Chapter 1104 The Recreational Star
“Huh? Is it like a playground?” Mengmeng’s eyes flickered with excitement.
Mengmeng had no resistance to the attraction of any playground.
“A playground? Maybe,” Li Mu said with a smile.
“Daddy!”
Mengmeng turned to look at Zhang Han. The look on her face seemed to be saying, “I wanna go there.”
“Then let’s go,” Zhang Han said with a chuckle.
Therefore, everyone packed their things and prepared to go out for a day or two. This time, they all traveled in one Thunder King.
After flying in the secondary s.p.a.ce for three hours—
“Swoos.h.!.+”
The Thunder King appeared in the void not far from the Dragon Horse Star.
At first glance, there were indeed more fleets coming and going here. They could a few things on the Dragon Horse Star from a distance.
“Isn’t that a Ferris wheel?”
Because she couldn’t see it clearly, Mengmeng screwed up her eyes in concentration. “There’s also a roller coaster. Are these flying cars? I think I saw some.”
“We’ll take the rides one by one when we get there.”
Zhang Han chuckled and winked at Zi Yan, as though telling her, “I’ll take you on some more exciting rides later.”
Zhang Han had never heard of the Dragon Horse Star before. But at first glance, he knew it was indeed a planet for leisure and entertainment. Also, it was quite big.
Most of those who visited recreational-oriented planets, such as this one, were the ones who couldn’t cultivate or didn’t have the qualification to cultivate but had relied on treasures to get into higher realms. Of course, there were also some real cultivators who came here to relax after going through a certain kind of training.
The Dragon Horse Star, as the number one recreational star in the nearby Star Areas, possessed a very high reputation. It also had attracted a lot of customers.
Among the fleets that were coming and going, the Thunder King stood out like a crane in a flock of chickens.
Many people were amazed.
“It really is a Thunder King!”
“The people inside are definitely extraordinary.”
“I bet it’s Zhang Hanyang and his group. Didn’t you hear? Zhang Hanyang is a new n.o.ble of the Sea Dragon Star Area. He subdued the Tiger Talisman Royal Family twice. He is a real bad*ss.”
The Thunder King slowly drew near the Dragon Horse Star. It pa.s.sed three checkpoints before entering the Dragon Horse Star.
“It’s really a Ferris wheel.”
Mengmeng gazed at the super-large Ferris wheel in front of her with eagerness on her face.
“Wow!”
Chen Chuan was the youngest in the group. He liked playgrounds very much. Thus, his eyes lit up when he saw the bustling venue with all kinds of entertainment facilities in front of him.
The aircraft, Blue b.u.t.terfly, parked in the designated area, which immediately attracted countless gazes. After disembarking from the aircraft, each of them paid 10 crystal stones as the ticket fee. Then, they entered the venue.
There was a hubbub of voices. Many people were bustling around.
They saw people with different skin colors and various features. Some looked so scary that they didn’t even need to put on makeup to play a ghost in a hunted house.
It was the first time that the group had seen such a lively scene.
“Shall we ride the Ferris wheel first?”
Mengmeng looked up at Zhang Han and tugged at his hand.
“Sure.”
Zhang Han chortled.
Every time Mengmeng went to a playground, she liked to take the Ferris wheel first so as to overlook the whole playground. Then, she would know what ride to take next.
The Ferris wheel was like the sightseeing boat on Mount New Moon. The cabin moved steadily in a designated track. It rose into the air. But when it reached the highest point in its trajectory, they still could not see the entire venue.
It appeared that most lands on this planet were occupied by various entertainment facilities.
The recreational activities included the track car, the towering waves, the simulated battle in s.p.a.ce. There were so many fun activities that the group stayed there and played for a whole day.
Soon, it was getting dark.
“The sun is setting here.”
While everyone was having cold drinks in a beverage shop, Li Mu finally found an opportunity to talk to them. He actively suggested, “We can go to the other side of this planet. It’s daytime there, and there are many fun activities there. The Dragon Horse Star is known for its Dragon Horse race. An adult Dragon Horse is huge in size and moves fast. The race is highly compet.i.tive. Sometimes, it’s hard to guess which one will win. Apart from watching the race, we can also ride young Dragon Horses. These are the unique activities the Dragon Horse Star offers.”
Upon hearing these words, the people around him all seemed tempted.
“Do you still wanna play? Aren’t you sleepy?” Zhang Han looked at Zi Yan and asked considerately.
“No, I’m not.”
It felt good to be taken care of. Smiling, Zi Yan said, “Let’s go there to play. After that, we can go back to the Cloud Shadow Sky to rest.”
