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Translator: Truth
Editor: Dhael Ligerkeys
“Pull your saber.”
Underneath the tree, the man said while staring at Lu Ye with a carefree expression.
Lu Ye stared at him in silent inquiry until he added, “I’m a Seventh-Order Cloud River Realm cultivator, and you don’t look like you’re very high level. If you kill me, you’ll get at least several hundred Contribution Points. Just think of it as my parting gift to a fellow cultivator.”
In the Spirit Creek Battlefield, killing stronger enemies rewarded exponentially more Contribution Points. The rule wasn’t just usable in the Spirit Creek Battlefield, but also the Cloud River Battlefield and Jiu Zhou.
Not only that, the base reward was way better after one had entered the Cloud River Realm. At the Spirit Creek Realm level, the base reward for killing a Fifth-Order cultivator was just a measly five Contribution Points. It was nine for the Ninth-Order, ten for Heaven Seven, and twelve for Heaven Nine.
At the Cloud River Realm level, the base reward for killing a First-Order cultivator was a whopping twenty Contribution Points. Not only that, the number went up by five for each jump in the minor realm.
Take the dying man before Lu Ye for example. He was a Seventh-Order Cloud River Realm cultivator, so the base reward for killing him was fifty Contribution Points. If Lu Ye killed him, he would be killing an opponent who was six minor realms above him and earning three hundred and fifty Contribution Points, which was seven times greater than the base reward. That was great value even to a wealthy cultivator like Lu Ye.
While killing enemies above one’s cultivation level would net greater rewards, unlike the Spirit Creek Battlefield, there was no punishment for killing cultivators below one’s cultivation level.
In the Spirit Creek Battlefield, bullying the weak would result in deduction in one’s Contribution Points. It was the Heavens’ way of protecting the low level cultivators and why the Spirit Creek Battlefield was separated into multiple Circles.
At the Cloud River Realm though, the cultivators had overcome the first stretch of their cultivation journey. They should’ve learned to differentiate between enemies they could and couldn’t make at the very least. If they were too stupid to make the distinction, then their inevitable deaths were no one’s fault but their own.
The Heavens would only protect those who were just beginning their cultivation journey. That protection was non-existent after they reached the Cloud River Realm.
“It’s fine. The payment you promised is sufficient. I promise to bring your sword to the Divine Trade Association and have it delivered to the Divine Freedom Sect.
Lu Ye had killed countless Thousand Demon Ridge cultivators since he began his cultivation journey. He had no qualms adding one more to the tally. However, killing a defenseless man who was but moments away from death was a completely different story.
The man let out a bitter chuckle. “That’s not it. I simply don’t want to suffer any longer than is necessary.”
Lu Ye was silent for a time. Finally, he unsheathed the Inviolable.
The man let go of his sword and closed his eyes.
Lu Ye channeled his Spiritual Power, crossed thirty meters in an instant, and stabbed them in the solar plexus.
Perhaps it was because of the sudden pain, but the man abruptly opened his eyes and grabbed Lu Ye’s arm. Despite being on the verge of death, there was enough strength behind the grip to hurt Lu Ye a little.
Of course, the strength didn’t last. Just a second or two later, the man’s hand fell limply by his side. The light in his eyes swiftly faded into nothing as well.
A shower of blood spurted out of the man’s chest when Lu Ye pulled out his saber. Seeing as his eyes were still wide open, Lu Ye wiped them close with his hand.
The man was a complete stranger to Lu Ye. Therefore, Lu Ye didn’t feel too bad despite killing him this way. What did affect him was the fact that even a Seventh-Order Cloud River Realm cultivator wasn’t strong enough to keep death at bay. Growing increasingly aware of the cruelty of the Cultivation World, he swore to be twice as careful during his time in the Cloud River Realm.
He was no longer no longer the untouchable king of the Cloud River Battlefield. Here, the amount of cultivators who could kill him with ease could only be described as innumerable.
Yi Yi appeared out of Amber and stood next to Lu Ye. She looked down because of what had happened.
Lu Ye stepped forward and untied the man’s Storage Bag from his waist. He then picked up the blood-drenched sword before wiping the blood clean with a towel.
He did not know what the sword meant to the cultivator, but it was important enough that he would entrusted a stranger, no, an enemy to return it to his sect during his last moments. He inspected the sword for a bit and found two words engraved above the hilt of the sword, “Qing Yun”.
It could be the name of the sword or a person. The one person who might answer his question was already dead.
It was probably the latter though. The sword could be a token of love between him and his partner. That would explain why he wanted it returned so badly.
“Can I bury him, Lu Ye?” Yi Yi broke the silence suddenly.
Yi Yi had killed plenty of Thousand Demon Ridge cultivators herself, but this was the first time ever she wanted to give one of them a proper burial.
“Of course. It is only right.”
Moral quandaries aside, He had accepted the man’s payment. Giving him a proper burial was the least they could do for him.
Lu Ye did not bury him where he was, however. He hadn’t forgotten how they had stumbled upon one another. It was very possible that the person or group who had dealt this man a fatal wound would show up very soon. That was why he carried the body and flew for a long time until they reached a beautiful location. Then, he and Yi Yi dug a big hole in the ground and buried him properly. She even bowed to the grave a couple of times before finally returning to Amber’s body.
