hammer and poured into the pond.

Alex was stunned as he saw that.

Valery walked onto the legendary Path of the Lich at the end of the day. Furthermore, he placed his spirit on the Black Hammer.

However, he did not think it through, because if the weapon was taken away again…

The three released their Breath of Origin as everyone else gazed at the pond.

Three Breaths of Origin, each different color, rushed into the pond and the grayish aura rolled in excitement and weaved with each of the Breaths.

Everyone else was anxious and excited. If their own leader could succeed in getting into contract, it might be possible that they benefit greatly from it.

After all, it was a huge arcane realm. They had checked out the area of the arcane realm, it was at least a hundred thousand square kilometer, which was equivalent to a moderate-sized country on Earth.

Furthermore, it was an individual dimension. If their leaders become masters of the realm, they would technically become gods. In that case, the follower could probably be granted the status of a lesser deity.

However, all those who were waiting anxiously only heard three exasperated yells…

“What? I can only be an undead servant? What are you so happy for then?”

“Ugh. it makes sense that it’s happy…”

“What? Anyone would be ecstatic if three servants came to them wanting to work without pay. God dammit…”

Everyone else witnessed as the three Breaths of Origin retreated hastily from the pond and toward their respective bodies.

Three streams of grayish auras chased after the two humans and a cat as if saying, “Don’t go, you have to stay!”

Claude flung his cape and blocked the incoming aura outside of it.

‘Hmph, why would I become your undead servant instead of being the leader of the Heliotropes? I don’t care for longevity that much…’

Black Cat Tom also muttered a ‘hmph’ and leaped onto one of its follower’s head to evade the grayish aura.

‘I am going to become a Grim Reaper in the future. If I become an undead servant, how would I turn it around in the future?’

Valery took the most direct approach as he swung his Black Hammer to crush the grayish aura. ‘Warriors will never bow to anyone!’

The pond began to bubble again. However, everyone could feel its fury this time.

“Dammit, this Source of Yin said it had already chosen a master of the realm beforehand and was just lacking some lackeys… What bullsh*t is this!”

“I only wanted to know who that damned master of the realm is. Someone stronger than us?”

Valery immediately yelled as he was a straightforward man who could not keep things to himself.

Black Cat Tom squinted and said coldly, “Probably another genius comparable to the Son of Heaven or something…”

Claude shook his head and said in confusion, “According to that logic, they should have been famous in the world of Death. If a newborn undead arcane realm had chosen them, there’s no way that we haven’t heard of them.”

Tom nodded in agreement.

It specialized in the Path of Death, and the tendrils of the Power Balance Association have reached every corner on Earth.

It believed that anyone who is anyone at all on the Path of Death was in its watch list. After all, they were all its direct opponent in the future.

For example, Claude who uses blood and death as his foundation for cultivation.

They had met before, Tom even tried to trick him, unfortunately, he did not take the bait.

Instead, Claude tried to turn the Son of Heaven against Vigilante A. He failed, and in the end, he had to order the Heliotropes who lived above ground to hide in his underground castle.

It was not clear how he managed to shield himself from Vigilante A’s global scan and live until now.

‘That’s unfortunate. Otherwise, wouldn’t it be nice if I had one less competition today?’

The two other bulky Russian men, on the other hand, had a pretty good foundation in the ways of undead. They were also in its radar, or it would not have been able to be the oriole behind the mantis that stalks the cicada.

Black Cat Tom suddenly thought of a possibility, and its facial expression wavered slightly.

Claude, being the sharp-eye that he was, caught the slight shift in Tom’s eyes.

Tom quickly recovered and said casually, “Looks like the Source of Yin would not choose us within this short period of time, we’ll need to find a way to make it desperate.”

Valery did not notice anything and asked hurriedly, “What can we do if we waited and then the real master candidate appear?”

Alex reminded him, “Don’t worry, trust these two to help us clean them up.”

Claude smiled creepily. “Easy. We’ll stake out over here and kill whoever is arriving next…”

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As soon as he had said that, the pond boiled again in wrath.

“Sorry, we’re sorry, I misspoke.” Claude raised his arms and indicated his apology, then silently made another hand gesture to his sister and other Heliotropes.

Claudia was slightly puzzled at first, but she came around and nodded.

Claude told the other two, “Now, we’ll need to hide…”

Valery finally understood him. After a brief hesitation, he sent his voice to his partner telepathically and discussed.

Soon, he nodded and agreed to Claude’s suggestion. Black Cat Tom did not react negatively as well.

The three parties discussed their hiding spots and went ahead to prepare at their chosen location.

…

Fang Ning laid on the ground of the System Cyber Cafe, looking like a really dead, really salted fish.

The System asked, “You didn’t do much this time, how are you so tired?”

Fang Ning answered helplessly, “I’m not tired, I just feel helpless when I realized there’s something even you couldn’t finish off.”

The System said, “Stop being such a worrywart. No matter how scary that Spectral Train is, it wouldn’t dare to come inside the System Space. If you’re so scared, why don’t you hide inside the smithery and go online?”

