Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

Bai Xinghe was recruited to a starship when he was eleven. Talented as he might have been, he was merely an ordinary person and could only serve as a sailor.

Maybe the deities were indeed watching over him. His luck continued, and he survived the fierce battles one time after another. His experience in fighting grew more and more abundant. He became stronger and stronger.

When he was fourteen, his spiritual root was awakened, and he became a Cultivator.

Then, his life was unstoppable like a flooding river.

At first, nearly at the cost of his own life, he rescued the leader of the pirate gang who bought him and pushed him into the abyss of Spider Den. He gradually won the leader’s trust and became his right-hand man.

Then, he conspired with a bigger pirate gang and buried the leader once and for all in a perfect betrayal.

However, he did not take the opportunity to take over the pirate gang. Instead, he joined the bigger pirate gang together with the pirate gang he used to be in.

Several years later, the leader of the bigger pirate gang died abruptly.

What was weirder was that Bai Xinghe, who had only begun his career a few years earlier and had no expertise or connections, was appointed as the new leader of the pirate gang.

Everybody agreed to the decision unanimously, except for the dozens of dead people whose throats were cut in the night.

In the decades that followed, there was a series of schemes, treacheries, massacres, alliances, and betrayals.

Bai Xinghe, the orphan who survived the cosmic storm and the treasure hunter who struggled to survive in the underground abyss of Spider Den, grasped one starship after another, and then crystal suit centers, and then docks.

In the end, the ’Abyss Pirate Gang’, governed by him, became the strongest pirate gang on Spider Den, and he personally gained control over the largest number of docks and crystal suit centers, thereby known as the well-deserved ’Pirate Potentate’!

During the decades of his rise, even the most ferocious space pirates would cry when they heard his name. The destruction of countless pirate gangs seemed to be related to him, but every operation had been clean without any traces. Therefore, the guardians of the rules of darkness could do nothing about it.

However, when he became the Pirate Potentate, he suddenly turned into the most loyal enforcer of the rules of darkness and started talking about ’traditions’ with everybody.

He collected the evidence of the pirate gang’s previous crimes diligently and revealed it in public in the meetings of the Nine Dragons Union. Then, he struck the pirate gangs under the name of the Nine Dragons Union and took over their assets and manpower matter-of-factly. His forces further expanded.

As a result, not only was Bai Xinghe’s personal strength getting higher and higher, other space pirates also became dutiful and obedient, intimidated by him.

It was not exaggerating to say that the recent decades were the golden era for Spider Den, when the society was most stable, and the crimes were fewest.

With so many docks and crystal suit centers, it had been a long time since the Abyss Pirate Gang went looting personally. They could lord over other pirate gangs and absorb blood from them.

It was one of the benefits of staying at the top of the food chain.

Even Fengyu Zhong, the old, cunning fox, is so wary of Bai Xinghe. It seems that he is not going to be easy to deal with.

Pondering for a moment, Li Yao meant to scratch his hair, only to touch his solid helmet. He then realized that he had been the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit all the time over the past month and had not taken it off other than when he was refilling spiritual energy.

Other than the information, Fengyu Zhong also recorded a very interesting anecdote.

It was a secret about Bai Xinghe’s rise.

Even in a place where personal ability was valued and familial background was overlooked such as Spider Den, Bai Xinghe was still a living legend to have risen from a rat-like treasure hunter into the greatest king of space pirates in only a hundred years.

When people analyzed Bai Xinghe’s skyrocketing rise, they found that he was always able to take out a huge amount of powerful magical equipment.

Then, word on the street was that Bai Xinghe had a ’Spider Key’ in his possession.

The underground of Spider Den was a complicated fortress. Such a fortress naturally had a control center, a map, and a key to turn off all the traps.

Over the past thousand years, no space pirate had been able to locate the control center or the key.

Many space pirates suspected that Bai Xinghe had crawled into certain secret tunnels and found the center of the underground fortress with the help of his tiny body size during his early years when he was still a treasure hunter. He must have retrieved a detailed map and a key to enter every room of the underground fortress!

In such a case, the arsenals, magical equipment, and techniques buried for ten thousand years were naturally all his!

With such extensive resources, and also because he was an unparalleled genius himself, it was only reasonable that Bai Xinghe became the dominator of Spider Den!

When the rumor was out, all the space pirates were grasped by jealousy. Some planned to steal, and some planned to rob. Seven pirate gangs joined hands, hoping to annihilate the Abyss Pirate Gang and take the Spider Key.

In the end, Bai Xinghe destroyed all the seven pirate gangs and swallowed them instead!

Then, it was said that the Spider Key did not exist and that it was a false message released by Bai Xinghe’s opponent so that everybody would turn against him.

But a more terrifying theory was that, although the Spider Key did not exist, it was Bai Xinghe who released the false message. His purpose was to lure other pirate gangs into attacking him so that he could launch a counterattack justifiably. In such a case, he would still be abiding by the rules of darkness on Spider Den and swallowing other pirate gangs to expand his forces at the same time.

