Xia Sahui cast Lu Er an oblique glance, the corner of her mouth twitching upward in a smile.

  "Not this again." Lu Er groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. "I'm not going to fight Hua Yong, no matter what you say. That's it. There's nothing to discuss here."

  "No one asked you to fight him directly," Xia Sahui replied, her demeanor infuriatingly calm. She adjusted the cuff of her sleeve, fingers brushing away nonexistent dust. "All you need to do is help me fight him."

  "Yeah, that's the same as you and me fighting him together, I'll definitely be implicated. No thanks." Lu Er denied any proposals that she might have harbored, crossing his arms firmly across his chest.

  "No." Xia Sahui shook her head slowly, her dark, violet hair shifting with the motion. "There is a high chance that he has a soul gift, and adding that metal morph ability, he's too strong for any single enemy to defeat alone. And beside you, there is no one else with a Ranked ability. So, you need to help. There is no choice."

  "No, no, not me. Get someone else—"

  "I'll triple your pay."

  "…"

  The silence stretched between them, Lu Er's mouth opened, closed, then opened again—his protest dying on his lips.

  "Well, I can try at least..." He continued with his blabbering, the words tumbling out in a rush. "If I don't even try this much, then what's the point of—"

  Meanwhile, Xia Sahui exhaled a barely concealed breath of relief, her shoulders relaxing almost imperceptibly. She had won the negotiation.

  A few minutes later, the assembly below had finished organizing their groups. Of the twenty-three Unawakened, Chen Tao and Chen Yuan together commanded twelve others, Xu Qin and Yao Ming each led five, while Zhu Yan had recruited only a single trembling girl who looked like she might bolt at any moment.

  The five group leaders returned to Xia Sahui one by one. After deliberating the finer details of their strategy, they quickly decided to split and circle toward the ruins from opposite flanks.

  Xia Sahui, Lu Zhiheng, Cai Hong, Xu Qin, and Yao Ming, along with their respective groups, would execute the ambush while the remainder would confront the enemy head-on, creating a critical window for the infiltration team to penetrate the temple and deactivate the floating mechanism.

  Although Hua Yong was the guardian of the temple, he didn't have control of everything inside. And since he still had no knowledge of Xia Sahui's involvement, the Chen brothers would find it relatively easy to stall him.

  With all said and done, they swiftly gathered their belongings and moved out.

  …

  Lu Er drew closer to Xia Sahui as they advanced toward the ruins. "Hey, I have a question for you."

  "And you couldn’t ask it earlier? Now is not the time," Xia Sahui didn't break her stride, her breathing even despite the demanding pace. "Conserve your stamina. It will be a long day."

  "It's important."

  "No."

  "Alright."

  He replied, disappointed, his shoulders slumping slightly.

  She glanced over her shoulder, taking in his deliberately long face, and finally relented with a soft tsk.

  "Fine then, ask." She held up a finger. "But remember—if it's not important, then I won't do the same in future."

  The rest of the group continued ahead, their silhouettes gradually fading into the distance. They'd have to sprint later to catch up.

  "Sure," He nodded, choosing his words carefully. "I want to know if you know any methods to speed up the time required to manifest or use the soul gift. My gift takes a bit too long to actually use it in a proper fight."

  Actually, it wasn't the Wood Barrier that was slow. His innate knowledge of the soul—now that he was Ranked—was enough for him to understand that the only way to speed up manifestation was to increase refinement. The real reason he had asked this question was because switching between Lu Er and Lu Yi took nearly ten minutes.

  And that needed to be fixed.

  Since soul gifts and the soul itself were closely related, there was a pretty good chance that she might possess relevant knowledge.

  "Huh? But you activated it immediately back then."

  "No, actually I got lucky." He shook his head, keeping his expression carefully neutral. "Because I still can't do it fast. That was a life-or-death moment, so maybe that helped—but I want to be able to consciously control it to be fast."

  "Hmm..." She tapped her chin, her eyes distant with thought. "I would have suggested keeping refining your gift, but what you're saying is you can use it fast instinctively sometimes, but not consciously right?"

  "That is exactly what I'm asking you."

