Douluo Continent: Starting with the Tiger Emperor Template

Lu Ren smiled but didn't answer. Instead, he changed the subject:

"Master, the Shrek Academy people already know of my existence."

"Given their style, someone will come looking for me soon."

"So, how do you plan to react after learning this news?"

Jing Hongchen's expression darkened slightly.

"It's impossible for anyone to invade this place silently. This is the Sun and Moon Empire, not a place for them to run wild."

"Is that so?" Lu Ren asked with a half-smile. "Even if Xuanzi himself infiltrated?"

Jing Hongchen's pupils contracted slightly.

Xuanzi, a level 98 Super Douluo, is one of the pillars of Shrek Academy.

For a powerhouse of that caliber, infiltrating the Sun Moon Royal Soul Master Academy would indeed not be difficult.

"It seems this was all part of your plan." Jing Hongchen stared at him. "You caused trouble at Shrek Academy first, then evaded capture and ran here, using your strength to force us to protect you. Am I right?"

"Otherwise, there's no way to explain this series of events; it's too much of a coincidence."

Lu Ren neither denied nor admitted it.

He simply looked at Jing Hongchen with a smile, waiting for him to continue.

Jing Hongchen asked, "What do you want to do?"

"Of course I trust the Hall Master's strength." Lu Ren's tone was light, as if he were talking about a trivial matter. "But when facing a powerhouse like Xuanzi, it's always good to be prepared."

He paused, his gaze falling on Jing Hongchen's face.

"Could you please provide me with a few soul tools? For example, a means to contact you under any circumstances?"

Jing Hongchen fell silent.

He stared at Lu Ren for a long time, as if reassessing the boy's worth.

After a while, he took out a fist-sized sphere from his pocket. It was silver-white and covered with fine soul-guiding arrays.

"If anything happens, put your hand on it and channel your soul power into it." He handed the sphere to Lu Ren. "I'll be there."

He paused, then added, "This thing has a location tracking ability, but you can rest assured it won't activate without soul power being injected. I have no need to monitor you, nor any interest in doing so; otherwise, I wouldn't have bothered telling you this."

Lu Ren took the sphere, weighed it in his hand, and without checking it, put it directly into his pocket.

"Thank you, Master." He nodded. "If there's nothing else, I'll go back and rest now."

"Go ahead." Jing Hongchen waved his hand. "Get some rest. I'm counting on you to teach Shrek a lesson in the competition. I've agreed to the deal you proposed. I'll find you a 100,000-year-old soul bone afterward."

"Thank you for your trust, Master."

After saying that, Lu Ren turned and walked towards the dormitory.

Jing Hongchen stood there, watching his figure disappear at the end of the corridor. Suddenly, she remembered that when she handed over the soul tool earlier, Lu Ren had accepted it without even looking at it.

This kid seems to trust him quite a bit.

He looked away, a faint smile playing on his lips.

trust.

At this age, to have this kind of mentality, to be able to make such calculations, and to accept things without hesitation after receiving them...

They are either naive to the point of being foolish, or shrewd to the extreme.

Lu Ren is clearly not the former.

Jing Hongchen stood with his hands behind his back, gazing at the darkening sky outside the window.

Shrek, Xuanzi...

He squinted.

It seems there will be a lot of maneuvering to come.

Most importantly, he began to have doubts about Lu Ren's true identity.

A mere Soul Master, yet he managed to make a trip through Shrekk and then, as if nothing had happened, traveled thousands of miles to join them...

"Could he really be a Shrek Academy spy?"

Jing Hongchen muttered to himself.

"But it doesn't matter. Even if he's an undercover agent, regardless of whether Shrek Academy cares or not, I have a million ways to make him willingly stay in the Sun Moon Empire!"

……

As dusk fell, the Shrek Academy buildings were bathed in a dark gold hue, and the hustle and bustle in front of the freshman dormitories had dissipated with the passing of the day.

An elderly man in gray sat on a bench. His face was deeply wrinkled, as if carved by a knife and axe. His eyelids drooped, and his eyes were dim and yellow. He exuded an air of impending death.

No one would give it a second glance if they passed by.

No one could have imagined that this frail old man was the most powerful being in the Douluo Continent.

Mu En, the 99th level Limit Douluo and Dragon God Douluo.

He slowly stood up, preparing to leave.

A figure appeared in front of him.

The newcomer was covered in grease, his hair was a messy tangled mess, and his once white robe had turned grayish-brown, with tears in the cuffs and hem, making him look quite awful.

This person is known as the "Supreme Elder of the Holy Spirit Cult," but in reality, he is one of the pillars of Shrek Academy, a level 98 Super Douluo, Xuanzi.

"Elder Mu," Xuanzi's voice was low, "you actually knew from the beginning that that child had been to Shrek Academy, didn't you?"

Moon smiled and said, "With so many children living in the outer courtyard every day, I really don't know which one you're talking about right now."

"Elder Mu!" Xuanzi exclaimed anxiously, "A month ago, it was that guy who ruined our secret agreement with the Haotian Sect. He sent Wang Dong'er to the academy disguised as a man to experience life there, and he exposed her in public. We naturally know the inside story, but the students don't!"

"Isn't this great?" Mu En said cheerfully. "Why should a girl, especially a princess of a sect, have to compromise herself by squeezing in with boys?"

That's not the point!

Xuanzi's voice rose a few decibels.

"The key point is that he revealed his spirit rings in public. His first and second spirit rings were both thousand years old, and his third and fourth spirit rings were even more advanced, reaching the ten-thousand-year level."

"This is the strongest genius we've ever seen, even surpassing our ancestor Tang San from ten thousand years ago!"

He became more and more excited as he spoke, and a burning light shone from his cloudy eyes.

"But why didn't you take the initiative to win him over, Elder Mu? Why did you let him leave?"

"If you had intervened and saved him that day, why would we have spent a whole month searching for him?"

On the day of the new students' enrollment, he and several top experts did not focus on the outer academy at all.

By the time the news reached them, quite some time had passed.

In that short period of time, Lu Ren could run a great distance.

Shrek even dispatched an inspection team to search the world, but to no avail.

A month has passed, and they haven't even caught a glimpse of it.

How could a fourth-ring Soul Master be so skilled at concealing his tracks?

"It seems Shrek Academy has been living a peaceful life for too long," Moon smiled, his tone calm. "So long that you didn't even react in time when someone invaded the outer courtyard."

Xuanzi understood the implied meaning and immediately lowered his head, feeling somewhat ashamed.

That day, he was elsewhere drinking and eating chicken legs, so drunk he was completely oblivious to what had happened.

Old Mu is giving them a warning.

Moon walked away slowly with his hands behind his back, leaving only one sentence drifting in the evening breeze:

"They have a very bad impression of us, so if they don't want to join, they don't have to."

"Forcing him to join us will only make him hate Shrek even more; it's not worth it."

"If you want him to come in, you need to solve this problem first."

Xuanzi's heart skipped a beat, and he quickly bowed in response:

"Yes, Elder Mu."