Chapter 80: A Moment of Revelry

“Li Shuang, how are things on your side?” 

In Sanshui City, Lin Fanyun, having expended some of his physical energy to heal his wounds, contacted Li Shuang using a terminal leaf. Before leaving, he had given Li Shuang a True Core stage secondary leaf.

With it, they could quickly communicate through the mainframe.

Soon, Li Shuang’s voice came through, “Master, we’re fine here. There was just an earthquake. Did something happen?”

Just an earthquake? Lin Fanyun then remembered that Blood Black City was almost ten thousand kilometers behind Sanshui City and directly at its rear.

‘It seems the true god of Sanshui acted to calm the spatial disturbance, preventing it from affecting the areas further back,’ Lin Fanyun thought, then continued to communicate with Li Shuang.

“For the specifics of what happened, check the mainframe network. There should be news there. In the coming period, restrain the others and don’t show yourselves unnecessarily. If I’m not mistaken, a prolonged war is about to break out in the Abyssal Sea.” 

Li Shuang didn’t understand the full situation, but Lin Fanyun’s words made him apprehensive.

The Abyssal Sea and its coastal regions were already chaotic. If even someone as powerful as their lord was alarmed by an impending war, what chance did they have?

Putting away the terminal leaf, Lin Fanyun gestured and a storage bag flew into his hand. It belonged to a True Core practitioner who the spatial distortion had torn apart.

“This sudden spatial tremor killed many cultivators, leaving them in pieces, but for the survivors, this is nothing short of a grand feast!”

Surviving and venting his anger had made Lin Fanyun keenly aware of this opportunity. He had rushed to heal his wounds and, without bothering to fully recover his physical strength, had come out to partake in this lavish banquet.

The wealth of the deceased cultivators lay scattered in the ruins of collapsed shops, partially destroyed by the catastrophe, but what remained was enough to make countless eyes green with envy.

It wasn’t just Lin Fanyun looting these corpses. Numerous surviving powerhouses were doing the same.

In this moment of chaos, order had crumbled, and everyone was frantically seizing resources.

They moved with incredible speed, like a swarm of locusts, stripping everything of value.

During this frenzy, Lin Fanyun occasionally crossed paths with other Low Manifestation Stage cultivators. With a mutual understanding, they avoided conflict, each flying off in different directions, wary of one another.

At such a time, fighting over resources was less sensible than finding other places to loot.

Given Sanshui City’s vast wealth, corpses and scattered resources were everywhere, making battles unnecessary.

“I need to hurry! I can’t waste too much time!” Lin Fanyun thought urgently. 

This sudden disaster had caught everyone off guard. But the majority of those who died were below the Low Manifestation Stage. Few in the Low Manifestation Stage had perished, and the demigods were entirely unscathed. Especially the rulers of Sanshui City, their elite forces remained intact.

Although True God Chen Sanshui had gone to the source of the disturbance, his subordinates were still formidable. There were numerous demigods and Low Manifestation Stage cultivators among them.

These individuals wouldn’t allow the chaos to continue unchecked. They were likely already starting to restore order.

After completely looting yet another ruined shop, dozens of streaks of light flew out from the city lord’s mansion.

Seeing this, Lin Fanyun realized it was time to leave. Without hesitation, he flew toward the city gates.

“It seems I’ll probably end up on Sanshui City’s blacklist after this, but it doesn’t matter. I just won’t come back until I’m stronger. Still, with this haul, my wealth has increased at least tenfold.”

This was Lin Fanyun’s rough estimate. He had looted dozens of shops, completely cleaning out their stock.

He had no idea how many storage pouches from Innate and True Core cultivators he had picked up, so many that he was running out of room to carry them. He had even collected several storage pouches from Low Manifestation Stage cultivators.

Along the way, he had also taken the remains of these martial artists.

With such a tremendous fortune, Lin Fanyun didn’t care at all about being blacklisted by Sanshui City.

“It’s not just Sanshui City. The tremors originated from the direction of the Abyssal Sea, passing through who knows how many unlucky forces along the way. Those forces that didn’t survive are also ripe for the picking. Even bigger than the spoils from Sanshui City.”

Lin Fanyun’s heart burned with excitement. Although his original plan had been disrupted, he wasn’t angry. Adapting to the situation and changing his strategy was the best way to seize the greatest benefits.

Flying out of the city gates, he saw the gate guards had suffered heavy casualties. The few who survived were severely injured and clinging to life, unable to stop Lin Fanyun.

Besides, Lin Fanyun wasn’t the only one taking advantage of the chaos.

The guards could only watch helplessly as Lin Fanyun and others like him made off with their plunder.

“What a pity, what a pity,” far from Sanshui City, Lin Fanyun muttered.

Although he had looted a lot of valuable items, it was nothing compared to the wealth possessed by the cultivators who had perished in this disaster. His gains were just a drop in the bucket.

“Unless something unexpected happens, all those things will eventually fall into the hands of Sanshui City.”

Though it might appear that Sanshui City was restoring order, all that unclaimed wealth would inevitably be appropriated by them, conveniently and legitimately filling their own coffers.

Without lingering on land, Lin Fanyun dove headfirst into the Abyssal Sea.

He didn’t rush to seize the assets of those unfortunate forces in the Abyssal Sea. Instead, he temporarily found a deserted island, dug a pit a thousand meters underground, and took shelter there.

With a flick of his hand, a dozen flagpoles shot out in all directions. He activated a concealment array to shield his presence from the outside world.

