27. The Crisis of the Outer Battlefield?
That night, Gong Yiling experienced the consequences of offending a nutritionist.
She thought she had said goodbye to the pill banquet, but that night, she was treated to a second round.
Yan Chuyue, now in a cook’s apron, looked at her with a ladle in her hand. “Your brain isn’t working well lately. I need to replenish it.”
“Pah! Your brain is the one that’s not working!” Miss Gong retorted defiantly.
“Are you sure?” Yan Chuyue narrowed her eyes, her gaze sending a chill down her spine.
Threatened, Miss Gong quickly backed down. “I’ll eat, I’ll eat, I’ll eat…”
She muttered to herself—Hmph, she’s the protagonist. I won’t stoop to her level.
“After you finish, tell me what fruit you want.” Seeing her submissive expression, Yan Chuyue chuckled. “That Miss Baiyao is quite interesting. Instead of other things, she sent boxes and boxes of fruit. We can’t even finish them.”
Uh… this was all because she had casually mentioned the fruit was good during the meeting.
She had omitted the part about “for quenching thirst.”
But it didn’t matter. This incident had drained her finances, and she had even been “sold” by her own mother. Now that the Baiyao Dynasty was entering spring, and the demonic beasts were becoming active, she had no intention of messing with their treasury.
Free fruit was a good compensation for her troubles.
“Then I want mango.” Gong Yiling raised her hand excitedly. “Preferably mango with strawberries.”
“Strawberries with mango? You’ll get a stomachache.” Yan Chuyue, while complaining, found this habit rather strange.
She rarely ate fruit with Gong Yiling. They usually went to barbecue stalls at night.
This habit of mixing everything she liked… was just like her brother’s.
—Did I set Gong Yiling to like mangoes and strawberries?
As she was thinking, Yan Chuyue still went to prepare the fruit for her.
Just then, an uninvited guest appeared.
“Is Ling’er here?”
It was Gong Musheng.
“Little Auntie?” Gong Yiling quickly swallowed the strange taste in her mouth and asked, surprised, “What are you doing here?”
Besides the meetings, she hadn’t seen her Little Auntie much these past few days, and she hadn’t mentioned when she should go to the Hundred Ghosts Ridge.
Was she here to confirm their departure time?
“There are some things I’ll only tell you. Whether you choose to tell your parents is up to you.” Gong Musheng sat down casually and said, “And whether you listen is also up to you.”
“Don’t keep me in suspense, Little Auntie. What is it?”
“You should know about the Eight Desolations Deer Hunt from Miss Baiyao, and have heard something about the Heavenly Sin, right?”
Gong Yiling was taken aback.
When Gong Musheng didn’t mention it before, she thought her Little Auntie wasn’t involved. But now it seemed the connection between the Hundred Objects, Not Predestined by the Heavens and the Heavenly Sin could be confirmed.
“You know about this, Little Auntie?”
“Of course.” Gong Musheng said, “That Miss Baiyao is actually my junior. And I know who that Prince Kui is.”
“I learned the Hundred Objects, Not Predestined by the Heavens at that time.”
She didn’t elaborate, but it sounded like she had been tricked into joining the Heavenly Sin and then escaped with her own wits.
It was like being tricked into a pyramid scheme, then outsmarting the leaders and escaping.
What a talent.
“I don’t know how much Miss Baiyao told you, but the information she has is probably from much later. They wouldn’t tell her that the next round of the Eight Desolations Deer Hunt has already begun.”
It’s already begun?
Why so fast?
“But isn’t the previous prophecy’s result not over yet?”
“They’re planning something big this time, so this hunt is starting early. And the participants are chosen by those unwitting pawns, who will slowly pass the items to others.”
Wait… if that was the case, she had actually received a token, the one from the Young Master of the Mo family.
Thinking of this, Gong Yiling immediately took out the longsword from her Universe Ring—the one that served as the Sword Alliance’s token.
“Is this it?”
Gong Musheng was surprised to see the sword in her hand. “You got one too?”
“Well,” Gong Yiling shrugged. “I didn’t know what the Eight Desolations Deer Hunt was when I took it. I thought it was just an ordinary secret realm.”
“So, Little Auntie, what exactly is this thing used for?”
“Do you remember the Outer Battlefield?” Gong Musheng countered.
“Mmm.”
She knew about this.
The Outer Battlefield was a treasure trove of extreme danger, where countless powerful figures had died defending against foreign invaders.
After their deaths, their dantians and meridians would form a “palace,” which would gradually become a secret realm over time.
So, the Outer Battlefield was basically a lottery for them. They couldn’t defeat the real masters.
Her mother had wanted to find a divine physician to heal her meridians quickly so she could go to the Outer Battlefield and challenge herself.
“What does the Outer Battlefield have to do with the Eight Desolations Deer Hunt?”
“Originally, nothing. But this time, the Heavenly Sin has chosen to hold the hunt in the Outer Battlefield.”
Huh?
Were these people crazy?
Although the Outer Battlefield was a place for the younger generation to scavenge, that was only for them.
For the sect leaders, it was a place to defend the continent and their sect’s honor.
Holding their boring prophecy game in such a place, what was the meaning of this?
