A Card In Hand

Chapter 99: Isn’t this Li Ao, known as the Great Demon King?

Suddenly, Captain Bai Ya appeared with a flash.

With a stretch of his hand,

He gathered all the wolf claws in the sky into his palm.

He perfectly caught Cang Yue’s claw that was about to strike Lie Yao’s face, then shook his head at Lie Yao, who was clearly startled by the sudden attack yet still wore a proud expression, “This is a spatial passage, and fighting is prohibited here. Lie Yao, you are not a newcomer anymore; you should know this rule. If there’s nothing particularly important, please leave immediately.”

Captain Bai Ya’s action,

Shocked the newcomers.

Everyone knew about Cang Yue’s capabilities.

Being able to catch his attack so effortlessly, probably even the Great Demon King Li Ao would not have managed to do the same.

“Of course, with Captain Bai Ya here, we will give you the respect you deserve.”

Lie Yao shrugged at Cang Yue and Chi Ming, “You should feel lucky. If you weren’t newbies, you’d be lying on the ground by now! Newbies, don’t rush; I’ll wait for you at your graduation performance, and then I will give you the best show of your life!”

“The one who should feel lucky is you!”

Cang Yue’s golden-silver demonic eyes blazed with a flame of fighting spirit: “Idiot!”

“See you at the graduation performance!” Lie Yao waved his hand and flew away at high speed.

His companions followed quickly behind.

With Captain Bai Ya there,

This fight,

Would never have happened anyway.

Li Ao and Shuang Han already knew this would be the outcome.

Of course, turning against someone doesn’t necessarily have to happen immediately in this explicitly non-disruptive spatial passage… Knowing who the other party is, one could just jot down his name in a little notebook, and find an opportunity later to deal with him.

“Boss, are you alright?”

Li Ao emerged from the Shadow Path and signaled for the gathered classmates to move on, while he turned to Fuxi.

“I’m fine, Little Li Ao, you didn’t need to come back; I never planned to start a fight.” Fuxi waved his hand indifferently.

“Fatso, are you really okay? I heard he hit you!” Cang Yue frowned unhappily.

“I’ve already forgiven him!” Fuxi said, causing a collective gasp.

Forgiven him?

How big must your heart be?

Just now, Lie Yao was so provocative, even publicly slapping you in the face, and you chose to forgive him?

Cang Yue was furious and slapped Fuxi on the forehead: “Coward, what are you afraid of? If you can’t beat him, don’t we still have each other? His combat power is just piled up with battle beasts, it’s shallow. Forget about Li Ao, I alone can take them all down!”

Fuxi quickly shook his head to show he was not a coward: “Big-eye monster, you misunderstood, I know he can’t beat you, and I’m worried that he would be ripped apart by you, aren’t I?”

“Isn’t it good for me to rip him apart to relieve your anger?” Cang Yue was even more puzzled.

“What we need now is to seize the time to improve ourselves, not waste it on these trivial people!”

Fuxi calmed Cang Yue down: “If you really take down Lie Yao and slap the face of the previous year’s seniors, it will definitely provoke retaliation from them. Then where will we have the time to do our own things? Let’s endure for a while, focus on enhancing our combat strength, and at the graduation performance, we’ll show them what we’ve got!”

In a single sentence, Cang Yue concluded with frustration, “You’re still a coward!” Her golden and silver eyes glared at Fuxi as she spat, “What the hell is a ‘big-eyed monster’?”

“Sorry, I spoke without thinking. I apologize, isn’t that enough? Oh, come on, don’t hit me!”

Although Lie Yao didn’t actually start a fight because of the apology,

Fuxi couldn’t avoid a beating from Cang Yue, a classic case of trouble stemming from careless talk.

Captain Bai Ya made a point of speaking with Li Ao, hinting that the situation might not be as straightforward as it seemed.

Ling Long and Huo Mei joined them,

and upon hearing the situation, Ling Long quickly realized, “Being provoked on the road is just a pretext. I think the real reason has to do with Li Ao.”

Huo Mei immediately grasped her implied meaning, “Are you suggesting it’s related to Prince Jinxi?”

Ling Long raised a pale finger, “Li Ao beat Prince Jinxi in the Unlimited Challenge, and who loves to put on airs? Lie Yao, Prince Jinxi’s cousin! Do you think it was just a coincidence he ran into Fuxi? Why target Fuxi specifically instead of someone else? A person flying by wouldn’t normally notice such things unless they meant to stir trouble. It’s clear Lie Yao had a plan! He chose this particular space corridor to provoke us because it’s safe for him. He knew with Captain Bai Ya here, we couldn’t make a move against him!”

Her analysis made a lot of sense to everyone.

Huo Mei thought for a moment, “And Lie Yao said he’d give us a ‘show’ at the graduation performance, which sounds like a planned provocation!”

Cang Yue, who hadn’t thought too deeply, believed violence was the best solution, “If that’s the case, we’ll just have to beat them at the graduation performance! I’ll take on Lie Yao myself. Give me one of the previous supernovas; I say the last three supernovas were all duds, not deserving of the title at all!”

“Li Ao, what do you think?” Shuanghan turned to Li Ao for his opinion.

