Chapter 556: Eye of the triangle

Just like that, six months passed.

Within these six months, Li Shiwei used her own power to construct a complete set of ruins, ancient texts, and perfectly faked clues, creating a long-circulated, super-ancient legend.

In this super-ancient legend, there was a mysterious organization called the ‘Triangular Eye’ that had existed from an extremely ancient past until now.

Of course, the name was made up by Li Shiwei.

In the storyline she wrote, this Triangular Eye concealed many of the world's prominent figures. Although the Triangular Eye did not operate in the public eye, it secretly manipulated the world from behind the scenes. Many Senior Instructors and even higher existences had secretly joined this Triangular Eye.

However, this organization had not yet begun its publicity, so only Li Shiwei and Shi Tou knew about it. Various clues, traces, ancient ruins, lost texts, secret knowledge, and the like were still stored in the ruins' warehouse, not yet revealed.

Nevertheless, Li Shiwei had already prepared the publicity work and was now just waiting for the first wave of official members to join.

The first wave of official members, naturally, was Shi Tou's responsibility.

She had everything arranged. Once the first wave of official members appeared, the world would begin to reveal itself!

It was all up to Shi Tou now.

Meanwhile, Shi Tou was currently teaching the local youngsters how to tame the Qi within their bodies.

To be honest… this difficulty somewhat exceeded Shi Tou's imagination.

In Shi Tou's impression, everyone should inherently possess their own Dao. Regardless of where this 'Dao' came from—whether self-conceived, learned from parents or teachers, or instilled by the surrounding environment—it didn't matter; it was surely present.

Therefore, when a Cultivator began their cultivation, the initial Qi would inevitably have a most basic Dao to follow, preventing it from running wild and causing the body to explode.

However, this applied to the world of All Under Heaven.

People in All Under Heaven could easily get started with cultivation because All Under Heaven was a place close to the Dao, serving as the base and stronghold for various major Dao Orthodoxy.

But in this Seventh-Rank world… Shi Tou finally understood why they didn't like using the miniature heaven and earth concept.

The people of this world fundamentally lacked a usable 'Dao'; their own world was difficult to self-consistent, divided into seven layers, each unable to unify.

In other words, the people of this world inherently had Dao contention within them.

This was troublesome.

No wonder their cultivation path was like this: forcibly refining the Spirit Soul, then using the Spirit Soul to collect Qi from the environment, temporarily assembling it into their specialized techniques, which they called 'Formulas'.

This method allowed them to cast quite effective techniques without accumulating a large amount of cultivation, but the problem was that this method required a long wind-up and incantation.

Even ordinary fireballs and ice spears required several seconds of incantation. If it was a 'Forbidden Spell-level Grand Formula' that only Senior Instructors could master, preparing it could take over ten days, and some even required setting up Formation in advance to gather environmental energy. It was said that the most terrifying Forbidden Spell Formula required a hundred years of preparation.

By then, the lily would have wilted.

Cultivators in All Under Heaven didn't use this method. Even for incredibly powerful large-scale techniques, they could perfectly prepare them within their miniature heaven and earth, striking wherever they aimed without any delay, though it would impose some burden on their body and cultivation.

Therefore, for the past six months, Shi Tou had been teaching the other party how to Break through Dao contention, how to establish a 'Dao' of their own, and how to build a stable understanding of the world through which to guide their actions and cultivation.

However, after more than half a year, he finally managed to condense the first wisp of Qi.

Lu De felt the warm current flowing through his body, then entered a state of inner vision, examining his miniature heaven and earth.

He had never imagined that within his flesh and blood, a world was hidden, and the power of this world could actually be mobilized by him.

What kind of immense power was this?

Although he could only mobilize a very, very small part, and his world was very weak, he felt that with just these few wisps of Qi, he could instantly kill all apprentices.

The reason was simple: apprentices' incantation times were too long, and only a very few apprentices who had mastered 'instant cast' techniques could achieve instant release.

However, instant casts generally had less power, while he could instantly cast attacks far exceeding the strength of ordinary Formulas.