“Mummy, if you’re sleepy, we can take a break,” Mengmeng said seriously.
Anyway, she was not tired. If her mother went to sleep, she would go play the Bone Demon World.
She had just started to explore the world in that game. As the City Lord, Mengmeng found that her city was not absolutely safe. Sometimes her city would be in danger. In that case, she would a.s.sign tasks to the guests in the city.
“Humph!
“Darn this game system! I’ve finally earned so much game currency with great effort. But most of it is spent on hiring the guests to protect my city.”
Mengmeng was a little dissatisfied with this.
What would she do when she was not satisfied?
She would top up her game account with more crystal stones.
With more game currency, she strengthened the walls, the grounds, and improved the weapons. After the grand remodeling, the security level of her city became even higher.
Mengmeng was sort of an Internet addict. She kept thinking about her little city in the game world.
After hanging out for a whole day, she was in a very good mood. Thus, if Zi Yan wanted to have some sleep, she would continue to play the game. If she didn’t sleep, they would go see Dragon Horses.
After thinking for a while, Zhang Han said, “Then let’s go check out Dragon Horses. We can take a brief tour there and then go back to have a rest. If you want to take more rides, we can come back here tomorrow.”
He thought he might as well let Mengmeng play to her heart’s content in one go. There was still more than half a month left. They might not be able to visit all the places in the Sea Dragon Star Area, but they should at least check out some unique planets here.
“We need to take an aircraft to get there. It belongs to a different area. Thus, we have to pay another 10 crystal stones per person when we get there,” Li Mu informed.
When it came to the common knowledge in the Sea Dragon Star Area, he would fill everyone in as soon as possible.
They came to the other side of the planet.
The racecourse for Dragon Horses was staggeringly enormous.
Each Dragon Horse was very big. They were more than 10 meters long. They looked even bigger when they spread their wings.
The racecourse was shaped like a round Olympics stadium enlarged a hundred times. There were some corridors in the air around the course. Each audience stand had its own compartments. After choosing their seats, they walked to their own compartments.
Above the center of the course, there was a huge screen showing the scores.
“Betting on horses!”
Liu Qingfeng, Zhang Mu, and the others thought of this phrase at once.
The racecourse was designed very professionally, and the service was also in place. There were waiters in front of each table.
“Senior Zhang.”
Sitting by a table, Li Mu edged to Zhang Han’s side and said, “The auction house of the Koro Sect has sent out invitations. Now some people are starting to go to their planet. If you want to auction something off, you can give it to them and let them hand it to the auction house.”
“Well, we’ll arrive there when it starts.” Zhang Han nodded slightly.
He was very interested in the auction to be held by the Koro Sect. But there was nothing that attracted him except for the Thunder Yang Sand.
It was also the only auction item that was quite rare.
“Daddy, are we going to bet on the horse that we think will win the race? Isn’t this gambling?” Mengmeng muttered.
“Well, that’s true. But adult Dragon Horse all have their own abilities, so it’s hard to guess which one will win,” Zhang Han deliberated for a moment and said, “you can just watch the race. If you want to bet, then give it a shot for fun.”
Chen Chuan, Mengmeng, Nina, Zi Yan, and other women in the group were not very interested in betting on horses.
On the contrary, they showed great interest in the appearances of the humongous Dragon Horses. At least, they looked quite beautiful.
They were ready to watch the race.
Just then, a group of six people came over from the corridor on the side. The group was led by a woman with black hair that reached her waist. She had a cla.s.sic oval face, big eyes, and blue pupils. She seemed serene, or perhaps a little listless. She was wearing a cloak, which made people think that she was a little cold.
On the left side of the woman was an old man with a flattop haircut in a cloth gown. On her right side was a handsome man, followed by three people.
It could be seen from their positions that the woman was the head of the group, the old man was the deputy, and the handsome man who was half a step behind them was the foil.
“What’s fun about this place?”
A man with long red hair at the back cast a sidelong glance at the crowd and mocked, “Told you we came here too early. Are we really going to play indigenous games in a barren place like the Sea Dragon Star Area in the next two weeks?”
The expression of the man who was leading the way for them stiffened a bit, but he didn’t dare to say anything.
He just saw that the aircraft they rode was in the shape of black eagles, which were the products of advanced science and technology. More importantly, he saw an icon on the side of the aircraft, which read Dragnet Academy!
It was a very powerful force in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province.
From the news spread by the Snowfall Alliance, the people in the Sea Dragon Star Area also had some understanding of the Heavenly Dragon Star Province and fancied going there even more.
After all, that was a developed Star Area.
It was said that the Dragnet Academy was founded 800 years ago by a G.o.d Transformation Realm cultivator.
