Totem

“Correct. I want you to use your knife skills to face Yulianne!”

The black figure’s hanging eyeball suddenly jumped, “Rodi, although Yulianne’s pledge isn’t necessarily valid, the fact that she is obsessed with knife skills is absolutely true. As long as you utilize your knife skills properly, you can definitely hold off Yulianne for ten minutes!”

“Mister, can I refuse?”

“Of course you can refuse. Continue being a slave who isn’t even comparable to a pig or dog if you wish!”

Jiang Nan sank into silence.

After a long while, he spat out a mouthful of spittle without the slightest bearing of a model professor and said fiercely: “Banana your guava*, it’s settled then! This grandfather will help you take care of Yulianne!”
(*TL: Scroll to the bottom of the chapter for an explanation.)

The black figure went blank. In his mind, Jiang Nan had always been a person who would demonstrate the bearing of a model character at every turn. Even if he had to risk his life to face Yulianne now and was a bit stirred up, it would not make sense for him to go as far as speaking that vulgarly, would it?

He nodded his head oddly: “Very good, I appreciate your decisiveness! Rodi, as for how you will hold Yulianne off…. I can only tell you this. Yulianne will arrive in Sun City at around ten o’clock in the morning, and her route will undoubtedly pa.s.s by Sun City’s food marketplace. As to how to deal with this, think of an idea yourself.” Halting a bit, he continued, “On the other hand, in the upcoming days, three hundred fellow Ghost Totem comrades will be sent to various places in Sun City. You must locate one of them, preferably one with leadership skills, and then relay may plan to him. Tell him to lead the rest of the three hundred to cooperate with the operation!”

“Alright, as *you wish!” After a momentary loss of composure, Jiang Nan returned to his appearance as a model character and gave a chuckle, “I will fulfill your condition. Mister, do you have any other advice?”

“No more. Hand over the map of Mount Longinus then.”

A blank, greased paper shot out of the black fog along with a quill pen to land gently before Jiang Nan.

Jiang Nan began drawing onto the greased paper, and just as he was about to complete the map, he suddenly asked without raising his head: “What do you need the map of Mount Longinus for? You wouldn’t tell me that I lack the qualifications to know this, would you?”

“No, you are already qualified to know this….” The black figure’s drooping eyeball swayed as he said with a smile: “You clearly saw the scene of Mount Longinus devouring the Weather Duo, right?”

Jiang Nan’s pen paused moving as he nodded, “Does it have something to do with that pale white light?”

“Correct. Mount Longinus has always had a legend of it devouring people floating around it: every year during the Drifting Snow Festival, when it is the coldest time of the year, if someone uses their totem power on Mount Longinus, the dormant volcano will devour that person!” The hanging eyeball brimmed with avarice, “In these thousands and hundreds of years, Mount Longinus has devoured at least twenty-some experts and several hundred powerful, strange beasts. I want the map of Mount Longinus so I can find the skeletal remains of these experts and beasts!”

“Skeletal remains?” Jiang Nan tilted his head up with a look of confusion. At the same time, he handed the completed map to the black figure, “Why would you look for the skeletal remains?”

After sweeping his eyes over the map, the black figure collected it into the black fog and then handed over a faintly purple, sheepskin scroll to Jiang Nan, “The reason is in here. Look at it yourself!”

After he said this, the black fog roiled about and disappeared before Jiang Nan’s eyes.

Jiang Nan spread open the sheepskin scroll. With just one glance, he let out a satisfied laugh, “I understand now. No wonder you wish to find the skeletal remains of those powerful figures…. Thank you for telling me this secret, Hanging Eyeball Mister!”

There were only three paragraphs written on the scroll.

The first paragraph: “Rodi, you are about to reach the peak of the primary-rank Totem Warrior stage. Before you advance to the intermediate rank, you must keep this in mind: primary rank is only a threshold. Only after you advance to the intermediate rank and possess a ‘Totem Guard’ will you officially begin the path of a totem master!”

The second paragraph, “A so-called Totem Guard is summoning a manifestation of nature to constantly follow by your side and fight for you! Furthermore, since you are a Ghost Totem master, the various defenses you can summon include corpses, bones, ghosts, zombies…. Any manifestations of nature that have to do with death!”

This sentence was the reason why that black figure wished to locate the skeletal remains of those experts!

Ghost Totem masters could summon corpses to act as their Totem Guard. Furthermore, the effect of summoning a dead pig and the skeletal remains of an expert would definitely be worlds apart.

The black figure precisely wanted the skeletal remains of the experts within Mount Longinus to become his Totem Guard!

And what was even more generous was that he had revealed this secret to Jiang Nan. He was clearly indicating to Jiang Nan, “Young fellow, before you advance to the intermediate rank, you can also come to Mount Longinus and summon the skeletal remains of a peerless expert to become your Totem Guard!”

Seeing this, Jiang Nan laughed contentedly.

