Chapter 349: Pirates?

Not too far away from Zhao Yu, there was a beautiful woman who was surveying her surroundings with curiosity, her shining eyes betraying her excitement. She had finally left Earth! Back then, she’d seen so many powerful powerhouses fighting on a screen. Those battles had all been incredibly exciting, and all of the interesting innate gifts and terrifying battle techniques displayed there had caught her attention. It was precisely because she’d seen the Astral Combat Tournament that Zhen Tong had decided to come to Zenyu Star. She needed to leave Earth so that she could become like Lu Yin and one day reach a stage where videos of her would be spread throughout the universe.

Most of the people here had a similar line of thought as Zhen Tong’s. Elsewhere, Fu Xiaoshu looked calm, but there was a blazing ambition buried deep within his eyes. His family had died from the mutation, and he no longer had anything worth living for. For a long time after that, he had scraped by as a beggar, merely scrounging for some food to eat while waiting to die. But then, he had witnessed something life-changing on that screen. The moment the word “Earth” appeared, he had realized the ultimate meaning of his life. When he saw Lu Yin fighting, he had realized what he should be pursuing.

Among the group, there was also a very brash young man. His name was Song Shi, and he too had watched the tournament through the screens on Earth. At that time, he’d been in the forest, trying to understand how the wind flowed through the trees. He’d watched the battles of the Astral Combat Tournament and the Tournament of the Strongest. During them, he had made the decision to follow this person for the rest of his life. Lu Yin would be his only goal and aspiration in life.

Many of the cultivators from Earth waited, both anxious and excited for what was about to happen. They had managed to stand out amongst the millions of cultivators from Earth and would definitely be able to return in glory in the future.

Clap clap clap!

Tianming walked up to them and smiled as everyone turned around to look at him.

“Hello, cultivators from Earth. I am Tianming, and I’m a Hall Master from Yu Academy. Starting today, you will be members of Yu Academy and will go through the harshest training available in the Great Yu Empire.”

Days later, back on San Dios, Lu Yin frowned as he looked at Barley. “Did you really tell Yue Xianzi and An Shaohua what I said word for word?”

Barley grew fearful. “Yes, sir.”

Lu Yin was baffled. “How did they respond?”

“They said that they needed to make preparations,” Barley replied.

Lu Yin narrowed his eyes. “Make preparations? Did they mention what kind of preparations they would be making?”

Barley shook his head.

Lu Yin was very confused. Why was it taking them so long? The Frostmoon Sect and Watermoon Villa shouldn’t be so poor that they would take this much time to gather the amount of money that he’d specified. That was impossible! These organizations clearly didn’t value him in the extreme, so they definitely wouldn’t give him too many resources. The whole situation was incredibly strange. Could they have lied to him?

With this thought in mind, Lu Yin snorted. “Go ahead and tell Yue Xianzi and An Shaohua to come to San Dios right away.”

Barley quickly acknowledged his boss.

The Ghost Monkey snickered. “They’re ignoring you, Seventh Bro. I told you—you’re just a Limiteer. Even if a Ten Arbiter does withdraw from their position, it will have nothing to do with you. There’s plenty of young Explorers already competing for that spot! For instance, the top ten on the Top Hundred Rankings. It’s hilarious that you think that you even have a shot!”

Lu Yin nonchalantly blocked the monkey off; the beast was too noisy.

Two days passed, and then Lu Yin received news from the Great Yu Empire’s finance minister, Gavin, that Watermoon Villa had sent a team to the Great Yu Empire and announced that they would help the empire’s economy to recover.

Lu Yin was left speechless. He clutched his head, stifling the urge to curse. In the end, Watermoon Villa had misunderstood him because he’d been too indirect! He could only place his hopes on the Frostmoon Sect, but he had a bad feeling about what they would do as well.

As he thought, Huo Qingshan contacted him that same day in the afternoon, informing Lu Yin that the Nine Stacks Sect had contacted him. The sect had promised that they would not attack the Frostwave Weave and were obviously trying to show their goodwill to the empire. They also passed on the fact that the Frostmoon Sect had sent people to request this of them.