Combat ability was a minor matter; the most crucial thing was… he felt that he had touched 'truth'.

The 'truth' that all research institutes and those Senior Instructors were pursuing.

He could feel that what he had gathered was gently revolving around 'truth'.

At this moment, truth was within him.

"Alright, you've finally gotten started. You've really worn me out… Also, what's inside you isn't the true truth, but what you believe to be the truth. You'll need to correct it later, letting it gradually approach the truth. Don't get complacent," Shi Tou sighed, admonishing him.

"Understood, I've truly troubled you, Instructor. I'll give you new energy right away," Lu De immediately stood up, preparing to crush the crystals to feed Shi Tou.

By now, Lu De completely believed that Shi Tou was a Senior Instructor.

It was common knowledge that the most fervent pursuers of knowledge in the world were the various research institutes, and within these institutes, Senior Instructors were the highest authority.

Therefore, in this world, besides true Senior Instructors, who else could possess such profound knowledge?

Over the past six months, the terrifying knowledge and profound philosophy Shi Tou had displayed deeply attracted him. He even vaguely, in his heart… regarded Shi Tou as a true teacher.

And Shi Tou never held back, cultivating Lu De into someone akin to a miscellaneous Cultivator from All Under Heaven, roughly equivalent to the Strongmen Gang's leader. In the Baiyue region of All Under Heaven, he could also achieve the status of a grassroots Gang leader.

In other words, in this kingdom world, among all apprentice Rank, he was very, very strong, almost… invincible.

And all of this happened in just six months.

"Are you still going hunting this month?" Shi Tou asked Lu De while absorbing the crystals around him.

"No, I've already secretly hunted a lot of crystals before, enough to last until next month. This month, I plan to try to get a position in the Royal Capital Guard," Lu De shook his head and said.

Over the past six months, to maintain Shi Tou's energy and waking hours—at least, he thought it was to maintain Shi Tou's energy—Lu De started working hard to earn money after getting out of bed.

However, he was just an apprentice. How much could he earn?

But Shi Tou couldn't say no, because Shi Tou initially said he needed crystal energy to motivate and spur this young man on. Pressure creates motivation, after all.

Of course, pressure alone isn't enough. You need the urgency chasing you from behind, and a carrot dangling in front. With both, a person runs faster.

Therefore, using money as a coercive tool, and knowledge as the carrot, was the only way to make him progress rapidly.

As a result, Lu De could only find ways to earn money himself. The best of both worlds he eventually thought of was to go hunting those Dao of Heaven’s Evolution creatures in the wilderness…

Oh, no, they should be called Crystal Beasts.

But to Shi Tou, they were simply a group of civilized creatures cultivating the Dao of Heaven’s Evolution.

Initially, Lu De relied on his knowledge, exploiting the Crystal Beasts' weaknesses to set traps, earning his first sum of money.

However, as he grew stronger, he could now even hunt Crystal Beasts directly without any preparation!

He hadn't relaxed for a single day in the past six months.

However, he felt a bit regretful… he hadn't seen that platinum-haired noble youth again, because the other party had gone to participate in a Senior Instructor's project.

The thought that the other party also had a Senior Instructor guiding him, and surely his progress wouldn't be less than his own, made Lu De work even harder.

"A position in the Guard? That's fine, as long as you have a plan," Shi Tou nodded and said.

The conversation didn't last too long. Soon, Lu De had packed up, hung Shi Tou around his neck, and left for the research institute.

Upon arriving at the research institute, he went straight to Jin Laoshi's office.

He knocked on the door, and after hearing Jin Laoshi say 'Please come in,' Lu De pushed the door open.

Then, his pupils trembled slightly.

Because, in the office, there was another student.

It was the handsome, platinum-haired noble who had beaten him to the point of being unable to care for himself.

Unfortunately, he didn't know his name. The other party had never introduced himself to Lu De. For this noble existence, Lu De was essentially just a passerby.

Lu De lowered his head slightly, walked in, pretending not to see the other person, and said to Jin Laoshi: "Jin Laoshi, this is the record for this time. Through further analysis of the equipment, I have found the traces left by the soul on the equipment. There are a total of thirty-nine places, and I have recorded them all."