First, he needed to take stock of his spoils.

“First, let’s look at the remains of those cultivators.” 

Lin Fanyun tossed a few storage pouches onto the ground.

In the urgency of the moment, he had hastily gathered a few storage pouches to store the corpses. Along with the remains, spiritual herbs, spiritual minerals, and magical artifacts tumbled out.

Sifting through, he picked out the corpses.

“Thousands of Innate cultivator corpses, hundreds of True Core remains, and four Low Manifestation Stage remains.”

Lin Fanyun’s eyes gleamed. These were valuable items.

Cultivators absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth and consume the essence of all things, making their bodies extraordinary treasures. Under normal circumstances, Lin Fanyun wouldn’t kill cultivators to refine his skills, but this opportunity was too perfect to waste.

He had no qualms about using the remains for his cultivation.

He unfurled the array diagram of Voracious Devourer and used his immense power to condense a thousand Innate corpses into several small meatballs, tossing them into the pool of resentful blood.

Sensing the presence, the gluttonous demon vine extended several fine tendrils to wrap around the meatballs, absorbing their nutrients. An intense aura of ferocity came from the vine.

“It seems that using resentful blood and countless corpses to cultivate the Voracious Devourer will make it even more formidable than I anticipated.”

Lin Fanyun carefully stored away the array diagram and placed the remaining corpses into a storage pouch. These would serve as future nourishment for the Voracious Devourer. The rest of his haul was even more abundant.

Piles of spiritual herbs, medicines, and elixirs, along with numerous spiritual minerals and magical artifacts. There were also various martial arts techniques and cultivation methods in great quantity. He organized the techniques and sorted the resources by grade.

It took fifteen large storage pouches to contain everything.

“Excluding what I can use, the remaining low-end resources and techniques would be most useful for my true body,” Lin Fanyun muttered to himself. 

As a blood and flesh avatar, he couldn’t cultivate martial arts. Those techniques could only provide knowledge and inspiration for developing body-specific martial techniques.

“But since I share memories with my true body, his insights are my insights. It’s better to wait until he has practiced them before I use them.”

With this thought, Lin Fanyun felt relieved.

“It seems I need to find a way to send these things to my true body.”

Lin Fanyun pondered for a long time. It was a troublesome task with no immediate solution in sight.

“If I could establish my own teleportation array, it would be much easier.”

He currently had no shortage of materials, and his true body had some stored in the small blessed land bottle. However, his true body lacked the ability to set up a long-distance teleportation array.

For short-distance teleportation, utilizing the inherent spatial abilities of the materials could suffice, with just a bit of guidance needed.

But constructing a long-distance teleportation array required a deep understanding of space, forcefully creating a spatial tunnel and then using rare treasures to build an array that would stabilize and protect this tunnel.

“It’s a pity that my true body, Zhang Shen, still has no understanding of space.” 

At the moment, Zhang Shen could not touch spatial powers. At the very least, he needed to reach the seventh layer of the Law Manifestation Stage to have any hope of accessing spatial force.

If even Zhang Shen is in such a state, there was no need to mention the limitations of his avatar, Lin Fanyun.

Suddenly, Lin Fanyun felt a tremor in his body as a powerful force surged from deep within. Momentarily losing control, his domineering and terrifying aura burst forth, shattering the concealment array.

Lin Fanyun quickly regained his composure, gradually retracting his aura.

Without hesitation, he packed up the flagpoles and relocated.

The Abyssal Sea was already perilous, and with many forces suffering calamities at this time, chaos was sure to follow. He needed to be cautious.

After flying over a hundred miles, he finally had the presence of mind to inspect the changes in his body and the shared memories from his true body.

“My physical body has reached the second level of the Low Manifestation Stage,” Lin Fanyun noted without much surprise.

Traveling from the Endless Wilderness near Lin Yuan City had taken several years. During this period, both he and his true body had been continuously consuming rare treasures without pause.

Their experience had already exceeded one hundred and ten percent. If not for the significantly increased experience required after the Low Manifestation Stage, his progress would have been even faster, thanks to having two bodies to feed.

“This breakthrough timing is a bit sudden.”

Indeed, it had caught him off guard.

But mostly, he felt joy.

With greater strength, he would have more confidence in participating in the upcoming resource battles in the Abyssal Sea.

A cold glint flickered in Lin Fanyun’s eyes.

While everyone in Sanshui City had an unspoken agreement to loot without fighting, the same could not be said for the Abyssal Sea.

Low-end resources might be easily obtainable, but no one would give up high-end resources without a fight. Even the competition for mines and spiritual veins would undoubtedly lead to fierce battles among the powerful.

“Before the explored regions of the Abyssal Sea stabilize, there will undoubtedly be decades of continuous conflict. And this is my opportunity.”

It was not just about seizing resources, but also about honing his skills. 

The continuous battles would allow Lin Fanyun to truly push this body to its limits.

With this in mind, he took out a map detailing the explored regions of the Abyssal Sea, something he had looted from those shops. He had initially planned to purchase one, but now he had managed to acquire it for free, along with detailed information from over a dozen maps.

On the map, several long, thin lines extended from the land into the Abyssal Sea, representing the explored regions.

There were also some shorter lines, indicating areas close to shore, such as the previously visited Hundred Reef Island. Beyond these lines lay blank spaces on the map, areas shrouded in mist and unexplored.

These regions symbolized mystery and the unknown.

But there was a pattern. The deeper into the Abyssal Sea, the more dangerous the unexplored areas became.