Battle Frenzy

Hebre’s expression sunk as he stared at Ma Dong with a sharp gaze. To be honest, he did not quite like what Wang Zhong brought to the Earth.

Regardless of whether it was winning the right to join the Star Alliance or establishing a foothold in Heavenly Treasures Street, perhaps these were great contributions to the Earth civilization. He had been happy about these before, but what about later on? What were the effects on the Karon family? In the past, before they joined the Star Alliance, the Karon family was absolute and kept to their word. He had worked together with his old friends and controlled a large part of the authority in the Holy City. He was the hidden king of the Earth. However, after Wang Zhanfeng and Shirley returned, and after they joined the Star Alliance, they were compelled by various pressures and were discriminated against by various civilizations. They could only be obedient to others.

So what if the Earth became powerful? The Karon family had weakened as a result, and they had less influence. They had turned from supreme kings to high-leveled blue-collar workers. To him, this had no meaning!

The Karon family who stood by their word and held supremacy in the Holy City and on Earth had become a thing of the past. Now, even a Heroic Soul Stage junior had dared to question him to his face?!

A wave of Sacred Teacher aura was emitted from his body, and he coldly stared at Ma Dong. However, before he could intimidate Ma Dong, two even more powerful waves of Sacred Teacher power had descended and enveloped the entire meeting room!

It was from Shirley and Wang Zhanfeng! As the only two Successor Disciples of the Holy Saint Teacher, the two of them definitely had the most powerful combat abilities in the Holy City and were far stronger than the others!

If one were to determine who had the greatest potential of accumulating their Void Core among this group of Sacred Teachers, there was no doubt that it would definitely be the two of them. Furthermore, since they were the disciples of the Holy Saint Teacher, they had wide networks in the Holy City, both in the past and especially now when the Earth had holed up. Now, when faced with the Star Alliance, there was no way out. There were still people with discerning eyes.

“Lord Hebre,” Shirley calmly said. “This is a meeting room. Please restrain your emotions!”

Hebre was extremely angry and turned around to look at his surroundings.

At that moment, many people who had previously supported him kept quiet. Even his old friends who were typically hand in glove with him did not stand up and fervently defend him. It was obvious to all that since Wang Zhong was able to receive the acknowledgement of the Heavenly Gates superintendent, it meant that Wang Zhong was at least a Void Core. Furthermore, his prospects were unlimited!

Offending a super expert like him was obviously not worth it. Regardless of whether it was in terms of combat power or influence, Hebre was no match for him. Everyone looked at Hebre and suddenly felt that he showed no understanding of the times.

“Hmph!” Hebre was extremely angry and laughed coldly. He knew that he would be unable to cause any waves in the face of the Wang couple. “You’d better remember this!”

“Wait.” Wang Zhanfeng’s voice sounded behind him. “Lord Hebre, you still haven’t replied to Ma Dong’s question.”

“…” Hebre slowly turned around, and there was a sinister glint in his eyes. “Wales Karon has been sentenced to punishment in the Sandpit. This is a punishment that he deserves after committing a mistake. I am very satisfied with the results of Wang Zhong’s decision. This is my answer! Sorry, I have some personal matters. I will take my leave!”

After he was done speaking, he turned around and left in large strides. The door of the meeting room was heavily slammed shut, producing a rumbling sound.

However, it was obvious that in the face of a rare treasure like a civilization upgrade, no one cared about Hebre’s emotions or even mentioned them. After a short few seconds of silence in the meeting room, the room surged with excitement and enthusiasm.

They were now a level-4.5 civilization! This notice was just too timely!

Even though the past few years had been very difficult for the Earth civilization, the sharing of information privileges, better cultivation methods, more advanced technology, and the rights to explore neighboring worlds had allowed the Earth to quickly become better off after just some three years. For example, there was a small eruption in the number of Heavenly Soul experts this year. They were almost close to gathering 100 Heavenly Souls who were below the age of 40. Meanwhile, one year ago, when Wang Zhong had just gone to the divine territory, the Earth civilization had only gathered 20 to 30 people!

A level-4 civilization had been able to accumulate such gains in just a few years. Of course, they had also paid a huge price in resources for these gains. When there was nowhere for them to advance, humans liked to engage in internal strife, but when they were met with a powerful pressure that threatened their civilization, the vigor that collectively burst forth would be extremely powerful. The various great families in the Holy City had all contributed.

