The Exchange Game Starting with Lu Mingfei

Chapter 125 The Beast Tide Is Coming?

fake?

Gu Yuena smiled.

It's okay, she just finds this face pleasing to the eye. Even though it feels a little strange, she'll accept it if she can't see it anymore.

Gu Yuena frowned.

That won't do.

"Anyway, I like this face." Gu Yuena went straight to the point.

Lu Mingfei covered his face.

孽 孽!

I'm sorry, senior, I didn't mean to make you take the blame.

I didn't intentionally attract these unwanted romantic advances!

but----

Lu Mingfei thought for a moment: Xia Mi was a mother dragon, and Gu Yuena was also a mother dragon. Xia Mi was dead, but Gu Yuena was still alive!

Should we bring back some local specialties for Senior Brother Chu?

"Get lost!" Gu Yuena glared at Lu Mingfei in annoyance.

Lu Mingfei smiled sheepishly and touched his face sheepishly.

Was his expression that obvious just now?

Gu Yuena, too lazy to bother with this unlucky fellow who revealed his true colors after leaving the Star Dou Great Forest, urged, "Hurry up and eat. Aren't we going out to travel after we finish eating?"

"Oh," Lu Mingfei replied, obediently lowering his head to eat.

Although this might seem to lack authority, Lu Mingfei now felt at ease.

Being a savior is certainly exhilarating, but it's also exhausting.

There is nothing in this world, especially in the Star Dou Great Forest.

Aside from real-person PvP and fighting, there aren't many other entertainment options.

He hasn't played games, watched anime, or frequented forums in a long time!

Well, although something unexpected happened before he came here, he hadn't had any entertainment over there for a long time — emm, being used as an entertainment prop to entertain others doesn't count.

Lu Mingfei quickly finished breakfast and then left the hotel with Gu Yuena, strolling around the small town surrounding the Star Dou Great Forest.

The streets were sparsely populated, a stark contrast to what I had expected.

"Are there so few people here?" Lu Mingfei frowned as he looked at the sparse pedestrians.

Logically speaking, this place should be very lively, just like Huo Yuhao remembered. Because it is close to the Star Dou Great Forest, many soul masters who need to go to the Star Dou Great Forest to hunt soul beasts will rest and replenish their supplies here.

Moreover, there are many Soul Hunting Groups here, which undertake tasks such as guarding junior Soul Masters to hunt for Soul Rings, or collecting Soul Beast materials and herbs.

But now, those Soul Masters who should be everywhere seem to have disappeared from this town.

"Is there a problem?" Gu Yuena asked, puzzled, seeing Lu Mingfei frown.

"Was the street like this when we first arrived yesterday afternoon?" Lu Mingfei asked in return.

Gu Yuena nodded: "There's not much difference, is there? There are very few people in this town."

Gu Yuena didn't know what a normal small town should be like, so she didn't feel anything was wrong.

"The lack of people is the biggest anomaly." Lu Mingfei didn't explain further, but directly activated his mental detection, covering the entire town with his mental energy.

All the houses in the town are occupied; there are very few empty houses.

"Could it be because we left too early?" Lu Mingfei wondered, and continued to probe underground.

The secrets of this world like to be hidden underground, so Lu Mingfei decided to see if there was anything hidden beneath this town.

The spiritual energy continued to penetrate downwards, ten meters, a hundred meters—until it reached nearly a thousand meters underground, only to be met with dense, uniform layers of soil and rock. There were no secret chambers, no passages, not even an underground river.

"What about last night?" Lu Mingfei withdrew his mental energy, but his doubts remained. "Did you pay attention to what happened last night?"

Gu Yuena shook her head again: "Last night was no different from the daytime."

How could there be no difference between day and night?

Lu Mingfei suddenly turned around and looked at the hotel where they had stayed the night before.

This hotel is normal. Although there aren't many guests, there are still some, and the guests coming and going are all Soul Masters.

In this world, it is extremely difficult for ordinary people to travel long distances. They lack the financial resources to support long-distance travel expenses and, more importantly, the security they need.

Soul Masters are completely superior to ordinary people. If an ordinary person is unlucky enough to provoke them or is even just caught in the crossfire, they often die in vain. In fact, it is too convenient to destroy evidence here; even if someone dies, no one will know.

However, this world is ultimately made up of more ordinary people, and even the Soul Masters need to eat and wear clothes, and need people to farm, raise livestock, weave cloth, and tailor clothes.

Therefore, even in the capitals of the major empires, there are a large number of ordinary people.

