The small tavern.

Yue Yang and Chimu sat across from Mingzhu like a pair of condemned men awaiting sentence.

Resistance wasn’t really on the table. One glance at the hammer resting beside their host’s seat — the hammer that could end any argument instantly — and whatever courage either of them might have summoned evaporated on the spot.

“What’s that hammer actually made of?” Yue Yang murmured to Chimu, who was doing his best impression of an innocent bystander beside him. Under Human Valley’s law, no one was supposed to wield weapons, let alone use violence. And yet this hammer was clearly under Mingzhu’s direct will — not personally infused with her strength, but obeying her intent precisely, very different from an uncontrolled puppet-beast attack.

“Secret. Armor.” Chimu answered through a voice-transmission, barely a whisper.

“Secret armor — what’s that?”

“No idea myself. Mingzhu developed it personally. Word is it draws on an ancient technique called the Mana-Liquid Gold Secret Art. The moment that ‘secret armor’ came into existence, it was automatically recognized as legitimate under Human Valley’s law — though of course, only its owner can actually wield it.” Chimu made it clear this hammer was no joke. It was a genuine weapon of devastation.

“Mana-Liquid Gold Secret Art.” Something stirred in Yue Yang’s memory. He’d heard the term before, though circumstances had never given him direct access to mana-liquid gold itself.

Mana-liquid gold shared some qualities with divine-fallen flowing gold but differed in more important ways.

What they shared: both began as liquid metal.

What set them apart: mana-liquid gold could be reshaped and then returned to its liquid state — a finished object could be melted back down. Divine-fallen flowing gold could not. Once divine-fallen flowing gold took final form, it became an absolute high-quality artifact — if the resulting object lacked spiritual awareness, it would very likely spontaneously develop it, since divine-fallen flowing gold was the most perfect energy-metal in existence, sitting at the very edge of divine-artifact quality. It originated as the molten residue of divine artifact fragments or supremely powerful treasures, and existed in the world at a rate of roughly one in ten thousand.

Mana-liquid gold, by comparison, fell considerably short of the finest divine-fallen flowing gold.

It had its own internal hierarchy of quality.

Low-grade mana-liquid gold could only produce low-tier objects — sometimes nothing more than a repair fluid for certain treasures. Even the very highest grade of mana-liquid gold remained far below divine-fallen flowing gold.

The gap between the two was roughly the gap between brass and true gold.

Even so — falling short of divine-fallen flowing gold didn’t make mana-liquid gold anything less than extraordinarily rare.

Yue Yang had obtained divine-fallen flowing gold through a stroke of fortune, but despite his long years moving through the Sky Tower and the Heavenly Realm, he had never once gotten his hands on mana-liquid gold. Until now, it had only ever been a name.

“Two grown men whispering in each other’s ears — is that really necessary?” Mingzhu had already ordered food and drinks for the table, though he himself had skipped the wine in favor of fruit juice, which he sipped with unhurried composure while informing the pair that whatever they wanted to say, they could say out loud.

“We were just admiring your generosity,” Yue Yang said, with the air of a man pressing his luck. “If, after the meal, you’d also like to treat us to a full foot-massage circuit, that would round things out nicely.”

“Does that sound remotely likely to you?” Mingzhu reached a hand idly toward the hammer.

“On reflection, going straight home to rest after dinner sounds quite appealing actually. Early to bed, early to rise — good for the constitution.” A bead of sweat had appeared on Yue Yang’s forehead.

“Yes, yes — good health practices, early to bed—” Chimu’s legs had started trembling. Evidently this was not his first encounter with that particular hammer, and the encounters had left a lasting impression. There was no helping it — within Human Valley’s restricted environment, that hammer hit harder than most actual divine artifacts, despite being nominally rated as nothing more than gold-tier.

After threatening Yue Yang into silence, Mingzhu shifted abruptly to business. “Let’s make a trade. I’ll give you the Mana-Liquid Gold Secret Art in exchange for your Sacred-tier quill pen technique.”

“Yes — perfect, everyone wins.” Chimu nudged Yue Yang, urging an immediate yes.

“Apologies,” Yue Yang said. “No.”

“You absolute fool—” Chimu’s first reaction was pure disbelief, his eyes going wide as though witnessing a Martian stroll casually through the street. When it became clear Yue Yang wasn’t joking, he deflated like a punctured balloon, sighing with genuine regret. As far as Chimu understood it, Mingzhu’s Mana-Liquid Gold Secret Art was a priceless treasure — possessing it would be the equivalent of gaining a self-protecting, on-call gold-tier “secret armor construct” that obeyed its master’s will absolutely. Less flashy than other gold-tier constructs, perhaps, but its combat output rivaled any of them — Zhonghua’s Jet Beast, Captain Cook’s Ocean Warrior, even Ji Wuri’s Vengeful Prince might not necessarily come out ahead against it.

“Mind telling me why?” Mingzhu didn’t seem particularly surprised — he simply wanted the reasoning.

