"I see," Xu Zhao Ting replied, slightly dejected. It was clear he was upset, but he wasn't going to argue.
"Get ready, tomorrow we'll fly to Yueyang. We'll finish the task, and we'll exchange the tokens for points," I said, starting to pack the few things that weren't already in the spatial ring.
"Okay," he said, his voice dejected, carefully folding the clothes that were neatly folded in the closet. "I wonder what rank we can reach after we hand in all the tokens?"
"I don't know," I shrugged. "Right now, we're at the initial rank, we have a lot of tokens, most of them from killing high and supreme servants, so we should rise well, maybe even skip the middle rank and go straight to high," I said, lost in thought. I used to think we'd reach the highest rank by the end of our journey and be only one step behind Ling Ling, but I had to pack up quickly. Although if we get a high rank, we'll be one step above Mo Fan now, I wonder how he'll react to that?
"Understood," Xu Zhao Ting replied, cheering up slightly.
The packing quickly ended, and I went to sleep. My body started to ache again, apparently the old man's goo was wearing off. But the pain was less than this morning. It was as if I had been recovering for a week, not twelve hours! The old man still has plenty of miraculous herbs, tinctures, and ointments that allow for quick recovery. I lay there for a long time, unable to sleep or turn over without causing more pain.
I woke up lying on a bloody lake, with nothing around and a crimson sky above, as always. I lay still, I just didn't want to start this nightmare, and I was sure it was a nightmare. Although why would Asura do this, didn't we settle everything? But soon I got tired of just lying there and got up, looked around, a bloody expanse stretched to the horizon. Asura was nowhere to be seen, which was strange, he usually appeared immediately in this place.
"Hello," a malicious voice came from behind. Turning around, I saw Asura.
"Ah, there you are, why are you bothering me with your nightmares again?" I asked him point-blank.
"It's not me," he grinned, walking closer. "I have nothing to do with it."
"Then why are you here?" I asked him with doubt in my voice.
"Ah, I'm always here, I can't be anywhere but here," he grinned again. "Let's watch the show better," he said, pointing behind me.
Turning around, I saw extinguished candles rising from the bloody lake. Some were almost completely burned out, some seemed to have never been used at all, but all of them were extinguished. There were twelve candles in total. After they rose to a height of a little more than a meter, silhouettes of people appeared behind them. At first, they looked like a gray, colorless mirage, but soon they became clearer, but still remained colorless. These were the people I had killed: Bao Qing Che's team, the man from Yueyang, a couple of bandits from Huzhou, a group of guardians I killed saving Xu Zhao Ting. All of them had expressions of fear and horror on their faces, as if they had been torn from the last moment before death. It was quite terrifying, and goosebumps ran down my spine.
"And now look here," Asura said, grabbing me by the shoulders and turning me around.
On this side, burning candles were already rising from the bloody expanse. There were only seven of them, almost half as many. When the candles rose to about the same level as the others, silhouettes of people also began to appear behind them, but this time they were colored. All six people were well known to me and occupied an important place in my heart. Lin Yun Er, Mo Jiaxingg, Jiaxing Xia, Xu Zhao Ting, Zhang Xiao Hou, and He Yu, and even Mo Fan – these were all those who were dear to me in this life in some way. They had smiles on their faces, some were filled with love, like Jiaxing Xia and Lin Yun Er, some were smug and slightly arrogant, like Mo Fan. Xiao Hou, Zhao Ting, and Mo Jiaxing had faces expressing kindness, trust, and confidence in the person they were looking at. This also touched my heart, and I realized that I would do everything to protect them all, maybe except for Mo Fan, let him sort himself out, the main thing is that he saves the world.
"Well, how did you like the show?" Asura grinned, leaning his back against mine. "Now you should understand everything."
I didn't answer him, but just looked at the people who were dear to me. Well, I also wondered how Mo Fan got involved here, but let him be, apparently ten years under the same roof had done their job. I'm not sure how long I stood there, but soon I fell into darkness and woke up in the apartment. Xu Zhao Ting was still asleep, so I went to have breakfast in proud solitude.
A couple of hours later, we were already flying on a plane to Yueyang, and an hour later, we were heading to the hunter's league office. It greeted us as always, with the noise and bustle of hunters coming for their business. Finding a free consultation window, we approached it. This time, we weren't very lucky, instead of a pretty female consultant, there was a young male consultant, but there was no particular reason to be upset, we were on business, and I don't plan to cheat on Lin Yun Er.
"Hello, we've come to complete the survival mission," I said, handing him the contract.
"Yes, okay, please wait a moment, I'll calculate the number of points," he said, and after a couple of minutes added. "You're just a little short of the middle rank, would you like to take any mission?"
"We'd like to turn in the tokens too," I said, handing him bag after bag, where we had put them all. There were actually quite a lot of them for two people.