Its goal was to cultivate top talents. Thus, the Dragnet Academy broke the shackles imposed by the normal sects. They didn’t look into which sect or force you came from, or the history of your past in Jianghu. As long as you pa.s.sed their test and your qualification measured up to their standard, you could be a student of the Dragnet Academy and receive 30 years of education. The academy would also protect you.
Each grade would take 10 years to finish. Thus, there were a total of three grades in the academy. After Grade Three, the students would leave the Dragnet Academy. But it was said that there was a way to stay there and make further progress. That was to become their inner-door disciples. But no one in the Sea Dragon Star Area had heard of the kind of payment to gain and price to pay if one chose that path.
This kind of academy was very rare. In the beginning, it was not thought highly of in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province. However, unexpectedly, after only a hundred years, the first graduates of the Dragnet Academy began to have their own life. They were grateful toward the Dragnet Academy for the decades-old education they received from there. When the Dragnet Academy needed help, all the former students offered their a.s.sistance. In this way, the Dragnet Academy gained a foothold in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province and prospered.
During the past hundreds of years, many forces had appeared and then disappeared in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province. But the Dragnet Academy was still there. It gradually became a super-large force in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province.
The mysterious dean of the Dragnet Academy had close relations.h.i.+ps with many sect leaders and hierarchs.
There were a lot of legends about the dean.
Thus, when the humble usher on the Dragon Horse Star saw the group from the Dragnet Academy, he felt his knees go weak. When he heard them belittle this planet, he naturally didn’t dare to retort.
In fact, he found what they said rather reasonable. After all, the Sea Dragon Star Area could not even compare with the Heavenly Dragon Star Province.
If it wasn’t for the Blue Sand Wind Domain, the two places wouldn’t be this far apart. Unfortunately, the Blue Sand Wind Domain stretched the distance between the two places by over ten thousand times.
If Zi Yan and the others heard about the Dragnet Academy and the three grades, they would probably think, “Isn’t it basically just a university on Earth?
“Could the mysterious dean be from Earth?
“But this was no such educational inst.i.tution on Earth 800 years ago.”
Yue Wuwei would also have to ponder over this. Several groups of people from Earth had stayed in the Sea Dragon Star Area after attending the previous trials for the Heavenly Lord’s martial arts heritage. Therefore, that dean might really be from Earth. The academy had different grades, which was similar to that on Earth. In his opinion, it was not surprising at all.
“You should talk less.”
Hearing the man mumbling behind her, the handsome guy on the right side of the cloaked woman tilted his head and said, “Everything is justified by its sheer existence. Although the Sea Dragon Star Area is barren and has few resources, it has fostered many famous figures. It is said that our dean…”
“Senior Lyu, what you heard was just hearsay. The dean’s never personally admitted that he’s from the Sea Dragon Star Area,” the red-haired man behind him replied.
However, his tone and att.i.tude had returned to normal. He was no longer ridiculing like before.
“Hearsays are not necessarily false.” Senior Lyu smiled and looked at the woman beside him, saying, “This time, we mainly came here to accompany Senior Lorry. We’ll just tour around these days. Moreover, we should mainly focus on cultivation. This trip will only last for a dozen days. It doesn’t matter where we go.”
“Senior Lyu is right. If it weren’t for Senior Lorry, we wouldn’t have been able to go out and have fun,” another man said with a smile.
It was obvious that the oval-faced Lorry and Senior Lyu were definitely not in the first grade.
“The dean is truly from the Sea Dragon Star Area,” Lorry spoke abruptly.
Her voice was a little sweet and delicate. Slowly, she said, “He once mentioned that there is an extremely mysterious place in the Sea Dragon Star Area. That place doesn’t seem to exist in this world.”
“Really?”
The three men behind her looked shocked.
Senior Lyu Qi and Senior Lorry were both people of high status.
Lorry, in particular, came from a top n.o.ble family. Her family was not a large force in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province, but its strength was very strong. When the elders of her family went out, the members of many other forces would greet them warmly when they met.
The sect Lyu Qi was in was a second-tier force in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province. As a very talented disciple of the younger generation, it was normal for Lyu Qi to come to the Dragnet Academy to cultivate.
The three of them also knew that Senior Lyu Qi liked Senior Lorry very much and wanted to be her Cultivational Partner.
It was just that Lorry didn’t seem to have any interest in that. Her pa.s.sion was to study pellet-refining art. In the pellet-refining school, she was one of the top students.
Since she was from a n.o.ble family and was very outstanding in the academy, she was favored by the head of the pellet-refining school. Occasionally, she would even be able to see the mysterious dean of the academy.
Since she said so, that was probably the truth.