Meanwhile, Ma Dong calmly looked at these people. Had they used up their resources?

No, they had only used up their resources on Earth. In the Holy City, families such as Hebre’s had accumulations of wealth that were beyond imagination. Humans had the natural habit of storing their resources. On the surface, they acted as if they had used up all their resources. However, according to Ma Dong’s understanding, they were far from that point. Naturally, they felt that others should charge forward and risk their lives to fight desperately against danger, while they should sit idle and enjoy the fruits of others’ labor.

Uncle Wang and Aunt Shea were not firm enough. With the backing of the Holy Saint Teacher, everything had been smooth-sailing for them. Thus, they did not understand the cruelty of development.

However, Ma Dong was not anxious and believed that haste would ruin everything. He would start by changing Uncle Wang and Aunt Shea’s mentality. Only with this level of assistance would he be able to change the Earth’s circumstances and gather everyone’s power, instead of simply relying on Wang Zhong to fight alone.

They had leveled up by half a level… A great 0.5 levels!

Could they have achieved this just by talking?

……

This… Lao Wang was not as miserable as Ma Dong had imagined. Except at the beginning when he was unfamiliar with the place and the people, Wang Zhong quickly became like a fish back in water.

Entering the Celestial Honors Class was an important matter. Of course, this was also a relatively “secret” matter. Few Celestial Honors Class members would proclaim their status. The Heavenly Gates did not outright ban doing so; it was viewed more as a foolish act that was beneath their dignity to respond to. Furthermore, few of the “freaks” in the Celestial Honors Class would care about this title, at least while within the Heavenly Gates. Ordinary pupils relied mainly on hearsay, and the Celestial Honors Class was like a legend to them. They did not know which freaks were in the Celestial Honors Class, or whether such freaks were hiding beside them.

However, the welfare benefits from the Celestial Honors Class…

Wang Zhong had also sent news about the Earth’s civilization upgrade through Old Cow.

Level-5 and level-4 information privileges were completely different. At the very least, they had preliminary communication privileges. In the future, the communications between the divine territory and the Holy City would no longer have to be so sneaky. It was said that Lord Dhomiguer from the Mizobudapi world had helped greatly in this matter. Not only did he review the Earthlings’ plans and documents that were forwarded to him, he even helped them to organize everything. Of course, as the docking point, Mugthol and Old Cow in the Heavenly Treasures Street had obviously helped out the most and had contributed money and effort. Now, the Heavenly Treasures Street was able to communicate instantaneously with the Holy City. Furthermore, the next batch of immigrants this year were about to arrive. This time, they would be directly sent to the Heavenly Treasures Street. Old Cow had already helped to arrange the preparatory work.

There were pros and cons to this matter. The benefits were clear, as the Earth civilization would start to establish their roots or even a “home” in the Land. However, there were also demerits to this. The Earth now had a base and had established a stable communication point, and the Star Alliance would definitely take note of this. In the future, Lao Wang and the rest would no longer be isolated beings who were daunted by everything in the Land.

Very few experts would not care about their fellow people at all. Thus, their civilization base would be a powerful chain that would always bind these individual experts together in the Land. This was also the means the Star Alliance used to keep these powerful experts in check.

Lao Wang suddenly realized that while the superintendent had made an exception to allow the Earth civilization to level up and given them a “home” in the Land, she could also use this to restrain him. This was both a reward and a restraint.

The Celestial Honors Class would spend a lot to nurture a genius and required sufficient assurance of some return for their “investment”. Obviously, no one would believe verbal promises of such returns. The Heavenly Gates wanted to control one’s weakness and ensure that they would not nurture thankless wretches.

Of course, one did not need to think much to understand this. For the Heavenly Gates to mysteriously believe your verbal promises, devote themselves completely to you, give you benefits, and allow you to take advantage of them, how could such an easy thing exist? Were the higher-ups in the Heavenly Gates all idiots?

Lao Wang understood this rather well. If he were the Heavenly Shell superintendent and stood in that position, he would definitely have made the same decision.

Furthermore, while the Earth was rewarded, Wang Zhong also received an individual reward.

It was a relatively extraordinary Golden Flash messenger, one of the representative symbols of the Heavenly Gates superintendent. There were only a few of such messengers in the entire Heavenly Gates.

