As time approached evening, Xiao Jie returned to the city and found a place to log off.
Having exited the game, Xiao Jie carefully checked the Monster data of the Hundred Wolves Cave, anticipating tomorrow’s action.
Although the Wolf King Chi Mei Jian was at a lower level, the inner core of a Boss-level Boss surely contained abundant Spiritual Energy. However, to elevate his Qi Refining Skill to the Third-tier, it likely was still not enough.
Raising from Second Order to Third Order required 3000 points of Spiritual Energy. The Wolf King’s inner core held, at most, one to two thousand points — still a long way to go.
Xiao Jie browsed the data for a while, glanced at the sun that had not completely set outside his window, and felt a stirring in his heart.
After hesitating for a moment, he simply got up, pushed the door, and walked out of his house.
He headed straight for Huqiu Mountain.
This time, Xiao Jie was not going for a run, but to perform the Qi Observation Skill from a high vantage point.
He soon arrived at the top of Huqiu Mountain. By then, the sky had grown dark and no tourists were left on the mountain top. Seeing no one around, Xiao Jie performed his Qinggong, executing a Flying Cloud Chasing Moon, and landed on the bracket of the Observation Pavilion.
Standing at this high point, looking around, he could clearly see the vast cityscape of Jiangbei City.
Xiao Jie closed his eyes, brewing his feelings—the Qi Observation Skill!
Suddenly, he opened his eyes and a burst of brilliance shone from them. The world before him had transformed into a different scene where only black and white existed.
Spiritual Energy was scarce... Looking at the dim surroundings, Xiao Jie sighed helplessly, wondering if it was due to the city environment where not a trace of Spiritual Energy’s luminance could be found.
It seemed that finding Spiritual Energy in reality was not as easy as he had thought.
Xiao Jie then looked down at his hands. Amid the surrounding darkness, his body emitted a faint white, smoky light, like vapor rising—this was the color of Spiritual Energy, slowly dissipating from his body into the air.
Although this rate of loss was very gradual, it still gave Xiao Jie a sense of crisis. He must constantly acquire Spiritual Energy to maintain his current realm. This was only the Second Realm. In the future when his Qi Refining reached the eighth and ninth layer, he’d lose one to two hundred Spiritual Energy Value daily even without doing anything—outrageous.
This path of Refining Qi and Cultivating Immortality was indeed long and arduous.
He was just about to go down the mountain and return home.
Beep beep beep, suddenly his phone rang.
Upon checking the caller, it was Zhang Xingwen.
"Xiao Jie, how did the Chess Skill duel go?"
"Not bad, I successfully took it down."
"Haha, I told you, our company’s AI is top-notch, no human chess player can beat it."
"Heh, don’t speak so soon, that person actually did win a game against me."
Zhang Xingwen flatly denied, "Impossible, unless that person also used AI to play against you, or maybe they are an immortal."
Hearing this, Xiao Jie couldn’t help but chuckle internally, sharp as ever, the opponent was indeed an immortal... but thinking deeper, the move ’It Transformation Freedom Heart’ used by Shen Jizi seemed to be an external tactic.
"Maybe, but towards the end your AI just froze, totally dominated by the opponent. Thankfully, I won the first two games."
"Come on, are you joking? Our AI is world-class. Even if it lost, it would have been due to lesser computing power, not stalling—maybe your computer was too crappy to handle it? Send me the AI, I want to study how it lost."
Xiao Jie replied, "Wouldn’t sharing the match data suffice?"
"It’s not that simple. The match data won’t reveal much, I need the backend data generated during the AI’s computations, but you wouldn’t understand. Just send it."
Thinking it over, Xiao Jie decided to just send it upon his return home. He still had to respect his old buddy, who might be useful in the future.
Time quickly reached the next day, and Xiao Jie logged on early.
It seemed that refining Qi in reality wasn’t easy, so it was better to hurry and slay Demons and seize their Dan.
At nine o’clock sharp, the core members of Dragon Soaring Knights’ branch, over forty in total, gathered in the square and majestically rode out of Luoyang Town.
They sped like the wind to Moon Howling Forest. Hidden Dragon instructed everyone to dismount and simultaneously clear the Little Monsters encountered along the way, quickly arriving into a gourd-shaped valley.
Though it was called a valley, it was merely a slightly larger depression, surrounded by several-meter-high earthen mounds covered with trees.
The depression was also overgrown with wild grass and had several dozen trees.
Xiao Jie nodded slightly upon seeing these trees—it was indeed a favorable setting for Dida La to show his prowess. Fire would soon ignite, potentially causing substantial environmental damage.
Hidden Dragon began assigning positions to ensure that no gaps would emerge in the encircling formation.
Since the mounds were only a few meters high, ordinary Wolf Soldiers would struggle to charge up them, but neither the Wolf King nor the Demonized Giant Wolf would care.
After thorough arrangements, everything was finally set.
"All members, take your positions."
Everyone began to find their spots.
Xiao Jie looked around at the enclosing circle formed by players on the surrounding mounds and felt it was quite reliable.
"President? Those wolf packs have keen noses; what if they discover us?" a player couldn’t help but ask.
"Don’t worry, I have everything arranged," Hidden Dragon said with a faint smile. "Everyone—log off and wait for my command on YY."