“Simple. I already know the Mana-Liquid Gold Secret Art myself — I just lack sufficient raw material. As for my Sacred-tier quill pen technique, no one but me could replicate it. Even if I taught it to you directly, or published it openly across all of Human Valley, not a single person would be able to learn it.”

“That’s quite a claim to make about yourself,” Mingzhu said, taking the boast in stride rather than with offense.

“A little quill pen — actually reaching Sacred tier? And was there even any need to push it that far?” Chimu felt a phantom ache somewhere in his lower body just thinking about it.

This much talent, and you waste it like this?

If you’re going to waste it, at least don’t waste it on something as worthless as a quill pen!

If that technique had been applied to a construct or a puppet beast instead, Jinji and his ridiculous Strong Magnetic Battle Construct — the one he’d been parading around with such smug self-satisfaction — would have had nothing left to stand on. Sacred tier. Throughout history, only an exceedingly small handful of monstrous talents had ever produced anything at that level — Conquering Empress Vivienne, Prison Emperor Zhanfeng. Beyond names like those, who else could possibly build a Sacred-tier construct?

In the wider world, Sacred-tier items appeared in plenty of categories — war beasts, weapons, treasures of every kind. All of those were at least conceivable.

But puppet constructs, which possessed neither intelligence nor spiritual awareness on their own, were the single hardest category in which Sacred tier could ever emerge. A construct couldn’t simply level up over time. It had to be granted spiritual awareness at the moment of its creation — born already at Sacred tier, with no path of gradual ascension.

How difficult was that?

Ji Wuri — a man who approached the divine in raw talent — had poured everything he had into the Vengeful Prince, and even that masterwork had only reached platinum tier.

The gap between platinum and Sacred wasn’t a gap at all. It was a chasm — the kind no bridge had ever crossed. Closing that distance was, by any reasonable estimate, ten thousand times harder than the supposedly impossible feats people called impassable. If the Heavenly Pride Chairman himself hadn’t personally vouched for Yue Yang’s ability to elevate a quill pen to Sacred tier, Chimu would never have believed a word of it.

Taking an object with no inherent grade at all, granting it spiritual awareness, and elevating it straight to Sacred tier.

Just thinking about it produced a kind of vertigo.

This was the category of miracle reserved for gods.

There was no other explanation that fit.

“For me, it’s simple,” Yue Yang said, smiling. “For you — you could spend your entire life on it and come away with nothing.” This wasn’t false modesty; it was simply true. He genuinely had no way to teach it. Without the Heaven’s Eye that let him see through all things, without the Creation Domain, without the Genesis Divine Pearl, without his overflowing reserves of chaos energy, without his grasp of minor laws, without the inherited knowledge passed down to him, without the core energy lineage from the ancient rune Sky Formation, without the Construct Grimoire foundation left by Yue Gong, without the construct schematics recorded in the two ancient golden coffins, without the slowly-built foundation laid by Taotie and Star Scorpion as they developed step by step — Yue Yang, however monstrous his talent, could never have picked up a single quill pen and elevated it to Sacred tier from nothing.

His prior experiences and his individual talent had together determined everything he was now capable of creating.

Every component he carried was necessary. None could be subtracted.

Put someone else in his position — Chimu, or Mingzhu — and there was no possible way to reproduce what he’d done.

“Whether I can master it isn’t your concern. Just walk me through the process once, in detail, and that’s enough.” Mingzhu reconsidered. “Actually — let’s do this properly. A real partnership. You provide the secret method for crafting the Sacred-tier quill pen, I provide the mana-liquid gold material along with whatever support is needed, and we jointly develop a Sacred-tier secret armor. What do you say?”

“A partnership.” Something in Yue Yang lit up. “If we’re aiming for a Sacred-tier construct, the mana-liquid gold requirement could be substantial.” This was, in fact, exactly the kind of opportunity he needed — rare material flowing toward him like timely rain in a drought.

“Don’t worry about the mana-liquid gold supply. Gold-tier quality might be a stretch, but bronze-tier and silver-tier — you can have as much as you want. Low-grade mana-liquid gold can be synthesized, and this young lord happens to be something of an expert in the synthesis technique.” A folding fan appeared in Mingzhu’s hand from nowhere, snapping open with a crisp sound. Seeing the genuine surprise on Yue Yang’s face, every trace of Mingzhu’s earlier irritation dissolved at once, replaced with the satisfaction of a man drinking a cold drink on a sweltering day.

“Excellent! Absolutely excellent!” Yue Yang seized both of Mingzhu’s hands and shook them vigorously, apparently forgetting to let go in his enthusiasm.

“You feel the same way?” Mingzhu glanced toward Chimu.

“I’m blind. I saw nothing.” Chimu sensed disaster approaching the moment that particular smile crossed Mingzhu’s face, and immediately played dumb.

Too late. A heartbeat later, the hammer came down twice in quick succession, flattening both Yue Yang and Chimu to the floor.