"Okay, just a moment," he said, slightly surprised, although his face showed complete shock. "Please wait in the lobby, this may take some time," said the consultant, when I handed him the last bag.
"Okay," I said briefly, nodding my head, and was about to leave when…
"Wait, I completely forgot, how should the points be awarded?" the consultant remembered, extending his hand to stop me.
"Equally to each team member," I said, heading for a bench by the wall.
It took a considerable amount of time to count and award all the points, so I took one of the volumes the old man had given me from my spatial ring. Xu Zhao Ting also started reading some book. Time flew by quickly for us, although for the consultant, the hour he spent counting seemed like hell. We were asked to approach the window via the loudspeaker, which we did. He was quite exhausted, and his eyes looked like those of a madman, I even felt a little sorry for him.
"Who are you pitying?" Asura grinned in my head, will he be with me constantly now? "You've gone mad yourself, who do you think I am, if not a second personality?" he said with a slight grin. In principle, he was right, if you think logically, so it's quite unusual, but oh well.
"So, what about our points?" Xu Zhao Ting asked the consultant, while I was figuring out whether I was crazy because of Asura or not.
"Ah, yes, a minute," said the consultant, starting to open something on the computer. "Your rank has been increased, you are now high-rank hunters, congratulations. How did you manage to kill so many monsters, huh?" the consultant said in a voice full of sadness and hopelessness. "Please give me your cards, I'll change the information on them."
"Okay," we replied automatically, both Xu Zhao Ting and I, handing him the cards.
"Now," he said, grabbing them and starting to do something on the computer.
My shock quickly passed, although it was a little unexpected that we got the highest rank so quickly, I had anticipated such an outcome. But Xu Zhao Ting stood in a stupor, his face frozen in an expression of childish joy and complete shock. I hope his head doesn't explode from joy like mine did, because the earth can't handle two Asuras, that's for sure.
"Everything is ready, here you go," the consultant's voice broke Xu Zhao Ting's stupor. He literally snatched the card from his hands and began to study it quickly.
"Thank you, we'll think about another mission later," I said, calmly taking my card. "Let's go, Zhao Ting," I said, literally dragging him by the hand.
"Jiaxing Yun, we're high-rank hunters!" Xu Zhao Ting said when we went outside. "And what rank is Mo Fan at now?"
"Middle rank, I don't know how he got it in the city of Bo, but it's a fact. I saw his card myself," I answered honestly without thinking.
"Cool! We've surpassed Mo Fan!" he replied joyfully, continuing to examine his card. It seemed that the rivalry with Mo Fan was very important to him.
"Well, I don't know who is stronger between you, but the hunter rank doesn't matter much until you reach the master hunter," I said, lost in thought, what if I pitted them against each other? I'm not sure that Xu Zhao Ting would lose so easily to Mo Fan now, so their rivalry would make them both stronger.
"I see," Xu Zhao Ting said, slightly disappointed, putting away his card.
"But you can always try to challenge him and fight," I said, shrugging. "Didn't you make him sweat last time?"
"Yes, that was the case," Xu Zhao Ting said, lost in thought.
"You were still at the initial level then, and now you're at the middle level and can unleash a lightning strike in less than five seconds, plus you're quite good at using wind magic, so you can quite possibly dodge his attacks," I continued, talking about his strengths, the main thing here is to help the seeds of rivalry grow in Zhao Ting's soul and plant them in Mo Fan's soul, which shouldn't be difficult. It will be enough if he realizes that Xu Zhao Ting is a dangerous opponent. "So when we get to Shanghai, try to fight him, I'd be interested in the result of your fight."
"Hmm… Not a bad idea, I think I'll do that," Xu Zhao Ting said, lost in thought and cheering up. "And don't you want to try fighting Mo Fan and find out who is stronger between you? I think you are much stronger than me, so you have more chances."
"No, after that scuffle with the guardian, I need to recover first, so I'm not going to fight Mo Fan," I said, fighting Mo Fan was absolutely uninteresting to me. I know his approximate strength level at the moment. And even if my actions changed him and made him actively train, so that he summoned his beast earlier than in the canon. I would still be bored fighting him. It hasn't even been a week since I killed a group of five mages at the peak of the middle level, how can some mage who has recently entered this level be an opponent to me? Even if it's the great Mo Fan?
"I see," Xu Zhao Ting noted sadly. "Are we going to Shanghai to Mo Fan now?" he asked in his usual tone.
"Yes and no, I was initially going to visit the market in Shanghai to buy some things," I said, lost in thought. Initially, I planned to spend my seventy million on armor and various trifles, now I'll probably have to spend it on an amulet to protect against spiritual attacks, it will be more necessary, plus I need to buy a huge pile of various herbs and other things. "I hope you don't mind," I said, turning to him, he just nodded his head.