Stunned by her words, those people also began to speculate.
“So our dean is from this Star Area. He knows there is a very mysterious place here. If we find that place, won’t it be a great contribution? Hahaha, the Sea Dragon Star Area is intriguing now.”
“The most dangerous place here is the Chaotic Region, right? With our dean’s strength, he can totally go there. Then how come he hasn’t found it yet? The dean says that place does not seem to exist in this world. Could it be… a secret realm that only opens for a limited time?”
“Who knows more? Senior Lorry, have you heard more details?”
Hearing this question, Lorry shook her head slightly and said, “I don’t know more. When the dean talked about that place, his expression was a bit strange. He seemed to really want to go back here and take a look. So, in the next few days, you guys can stroll around. If you really stumble on that place, the dean will definitely give you a generous reward.”
“Haha, Senior Lorry, you’re so nice to us,” the three juniors behind her said with a smile.
Among them, the man with long, red hair was a disciple of Lyu Qi’s sect. The other two were his roommates. They were on good terms with him, so he let them tag along.
At first, they were very disappointed when they saw the scale of the Dragon Horse Star.
They found the race boring, too. But to their surprise, they heard this news and suddenly became energetic.
They could go explore the Sea Dragon Star Area in search of that mysterious place.
Now they had a mission, this journey would be different.
Although they knew that the chances of finding that place were slim, it didn’t stop them from getting excited.
“Your Excellencies, if you’re looking for a mysterious place, there is someone you can go to for consult,” the usher leading the way turned around and said with a respectful look on his face.
“Oh? Someone here knows about that mysterious place?” The red-haired man raised his eyebrows slightly and then shook his head. “You’re just an usher. What could you know?”
“I know little about that place. But a very powerful force suddenly showed up recently. They said that they came from the Sea Dragon Star Area, but they didn’t say where exactly. One of them is also suspected to be in the G.o.d Transformation Realm,” the usher in the front replied in a low voice.
“The G.o.d Transformation Realm?”
The old man’s eyes narrowed slightly.
The news about the sudden appearance of a G.o.d Transformation Realm cultivator still needed further verification.
“Your Excellencies, your table is right here. Please take a seat. I’ll fetch you some drinks and food now.”
“Wait a minute.”
Lyu Qi looked at the usher. He casually threw out a medium-grade crystal stone and said, “Tell me more about what you just told me.”
“Yes!”
The usher just wanted to get the tip. He rejoiced over getting the medium-grade crystal stone. What a generous tip! “Sure enough, people from the Heavenly Dragon Star Province are all rich!”
“Half a year ago, there was a trial on the Lost Continent. A group of people seemed to have appeared there out of thin air. One of them was called Zhang Hanyang, who seemed to be the key figure of that team. He was very domineering and killed many members of the Tiger Talisman Royal Family and other forces. The Tiger Talisman Royal Family is the top force specializing in science and technology in our Star Area. It is very strong. It is located in the Sea Central Star Area. It has…”
“Can you get to the point? What’s to brag about your lame technology?” the red-haired man, who seemed short-tempered, interrupted him directly.
“Yes.”
The usher didn’t dare to refute. He immediately said, “It’s said that Zhang Hanyang and his people have more than a dozen kinds of sixth-tier spirit treasures, all of which are weapons. After leaving the Lost Continent, they went to the Dal Star to buy some clothes and other supplies. They spent millions of crystal stones there. You can imagine how rich they are. Then, they suddenly vanished. No one heard about them for a while. But last month, Nina, the seventh princess of the Elemental Elf Clan, held her Coming of Age Ceremony. At that ceremony, they reappeared…”
After recounting the story, he added, “It is said that Zhang Hanyang bought 10 Thunder Kings, 60 defensive s.h.i.+ps, and many aircraft from the Snowfall Alliance. He is loaded. No one knows where he and his people are from. But some of them mentioned that they came from the Sea Dragon Star Area. Just now, I heard you talking about a mysterious place. I think maybe Zhang Hanyang and his people know about it.”
“Er… they bought 10 Thunder King from the Snowfall Alliance? That cost one billion crystal stones. They’re absolutely rich.” Lyu Qi’s eyes narrowed slightly.
In fact, many forces in the Heavenly Dragon Star Province have such an amount of crystal stones. It was not a really huge sum. But not all the forces could really afford such a fleet.
But the one who made such a big purchase was from the Sea Dragon Star Area. That was a bit startling.
“You really told us something useful.”
The red-haired man chuckled, then tossed a medium-grade crystal stone to the usher nonchalantly and said, “This is your reward.”
“Thank you, Your Excellency!” The usher bowed even lower.