Li Yao cursed silently, not knowing whether he should play dumb or tell the truth.
Although Xiong Wuji was standing casually five meters away, the intimidating aura he released was growing exponentially, as if an invisible bear had hugged him!
Sha Yulan said, “Whoever you are, you saved my son, who is also the adopted son of Xiong Wuji, leader of the Furious Bears Tribe. We cannot thank you enough, and we mean you no harm. I wasn’t lying to you on purpose, either.
“I have never seen the tattoo on your chest before, but I can sense a unique feeling of evilness from it that is the distinguishing characteristic of the Black Spider Death Curse.
“I’m aware that only those who have killed the best assassins of Black Spider Tower are likely to be harassed by the Black Spider Death Curse.
“If you are really a native of Iron Plateau, then I can’t help but wonder why a member of Spider’s Thorn has landed on Iron Plateau for no good reason and was killed by you.”
Li Yao failed to come up with any response.
It was not entirely because of his bad acting skills. He had never expected that somebody on Iron Plateau could recognize the Black Spider Death Curse!
“My friend.”
Xiong Wuji opened his mouth slowly, his voice low and deep like a bear that was rubbing against a tree. “You risked your own life to save my adopted son. I owe you a great favor. You are from the space, Dr. Sha is from the space, and my adopted son Wu Mayan is also from the space. You can see that the Furious Bears Tribe is different from certain other tribes! Who are you, why are you here, and what do you want?”
Li Yao blinked, his mind in a mess.
He didn’t know that this Sha Yulan was truly from the space, and it did not seem to be a secret in the Furious Bears Tribe!
Sha Yulan gestured for Xiong Wuji to retreat farther. She then carried a chair and sat down, before she spoke softly. “Judging from the wounds on your body, you’ve suffered a lot on Iron Plateau. I can totally imagine what kind of life a space resident must’ve been living after he was forced onto Iron Plateau. It is perfectly normal that you are very alert. How about I tell my story first, and then you tell yours?
Before Li Yao could reply, Sha Yulan had already started. “I’m from a family that specialized in the medicine, born the Horizontal Wind Space Zone. My father was a well-known doctor in the space zone. Once, a patient who suffered from the Black Spider Death Curse and was on the brink of death came to my father.
“Although my father failed to save him, the Black Spider Death Curse left a very deep impression in me. That’s why I saw through your tattoo easily a moment ago.
“My husband was a manager of a small sect in the Horizontal Wind Space Zone and was in charge of the logistics.
“When our son Wu Mayan was six months old, the three of us went on a trip to visit my parents, but we encountered space pirates half way through.
“Most of the starships in our fleet were captured. My husband managed to break away from the siege as a skilled pilot, but in our haste, and driven by a cosmic storm, we drifted to the Iron Plateau Space Zone.
“When we arrived here, we had run out of food and ammunitions, and there was barely any fuel left. The telepathic thought transmitter on board was broken, too. We could not reach out to the outside world via the Spiritual Nexus as there was no such thing here.
“Therefore, we could only risk landing on Iron Plateau.
“But we didn’t expect for the defense network of Iron Plateau in its atmosphere to be so powerful. Our starship was seriously damaged again when we were breaking through the planetary ring.
“My husband burnt his life and soul without thinking about anything else in order to steer the broken starship. Although we landed successfully in the end, my husband passed away unfortunately because of over-exhaustion.”
Sha Yulan sighed. “Wu Mayan, who was only six months old back then, and I were lost in the desert and about to be slain by the demon beasts when qi-trainers of the Furious Bears Tribe appeared and rescued us.”
Li Yao lips moved, but he did not dare to open his mouth. He was meaning to ask why the qi-trainers did not ask for her trouble since she was also a Cultivator.
Xiong Wuji seemed to have seen through what was on his mind. He sniffed and remarked, “What do you think we qi-trainers are? Scumbags who bully women and children?”
Sha Yulan managed to make a smile. “I’d read a few confidential files about Iron Plateau before and was aware that, although the natives of Iron Plateau were not primitive barbarians, their impression about the residents in the space, especially Cultivators, was not very good. However, for my son, I couldn’t care less about that and thought that they could torture me however they wanted as long as they kept my son alive.
“As it turned out, when those silly bears discovered that there were only the two of us, they did not know how to deal with me at all even though they had noticed that I was a Cultivator.
“At that time, Wu Mayan was still being breastfed. He was just a small meatball. I was merely a non-battle-type Cultivator who could not even catch a chicken. They could neither beat nor condemn us, and we would be dead for sure if they drove us to the desert.
“Therefore, they established a small house in the corner of Furious Bears City where my son and I could stay. It seemed like they were even scared that we might die. Haha.
“Then, the wife of a qi-trainer had trouble during her labor. Both her child and herself were about to be killed. Nobody knew what to do. I happened to drop by and saved the two of them.
“Later, more people gradually came to seek treatment from me. It was mostly women and kids in the beginning. The job I did most often was the midwife.