After the seven pirate gangs were exterminated by Bai Xinghe, no more space pirates dared to mess around with him anymore.

Another point of interest was that Bai Xinghe, the Pirate Potentate, had a weird sense of humor.

He had truly refined a giant pendant that both looked like a spider and like a key and put it on his neck, showing it to everybody. The pendent was waving in front of chest wherever he went.

But no space pirates ever dared to ask him whether or not it was the Spider Key that could control the entire underground fortress of Spider Den and the countless kinds of magical equipment, techniques, and arsenals inside!

For a space pirate, his achievements could not be more remarkable.

Li Yao turned off his crystal processor and inwardly sighed.

On his journey to Spider Den, he would be faced with both Fengyu Zhong, an old, cunning fox who was now in the Nascent Soul Stage, and Bai Xinghe, the most distinguished space pirate alive.

If Hellsword was not lying, the real Black King should be at least in the Nascent Soul Stage, too.

Three Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators. And that was not counting the other experts of the Temple of Immortals such as the Lotus King.

For a moment, Li Yao had the urge to go back home immediately.

This trip to Spider Den will be different from my visit to Iron Plateau. I must change my style and focus more on investigation without alarming anyone. I should not fight unless it is absolutely necessary. I must keep a low profile! Otherwise, if three Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators are angered by me, the outcome won’t be good!

Li Yao scratched the iron skull of the crystal suit and pondered. The carrier has cruised in the sea of stars for more than a month and crossed multiple stone belts. Many parts on the carrier have been damaged. When it arrives in Spider Den, it will certainly be examined in a certain dock. At that time, I will sneak out and hang around with the reserve space pirates in the bottom class who are waiting to be employed.

The questions remains, how am I going to approach the leadership of Spider Den?

While Li Yao was thinking hard, the cooling tubes all started shivering slightly.

Li Yao was dazed. He leaned against the wall of the tube and heightened the sensitivity of his soundwave reception rune array to the maximum, only to hear earsplitting roars from every direction.

Not good!

Li Yao’s pupils constricted violently. Again!

There was no telling what accident the carrier had run into, but it was zigzagging and performing the craziest dodging movements.

In such a state, all the power rune arrays were fully activated. Naturally, the hot stream inside the cooling tubes was disordered and lost all patterns!

BOOM!

In the next moment, Li Yao was blown away by a cluster of air more than two thousand degrees high and extremely corrosive!

The crystal processor of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit was buzzing crazily. The damaged part on the breastplate, which had temporarily been repaired by materials from the Black Horn Battlesuit, was ripped open again. Endless flames leaked into his crystal suit through the holes. He felt that he was slashed in the chest again!

I’m going to die!

Li Yao ran forward crazily and improved his senses to the limits, looking for a shelter in the labyrinth of cooling tubes.

However, the fully-functioning power rune arrays were even more fierce than three days ago when the carrier was caught by a cosmic storm. Of all the cooling tubes, there was not one whose temperature was low enough for him to stay in briefly.

What’s happening? Another cosmic storm?

It can’t be! We’re already in Spider Den Space Zone, and they are travelling in the sailing route that they are most familiar with. It’s not likely that they are unfortunate enough to run into such a large-scale cosmic storm. Or are they?

The alarms on the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit were louder and louder. In his anxiety and finding that he had nowhere to run to, Li Yao gritted his teeth and blew up part of the cooling tube, crawling out!

He appeared in the maintenance room next to the engine compartment. It was empty for now.

However, dangerous red lights were blinking on the wall of the cabin.

Broadcast rune arrays were sending out hasty alarms, too.

Li Yao had chosen the starship to lurk in after full deliberation. He had examined the few starships he found and selected the most ragged-looking one.

According to the plan on Hellsword’s crystal processor, there were no important people of the Temple of Immortals on this starship. It was merely transporting the trivial assets and low-level Immortal Cultivators.

The journey was very long. Li Yao did not intend to stay on the same starship with dangerous people such as the Black King for a month.

Even so, he could not be too careful.

Looking around, Li Yao removed the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit and put on a mechanic’s uniform after picking one from the closet of the room.

At this moment, the carrier was shaking more and more violently, like a lonely boat at the mercy of the surging ocean, one that had a giant hole on the bottom.

Li Yao’s head almost crashed into the ceiling several times.

Sticking his ear to the cabin door, Li Yao listened carefully for a while. When he was sure that there was only one person’s footsteps, Li Yao opened the door suddenly.

”What—what has happened?” Li Yao stammered, pretending to panic.

There was indeed only one space pirate in the pathway who hadn’t got the opportunity to put on his crystal suit. His face was even paler than that of a dead person, as he shrieked, ”Bo—Boss Bai is here!”