Lu Yin was incredibly disappointed. He had actually been too indirect, and it had led all of these fools misunderstanding him! Next time, he’d have to ask for money even more directly.

Thankfully, he’d blocked the monkey off beforehand, or else he’d be teased forever.

Lu Yin tapped his gadget and started brainstorming the best way to earn money. All of a sudden, Mira appeared with a strange smile on her face, as if she was delighted to announce horrible tidings.

After seeing her excited smile, Lu Yin’s heart lurched, and a bad feeling surfaced in his heart. “What happened, Ms. Mira?”

Mira chuckled. “You’re in trouble, Mr. Lu.”

Lu Yin’s eyes flashed as he eyed Mira. He suddenly thought of Puyu. That guy had been looking into why Lu Yin had sealed Firesmelt Planet’s three military planets, which meant that the Councilor had been quieter than usual recently. “Has Puyu already made his move?”

Mira nodded. “Puyu has already made what you did to Firesmelt Planet public. Right now, nearly a hundred organizations from the Grandtop Weave, Lars Weave, and Woori Weave have banded together to report you, claiming you’ve abused your authority by interfering in wars in the Outerverse. They say that you’ve destroyed the balance, used your authority for personal gain, and so on and so forth. There are dozens of accusations that have already been sent to Arbiter Wen.” Mira then grinned widely in an exaggerated manner. “Even I got mad from seeing those accusations, Mr. Lu. Hehe.”

Lu Yin went quiet, looking quite glum. Puyu had been in the Outerverse Youth Council for a long time and had built up numerous connections. The fact that he’d managed to band together over a hundred organizations to go against Lu Yin was rather frightening and showed the amount of influence the Councilor possessed. Of course, this also had to do with the Darkstar Gorge that was backing Puyu. However, the Councilor himself was quite capable as well.

After seeing Lu Yin fall silent, Mira grinned. She quite liked seeing Lu Yin with a disgruntled expression. For some reason, it felt refreshing. Ever since she’d been teased at the border warfront after that battle, she’d become slightly vindictive towards Lu Yin.

Mira crossed her fair legs, revealing her perfect, bare ankles that dazzled Lu Yin. He looked up at her face with an earnest expression. “How many organizations did you say there were?”

“Over a hundred.” Mira looked up with a satisfied expression, as if she was the one who had gathered them all together.

Lu Yin suddenly chuckled in an incredibly happy tone, to the point where it sounded quite disgusting.

Mira blinked. “Are you okay?”

Lu Yin looked at her, lifted a hand, and used his star energy to create a chess board. “If there were a thousand pieces on this chess board that belonged to you but then someone suddenly took a few, how would you react?”

“I’d cut off the hands of the person who touched them,” Mira answered matter-of-factly.

“Why?” he asked.

Mira arched an eyebrow. “What’s mine is mine. Nobody has the right to take it away from me.”

Lu Yin nodded and sighed. “Exactly, what’s yours is yours. And I imagine that Arbiter Wen feels the same way.”

After hearing Lu Yin’s metaphor, Mira’s expression suddenly changed before she stood up and hurriedly left.

Lu Yin smiled as he watched her leave.

Puyu had made the wrong move. If he had simply worked with a few organizations to pressure Lu Yin, then Arbiter Wen might have followed along and given some kind of punishment to Lu Yin to further pressure him. However, Puyu had banded together with over a hundred different organizations, revealing the large amount of influence that he wielded in the Outerverse Youth Council. Those organizations should have sided with the Ten Arbiters, but Puyu had been able to mobilize them all by himself. These Outerverse organizations were essentially a handful of chess pieces out of a thousand that the Ten Arbiters controlled. It was no wonder why Arbiter Wen would be annoyed that his chess pieces had been mobilized by someone else.