It was an insect race messenger, but the Golden Flash messenger was completely different from the other messengers, such as those used in the Combat Cultivation Hall. It could be called a god-tier messenger and was a natural favorite. It was able to teleport over short distances in the Land, despite the high spiritual pressure. And in terms of messaging speed, if the Golden Flash messenger was second, then no messenger in the Land would dare to claim to be first.

It was not for a class or for a mission from the Celestial Honors Class, but an individual reward just for joining the Celestial Honors Class. Other than a few words from the superintendent, there was also an ancient ring in the letter.

“It’s the Celestial Honors Class space ring!” Jhonas was about to drool. He wanted to touch it, and his eyes lit up. Even though the space ring was not a particularly rare item in the divine territory, all those who possessed them were “bosses” in various aspects. Ordinary Void Cores could not even think of having one. For example, Jhonas did not have one. It was not that the Babi family could not give him a space ring; his family simply did not want to spread the news of their heir who did not yet have any authority. “Boss, Boss, how large is it?”

Wang Zhong sensed the space ring in his hand. Just like with ordinary equipment, when he channeled his spiritual power into the space ring, the ring automatically matched his spiritual power waveband and became linked to him, meaning that it had become a personal item. The space ring’s storage capacity was about one cubic meter. Furthermore, this space ring had an invisibility field around itself. It was not very complex, but once he linked with this ring, only others who also possessed the Celestial Honors Class space ring would be able to see through this field. Frankly speaking, this forcibly formed a social circle within the Heavenly Gates. Only those from the Celestial Honors Class would know about this.

“It’s not very big,” Lao Wang simply and calmly said. “It’s only one cubic meter. Not many things can be stored here.”

In terms of the amount of space present, Lao Wang paid no attention to it. His fragment world was much bigger than this and did not just store items. Compared to this ring, Lao Wang focused more on the contents of the letter. It mentioned several other benefits of joining the Celestial Honors Class, such as access to the Heavenly Gates Library. In the past, Lao Wang and the others were only allowed to borrow books from the lowest-leveled Combat Cultivation Hall shelves. Furthermore, there were many restrictions. After joining the Pill Refinery Hall, he could only borrow some secret books that were level-7 or below. But now, other than some extremely special books in the library, most of the works were accessible to him, including many valuable prescriptions and even secret cultivation methods. But the borrowing fee was very high… Furthermore, some restricted areas in the Heavenly Gates had been opened to him, such as the Illusion Sea World. In the past, the supervisor had to submit an application before the class could go, and there would be strict restrictions. However, if Wang Zhong wanted to go now, he could apply for a spot as an individual.

Lao Wang answered him absent-mindedly. He looked at the Celestial Honors Class’s prestigious space ring as if it was nothing, but his eyes lit up as he stared at the privileges that had been unlocked. Meanwhile, Jhonas was completely speechless and simply rolled his eyes.

This was what was bad about Boss. His values were completely different from Jhonas’s. Who liked to look at those privileges and books? Compared to those, the Celestial Honors Class space ring was number one! What was most important was its level, its grade, and its rank! Damn, if the Celestial Honors Class Space Ring was his, he would immediately go back to his home in glory. When he returned to his family, he would become like a national treasure, and his elder would have to present offerings to him as he did to their ancestors… Ah! He had no such luck!

Of course, he could only secretly look down on Wang Zhong, the country bumpkin, in his head. If he were to say these out loud, even 10,000 guts would not be enough for Jhonas.

“Jhonas, I’d like to ask for your help with something.” Meanwhile, Lao Wang put away his things. Jhonas had clearly seen Lao Wang wear the space ring on his finger, but the moment he put it on, the space around it seemed to distort. When Jhonas took another look, only a bare finger was left.

“What is it?” Jhonas was slightly dejected. Recently, he felt that he was rather decent and had achieved top 10 status in the Equipment Refinery Hall. However, when he compared himself with his dorm mate, the gap was just too glaring. He had no presence at all.

“Doesn’t the Babi family have a lot of businesses in the Land? Furthermore, a lot of these businesses involve the peripheral worlds. I believe that you should be more knowledgeable in this aspect. Is it possible for you to help us Earthlings in this aspect?”

The Illusion race was most skilled in manufacturing illusion equipment with equipment pseudo-spirits. Many civilizations that collected “beliefs” from the peripheral worlds liked to bestow such illusion equipment to their local spokespeople. The Babi family had many similar businesses. It could even be said that the Babi family was the richest among the businesses that made money off the peripheral worlds.

Jhonas was stunned and furrowed his eyebrows. “Boss, to be honest, I have no ability to influence the family’s decisions.”

