Beastmaster of the Ages

Tianming estimated that he had thirty kegs in total, ten of springwater and twenty of baleflame. It was an unbelievable amount for anyone in Myriadpath Valley, and also what Tianming needed to reach for the Foundation stage.

”If I can get my hands on a grade-nine order fragment from Antiquitas Mortis, I’ll be able to do just that!” The problem was that doing so was unbelievably difficult. Tianming had learned that the highest-tier manna he could get with merit points only had nine hundred apertures. And each of those cost over eight million merit points.

In the past decade, Tianming had received an extra ten million points, but that would only be enough to trade for a single 900-aperture manna. And that was only enough for a grade-eight order fragment, much less a grade-nine one. He estimated that he would need at least seven or eight manna of that level for a single grade-nine order fragment, which would cost him hundreds of millions of merit points!

He shrugged and asked, ”Auntie, did you ask Princess Ying how many grade-nine order fragments they have?”

”Grade nine? I think she brought it up once. They only have three in total. Two belong to their emperor, while the last one belongs to the second strongest person in Antiquitas Mortis, their prime minister.” Eminent Jiguang shook her head. ”Forget about getting grade-nine order fragments for now. Just use baleflame and springwater to progress. They aren’t as fast as using order fragments, but they’ll still be useful to you in the future.”

”Does Princess Ying herself not have any?”

”Why would she? Grade-nine order fragments are just too rare.”

Tianming gave it some thought. He was just a step away from reaching the Foundation stage. Since he was in such a good position, he didn’t want to wait decades to take that step. ”Let’s say I do have the manna needed. Would the emperor or prime minister be willing to trade it with me?”

”That kind of manna is in the hands of House Qitian and House Yumo. House Suishen doesn’t have a single one. And even if you have the merit for it, you wouldn’t be able to trade for it.”

”Well, I actually do have one....”

”If it’s 920 or 930-aperture manna, it isn’t too different from 900-aperture manna to the antiquitean imperials. You’d need a 970-aperture manna at least. Only that would be rare enough to qualify as a top-tier manna,” Eminent Jiguang said.

”I have 999-aperture manna!” Tianming straightforwardly said. In fact, he had two.

Eminent Jiguang seemed quite taken aback and grabbed his hands. She turned to face him and asked, ”You aren’t joking, right?”

Tianming shook his head. He didn’t hesitate and took one of the two out to show her. It would need only one extra aperture to be classified as the tier above. The foundation-fortress-like manna made Eminent Jiguang blankly stare.

She held it in hand and counted the apertures herself. ”Nine hundred and ninety-nine.... One more and you’ll have a thousand. This is incredibly rare even in Myriadpath Valley....” After a moment of processing her shock, she turned to him. ”Where’d you get something like this?”

”Auntie, I have my secrets....”

”Something you can’t tell me?” She pursed her lips in conflicted thought. On the one hand, she felt that Tianming was shrouded in so many layers of mystery that it may go out of control and hurt him one day. But on the other, she didn’t want to limit his freedoms and make him suffer for it.

What she didn’t expect was that he would simply smile and say, ”Since you’ve already given me so much, Auntie, I already consider you family. I’ll tell you about it.”

She froze from the torrent of emotions and tears welled up. She bit her lip and said, ”You brat, why do you keep saying moving things like that....”

”It’s all from the heart.”

”Fine! Just say it.” She was starting to feel rather embarrassed about how emotional she was getting.

”Long story short, I found an infinitum-class divine astralship in my home world. I don’t know where it came from, and I’m the one who’s receiving the legacies left within. This manna is one of the legacies I obtained from it. Basically, everything that changed about me is due to that divine astralship. I’ll take you there to see it when we have a chance, Auntie.”

Tianming had attributed all the weird things that surrounded him to the Gladean Ruins, mixing truth with falsehood. However, he believed it was all she needed to know for now. Not to mention, he wouldn’t be willing to breathe even a single word of even that half-truth to anyone else; it would merely fuel their greed and Tianming would rather not tempt fate.

Eminent Ranxing, for instance, would definitely force his way to the ship if he learned about it and the Infinitum Mundus, but Eminent Jiguang wouldn’t.

”Then you truly are a lucky one. You’re able to shine so brightly in Myriadpath Valley just because of that legacy alone. It’s no wonder that you don’t dare to let anybody else learn about your home.” Fortunately, she didn’t know that Tianming’s real home was the Infinitum Mundus, or she would have made the connection with House Yumo’s latest tragedy.

”Well, I’ve more or less finished using all the legacies I obtained, anyway,” Tianming awkwardly said.

”Make sure to not tell anyone else about it. I’m worried you’ll give people ideas.”

”I’ll do as you say, Auntie.”

”Good.” Eminent Jiguang breathed in deep and lowered her head in thought. ”I believe no 999-aperture manna has appeared in Antiquitas Mortis so far. Not to mention, the star count of the emperor isn’t at that level yet. It’s likely that we’ll be able to get a grade-nine order fragment. Since I’ve made a trip back, I’ll help you out one more time! If you can reach the Foundation stage, you’ll be able to fight seventh-level reverends and not worry about exposing your true cultivation level. I’ll finally be able to rest easy.”

The timing was simply perfect.

***

They returned to the Xenoabyss once more. Eminent Jiguang had Tianming stay near the stareye and went looking for Princess Ying alone. Thanks to their previous trades, her relationship with Princess Ying had considerably improved.

Tianming patiently waited, and before long, Eminent Jiguang reached out to him through his transmission stone. ”How did it go?” This was their biggest transaction yet; he was worried about whether it would smoothly go through.