“Late-stage Soul Sprite! And…you’re on the verge of breaking through!!”
Upon sensing Jing Mingfeng’s current level of strength, Bai Yunfei was incredibly shocked. Just a year ago, Jing Mingfeng was only an early-stage Soul Sprite. But now, he was on the verge of making the breakthrough!! A rate of training like that was utterly shocking to hear about.
Pleased as punch at the reaction of Bai Yunfei, Jing Mingfeng smiled, “How ‘bout it? Ol’Bai, I managed to get a lot stronger after almost dying. I only just need a single step more to become a Soul Ancestor, and I’m confident that I’ll be able to do it!”
The absolute pride he had in himself caused Bai Yunfei to calm down immediately. “Haha, it’s really surprising. You’ve must have picked that up during one of your adventures, eh?”
“Of course, you can say it’s quite shocking, really.” Jing Mingfeng snorted. “But lets not talk about that for now. Ol’Bai, how strong are you now? And how are you hiding your strength, I can’t even sense any elements inside your body?”
Bai Yunfei shook his head with a sigh, “I’m not hiding my strength at all. What you’re sensing is correct.”
“Eh? What do you mean by that?”
“What I mean is that there isn’t any elemental fire in my body at all. Not even my essence fireseed is in me….”
“What?!” Jing Mingfeng exclaimed, “Ol’Bai, are you messing with me? What happened?”
“Well, about several months ago….”
Without hiding any details of the story, Bai Yunfei recounted the events of what happened outside of Curopia City to Jing Mingfeng.
“You…you’re telling me you used your essence fireseed as a price to use this ‘lifebound armament’ to kill two Soul Ancestors and a Soul Exalt?!”
Jing Mingfeng’s eyes were as large as dinner plates. He simply couldn’t believe his ears on what he was hearing, and he was clearly looking at Bai Yunfei in a state of absolute befuddlement.
It took Jing Mingfeng several minutes and a long drawn-out breath before he was able to speak again. “Ol’Bai, I really don’t even know what to say to you…Killing people beyond your level feels like it’s to be expected from you now. In the past, you could kill people just a little bit stronger than you, but now, you’re skipping levels entirely….that’s a little….”
“Haha, it’s all because of my lifebound armament, that’s all.” Bai Yunfei laughed, “I’m just very lucky. I was in a special situation, so I was able to kill that person.”
“A kill is a kill, what do you mean by being ‘lucky’? Even luck is a type of strength. Either way, talk about depressing! I wanted to catch up to you, but then you’re already a Soul Ancestor….” Jing Mingfeng bemoaned for a moment before asking the next question on his mind, “Then what are you going to do now? Can your essence fireseed be restored?”
“Yea, I’m having my essence fireseed heal in my lifebound armament. It should recover soon enough.”
Jing Mingfeng let out a sigh of relief, “Well, that’s good then….what exactly is this ‘lifebound armament’ of yours? I’ve never heard of such a thing before. Can I see it?”
“Er….” Bai Yunfei frowned; he felt a little embarra.s.sed confessing to Jing Mingfeng that his lifebound armament was the brick they used before.
“It’s…not very convenient to show you right now, I’ll let you see it later.”
“Alright then.” Jing Mingfeng nodded in misunderstanding. To his knowledge, it wasn’t a good idea to show the lifebound armament with Bai Yunfei’s essence fireseed inside, so he didn’t ask again to see it.
“Oh, one more thing.” He segued with a mirthful smirk, “So, Ol’Bai….not only did you join the Crafting School with Xinyun, you brought her home as well? Tell me, when did you get so chummy with her??”
“….” Finding it hard to look at Jing Mingfeng straight in the face, Bai Yunfei tried to explain, “There’s….there’s nothing going on between Xinyun and I….”
“Ah shut up, who’s going to believe that? Not me, obviously.” Jing Mingfeng snorted, “I could see how lovey-dovey you two were getting in the auction house. And that fireseed spirit mushroom, weren’t you buying it for her? You said it before yourself, she’s in that state now because she saved you. With so much going on between the two of you, are you really going to try and say there’s nothing between you and her?”
“I….” Though he tried as hard as he could to think of an explanation, nothing came up for him to say.
But knowing that Jing Mingfeng was on the verge of teasing him again, Bai Yunfei quickly changed the topic, “Anyways, what are you doing in the auction? I heard that to even partic.i.p.ate, you’d need the approval of the Tang….”
A pleased smile replaced the mocking smile on Jing Mingfeng’s face, “Hehe, I’m an important client, of course I’d be able to take part.”
“Client?” Bai Yunfei asked, “You’re telling me you’ve something to sell?”
“Course. Let me tell you, my items aren’t your ordinary stuff. Just today, three of the items sold were from me! And I’ve still even more precious stuff to dish out!”
“That many? Were they ‘spoils’ from your adventure too?”
“Hehe, most of them. But there’s some that I worked hard to get too.”
“I see now, no wonder you were able to ama.s.s so many primal stones to bid for that wind squaller.”
Jing Mingfeng’s eyes brightened at the mention of the wind squaller, “Ol’Bai, you bought that baby wind squaller probably because you didn’t want to see someone from the Beast Taming School get it, right? What do you plan to do with it? Why don’t you form a soul contract with it? It’s a wind type, so it’ll suit you well since you’re a fire type….”
The look of longing on his face was far too much for Bai Yunfei to endure, “You want it?” He laughed.
“Well….hehe, I can trade you something nice for it. If you want primal stones, wait until the stuff I gave to the Tang to sell. I’ll give you your primal stones then…” Jing Mingfeng rubbed his hands in slight expectation.
It would appear that Jing Mingfeng really wanted the baby wind squaller.
For a while, Bai Yunfei just stared at Jing Mingfeng to the point where Jing Mingfeng felt slightly scared, but then;
“No problems then, the wind squaller is yours!”
“Really?!” Jing Mingfeng cried out, “Haha, you’re definitely a brother of mine! But, I don’t have anything that could compare to your high-earth tier soul armament.
“So how about this then, I’ve plenty of good stuff, they’re not as rare as your stuff, but feel free and take some. What type of soul armament would you like, or maybe you’d like a soul skill!”
Though surprised to hear that Jing Mingfeng had plenty of treasure, Bai Yunfei shook his head to refuse them all. “I want the….Soul Concealment Art!”
The look on Jing Mingfeng’s face froze completely still. The smile on his face abated somewhat as he furrowed his eyebrows, “Ol’Bai, I…I can’t promise you that. I may want the wind squaller, but….I can’t trade you the Soul Concealment Art for it.”
Thinking about it a little more, Jing Mingfeng sighed again. “Ol’Bai, I’ll be honest with you. The family rules about ‘letting no outsiders know’ don’t really mean much to me anymore. But still. The Soul Concealment Art is completely different than the Face Changing Technique I gave you before. It’s my biggest crutch. It’s not that I can’t give it to you, but….”
His voice trailed off here, but Bai Yunfei knew what he was going to say.
While the two were good friends, they weren’t so good of friends that he’d be willing to divulge the secrets of his family to him.
Nodding, Bai Yunfei replied, “I know what you’re saying, but you didn’t let me finish. Aside from the wind squaller, I’ll happily give you a few other things for it!”