He paused before continuing, “Personally, I have some reputation, but I am not very important. The most I can do is ensure that the Earthlings are not bullied terribly while engaging in trade.”

Lao Wang nodded his head as he had also understood this. This was already considered a big help. At the very least, this would reduce a lot of pressure for Ma Dong and the others. Making things more difficult during tough times would not be helpful.

The Heavenly Treasures Street had just gotten in touch with the Earth. In reality, Lao Wang knew some information about the current circumstances on Earth. Even though the Earth had advanced to a quasi-level-5 civilization, the pressure on their finances had not decreased significantly. Also, the debts from three years ago had injured them severely, and it was not easy for them to slowly recover. Furthermore, not every civilization would give them respect. In the end, they were only a quasi-level-5 civilization. At the very most, others would not target them in particular.

The Earth only had the ability to slowly recuperate and build up some strength, but Wang Zhong did not want to wait. No one — whether it was him, Mu Zi, or the others in the Land — could smile until the very end as accidents could occur at any time. If these main pillars were no longer around and the Earth did not rapidly develop before that happened, they would return back to square one or be even worse off than before.

He simply took out 10,000 Gold Star Stones.

This was the amount of money that Grai had given him. He had wanted to save it for his expenses, but since he had joined the Celestial Honors Class, he would not be short of cultivation resources in the future. Even if he needed materials for pill refinery, his fragment world could reduce his costs to their minimum, so he did not worry about them at all. Thus, this sum of money did not mean much to him. However, if it could be used to help the Earth quickly establish a footing in the Dimensional Chamber of Commerce and develop powers that truly belonged to the Earth, then it was a foundation that could help tide them through a storm.

“This amount of money should make it easy for you to build some relations. If it is not enough, let me know. I’ll think of something,” said Lao Wang seriously.

“Hey, if Boss says so… For these kinds of things, it is very easy once there is money.” Jhonas’s eyes lit up. To be honest, he had built relations with the right person. Boss always gave thought to him and would never make things difficult for him because of minor matters. “Relax, leave this to me. It’s settled!”

Lao Wang knew Jhonas’s personality rather well. This little fellow was very slick and sly, and typically would not guarantee anything. Since he said that it was settled, there would definitely be no problem. He had never thought about asking Jhonas for help. In reality, the Babi family’s creed was decent, and they did not hurt others’ feelings when they were given money to do things. They were rather good.

Asking Jhonas and going through the Babi family instead of the Heavenly Treasures Street was a plan that Lao Wang had arrived at after careful consideration. After all, the strength of the Heavenly Treasures Street was no match for the Babi family. Furthermore, in terms of trade with the peripheral worlds, the Babi family were old hands. Furthermore, this sum of money might seem like a lot, being over ten times the current assets of the entire Earth civilization. However, if this was directly given to the Earth, it would be like skinning a sheep as they might spend everything and run out of money quickly. It was no match for using the money to build good trade relations. This was a long-term plan that would bring major returns.

Furthermore, the Earth civilization was full of various black sheep. Previously, Wales Karon had warned Wang Zhong. Even though there were only a few corrupt ones, most of the time, just one mouse dropping would be enough to ruin a pot of soup.

Humans were suited for sitting idle and enjoying the fruits of others. Without any pressure, the Earth civilization could not grow. This was an inherent weakness of any civilization. From ancient times till the present, thousands of races had multiplied and developed, but they had never escaped from this pattern, and the Earth was no exception…

It had been a few days since he had entered the Celestial Honors Class. Other than the various gifts at first, it seemed as if there was suddenly no news. There was no notice of any individual classes with the elders as he had expected, nor were there any tests or missions from the Celestial Honors Class. It was unusually peaceful.

To Lao Wang, it felt as if joining the Celestial Honors Class was like bestowing upon him a special honor, allowing him to show off and feel happy…

Of course, Lao Wang was very calm. He was not the kind of person who would be prideful. It seemed as if Senior Lavel was still desperately refining the piece of Soul Steel. Back then, he had sent Nini to ask when they could start the next step, but ever since the previous visit, she had not left the equipment refinery house. It seemed as if this closed-door cultivation would last for a long time.

Although Lao Wang had been thinking about “his” level-4 equipment all this time, he did not dare to disturb her. He was simply at ease. When he recalled the various benefits from the Celestial Honors Class, he made plans to go to the library to take a look.