Chapter 271: The Lost Time
Translator: TYZ Editor: X
The crude bathtub was filled with a black medicinal water, giving off a pungent smell that pervaded the air.
Suddenly, the tranquil water surface bubbled as a craggy, stern-looking face slowly floated up. The black medicinal water slid off both sides of the face, resembling a sea monster that emerged from the sea.
Splash.
A half-naked guy sat up from the bathtub.
"Ai Hui, how do feel?" Lou Lan asked as the dark red glow in his eyes kept on flickering.
"Very terrible," a lazy voice replied.
As Ai Hui stood up from the medicinal water, the black liquid trickled along his well-defined muscles as it flowed. His body was not powerfully built and even looked somewhat lean. However, any movements he made or any slight twitches of his muscles would involuntarily release a dangerous aura.
On the left side of his dripping wet chest, there was an image of a glistening, beautiful, blood-colored plum blossom.
"25% of my elemental energy has been devoured by it."
Ai Hui stepped out of the bathtub, picked up a clean towel from the wooden rack, and wiped off the medicinal water on his body. With a casual tone, he said, "One Thousand Yuan must have been a loan shark in her previous life. The interest she collects is even more ruthless than mine."
"Lou Lan believes that student Bangwan wouldn’t think so," Lou Lan replied with a serious look on his face.
Ai Hui, who was putting on his clothes, laughed out loud. "An immoral fellow like him has no right to criticize others. How’s our ingrate doing recently?"
"From the news, he doesn’t seem to be doing well." Lou Lan continued, "Recently, there has been quite a lot of news regarding student Bangwan."
Immediately, Ai Hui became excited. "Choose some headlines and tell me."
With a bang, Lou Lan transformed into a row of rolling words made of sand.
"The Jadeite Prince Spent His Whole Night In A Brothel!"
"The Jadeite Prince Heavily Drunk!""
"The Jadeite Prince Drowning His Sorrows With Alcohol!"
Ai Hui was slightly shocked. "He owes someone money again?"
With a bang, Lou Lan transformed into another row of rolling words.
"Duanmu Kang: My Son Is A Prodigy!"
"Dai Gang: Huanghun Is A Genius, He Needs To Find A Girl That Can Match Up To Him."
"The Avalon Of Five Elements: Jadeite Forest And Avalon Of Five Elements Are Of The Same Roots, We Ought To Cement The Old Ties By Marriage."
"Blood Of God: In This New Era, The Duanmu Family Needs To Bring In A Contemporary Young Mistress."
"Jadeite Forest: We Will Take These Opinions Into Serious Consideration."
Ai Hui could not help but laugh when the image of Duanmu Huanghun drowning his sorrows with alcohol appeared in his mind. He was rejoicing in Duanmu Huanghun’s misfortune. "Hahaha, he has to pay for whatever mistakes he made."
"Qingye is here." Lou Lan transformed back into his usual form with a bang.
When Su Qingye walked into the training hall, the first thing he saw was an eye-catching message tree that looked extremely ancient. Every time he saw this message tree, he could not help but purse his lips. The teacher was so young, but why was he so old-fashioned?
This message tree looked like a defective product that was picked up from a rubbish heap.
Nowadays, there were various types of cool and trendy message trees. Some were decorated with dazzling lights, while others could even simultaneously project images and talk. His teacher’s ancient message tree, which only allowed written messages, had been outdated for an unknown number of years.
His teacher was like an old man.
Su Qingye cursed his teacher silently in his heart. However, when he saw his teacher, he quickly straightened his body and greeted him respectfully, "Teacher."
Ai Hui glanced at him and asked, "There’s no lesson today, so why are you here?"
"Teacher, Dragonrise Training Hall is setting up a branch in this city," Su Qingye replied enthusiastically.
"Dragonrise Training Hall?" Ai Hui shook his head. "Never heard of it before."
Su Qingye widened his eyes and stared at his teacher. However, his teacher’s facial expression remained calm, appearing not to be lying at all. Su Qingye raised his voice and asked, "Teacher, how come you don’t even know about Dragonrise Training Hall? It’s one of the biggest training halls! It’s a mega training hall that has more than 50 branches!"