He then continued to look at the next paragraph: this paragraph was the incantation to summoning a Totem Guard. However, written in the paragraph was a particular warning that said, “Rodi, before your strength surpa.s.ses mine, you can only summon ‘one type’ of Totem Guard. Furthermore, once you summon it, you cannot abandon or change it! As such, when you are about to summon it, you must be beyond cautious. By no means should you make the wrong decision…. In simpler terms, you do not summon at all, or you choose the best option for the sake of your future path once you do make a summoning!”

If he was to summon, he would have to summon the best!

Jiang Nan silently engraved these words onto his heart, then recalled the map of Mount Longinus.

If it was possible, he could go look for the experts’ skeletal remains right now!

However, it was a pity that because Weylin was not aware of the Mount Longinus’ legend, she had not marked any trails to the remains.

Furthermore, just as Jiang Nan was about to sink into deeper thought and study, various shouts suddenly floated through, “Rodi, Miss Weylin wants you to immediately appear. If you haven’t come out within ten minutes, the Miss will break your useless legs!”

Oh, alright. The matter of locating those skeletal remains could be pushed to a later date.

Jiang Nan patted his forehead in irritation and came to the town at the foot of the mountain.

Weylin was currently leading people to look for Jiang Nan, and seeing Jiang Nan come over, she launched into a bout of scolding: “Rodi, you said that you wanted to inform this woman, but then what happened?! Where did you go die!”

“Calm down, Miss Weylin!” Jiang Nan shook his finger and laughed, “You know, I’m actually a very cowardly person….”

“This woman knows that you have no courage, but this woman is asking you….”

“Since you know that I’m a coward, Miss Weylin, in such a public place, can you keep from asking anymore?” Jiang Nan shrugged his shoulders with a troubled looks and inched close to Weylin’s ear, whispering: “Don’t tell me that you actually want me to tell the truth and say that when that earthquake happened, I was so scared that I nearly p.i.s.sed my pants and went to hide in a mountain cavern? Weylin, I am a slave, but I am also a man. How about you leave me some face?”

Weylin went blank, then suddenly went ‘pft’ and began giggling.

Jiang Nan also laughed, “Miss Weylin, I’ve already heard the results of the match. Right now…. Can I return to Rheim Pasture?”

“What’s the rush? Don’t tell me that you don’t want to see this woman?” Weylin glared, but she soon began laughing, “Let’s leave at noon. It just so happens that this woman needs to send some criminals to Rheim Pasture, so come along with me!”

Criminals?!

Jiang Nan stared blankly. He a.s.sumed that it was Eddy who had been captured by Weylin and had become the farm’s prisoner.

Turning his head around, as expected, the unlucky chef Eddy was imprisoned within a jail cart and was currently crying and wailing as he was sent along.

But behind Eddy, there were ten more jail carts. Twenty eyes flickered with a ghastly and eerie light while the faces of these ten criminals just so happened to gloomily fix onto himself!

The criminal in the third jail cart was the one who caused Jiang Nan’s heart to tremble the most!

This person’s physique was not very big. One could even say that he was a bit skinny. However, he was carrying an enormous 150 kilogram iron cangue, and not even one bone bent under this burden. A deep furrow could be seen between his eyebrows and a cold light gleamed in within his eyes. With just one look, it was clear that this was an iron-blooded person whose life had often come into contact with life and death, a person whose knife would fall at the slightest lift of a hand.

This was Jiang Nan’s and Glaston’s first meeting.

If this was narrated in the melodramatic way of a wandering bard, it should have been like this, “In year 2143 of the Milky Way Calendar during the Drifting Snow Festival, the great Saint Rodi was still a slave full of a model character’s bearing, and there were still many people who loathed him. However, this day, the person acclaimed as his number one faithful follower, the unimaginably loyal and steadfast Lord Glaston, miraculously discovered this side of the esteemed and great Saint. From this moment onwards, the wheels of fate began to turn….”

It is a pity that facts and history will always have some sort of disparity.

When the person in the cage sensed Jiang Nan looking at him, his head did not even turn. It was as if Jiang Nan was simply a lowly ant looking up to a gigantic dragon!

And after staring at this man for nearly half a day, Jiang Nan clicked his tongue and gave a fitting a.s.sessment:

This was a distinctively masculine man!

He then asked Weylin: “Miss, these men are….”

TL note: The meaning behind “Banana your guava” is basically cussing and swearing. Just use your imagination and subst.i.tute the fruit names with curse words. The backstory behind this is that there was a male character who would often scold and curse people. Because of this, it would bring a lot of trouble to him. As such, he went to a church to find a priest to help him with this shortcoming of his, asking him if there was any way for him to change his bad habit. The priest told him to simply change the curse words to the names of fruit. n.o.body would be able to tell exactly what curses he would be saying, but it wouldn’t matter as long as he himself knew that he was getting angry at them. From then on, whenever he cursed or scolded people, he would always subst.i.tute the bad words with fruits.