“Let’s do it as the ‘big-eyed monster’ suggests. Not just the last supernovas, but the batch before them too! We need to show the world that if you’re not a true genius, you don’t deserve to be ranked with us!”

Li Ao declared, eliciting cheers from all the students, their morale soaring.

With the Great Demon King, they had the confidence to look down on all other young talents in the world.

What about the previous supernovas? Without our batch’s recognition, you don’t even qualify to rank with us!

That’s right!

We set the standard!

Because we are the strongest newbies who have survived under the Great Demon King!

Captain Bai Ya stood quietly in the crowd, almost invisible, but his eyes couldn’t hide a hint of surprise as they swept across Li Ao’s face.

He had seen many proud and arrogant newcomers, but Li Ao’s natural arrogance was something he had never encountered before.

In the first layer of the Nine-Layer Ancient Prison.

The Sunset Ancient Prison.

Unlike the surface, where there is day and night, the Sunset Ancient Prison is devoid of night.

It is perpetually in a state of sunset, with a low-hanging sun always visible on the horizon.

It has been measured that

there are three suns in the Sunset Ancient Prison, all perpetually in a state of sunset.

They take turns crossing the horizon at an angle, creating a unique astronomical spectacle of a sunset that never truly sets.

“Li Ao, with what happened to Lie Yao, should we keep all the students with combat power of a thousand on the first layer? First, they can look after each other and hunt more demonic beast crystal cores; second, with Captain Bai Ya’s protection, it will be difficult for Lie Yao and his gang to cause any trouble!” Lie Feng thought it was not a good idea to spread the students too thinly as it made them easy targets.

“That makes sense, cousin. We’ll take those with a combat power above a thousand to the lower three layers. As long as the students under Captain Bai Ya’s protection are safe, we won’t have to worry about Lie Yao coming after us!”

Qiu Ye also agreed with Lie Feng’s suggestion.

“I don’t mind either way.”

Shuanghan was indifferent about the plan.

“Actually, I’d rather have Lie Yao and his gang come and fight.”

Qian Nian raised an eyebrow.

“If you guys think it’s a good idea, we have no objections.”

Ling Long felt the proposal to split into two groups for training was a bit hasty: “How about we stay here for half a month? After all, they are our classmates. Splitting up as soon as we arrive might demoralize them. We should be a united group!”

“Let’s stay for half a month then,” Li Ao nodded. “During this time, I’ll share my insights on energy stasis with you all.”

It was said to be a sharing session.

But in reality, Li Ao intended to teach everyone how to achieve energy stasis, though this sounded a bit more palatable.

Upon hearing this, Huo Mei smiled broadly, touched her lips with her finger, and blew him a spicy kiss: “Wow, who knew that the cold and ruthless demon king could also be cute!”

The students felt both touched and pressured by the news that the challenged prodigies were staying behind.

Aren’t these guys supposed to go to the second and third layers to challenge themselves?

Why stay here?

With Captain Bai Ya looking out for us, nothing can possibly go wrong!

They unanimously sent Fuxi, Fang Yan, and Wu Ding to persuade Li Ao and the others not to waste their time on the first layer, arguing that the challenges of the Nine-Layer Ancient Prison were far too simple for them.

“We are staying to utterly crush you weaklings! If you keep being this weak, I’d be embarrassed to stand with you!”

Cang Yue retorted arrogantly. He wouldn’t admit that he actually wanted to train Fuxi and the others to improve their combat power.

If it weren’t for the vast difference in strength, Cang Yue might have had plans to train Fuxi to single-handedly challenge and defeat Lie Yao.

“We’ll stay for half a month. How much you improve is up to you!”

Lie Feng decided that since they were staying, they might as well openly address and resolve all the issues their classmates urgently needed to deal with.

In Sunset City, since entering the Nine-Layer Ancient Prison, Fuxi and the others had been training tirelessly outside the city.

They were so focused on their training that they ignored the demonic beasts around them, not bothering to collect any demonic crystals.

Because of this bizarre behavior, many summoners who were unaware of the situation mocked them as greenhouse summoners, good-looking but useless.

Some heard another version of the rumor stating that when this batch of newcomers entered the Nine-Layer Ancient Prison, they had a conflict with Lie Yao, who was among the top five from the previous batch, and were too scared to leave Sunset City…

The truth was unknown.

But the rumors flew high and far.

Many summoners entering Sunset City gave Fuxi and his group strange looks, thinking this batch of newcomers was exceptionally timid.

Having over three hundred people gathered together, afraid to leave Sunset City or venture out on their own… Since the inception of the newcomer trials, there had never been a batch like this one, where all the newcomers were so cowardly that it became a joke. In any other batch, the newcomers would split into dozens of exploration teams to gain experience.

None would gather in such large numbers, afraid to spread out.

Staying in Sunset City but afraid to venture beyond its suburbs had become a topic of ridicule among the summoners.

“The newcomers of Sunset City” had become synonymous with cowards and weaklings.

And it had become a specific reference to this batch of newcomers.

Ten days later.

Lie Yao appeared before Li Ao and the others: “Hey, isn’t this our demon king, Student Li Ao, from this batch of newcomers? The demon king, eh? Sounds impressive!”