Unexpectedly, the handsome, platinum-haired noble heard this and smiled: "Oh, this is what's going to be used this time, right? I was just about to ask Jin Laoshi for it. He just said you hadn't delivered it yet, and that you were a bit slow this time. I didn't expect you to show up while we were talking. What a coincidence. Just hand it directly to me; I'll take it to the Senior Instructor."

As he spoke, he reached out directly, naturally wanting to take the document from Lu De's hand.

However, he tugged, but found that Lu De hadn't let go, not even moving his eyes.

This made the handsome, platinum-haired noble frown slightly.

It was Jin Laoshi who reacted quickly. He immediately stood up, placed his hand on the paper, took the document, and said with a smile, trying to smooth things over: "I'm sorry, Young Master Walong, Lu De is quite rigid and stubborn. He insists on handing it to me personally."

Saying that, Jin Laoshi deftly took the document, aligned it on the table, and handed it to the platinum-haired noble.

The noble, called Walong, relaxed his brows and then smiled: "It's no problem. Just doing things by the book. Integrity is a very good quality, after all, my order was to collect the data from you, Jin Laoshi."

Then, he nodded to Lu De and said: "You did well. It really should be this way. You hand it to Jin Laoshi, and then I collect it from Jin Laoshi. This is the most appropriate. You did well. For someone like you, I believe your data must be very detailed, which will be of great help to the Senior Instructor's work. Thank you."

After speaking, he turned and left, maintaining politeness throughout.

But… he was condescending.

Although his words were polite, the implied meaning was very clear.

You are merely a handyman, doing the grunt work of data. The results of your labor will all be sent to me and the Senior Instructor, becoming the fuel needed for true creative work.

Perhaps he wasn't thinking this way when he spoke, but the feeling conveyed by his words made it seem like such a statement.

Watching Walong leave, Lu De sighed.

At this moment, Jin Laoshi patted his shoulder and said: "Oh, why are you being so serious with him? He just came back to check on something. Everyone gets along, and it's over, so why bother?"

"Nothing, I just think rules are important. By the way, Jin Laoshi, you said he came back to check on something? Wasn't he here to pick up documents? What does he need to check?" Lu De asked curiously.

Jin Laoshi replied: "It's said to be because of the strange occurrences in the Royal Capital recently. Crystal Beasts in the surrounding forests are dying in large numbers, seemingly hunted by a hidden person. But the problem is, after all the crystals are dug out, they never enter the market; it's as if they vanished into thin air."

"This matter is very strange. Walong has been assigned the task of investigating it, but it has nothing to do with us. Let him handle it himself," Jin Laoshi smiled: "There's nothing else here, so you can leave now. I see you've been quite busy lately. Have you gained anything?"

"As for gains…" Lu De was about to answer, but then heard Jin Laoshi interrupt him.

The old man said: "There's no need to tell me these things. Keep your own gains to yourself, and don't tell others casually. Competition among apprentices is still very fierce. By the way, you can look at this; I think it's a good assignment for you."

Saying that, he took out a letter of introduction: "Go back and read it yourself, don't open it here."

"…" Lu De was silent for a while, then nodded, taking the envelope: "Thank you, Jin Laoshi."

"I brought you out of the mine, so I must take responsibility for you. Go, do what you need to do, and don't conflict with Walong. You can't afford to offend him. Luckily, half a year has passed, and he has defeated too many people, so he might not even remember you," Jin Laoshi admonished.

"Hmm, I understand." Lu De also nodded, then bid farewell to Jin Laoshi and turned to leave.

However, just as he left the research institute and was still at the entrance, Lu De was surprised to find Walong standing at the entrance, seemingly waiting for him.

"Hmm?" Lu De stopped.

Walong then walked up and sniffed Lu De's scent.

This sent a shiver down Lu De's spine, and he took a step back.

However, Walong's next words made Lu De's blood run cold!

The noble said: "You… have the scent of many different kinds of Crystal Beasts on you. Do you often hunt Crystal Beasts?"

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