Star Gate

Chapter 739: There is No Fear of Lack of Bites When There Are Enough Lice (III)

Quite a great deal was implicated in whoever held sway over the Night Watchers. Many of them came from middle to lower class families in various small cities.

“Many of the Night Watchers also come from the Inspectorate. You know how the Inspectorate is staffed by veteran inspectors who have undergone training. They have unique methods when it comes to upholding order and investigating cases. They also possess a basic heart of guardianship. Protecting the local peace has also been something the Inspectorate has constantly advocated for...”

In simple terms, the Night Watchers were important because they represented the lower to middle class supernaturals of society. Most of them respected the law as well. Commanding them meant commanding the lower echelon of modern society.

“That makes sense, then I’ll discuss this with Director Yao.” Li Hao nodded after some thought. “Granted, not now! I don’t want to think about any of this lately. Just help me handle everything I mentioned earlier.”

The young man was planning on entering closed door cultivation for a while to help more of his supernatural locks manifest. He hadn’t had time to cultivate previously, and it was a good time to keep a low profile for a few days. Otherwise, people would think that all he knew was to stir up trouble. That wasn’t him!

“Very well!” Deputy Zhou concluded.

Li Hao smiled when he looked outside. “Inspector Yang is here, come on in!”

Yang Shan quickly entered the room and inclined his body at Li Hao. “I have inadequately fulfilled the commander’s orders!”

The great battle broke out not long after his departure; Li Hao was already gone when he returned. Given how recent events had developed, not only did he not ensure the elimination of the North Sea king, but he hadn’t even had time to give to Li Hao the items he’d brought back from Silver Moon.

He’d struck out on participating in the great battle, failed as a courier, and didn’t bring back White Shark’s head either... Yang Shan was very nervous! This was his first official mission, but he’d completed it in a rather shabby manner.

“It’s fine, I hadn’t expected Inspector Yang to return so quickly either,” Li Hao laughed.

Yang Shan quickly offered a storage ring. “Commander, everything that I brought back from Silver Moon is inside!”

Li Hao reached out and inspected the ring—one hundred and twenty drops of Water of Life. He’d just given two hundred out of five hundred to Deputy Zhou, now he was at four hundred and twenty drops again. With what he’d seized from recent battle spoils, he was almost at five hundred total.

“Well done!”

“You praise me too highly!” Yang Shan relaxed slightly, but was still apprehensive. A cultivation level of metamorphosis had made him a powerhouse before, but Li Hao killed multiple Arcanus in that battle. That caused Yang Shan to worry again as he hadn’t been able to join the flow of that battle. Who knew when he’d be able to ascend to Arcanus?

Thankfully, his wife had been able to keep pace. Qin Lian was preparing to enter metamorphosis, but didn’t attempt the breakthrough yet because she was still short on a few things.

“There’s no need to think too much!” laughed the young man. “I’ll need Inspector Yang to make a few preparations as well. I hope to be stronger after I emerge from seclusion and might look to strengthen some supernaturals. You know that I have very few supernaturals by my side—my people are all martial masters. As good as they are, sometimes they are lacking in certain areas.”

Supernaturals had their advantages, as did martial masters. Li Hao had many premier martial masters by his side, but when it came to premier supernaturals... It was Yang Shan and Qin Lian who were the strongest, if he didn’t count Hong Yitang and himself. There weren’t that many supernaturals who’d answered his call. Hao Lianchuan, Wang Ming, Li Meng, Hu Hao, and Yun Yao were familiar faces.

Now that Li Hao thought about it, he could help but smile ruefully. He was a heavyweight now, but there really weren’t many supernaturals who came to join him! Perhaps everyone still thought of him as a Silver Moon martial master and knew that this group of people heavily despised supernaturals. Hence, supernaturals politely declined working with Li Hao as well. They would rather seek out other local dictators than come to the young man.

Of course, some of it had to do with his current circumstances. As the saying went, he’d spent a thousand pieces of gold to buy the Yang couple!

Not all supernaturals were bad people. Li Hao thought of one, a very weak supernatural. On his way back to Silver Moon, he’d met Lu Chuan escorting people through the sea. Who said that only martial masters would perform random acts of heroism? That one was a hero too.

Although Li Hao hadn’t said or done anything at the time, much less help, the presence of the weak Lu Chuan had greatly changed his image of supernaturals. Maybe it also had something to do with him becoming supernaturals. Right now, Li Hao wanted to recruit a batch of supernatural powerhouses.

It would be best if they had unique abilities. Those skilled in offense weren’t worth much. Ones like Li Meng might be able to smoothly cross into a stable Arcanus level.