"Is it? Wow, they are really powerful!" Ai Hui raised his eyebrows and put a surprised look on his face. However, his acting skills were too poor, and he did not seem sincere at all.
"Teacher, how can you be so unambitious?" Su Qingye was slightly annoyed.
"It seems that you are very free." Ai Hui looked at Su Qingye intently. "Today is such a beautiful, sunny day. Let’s see, what would be the most suitable thing to do on such a day?"
The moment Su Qingye saw his teacher’s gaze, he could sense that something was not right. Then, upon hearing his teacher’s question, he immediately turned listless. He lowered his head and replied listlessly, "Training."
"That’s right!" Ai Hui’s face brimmed with approval.
He turned around to Lou Lan and instructed, "Lou Lan, give him 200 drill sets of the sand puppet counter technique. He can go home and have his dinner only if he successfully counters more than half of the attacks."
"No problem, Ai Hui," Lou Lan replied cheerfully.
The sand puppet counter technique was one of the most commonly-used survival techniques for earth elementalists. This technique involved using the sand puppet as a shield to block an enemy’s attack before carrying out a counter-attack.
The difficulty of this technique was very high. Whenever a sand puppet was attacked, especially when the attacker was very powerful, the connection between the sand puppet and the earth elementalist would be broken. Hence, it would be very difficult for the earth elementalist to use the sand puppet to carry out a counter-attack afterward.
He had to successfully counter more than half of the attacks…
Su Qingye’s face turned ashen, and he stammered, "Teacher, tonight there will be guests coming over to my house, so I can’t be late…"
"For the sake of your guests, you must put in more effort!" Ai Hui made an encouraging gesture and cheered him on.
"Qingye, come on!" Lou Lan happily cheered for Song Qingye as well.
Ai Hui waved his hand and left the training hall.
Peace City had changed significantly since the day he first arrived. When he had just arrived, Peace City was just a small town like Central Pine City. Now, it had become a prosperous city that bustled with activity.
The city was mostly made up of water elementalists and metal elementalists. Most wood elementalists had chosen to seek refuge in the Jadeite Forest with the Duanmu family as their leader. Meanwhile, the ambitious Deep Sea Enterprise, which was mainly established by new citizens, was trying to build a commercial empire.
As for fire elementalists and earth elementalists, their situation was now extremely dire. After the Fire Prairie and Yellow Sand Corner fell into the hands of the Blood of God, materials that could be easily bought in the past were currently very hard to find on the market. The dire situations of the fire elementalists and earth elementalists had even affected the Avalon of Five Elements’ rebuilding plans for the Thirteen Divisions.
This was also why the higher-ups of the Avalon of Five Elements tacitly allowed trade between the Blood of God, the Jadeite Forest, and the Avalon of Five Elements.
Even though trade existed, the prices of various materials had become much more expensive than before. The less affluent earth elementalists and fire elementalists could only go to the Wilderness and hunt for dire beasts.
For the past three years, Ai Hui had been observing the Blood of God from the shadows.
The Blood of God’s methods were far more vicious that he had anticipated. The surrender of the Icy Flames Division had also exceeded everyone’s expectations. The Icy Flames Division’s division leader, Ye Baiyi, used to be everyone’s idol in the Avalon of Five Elements. No one had foreseen him leading the Icy Flames Division to surrender to the Blood of God.
Nowadays, whenever Ai Hui thought of how people in Central Pine City used to call him "Ai Baiyi," he could not help but sigh.
The Ardent Flower Division was an unyielding division, but they eventually came to a grisly end. Everyone in the division, including the division leader and vice division leader, was killed.
The Mountain King Division and Lordsand Division fell into the hands of the Blood of God almost without any resistance. When the Blood of God brought the family members of the two divisions onto the battlefield, both the divisions crumbled effortlessly.
However, after the unscrupulous and ruthless Blood of God conquered the Fire Prairie and Yellow Sand Corner, their style of operation changed.