Puyu had been too impulsive, or perhaps he had been driven mad by Lu Yin. The recent events had led to Puyu desperately trying to take care of Lu Yin once and for all. Unfortunately, he’d gone too far.

The next time Mira saw Wen Sansi, her heart lurched; he appeared to be in a bad mood.

“Sir,” Mira started.

Wen Sansi grunted in acknowledgement. When he saw the list of organizations that had banded together on his screen, something had flashed across his eyes. Puyu was truly capable since he had gathered so many organizations in just a few days. How were they benefitting from him? Is this really all just to punish Lu Yin? Puyu had gone overboard.

“Puyu isn’t someone who’d be easy to control. It’s said that he wants to challenge the top ten of the Top Hundred Rankings and wants to become one of the next Ten Arbiters,” Mira said.

Wen Sansi burst out in a fit of laughter. “Become one of the Ten Arbiters? And just how is he going to do that? None of us are dying.”

Mira opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but then, Wen Sansi raised his hand to stop her. “Each one of the Ten Arbiters has attained a great number of connections and benefits to reach their position. Him receiving a spot? Who can force that? Age is just a number. So what if you’re in the top ten on that list? There’s still a huge gap between us.” After saying that, Wen Sansi stood up. “Make some preparations. We’re returning to the Innerverse.”

“What about Puyu and Lu Yin?”

“Ignore them both. They can handle this on their own. Zhenwu sent someone over as well, so things are about to get very messy. Though, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.” Then, Wen Sansi disappeared.

Mira stared at the place where Wen Sansi had been standing with bright eyes. It was no wonder why Lu Yin had been so delighted by the news. Puyu had gone too far, but that had actually improved Lu Yin’s situation instead.

Puyu had been waiting for Wen Sansi to punish Lu Yin, but the only answer he received from the Arbiter was, “You talk too much.”

Puyu froze when he saw Wen Sansi’s response and felt indescribably humiliated. He’d done everything that he could and had even used the power of Darkstar Gorge to cooperate with various Outerverse organizations. Even if he wasn’t able to completely destroy the bastard, his plan had been to thoroughly humiliate Lu Yin. After all, Lu Yin was a part of the Council of Astral Academy, which meant that Puyu had to be completely ruthless when dealing with this person. However, this was the unfortunate result.

Puyu abruptly smashed his gadget to bits and howled in fury. He was a member of the Outerverse Youth Council and only a single step away from becoming one of the next Ten Arbiters. However, this last step was too difficult to take! It frustrated him to no end that these people could humiliate him as they wished. No matter what, he had to become one of the Ten Arbiters. Regardless of if it was Wen Sansi or Lu Yin, he’d destroy them both.

At that moment, a pale-looking man walked over. It was the person known as Vulture, the Corpse King from the Neohuman Alliance who had fought with Lu Yin in the past.

𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

Puyu had no idea what this person’s true identity was, and Lu Yin hadn’t exposed him yet. This was the time bomb that Lu Yin had left next to Puyu.

“Something strange just happened, my lord,” Vulture reported coldly.

Puyu was still furious, so he answered in a terrible tone, “What is it?”

“A large number of pirates have suddenly appeared at the Grandtop Weave, Lars Weave, and Woori Weave, and they’re attacking the space stations of various organizations. They’ve caused a lot of damage,” Vulture answered.

Puyu frowned. “What does that have to do with us?”

“The organizations that the pirates have been attacking are all those whom we cooperated with to put pressure on Lu Yin.”

Puyu suddenly stood up, and his expression drastically changed. “What? All of them?”

“Most of them,” Vulture replied.

Puyu had a cold look in his eyes. “Be precise. All of them, or most of them?”

“Most of them,” Vulture answered.

Puyu frowned. This incident was indeed very strange. Pirates typically did not attack the space stations of the larger organizations for fear that they’d be attacked back by large groups. However, this time, they had actually done so. What was going on? Why were most of the cooperating organizations being attacked? Was it possible that Lu Yin had connections with pirates?