Few people were traveling on the highway. Su Ping would see vehicles driving toward the Mysterious Realm only occasionally. Su Ping saw the license plates and the way they were coming from and believed they had to be from the Longjiang Base City.
Several hours later.
Su Ping rode on the Dark Dragon Hound and arrived at the explorers’ base.
This was a transfer station on the highway. Before he went within the limits of the base city, Su Ping sent the Dark Dragon Hound back into the pet space. The Dark Dragon Hound was so tired that it was out of breath. “I must find a flying pet to use as my ride. When I become an advanced battle pet warrior, I will have the right to ride on flying pets inside the base city. With a flying pet, traveling around will be easier and faster,” Su Ping said to himself.
He looked at the sky. It was in the afternoon.
Su Ping walked into the explorers’ base. Su Ping planned to hitch a ride back to the Longjiang Base City. That would be much easier than riding on the Dark Dragon Hound and he could go into the city directly.
After all, no one-other than master battle pet warriors-was allowed to ride on pets on the ground inside the base city. Unless necessary, most of the battle pet warriors were unwilling to swagger their way around in the base city while riding on their pets.
I wonder if Ye Chenshan and Luo Guxue are back.
Su Ping went into the base and walked along the chaotic roads. The explorers’ base had been established in the wild. Since dead beasts were being transported in and out, the streets were messy, tainted with blood while foul smells wafted in the air.
There were some stalls on the two sides of the streets, set up by some explorers who were there to sell some rare materials harvested from the beasts they had caught, like venom sacs, fangs, etc, and other stuff that could be used on weapons. Some venom sacs from rare poisonous beasts were in popular demand.
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Su Ping planned to find Luo Guxue. She was a teacher at the academy and also lived in the base city so he could ask her to drive him back.
Not long afterward, Su Ping heard some familiar voices at an entrance to an alley.
“Captain Zhou, this is not fair!”
“Right. We are students, newcomers if you will, but we have made our contributions along the way. Miss Su’s Lightning Rat killed several advanced beasts, but you don’t want to share any merit points. This is outrageous!”
At the alley, several people were standing there. They seemed to be from the same team.
Close by, four were standing on one side. They were all in their early twenties; very young and with pale, soft skin. One look and Su Ping could tell that they weren’t seasoned explorers that would frequent the barren lands. Su Ping could still see signs of their good lives in the city. Facing them were five people, both male and female. They were wearing armor of different styles. Su Ping noticed that those people were capable and experienced. Their leader was a bulky middle-aged man with claw marks and wounds on his arms; they gave him a ferocious look and were basically his medals of honor.
At the moment, he was pulling a long face as the two girls were arguing with him. His eyebrows were tightly knit.
“Hmm, stop it. You are just students. You should feel grateful enough that some teams are willing to take you and train you. How dare you ask for merit points? You wish!” A young man with short hair and a sour face seemed to be short-tempered. He glared at the four students.
Of the four students, three were girls and one was a boy.
This boy was taken aback. Along the way, the young man had been gentle to them. However, the same young man turned hostile the moment they began to talk about merit points. The boy argued, “Our academy has already paid you for taking care of us. We killed beasts, so we should have merit points. It’s still within reason that you would want a bigger share of points, but to leave none for us? How greedy of you!”
“Are you saying distribution according to work? Who gave you the right to talk about this? You dragged us down the entire way. How dare you talk about work?” A lady with black hair sneered. She had an old scar which made her pretty face look twisted.
“Dragging you down? Yes, there were some small troubles caused by us when there were things we didn’t understand, but none of them were fatal. Besides, we obeyed you in every way throughout the entire journey, and never acted without consulting you!”
The youngest girl of the four students said furiously, “During the battle against the Flare Elephant, could we have exterminated all the beasts if it weren’t for the fact that the Lighting Rat distracted the other two beasts? Besides, the Lightning Rat killed several advanced beasts on its own. You should at least give us the merit points for those kills, don’t you think?”
The bulky middle-aged man who was the leader appeared to be even unhappier. Those students had indeed behaved along the way. He thought that he could bluff his way and easily finish the journey. However, the youngest girl had stood up and that riled up the other three students. They began to argue. The one person who had spoken the least was the girl who owned the freaky Lightning Rat. She had been quiet, not being the kind that liked to stir up trouble.
“Are you done?” the middle-aged man said. His voice was low but it contained violence that came into being after his years of battling
The angry girl and the boy stopped, clearly scared by this.
They were enraged but they could read the room. The bulky middle-aged man was the captain and he was at the seventh rank. One rank above and he would become a master battle pet warrior! His main pet was formidable, a pet at the intermediate position of the eighth rank from the demon family. He could easily defeat all of them. The quiet girl looked up when she heard the middle-aged man’s voice. She stepped forward in front of her peers and looked into the eyes of their bulky leader.
The middle-aged man pulled a long face as he sensed the girl’s attitude. He was a bit wary of the girl’s unusual Lightning Rat. That being said, it was a low-rank pet after all and could not stand a chance in front of his eighth-rank battle pet.
“You newcomers know nothing about rules. Your first trip should just be one where you learn things from the team. How dare you ask for merit points? Do you want the merit points that badly? Do you have no concerns for the future? Don’t you want to be explorers?” the middle-aged man cautioned the students coldly. He viewed himself as their superior.
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Those words saddened the four students.
Three of the four students were at a loss for words. They didn’t ask for merit points from the very beginning just because they had such concerns. After all, they were about to graduate and become official explorers. The other was just a freshman.
“Are you jealous because we had a fruitful journey and got many merit points? Remember, without us, you would never make it back alive!” The middle-aged man thought he had successfully awed those students.
The students again kept silent. The middle-aged man said in a calmer tone, “But, you did make some contributions during this trip. At the very least, you didn’t slow us down too much. The three of you will take one thousand merit points and Su Yanying, you will have two thousand. End of discussion.”
The four students were furious.
They were unhappy about how the merit points had been distributed between them but there was nothing they could do.
A girl bit her teeth and clenched her fists. She wanted to say something but she knew that they couldn’t do anything about it. At the moment, she realized all of a sudden that she couldn’t earn a place in the world even with all the knowledge from the academy.
Only the fist could get her the power!
All of a sudden, someone said with a chuckle, “Look at you. Hi everyone.”
All of the nine people were surprised by this chuckle. They turned around and saw a young man approaching.
The middle-aged man frowned. They didn’t know this person but they could tell that he was most likely a student acquainted with the other four by gauging his age.
Su Yanying and the other students opened their eyes widely; they were astonished after seeing this young man. Him?
The four students stood there in a daze.
The youngest girl was the most shocked of all. Never did she expect to meet him there. Shouldn’t her despicable brother be at the store?
“Sir… Sir?” said the boy and the other girl with long legs.
They had met Su Ping, the well-known teacher in the academy. What a small world.
“Mr. Su?” Su Yanying was surprised. She, like all the others, never thought she could see Su Ping there. She thought that Su Ping would always curl up in that small store of his despite the powerful abilities he had demonstrated.