Joy flashed through Yang Shan’s eyes and he quickly stammered, “My thanks to the commander!”

“It’s a small matter, you can go about your business!”

Yang Shan smiled bashfully and quickly dismissed himself. His business? What business? No one knew what they should be doing since Li Hao had not yet completed his system of operations. Therefore Yang Shan had no idea what to do next.

Although Li Hao sensed the man’s confusion, he didn’t say anything. He waited for Yang Shan to leave before continuing to address Deputy Zhou. “I have too many titles right now, but they’re not very useful. Just as the deputy said, not only do I not have any goals, but none of my people do. We take things one day at a time without concrete duties or missions. Once I emerge from seclusion... Will it be better if I give people official responsibilities and missions after I take the Night Watchers for myself?”

“Of course!” laughed the deputy. “Coming to such realizations is a sign of growth! Then I await your return. I’ll outline the foundations for now. You have to fill in the rest!

“You also need to consider under which title you will be taking action in. Skystar Governor General is not bad, but it has too much to do with the royal family. I recommend focusing on the Skystar Commander Office. As minor as that position is, its range of authority is great and doesn’t have much to do with either the royal family or nine ministries.”

“I’ll consider it thoroughly!” Li Hao nodded smilingly.

Deputy Zhou quietly took his leave, some more expectation brimming in his eyes than before. There may be quite a few areas for growth when it came to Li Hao, but he improved quickly and was willing to listen to suggestions. That was a greatest ingredient for success.

Meanwhile, Li Hao was wondering if he should kill a few people to celebrate the official establishment of the Skystar Commander Office? Who should he kill? Who would make the biggest splash, but not actually cause too much trouble?

He stroked his chin, then laughed. He should materialize his light and dark locks first. If he could break them, then would he be an Arcanus of four elements? Would he have to be afraid of anyone other than those ancient powerhouses then?

“Let’s go, Panther!” Li Hao called out, taking the dog with him. With Panth present, he wasn’t concerned about energy leaking and giving clues to his enemies. The dog could eat anything and everything, leaving not a ripple behind. It was his greatest barrier now; Panther happily ambled behind him. There was nothing wrong with this picture—there would be more to eat soon. Life was good!

......

The young man didn’t go far—just a spot behind the tattered complex. When he said closed door cultivation, he really meant that he would be turning a blind eye to everything outside. At the moment, he was devoting full strength to absorbing dark and light energies. He’d been devouring these energies the past couple of days. Two locks swam through his body like miniature dragons.

“Breaking these two locks may not make me as strong as breaking four total of the organs, but it should make me stronger than breaking three of the organs...”

Would his body be able to endure the energy released by these two locks? How much would his strength increase by? Could his body and bones contain the next eruption of power? But if he broke only one, would that cause an imbalance?

Various thoughts floated into his mind as he reviewed previous thoughts and speculations. Should he give it a try?

“Let’s not fully snap them in one go, let’s just break them a little and release some energy, like unsealing myself. I can then try plugging them again!”

Li Hao was a bold sort—or rather, he was no longer afraid of breaking his supernatural locks. Thus confident, he grew bolder in his experiments.

“Pfft!” He spat out a mouthful of fresh blood, melding mental strength and mind intent into the lock. It was similar to concentrating the Incantation of the Blade of Blood within the body. Based on the instructions within the golden booklets, he coalesced two large characters in the air.

Break, attack!

With blood qi and mental strength as the base, he traced two shimmering characters in the void.

“Simply condensing blood qi and mental strength means a lack of core origin for support...”

Ancient martial cultivators likely gathered core origin strength to make these characters great. Lacking them rendered the greatest ancient arts simply mediocre in Li Hao’s eyes. This kind of offensive power might even pale in consideration to blade intent from the Incantation of the Blade of Blood.

This is too weak...

Inspiration struck; two currents of force suddenly rampaged through his body—one of wind, the other of thunder. Wind and thunder converged!

They separated in the next second and flowed into the characters. The break character sparkled with lightning and the attack character howled with the wind.

Separating the elements within the body and incorporating them into the characters. It’s best if they can be solidified...

Continued experimentation gave Li Hao an uncomfortable feeling. The break and attack characters didn’t seem to be a match with the wind and thunder attributes.

The young man sank into deep contemplation. The greatest arts of Tranquil Star might seem similar, but each of them represented a martial dao path. They weren’t just randomly selected characters.

The one of attack represented the Chens’ undying battle methods of utter ferocity. The one of break represented the Jiangs’ intent of a myriad destruction. It broke through everything. The core of these methods came from the dao force of each clan’s ancestors. That was the strength that these methods borrowed, and not just a few characters.