Originally, the plan was to return to the Arcane Glade as soon as possible. Now though, they needed to make a trip to the Divine Trade Association first. On the way, Lu Ye studied the sword for a bit and found nothing special about it. It was just a Middle Grade Spirit Artifact with eighteen enchantments in it. At best, it was worth several hundred Contribution Points.
Next, Lu Ye took out the guy’s Storage Bag and began dismantling its Restraining Lock.
On a related note, Lu Ye discovered that his luck had been great since he entered the Cloud River Battlefield. First, he had encountered the iridescent cloud and participated in a Token of Providence event not long after he entered the battlefield. The cloud had stopped directly above his head as well. Although he only managed to nab a Green Amulet with his own strength, the ending did not go the way he expected it to go at all. Not only did someone throw a Purple Amulet into his hands, he had gotten away with it.
Later, he was looking for a place to rest when he stumbled upon a once-in-a-century Arcane Glade revival event completely by accident. He had basically gotten an Arcane Glade for free. That wasn’t the end of his good luck, however. Originally, he was planning to spend the night in the Divine Trade Association. He was just so worried about the Arcane Glade that he decided to risk traveling during the night. On the way, he was wondering how he could solve the issue of his cultivation resources running low when a dying man came up to them and surrendered everything he had to him. Suffice to say, this would never have happened if he had chosen to stay the night at the Divine Trade Association.
Lu Ye’s luck had never been this good, not to mention that it hadn’t even been ten days since he entered the Cloud River Battlefield. That was why he suspected that divine intervention was involved in the string of good luck he had had recently. To be specific, he suspected that it was one of the effects of the Gift of Providence.
The Gift of Providence was a highly praised blessing, but so far the tangible benefits had not met his expectations. However, it was a completely different story if it improved his luck.
Luck was an ephemeral, strange thing. An exceptionally lucky man could rise to the top with little to no effort, while an exceptionally unlucky man could choke on water if they weren’t careful. Personally, Lu Ye thought that his luck was just average. It made no sense to him that his luck would improve so drastically after he entered the Cloud River Battlefield. Therefore, the Gift of Providence was the only answer.
Of course, this was just a theory. He would need to find a way to verify it in the future.
Considering Lu Ye’s current attainment in the Way of Glyphs, the task of opening a Restraining Lock was almost as easy as breathing air. It took him only a moment to unlock the Storage Bag. When he looked inside, he found that the man had not lied to him. He was fairly wealthy compared to the average Cloud River Realm cultivator.
For starters, he saw a bunch of rare ores and strange plants that he couldn’t name in the Storage Bag. He reckoned that it was the loot the man had collected during his journey. The reason he thought this was because he counted at least a dozen Middle Grade Spirit Artifacts in the Storage Bag. There were a handful of flying Spirit Artifacts as well.
There wasn’t a single cultivator in the world who needed this many Spirit Artifacts. That was why it had to be the loot he had lifted off his enemies’ corpses.
Most of the loot didn’t mean much to Lu Ye. He supposed he could sell them for Contribution Points at the Divine Trade Association, but that was it.
The rest of the stuff was very useful though. As it turned out, the man had several bottles of Healing Pills and over twenty bottles of Vital Spirit Pills. Not only that, he had a ton of Spirit Stones. He saw Low Grade Spirit Stones, Middle Grade Spirit Stones, and even High Grade Spirit Stones, though he wasn’t one hundred percent sure because he had never seen a High Grade Spirit Stone before.
In total, the man had over ten thousand Spirit Stones.
Lu Ye considered himself a fairly worldly man at this point, but the deceased man was easily one of the wealthiest cultivators he had ever encountered. To make a comparison, Lu Ye himself did not have ten thousand Spirit Stones on his person.
In any case, the man had unwittingly solved Lu Ye’s resource scarcity problem. Although he had purchased a large amount of Vital Spirit Pills at the Divine Trade Association, he fully expected to run out in a matter of weeks. That was why he was thinking about ways to obtain more cultivation resources until he stumbled upon the man. Now though, that wasn’t necessary anymore. At the very least, he wouldn’t have to worry about this for the near future.
He transferred everything that was useful to him into the storage space at the back of his hand. Then, he took out what looked like a copper plate from the Storage Bag.
The copper plate was palm-sized and, at first glance, looked completely ordinary. Lu Ye was unable to figure out what it was used for despite inspecting it for a long time. It wasn’t until he channeled his Spiritual Power into it that a beam of light suddenly shone from it. Then, he felt something pulling at him from inside the copper plate. It felt like it was pointing him in a certain direction. This basically confirmed that the copper plate contained some sort of secret.
Lu Ye didn’t know where the copper plate was pointing him to, but he was fairly sure that he would find something if he followed its instructions.
For a while, Lu Ye simply held the copper plate and weighed his options. In the end, he decided to store it in his storage space and put it temporarily out of his mind. Right now, his first priority was still increasing his cultivation to an acceptable level. Only then could he protect himself from the dangers that might be associated with the copper plate and the Cloud River Battlefield itself.
After arriving at the Divine Trade Association, Lu Ye descended in front of a building and walked inside. He then sought out a manager and inquired about the procedure to deliver a sword. After learning the ins and outs of the situation, the manager offered Lu Ye a solution. He told him that the Divine Trade Association could safekeep the sword while sending a message to the Divine Freedom Sect. When a cultivator of the Divine Freedom Sect showed up, they would then pass the sword to them.
Lu Ye saw no problems with the solution. His only request was that his information be kept a secret.