“However, healthy as the men here may be, it was natural that they broke a bone or two when they were fighting demon beasts outside. Some of their traditional methods were effective, but many wounds could only be treated with the more modern medical knowledge.
“After I saved a few seriously wounded qi-trainers, my name gradually spread afar. They started calling me ‘Dr. Sha’. Not only was I known within the Furious Bears Tribe, the qi-trainers of the Silver Moon Tribe and those of the Greedy Wolves Tribe would come to ask for my help if they had no solutions themselves, too.
“In the last twelve years, I’ve saved more Iron Plateau natives than I can count. The serious wound on Xiong Wuji’s chest couldn’t have been healed without me.
“With my contribution, the adults of the Furious Bears Tribe mostly have the decency not to speak ill of the space residents when I’m around. But sometimes, little kids say the nastiest things, and don’t even realize it, when they are horsing around.”
Sha Yulan paused for a moment and the continued speaking, somewhat reluctantly. “Yesterday afternoon, my son was playing with a few other kids. He’s a proud and aggressive one, and he beat his three companions down heavily. One of them was pissed off and said something that was not very nice.
“My son did not give a reply there. He secluded himself for half a day when he was back. No one expected that he would run out secretly late at night to hunt demon beasts by himself in order to prove that he was as valiant as any Iron Plateau native even though blood of the space flows in his veins.
“Thankfully, you showed up in time, or it would’ve been a terrible disaster.”
Xiong Wuji said, “Last night, I received a message from the Burning Sun Tribe stating that a Cultivator had landed on Iron Plateau and encountered them. The Cultivator was even trying to make a deal with them, but he didn’t know that the Burning Sun Tribe was the tribe that hated Cultivators most among the six tribes of Iron Plateau. In the end, the Cultivator fled desperately and even humiliated the son of the leader of the Burning Sun Tribe. If my guess is correct, the Cultivator was you, right?
“The Furious Bears Tribe and the Burning Sun Tribe are different. Why don’t you tell us what the deal was that you tried to make?”
Li Yao was interested. He observed the two of them and discovered that they were as calm as before and showed no signs of lying.
Besides, if Xiong Wuji was really the best warrior of the six tribes of Iron Plateau, there was no need for him to lie at all.
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao kept most details to himself and simply said that he was a member of an Exo Society who had fiercely battled against space pirates in the Iron Plateau Space Zone and that he had been forced to land on the planet eventually.
Xiong Wuji nodded. “According to our observation, it’s true that a fierce battle took place in space a month ago. There were also signs that the defense system of the planet was triggered.”
Li Yao concealed most of the details, but he elaborated on his performance in the Skyhill Sword Seminar to prove that he was reasonably good at the art of refining and could help the Furious Bears Tribe craft a huge amount of magical equipment.
Xiong Wuji listened attentively. He suddenly interjected when Li Yao was talking about the Skyhill Sword Seminar. “You are a refiner? Then, can you repair starships?”
Li Yao’s eyes suddenly shone. He replied, “My specialty is the refinement and maintenance of melee magical equipment, namely swords and sabers. As for starships, I’ve conducted a few maintenance tasks before, but I’m not adept at it. It will depend on the model of the starship, the extent of damage, and the number of backup components.”
He was better at destroying a starship than repairing one.
Xiong Wuji nodded in acknowledgement and hinted for him to continue.
When Li Yao finished his speech, Xiong Wuji concluded, “So, the deal you talked about was that you get resources and maintenance facilities from us and we get a lot of magical equipment crafted by you.”
“Correct!”
Fire of hope was ignited in Li Yao’s heart, as he nodded and said, “Chief Xiong, I can tell that you are much more rational than the guy from the Burning Sun Tribe. The deal I’ve proposed is a win-win for us. If you don’t believe me, I can refine a few swords and sabers right now. You can test their quality yourself!”
“I believe you… but the deal cannot be made right now.”
Xiong Wuji shook his head. “Right now, I don’t have enough resources and facilities to make a deal with you.”
Li Yao was dazed. “Why?”
Xiong Wuji narrowed his eyes in which two terrifying flames were burning, while he said coldly, “Because an apocalypse is coming. All the resources must be used to forge the large war machines, and all the personnel must be summoned to join the battle of the apocalypse! Your crystal suit should be a piece of very precise magical equipment. To mend it would require a lot of resources and time. However, right now, I don’t have enough resources and time to trade with you.
“If both of us are still alive after the apocalypse, let’s make a deal then!”
This was the second time that Li Yao heard the phrase ‘battle of the apocalypse’.
Seeing the grave expression on the best warrior of the six tribes of Iron Plateau, Li Yao was grasped by anxiety, too. He asked, “Didn’t the apocalypse take place five thousand years ago? What exactly happened at that time? Why are the Iron Plateau natives and space residents so against each other? What is the battle of the apocalypse?”
