Chapter 289 – You’ve Turned Bad
Within the most stately building in the large compounds of the Assassin Family, Tumo was processing his final document. The development in Tianjing concerned the future of the Assassin Family. Not only that, they required more than money and territory to truly develop the spatial transmission array over there, as there were more complicated matters like the suppression coming from other families and their enemies. It was not an easy task to distinguish one’s family from the first grade families.
“Chief En.”
“Yes, master. What are your orders?”
As usual, the old steward replied instantly.
“How’s Emily’s current condition?” Tumo’s eyes sparkled.
“She’s currently undergoing the extraction of the medicine effects. The medicines that the little miss has been eating with her daily meals over the years have started to show their effects.”
Tumo looked at the numbers on the form, which caused a sliver of a faint smile that rarely came by on his old and aged face. Since his promise to his son on the latter’s deathbed, he had truly never given up on Emily, continuing to secretly add medicines into Emily’s food which stimulated one’s bloodlines and talent. With this accumulative slow method, it did not go against his promise!
He had promised to give her a life of freedom, without saying he would not be guiding her. Naturally, it was still Emily’s own decision that mattered in the end.
In this era where bloodlines were treasured, especially powerful talents like Emily, who in their right mind would give up such a thing? Who could give it up?
The current CHF was rather important for the Assassin Family, since if Emily was able to perform outstandingly, the Assassin Family would be able to obtain the support of the parliament. In any era, those who were weak had no say in power.
“Chief En, it’s about time for the third phase.”
“Won’t this be pushing it too far?” The old steward was slightly worried. After all, Emily’s way of life was not much like the other successors of the Assassin Family.
“One has to face something that will inevitably come in the future. It’s better to get it over and done with than to prolong the pain,” replied Tumo in an indifferent tone, though a sliver of emotion flashed in his eyes.
Very quickly, Emily discovered that her training was starting to become intense, with the degree of difficulty reaching her limits. The training every day was just like an armored train ramming against her and she was a bow string stretched taut, about to be snapped into two at any moment.
Nevertheless, she did not give up and collapse. Every time she felt as though the weight of a feather would cause her to snap and fall, she would always think back to Tianjing Academy. Those experiences of failure, lessons, unwillingness and also the comrades who fought with her always swelled her body with power and enabled her to continue. This was the accumulation of confidence which allowed Emily to become stronger with each step forward. At this moment, she had already gradually begun to feel the benefits of this special training.
As the number of training participants dropped down, there was a constant flow of people coming in to replace those who were eliminated. In accordance to the rules of an assassin, the icy cold atmosphere within the entire training was constantly being augmented, with people being dragged off right before Emily’s eyes, life and death unknown.
On the other side, it was night time and Wang Zhong was sleeping like a dead log with many dreams appearing in his sleep. With the overly deep memories of his soul being burnt alive unconsciously playing back in his dreams, he would experience hell once again, to the point of him wanting to spread his wings and fly his burnt self away.
He only woke up at noon on the second day. For a new human filled with exuberant energy, having such a long sleep was indeed slightly inconceivable. Truthfully, he had consumed too much of his spirit and even with the protection of the Fate Stone, his soul had become exceedingly weak. Even Wang Zhong himself was unable to clearly differentiate between his soul, spirit and flesh. The only thing he could feel was his body feeling slightly warm, fluttering around as he walked…
The training in the society continued as usual, with Barran being the only one who felt something was amiss. His senior Wang Zhong, who was always filled with an exuberant energy, was slightly… weak. He had almost sent Wang Zhong flying a few times with extremely ordinary impacts.
“45!”
Bang!
“46!”
Bang!
After the usual one hundred consecutive impacts, Wang Zhong waved his hands and said, “Barran, I think you should practice by yourself today.”
After he spoke, Wang Zhong leant against the wall and gulped down large mouthfuls of water. This caused Scarlet and the rest of the squad to look at each other, as Wang Zhong had already consumed over twenty bottles of water.
“Wang Zhong, are you alright? You’re really sweating a lot,” asked Scarlet, feeling slightly worried about his condition.
With a smile, Wang Zhong waved his hands and replied, “I’m alright. It might just be a slight fever. I just need to rest and it’ll go away.”
Hearing his reply, Scarlet did not ask anymore and everyone continued with their training. Although their holidays seemed long, truthfully speaking, there was not much more time left until the start of the CHF. Scarlet and Milami were persevering with their daily drills in hopes of maximising their tacit understanding to its limits. Apart from the training in the society during the day, Barran would do additional training in the night. As for Wang Zhong, god knows what he was doing. Other than participating in addition training, Colby and Lily had spent even more time practicing in Saint Judgment, as there were much more training partners and techniques to temper soldiers. During the joint training at night, Wang Zhong could only play the part of a spectator, being well enough just to give some pointers to everyone about some problems in their positioning.
After a whole day of recovery, Wang Zhong became exceedingly energized at night. Perhaps this was due to the intense thirst propping up his spirit. Naturally though, Simba was exceedingly unenergized. He felt extremely wronged and began to think back to the trainings in the past. He wondered if he had treated Wang Zhong too cruelly for this fellow to actually become so crazy.
The most miserable person now was Simba. Compared to him, those concubines of the ancient legends that were buried alive at the emperor’s death could not have been more miserable. At worst, they were only being buried alive just once while he was dying four times a night. Furthermore, as Wang Zhong’s heat resistance increased, the number of deaths he accompanied continue to rise.
“I can’t stand it anymore! I’ll go crazy if this continues! Wang Zhong, aren’t we good friends? Aren’t we brothers? Is there any need to torture your own brother like that?”
“No pain, no gain…”
“Wang Zhong, let’s discuss something else. Look, don’t you have another Spongebob Squarepants? We can play the “Fight the Landlord” (card game). Let’s not train today and find a place to play, alright? Aren’t you good at playing cards? Hmph, hmph. Simba doesn’t believe that one bit!”
“No pain, no gain…” Wang Zhong was still in a daze after being roasted by the flames.
“Wang Zhong, if you truly wish to experience a sea of fire, we can conjure an illusion of it within your soul sea. Please be reasonable, okay? My degree of illusions is very high so we don’t need to be burnt to death so miserably every time.”
“Okay, we can talk about reason slowly in there.” Wang Zhong nodded in reply. In the past, Simba’s illusion technique was quite good, however, he was already unable to display it. Most importantly though, such an illusion would definitely be not able to help him. Indeed, the hyperdimension was able to temper one’s soul, increasing resistance as well as strengthening and consolidating his soul strength. Now, the only thing left was for him the break through to Heroic Soul Stage.
“Wang Zhong…” cried out Simba with tears gleaming in his eyes.
“Simba…” As he activated the hyperdimension pull, Wang Zhong shot an earnest and deeply emotional look at Simba.
“You’ve turned bad, AH~~I don’t want~~”