Fang Ning snapped, “That place is full of clinks and clanks all day every day, how would I have any mood to go online?”

At this point, a voice that had him jumping for joy was transmitted into the System Cyber Cafe.

“Mister Warden, according to the ghosts’ method, I have found the way in.”

Fang Ning immediately scrambled to his feet and charged straight to Anderson’s office.

“Tell me,” he urged. “As long as you can take out the creepy train, I will give you a hundred Dragon Clan’s secret medicinal pills.”

The System interrupted, “Remember, one pill is ten thousand experience points.”

Fang Ning was in no mood to care about the idiot System who had no fear and who only cared about money and experience points. He paid attention to Anderson’s explanation.

As soon as Anderson spoke a name, Fang Ning immediately understood and become upset with himself.

‘Every time I got a shock, my intelligence would fall. When we were facing off the Demonic Realm, I’ve used it.

‘I’ve only wanted to understand how to manipulate the Heavenly Axiom, how humans can affect a natural phenomenon.

‘Now that I think about it, isn’t that guy the best candidate to be the Grim Reaper?

‘We’re really looking for the donkey while on riding the horse.’ ¹

…

At this moment in the second floor of the Draconic Arcane Realm, Ma Dechun held a maroon-colored pill in his mouth as he supervised some newly-inducted inmates moving bricks.

The third floor had been completed, habitable, and was currently nurturing some plants.

The second floor was designed to be an arena of sorts. Due to the influx of the inmates, they had enough manpower to hasten the renovation of the floor, and it was mostly completed.

Once it was finished, Fang Ning could open his own arena and gather powerhouses for the System to challenge.

The main goal right now was no longer earn money, but to gain experience.

Due to Ma Dechun’s good performance, Fang Ning had gifted him a Dragon Clan’s pill as well as making him a foreman through Anderson. As one of the three veterans of Draconic Penitentiary, he was no longer purely a laborer.

The pill was made with an extremely high quality. Not only was it incomparable by the usual Vitality Pills, it can even allow spirits to taste the sweetness it had…

This was terrific.

Ma Dechun was reluctant to finish it in one go, so he kept it for a long time, occasionally tasting it a little to recall the sweet times when he was a human. At the same time, he used those moments to show off his uniqueness to other spirits.

He was tasting it again this day as he supervised the new inmates. They were lazing about sneakily, but that did not fool Ma Dechun who had had plenty of experience.

“Do your work, don’t think I didn’t see you! All of you are here because of your sins, this is an opportunity for you to compensate and atone for the bad things you have done! If you do it well, you may even have a chance to be promoted.”

All the spirits looked at him and began to snigger.

“What are you laughing at? Are you asking me to inform Mister Anderson so he arranges for another round of his Love-and-Justice re-education program?”

Silence took over.

As soon as Anderson was mentioned, his voice was heard from far.

“Foreman Ma, please come over, Mister Warden wants to see you again.”

A grin appeared on Ma Dechun’s face immediately.

This round, he was not afraid.

He knew, even if they wanted to purge the penitentiary of useless spirits, it would not be his turn…

It must be a chance for him to contribute if Anderson called him now.

He just did not expect how big a merit this new task was.

…

In a town somewhere east of China, the Spectral Train appeared silently on the tracks of an abandoned coal mine.

It led to the abandoned mine not very far from where the train had appeared, not a single soul can be seen near the area.

Lands as far as eyes can see were barren, peppered with deserted factories and areas that caved in, flooded, and waiting for people to convert it into something else.

As soon as the train appeared, a fog rolled out and spread toward the areas around it, blocking prying eyes.

After that, it stopped abnormally.

In the empty cab, a conversation started again.

“Lock, according to the master’s instructions, the real candidate will come from China. That’s so absurd. An Asian person becoming the Grim Reaper, what does that mean?”

“Danny, that’s because the grass is greener on the other side. China had such a long, unique history, it’s the center of the new era. The Heavenly Axiom inside the arcane realm wouldn’t distinguish what race its choices are, as all humans are the same in its eyes.”

“Unfortunately, out of the three teams of people that we sent in a while ago, two of them are Caucasians. Their talents were not bad, but it was only enough to become a servant.”

“Danny, the one I pity the most is the black cat. Its talent was just shy of being enough. Furthermore, it’s strong, just a little weaker than the arrogant fellow after them. It could’ve compensated its talent with its power, but it’s not a human, so it’s destined to not become the master of the realm, maybe a pet or a servant.”

“We’ll just wait here for a couple of days, anyone who specialized in the Path of Death would’ve sensed the Spectral Train. This is a huge opportunity, so I believe they will arrive soon. The real candidate will be among them. As soon as they appear, we will know.”

“Mm, that’s right. Too bad we can’t ask too much of the real candidate, what a waste of an opportunity to get rich quick.”

“Don’t worry Lock, after the master of the arcane realm is born, will there be a shortage of fresh dead bodies in the future? Haha!”

“Danny, you’re right. I can already see it. A year later, death happening all around. That will be our feast.”