If an ordinary person has the opportunity to work for a Soul Master, then he will also have the opportunity to travel—because a Soul Master will accompany him.

The business of Soul Masters also needs the participation of ordinary people. After all, there are few Soul Masters, so how could they be asked to do such trivial work?

The proportion of Soul Masters in this town is not high; most of the residents are likely native inhabitants.

They would work in the fields outside the town, in various workshops and shops within the town, or run their own small businesses to make a living.

So here's the question: Where are these ordinary residents who should be busy starting in the early morning?

It's already past eight o'clock!

What kind of farmer is so lazy that he's not working in the fields at this hour?

But most of the town's residents were indeed at home, and their movements were normal; they were either sleeping or had just gotten up and were washing up or eating breakfast.

Is this the custom of this world?

But why aren't the kids going to school at this hour?

The town's only school hasn't even opened yet!

How outrageous! Does this world also follow the Western model of "happy education"?

"What did you find?" Gu Yuena asked quickly.

Lu Mingfei was angry, which clearly meant there was something fishy going on in this small town!

Lu Mingfei couldn't admit that he was jealous of the students here.

But he still felt something was wrong.

"Mr. Yi, have you noticed the problem?" Lu Mingfei decided to ask for help.

Electrolux hasn't had any contact with ordinary people for many years, and he's also had almost no contact with the lower classes, so he's not sure if there's anything wrong with this town.

"Actually—it doesn't seem like there's any problem." Lu Mingfei, with Gu Yuena by his side, wandered around like a street urchin.

There were people setting up stalls along the roadside, and some of the shops along the street had also opened.

However—there are indeed very few Soul Masters coming and going.

Lu Mingfei walked up to a pastry shop that looked like a long-established brand, took out some gold soul coins and handed them to the shopkeeper: "Pack up as many of these as you can."

The shop owner was a middle-aged woman who looked to be in her thirties. She smiled and took the gold soul coins, then packed up a third of the pastries from the counter for Lu Mingfei.

Lu Mingfei blinked.

The purchasing power of Gold Soul Coins seems to be quite strong.

However, compared to the items that fetch hundreds of thousands or even millions of gold soul coins at auctions, this daily expense is simply too inexpensive.

Lu Mingfei took out another gold soul coin and placed it on the counter, asking casually, "When I was here last time, it seemed quite lively. Why are there so few people here these past few days?"

While packing the food, the shopkeeper glanced at Lu Mingfei and asked, "Are you a Soul Master?"

Lu Mingfei raised an eyebrow.

The shopkeeper sighed, "Recently, that Beast God in the Star Dou Great Forest has been appearing frequently, and many Soul Masters dare not enter the Star Dou Great Forest at this time. Moreover—"

As she said this, her tone became noticeably hesitant.

Seeing this, Lu Mingfei put down another gold soul coin.

The shopkeeper's eyes lit up, but he immediately shook his head, his expression returning to normal: "It's not that I'm trying to trick you out of your money, it's just that I don't know how to explain it."

She sighed, placed the packaged pastries on the counter, and took only one gold soul coin from Lu Mingfei.

"It's said that two Soul Kings from Shrek Academy have gone missing in the Star Dou Great Forest, one of whom is the closed-door disciple of a Title Douluo," the shopkeeper said. "A few days ago, a team of Shrek Academy members went into the Star Dou Great Forest to investigate, but only one of them returned alive."

As she spoke, she unconsciously glanced in the direction of the Star Dou Great Forest, her face full of worry: "Moreover, the soul beasts in the Great Forest have been very active recently. Some powerful soul masters have speculated that a beast tide may be about to occur."

Lu Mingfei: "???"

Is a beast tide about to erupt in the Star Dou Great Forest?

He subconsciously glanced at Gu Yuena beside him and found that she also had a hint of doubt in her eyes.

They looked at each other in bewilderment.

Could it be that Di Tian is planning something behind their backs?

"If there's going to be a beast tide, why don't you run away? Besides, there doesn't seem to be any tension in the town," Lu Mingfei pressed.

For ordinary people, a beast tide means annihilation, almost certain death. Faced with such a threat, why didn't they run away?

"Where can we escape to?" the shopkeeper asked with a bitter smile. "Once we abandon our homes and businesses and run away, we'll become refugees, and the next step will be slavery."

"While it's said that a miserable life is worse than a good death, how much better is living like that than dying in a horde of beasts?"

"Even if we escape, how can ordinary people like us possibly outrun soul beasts once the beast tide really starts? Especially since it's said that the Beast God will personally take action this time—perhaps only large cities can withstand it?"