  "Hmm … Let me think…" She took her time to formulate a response, her expression that of deep contemplation—a furrow forming between her brows, her lips parting slightly. "To be honest, I don't think there is anything else you can do other than refinement."

  Her eyes lit up suddenly, "Ah right! That might help you," She straightened, her previous hesitation evaporating. "Have you read the story about The Dao Dancer from the Moon?"

  "That trash romance novel about the dancer who killed millions of Awakened just by dancing, only to get rejected by his true love?" Lu Er made a face.

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  Xia Sahui’s amiable expression vanished. Her gaze snapped to his, and the air around them seemed to drop several degrees. "IT'S NOT TRASH!" The words tore from her throat in a deathly serious, monstrous voice—completely different from her usual tone, which was usually controlled and measured.

  "What the—! "Alright-Alright! Don't scare me like that!" He held up his hands in surrender. "What about it?"

  "No, you don't have respect for the story." She waved him off dismissively, her anger cooling as quickly as it had ignited. "You can guess the rest by yourself. I'm not telling."

  She turned and began running toward the group.

  "Wait!" Lu Er called after her, his voice desperate. "Sahui, I need this! Otherwise, how am I supposed to help you in the fight?" He quickened his pace to match hers. "Please tell me! It will be helpful for you too!"

  But she didn’t break stride, her figure still moving rapidly.

  "Alright! I'll forfeit half of what you were going to pay me!"

  She finally paused, turning her head just enough to catch him with her gaze. "I don't want your money." Her voice was cold, clinical. "You will work for me for the rest of the game, and one month after the game, in exchange for the information."

  ‘She wanted this from the start! And here I thought she was genuinely offended by my calling the novel trash.’ Lu Er's thoughts churned before he responded aloud. "Aren't we already in alliance?" He countered, trying to negotiate from a position he already knew was weak. "And that's too much for what I have asked."

  "Yes, we are in an alliance." She nodded once, the motion crisp and decisive. "But after the exchange, you will be my subject. My subordinate. And no—the information I'll give you is worth more than that."

  'What's with this weird obsession of hers to be at the top?' He watched her with growing bewilderment. 'It's not even bound by any contract or agreement. Is there something I'm missing? My words don't actually make an agreement right? Sigh... I'm overthinking it.'

  “Fine,” he conceded aloud, dipping his head in a shallow nod. “Accepted.”

  A flicker of satisfaction crossed Xia Sahui’s features before she schooled them back to neutrality. "You know that many folklores and stories are based on actual real-life events, right?"

  "You mean The Dao Dancer from the Moon is based on real events?" Curiosity sparked in his voice.

  "No, the story itself is purely fictional." She shook her head. "But Daoist Wu Zhe was a real person. And so were his techniques. In the story, it mentions that his dance killed the enemies—but it's not true. What actually killed his enemies were his actual techniques and abilities."

  "Then, the dance..."

  "Yes, just as you guessed. There was no dance. In reality, it was all just a set of moves that he had assigned to himself to activate his different abilities and attacks. He would first find an extremely specific attack, then assign a similarly specific movement to it. When it all came together, it would look like a dance to outsiders. The Dao Dancer wasn’t the first human to use Assign techniques but he elevated them to the highest levels."

  "So, how exactly are the Assign techniques used?" Lu Er asked enthusiastically, his earlier resentment forgotten in the face of genuine intellectual curiosity.

  "It's simple." She shrugged. "You just need a specific formation circle, then slowly bleed half of your blood into the circle while performing the movement and the attack. Each Assign technique you create, a mark is added to your body."

  "There are many disadvantages to Assign techniques." Lu Er frowned, "Won't the enemies figure out what attack is coming based on the action?"

  "Yes, they can—but the movement doesn't guarantee the attack will follow. The cultivator retains the choice of whether to actually execute it. This creates opportunities for deception and feints. That's why even in the current era, many cultivators still integrate Assign techniques as a mandatory component of their combat styles."

  "So..." Lu Er's eyes lit up with understanding. "Can I use Assign techniques to fix the speed issue?"