The Blood of God began to actively promote god elementalists, provided free materials, and built God Academy. Every child that was of a certain age had to start practicing god elementalism. They opened official positions to the public and groomed those talented god elementalists. They disregarded the family backgrounds of the candidates and attracted a lot of citizens from the Old Territory. In addition, they also banned their people from using elementalists to practice god elementalism and replaced the source with blood fiends so as to obtain blood crystals.
In three years’ time, the public perception of the Blood of God had changed completely.
The higher-ups of the Blood of God were extremely mysterious. The one who usually took care of the Blood of God’s daily matters was a young man named Bei Shuisheng. Reportedly, he was frequently sick since young and was an extremely fragile individual. Nonetheless, he still managed to gain the trust of the emperor of God Nation.
All of the bold and decisive measures were carried out by him. In the Blood of God, he was known by many as the "little advisor." In the Avalon of Five Elements, he was known as the "sick tiger." Most elementalists feared of him. In the Blood of God, Bei Shuisheng enjoyed high prestige and was revered by many. Even though there were countless talented individuals in the Blood of God, all of them still obediently followed his orders.
Under the management of Bei Shuisheng, the Blood of God was becoming more prosperous with each passing day.
On the contrary, the Avalon of Five Elements was on the decline. The conflicts between the new citizens and the aristocratic families were growing increasingly intense as the days passed. The lack of training grounds for earth elementalists and fire elementalists had become a serious problem. The estrangement between the Old Territory and the Avalon of Five Elements, caused by the thousands of years of aloof and remote regard by the latter toward the former, had put the Blood of God in an advantageous position over the Avalon of Five Elements in their war. The Avalon of Five Elements could not win the trust and support of the Old Territory’s citizens. The proclamation of independence by the Jadeite Forest and Avalon of Five Elements’ compromise on this issue had encouraged many powerful aristocratic families to work toward their own independence as well. Even the notion of expanding and becoming an independent state in the Wilderness had attracted many families. No matter where or when, the notion of occupying and becoming the king of a piece of land would always hold a captivating power over anyone.
When compared to the thriving Blood of God, the Avalon of Five Elements was like a critically damaged wagon.
Whether or not the Avalon of Five Elements emerged victorious or defeated, Ai Hui did not care at all. His enemy was the Blood of God.
Compared to three years ago, the Blood of God had now become a colossus. Its resplendence outshone the Avalon of Five Elements, but Ai Hui had not forgotten about the Battle of Central Pine City,
There was still a lush and verdant city that stood empty and alone amid the sea of blood.
Initially, the Avalon of Five Elements tried to propagandize the Battle of Central Pine City. As the war progressed, however, there were more and more epic battles as well as more and more emergent heroes. The Battle of Central Pine City was soon forgotten by many. Few people still remembered the lone city situated in the war-torn, blood-filled Induction Ground.
Only when Shi Xueman’s name was mentioned would people remember the existence of Central Pine City. After all, that was the battle that made her famous.
Shi Xueman’s greatest achievement in the Avalon of Five Elements during the past three years was becoming the disciple of one of the last extant great Grandmasters, An Muda.
Besides the iron lady, the rest of the A-1 unit was also doing quite well. Occasionally, Ai Hui would see their names appearing in the news. The Blood of God was extremely vicious in attacking the Induction Ground to directly exterminate the younger generations of the Avalon of Five Elements, cutting off their reserves. The A-1 unit, which had the best war achievements among all student units, became the Avalon of Five Elements’ main target to nurture and foster. One could anticipate that the members of the A-1 unit would become the backbone of Avalon of Five Elements in the future.
Ai Hui felt happy for them.
As for Fatty, after he returned to the Old Territory, he had been leading a satisfying life. He was still a kind soul after all, gathering the family members of the laborers that died during their three year stint in the Wilderness. He then formed a stronghold with them and started a business.
Reportedly, his business mainly dealt with artifact remnants and had expanded significantly, becoming rather lucrative.
On account of Duanmu Huanghun, the Blood of God did not seek trouble with Fatty either. Thus, he had been leading a comfortable life.
After knowing that everyone was leading a rather good life, Ai Hui was very happy.