“What in the world — we just agreed to a partnership and instead of a toast you bring out the hammer?” Yue Yang clutched the new lump on his head, furious.

“Couldn’t help myself.” Mingzhu offered this apology with absolutely no remorse whatsoever.

“This young master is settling this right now!” Yue Yang sprang up and lunged at Mingzhu, unleashing what he announced was the legendary Wave-Snatching Dragon Claw technique.

The hammer met him head-on with a sound like rolling thunder, driving him straight into the floor. Mingzhu settled back into his seat with utter indifference, posture unmoved, idly twirling the absurdly heavy golden hammer with his left hand. Chimu, cowering in the corner, had broken into a full sweat and raised both hands in clear surrender, terrified that Mingzhu might decide to extend the same courtesy to him next.

Now that the partnership had been settled, Mingzhu’s attitude toward Yue Yang noticeably softened — at least marginally. As long as Yue Yang refrained from breaking out anything resembling the legendary moves of Lord Wei, the golden hammer wouldn’t be coming down on his head without provocation.

“First priority,” Mingzhu said, business resuming. “You need to win the newcomer Assessment championship. With a title and territory behind you, we’ll actually have a foundation to start closing the distance on Ji Wuri.”

He continued. “Set Ji Wuri aside for now — he’s beyond your reach at present, no point dwelling on it. Focus on the newcomer championship first. On the surface that looks straightforward enough, but if you’re under the impression that Jinji’s Strong Magnetic Battle Construct represents the strongest competition out there, you’re badly mistaken. You may not be aware — among the reincarnated challengers who entered alongside Ji Wuri, there are two others: one called Wanmo and one called Ranfeng. Both are Central Divine Hall hall masters, and both are devoted allies of Ji Wuri. To avoid competing directly with him and instead maximize their collective standing, they’ve each held back a finished construct for this Assessment — a ‘Flesh-and-Blood Construct’ and a ‘Raging Flame Construct’ — to seize the runner-up championship.”

“A flesh construct and a flame construct?” Yue Yang’s brow drew down slightly.

“The Raging Flame Construct is basically a contained ball of fire, honestly — I can’t even work out how it qualifies as a puppet construct at all,” Chimu put in. He’d seen the finished piece firsthand.

“My guess is it’s elemental in nature, with some kind of controllable construct skeleton layered in — our intelligence on it is incomplete. Wanmo’s Flesh-and-Blood Construct, though, we have better information on. It’s a puppet embedded directly within a living human body. The construct still can’t draw on the host’s own physical strength, but with human control directing it, the combat output it generates is probably ten times what an equivalent-tier construct would normally produce. In raw control and combat power, the Flesh-and-Blood Construct might not fall short of my secret armor at all — and worse, it can be mass-produced.” When Mingzhu mentioned the Flesh-and-Blood Construct, something like genuine revulsion crossed his fine features, as though the bloody, body-violating nature of the technique disturbed him at a deeper level.

“Besides the Flesh-and-Blood Construct and the Raging Flame Construct, is there anything else I should be watching for?” Yue Yang considered this for a moment, then asked.

“A handful of others, each with its own particular angle — the intelligence is still being put together. I’ll have a fuller report for you soon.” Chimu added that, following Ji Wuri’s overwhelming championship win at the last Assessment, this round had attracted an unusually large field of serious contenders, including several scions from hidden clans who’d quietly signaled their intent to compete.

“That doesn’t leave me much time,” Yue Yang said quietly, with a small sigh.

At least his real trump cards remained hidden. With Zhonghua’s open support, Chimu and Mingzhu’s covert backing, and the standing alliance of figures like Ren Tiange and the Silver-Eyed Great Sage from his earlier circle, this fight was very much winnable.

The problem was timing. The moment he made a real name for himself, every rival in Human Valley would start watching him with a hundred times the scrutiny — and the quiet, unbothered research environment he currently enjoyed would almost certainly disappear.

Especially someone like Ji Wuri, whose instinct for threats ran sharp and paranoid. The moment Ji Wuri registered Yue Yang’s rise, retaliation of some kind was practically guaranteed.

Neither Chimu nor Mingzhu knew about the genuinely era-defining projects Yue Yang was quietly developing — the flying battle constructs, the shape-shifting constructs, monstrous achievements far beyond anything discussed at this table — and even without that knowledge, they were both visibly worried for him. Had this partnership begun the moment Yue Yang first entered Human Valley, developing a Sacred-tier mana-liquid-gold secret armor in time would have made the championship a near-certainty. But nearly two months had already passed. Barely a month remained. How could there possibly be enough time?

Chimu scratched his head for a long while, turning the problem over without landing on anything useful.

Mingzhu’s brow furrowed briefly — then his expression cleared, and a slow smile spread across his face.

“I’ve got it. I have an idea. I don’t know yet if it’ll actually work, but it’s absolutely worth trying.”

(End of Chapter)