Lu Mingfei was puzzled: "Isn't this part of the Star Luo Empire's territory? Didn't the Star Luo Empire send troops here to build defenses and repel the beast tide?"

The shopkeeper didn't say anything.

Just by looking at her helpless and bitter eyes, you could tell that the Star Luo Empire was hopeless.

"Shrek Academy suffered such a huge loss this time, didn't they react at all?" Lu Mingfei asked, puzzled.

Isn't Shrek Academy playing the role of "World JC" in this world?

Even if they can't be as reliable as the police in China, they've already suffered such a huge loss, how could they not seek revenge?

"They just need to hold Shrek City," the shopkeeper sighed, his tone revealing a numb resignation. "Actually, a beast tide might not even happen. Other towns near the forest haven't shown any signs of large-scale evacuations yet."

She paused, then lowered her voice, "Moreover, those Soul Masters don't seem to be idle either. I heard that quite a few have gathered in the small villages closer to the edge of the forest, discussing how to take advantage of this opportunity to make a fortune."

Soul beasts are treasures from head to toe; their meat is edible, their skin can be worn, their bones can be used to make medicine, and their soul rings and soul bones are priceless treasures.

If they could take advantage of the beast tide to hunt down more soul beasts, those rogue soul masters could become rich.

Fortune favors the bold.

In any case, the Soul Master is a profession that involves living on the edge of a knife.

"Isn't this the town closest to the Star Dou Great Forest?"

Gathering in a small village is nowhere as convenient as living in a town.

What could a village possibly have? No supplies, no intelligence.

"The rest of the Soul Masters haven't arrived yet."

The shopkeeper looked at Lu Mingfei, then glanced at Gu Yuena behind Lu Mingfei who had remained silent. After hesitating for a moment, he still advised, "There hasn't been a beast tide for many years. Although everyone knows it's terrifying, no one thinks they'll be the unlucky one until they experience it."

That's surprisingly philosophical.

Lu Mingfei subconsciously probed the shopkeeper's situation. No matter how he looked at it, the person was an ordinary middle-aged woman.

She has no soul power; her martial soul is a... oven?

Lu Mingfei picked up the packaged snacks, nodded to the shopkeeper, and left with Gu Yuena.

Can a person's martial spirit be an oven?

He looked at more people and saw more martial spirits.

Hoe, kitchen knife, fishing rod, piece of cloth —

Many people's martial souls are Blue Silver Grass, ordinary trees, ordinary cats, rabbits, or dogs.

None of them possessed soul power, and Lu Mingfei couldn't even be sure whether they had awakened their martial souls.

"What are you thinking about?" Gu Yuena asked.

Why does Lu Mingfei look so distracted?

"Di Tian wouldn't launch a beast tide behind our backs; he wouldn't have time to do something that would harm our own interests," Gu Yuena said.

The Star Dou Great Forest is currently at a crucial stage of accumulating strength. Therefore, for the Star Dou Great Forest at this time, the more beasts it has, the better.

Both she and Lu Mingfei, these two big shots, were urging her to have a baby. As the one being urged the most, how could Di Tian possibly take the initiative to launch a beast tide and provoke a conflict with humans at this time, causing a large number of soul beast casualties for no reason?

That's just stupid.

"I know." Lu Mingfei didn't think that Di Tian would outwardly comply but secretly cause trouble.

Di Tian was well aware of his ambition; he knew that Di Tian wanted to unify the world and rule over all living beings.

Although the conflict between soul beasts and soul masters has lasted for tens of thousands of years, Lu Mingfei wants to lead the soul beasts to defeat and rule humanity.

As long as he can be the ultimate victor and enjoy all the fruits of conquest, Di Tian wouldn't mind becoming Lu Mingfei's subject along with humanity in the future.

In fact, the more races Lu Mingfei could rule, the more honored Di Tian would be.

Di Tian dreamed of seeing the day when the Dragon God's glory would be restored!

In those ancient times, the Dragon God was the supreme ruler of the divine realm, revered by all beasts and bowed down to all gods.

Even gods created by humankind must maintain respect before the Dragon God.

That was an unparalleled and glorious era belonging to soul beasts, especially those of the dragon bloodline.

Lu Mingfei is now the only hope that Di Tian can see for the Dragon Clan to be great again!

Even though Lu Mingfei is still close to humans, as long as his stance is not biased towards humans and he is plotting for the sake of soul beasts, it doesn't matter.

He remains the Black Dragon God of the Soul Beast Clan!

"Should we continue the investigation?" Gu Yuena asked, also becoming curious.

If Di Tian won't launch a beast tide, why is this town so strange?