  "No." Her response was immediate. "The Assign techniques are not something you will be able to do." She held up a finger to forestall his protest. "First of all, they are only applicable to Awakened—physical or metaphysical abilities." Another finger. "And secondly, for you to connect them with your soul gift, you will need some sort of spiritual emulsifier." She grimaced. "Any resources related to soul are extremely precious and scarce. Even then, it's still very risky to do anything with your soul."

  She spread her hands, a gesture of helplessness.

  "And if you somehow managed to cross all of the requirements, you still need years of training and stabilization for it to work properly."

  "Then what do you expect me to do?"

  "Nothing."

  "Huh?"

  "You said you will take anything remotely helpful." She raised an eyebrow. "You can try something similar if you want—create your own system. It's not like you can't create something just because it doesn't exist yet."

  "Ahh, this doesn't help at all!"

  Actually, it did help, and that too, a lot. But he couldn't just show her a satisfied expression. Not when she had already extracted such a heavy price for this information.

  "At least tell me how to make the formation circle."

  "I don't have it on me." She shook her head. "But it is available in my family treasury."

  "Uhh..." With a deeply unsatisfied expression, he muttered: "You scions sure are lucky. To know so much, even going around influencing others to learn—you people are basically drowning in advantages."

  "Not without equivalent sacrifices." Xia Sahui's gaze drifted away, her eyes carrying a distant, wistful quality that seemed to age her features.

  "What sacrifices?" he pressed, genuine curiosity overtaking his frustration.

  "How old are you?"

  "Me?" Lu Er pointed at himself, startled by the sudden shift.

  "Yes."

  "I'm sixteen. Why?"

  "I'm nineteen."

  "What?!" This was a shocker. He had thought she would talk about her emotional instability when she mentioned sacrifices, something about her family, her upbringing, the price of being born into privilege.

  "So, all of you scions are older than your peers? That's the sacrifice?"

  "Why are you talking as if it's not a big deal?" Her tone turned sharp, defensive.

  "Because it's not! It's just a three-year gap! What's the big deal here?"

  "Hmph. You wouldn't understand."

  "Alright, let's say it is significant. Then why do your families still force-feed their children this type of knowledge they might never even utilize? I understand the necessity of combat training, but why all this esoteric information?"

  "I already gave you equivalent knowledge." She fixed him with a pointed look. "If you want more, then put up more."

  "Oh, come on!" He pleaded, pressing his palms together in a gesture of supplication. "That didn't even help me in any way! Please?"

  He looked at her with large, sparkly eyes—basically piercing through her face with manufactured desperation.

  She looked at him with a disgusted expression, her nose wrinkling slightly.

  "Fine. Just shut those eyes." She gave in, her shoulders slumping.

  "I just brought you for a month because of this knowledge—is this not enough?"

  She took a breath, continuing before he could interrupt:

  "They didn’t teach me about the Dao Dancer, I just know that because it’s one of the stories I like. Aside from that, you don't even realize how fortunate we are that we received a battle royale for our Game. There are scenarios where Unawakened must fight and survive in realms teeming with monstrous entities. That's why our families feed us with as much knowledge as we can. Even the side effects are slightly changed such that we can get even more advantages." She paused. "Satisfied?"

  "Mhmm." Lu Er nodded vigorously, bobbing his head with exaggerated enthusiasm.

  "Alright, let's go then, we're falling considerably behind." She broke into a sprint toward the ruins.

  Lu Er followed behind her.

  ‘The Dao Dancer… Assign techniques… Interesting, it's unfortunate I won't be able to begin practicing immediately. As for her, she must be on the opposite side of the map by now. I wonder what she's doing.’

  After nearly fifteen minutes of running at full speed, they finally caught up with the group.

  The Unawakened around clearly gave both of them strange looks. For Lu Er, it was clear as day to predict what they were thinking. Even Cai Hong was giving him weird-ass smiles and eyebrow raises—the expression of a man who had just witnessed something particularly juicy and was savoring every moment of his friend's discomfort.

  ‘These kids, they think too much from places where they shouldn’t.’

  Meanwhile, Xu Qin was already becoming a ripe tomato on her own, her face flushing crimson as she stared at the ground, her fingers twisting. Only Heavens knew what was going on in her mind.

  The erratic situation continued for a few more minutes before they reached the ruins and arrived at their specific location for the ambush.