Chapter 284 - Top-secret
Hearing Bai Zemin asking Fu Xuefeng about his job and breakthrough mission, everyone's attention was immediately drawn to the slender young man with glasses.
The only reason why Bai Zemin asked such a question with so many people present was because he believed that none of them would dare to harm Fu Xuefeng. After all, doing so was the same as offending him, betraying the entire faction, and basically would not be much different from buying a ticket straight to hell for free with no chance of ever returning.
Fu Xuefeng was silent and his eyes seemed to go unfocused for a few seconds.
Everyone realized that he was checking the records imprinted in his soul, so they did not interrupt and simply waited patiently.
Although the Soul Record had become part of the daily life of all living beings on Earth, it would still take some time for everyone to properly adapt to this strange unknown entity. Therefore, everyone needed some time and focus in order to obtain information about a specific record.
After roughly 10 seconds, Fu Xuefeng finally seemed to refocus and apologized to everyone before saying, "I have it here. My current level is in fact 25. Among the 3 job options I could choose from, I took the one that seemed the rarest and most powerful.. The name of the job I chose is called Storm Assassin and, although I'm not 100% sure, I think this job was born thanks to the fruit that big brother Bai gave me just before he departed to the north."
Indeed.
Just before Bai Zemin left with Nangong Lingxin, Nangong Yi, and Shangguan Bing Xue northward, he gave a Lightning Fruit to Fu Xuefeng and one to Kang Lan. As for Zhong De, because the man was still on the front line standing guard in the south to warn in case a large army from Baiquan Camp moved toward Beginning Village, he temporarily had to keep the fruit with himself; Bai Zemin himself would give him the fruit when he returned to the village.
Therefore, it was no wonder that Fu Xuefeng's thoughts were directed in such a direction. After all, the Lightning Fruit was a great treasure of the Thousand Lightning Plant that Bai Zemin found during the first few weeks of the apocalypse and its fruits bestowed a powerful Second Order skill with two activations, which was a rarity in itself.
The skill was so powerful that one of the Archangels named Gabriel, right under the command of the leader of the Army of Heaven, the God of the Bible, possessed such a skill as his main. So it was no wonder that the presence and intervention of such a skill opened the doors for Fu Xuefeng to obtain a special job that would sync with his skill Invisibility.
"Lightning Fruit?" Shangguan Bing Xue seemed to catch the meaning of something and her adorable ears twitched softly.
"Ah, I forgot to mention about that." Bai Zemin suddenly realized his mistake and palmed his forehead.
Because things were unclear in the past, he was simply unwilling to share secrets like the Thousand Lightning Plant with individuals like Shangguan Bing Xue. After all, the originally set plan was that she would separate from him once they reached Changping District. However, things were different now that Bai Zemin had made it a priority to conquer the whole of China.
Although it was still not 100% set in stone, the chances of Shangguan Bing Xue joining Bai Zemin's faction were 99% considering that she was carrying out his orders to the letter without protest and only giving a few advice here and there occasionally. The current Shangguan Bing Xue had already practically lost all hope in the old Chinese government after seeing the North Camp police force practically ignoring the safety and welfare of the people.
Therefore, he did not need to continue to hide this from her.
As for Nangong Lingxin and Nangong Yi, the two siblings could only rely on Bai Zemin at this point. Although they were both strong, if they left the safety of his faction and ran into a First Order beast or two, the fate of both of them would be sealed.
Bai Zemin looked at Fu Shuren and then at Fu Xuefeng.
Although he said nothing, Fu Xuefeng understood the hidden meaning behind his gaze and hurriedly glanced at his elder sister before saying, "Sis, can you go ask the maidens to bring some tea?"
Fu Shuren was a smart woman, so it didn't take her long to understand the situation. She stood up quickly and excused herself, "Then, I'll go make the tea myself. Please excuse me."
Even though she was Fu Xuefeng's big sister and Bai Zemin trusted in the slender young assassin, this did not mean that Bai Zemin trusted her. It was simply impossible for him to have the slightest bit of trust in a person he did not even know properly, and even though Fu Shuren seemed to be an honest woman, he simply could not risk telling secrets that could casually cause calamities.
"What I will say now can be considered a state secret of the highest level and cannot leave here. If a single word leaks out, then I will personally see to it that the culprit pays miserably." Bai Zemin looked at everyone and spoke in an extremely serious voice as a chill flashed in his dark pupils.
Hearing his words with a slight tinge of murderous intent, everyone held their breath for a second before their expressions turned serious as well. For him to say such a thing and consider the information he was about to tell them top-secret, then it could only mean that what they were about to hear was no small thing.
"Some time ago, I was fortunate enough to accidentally come across a strange mutated plant."Bai Zemin narrated the events of how he encountered the mutated plant, currently named Thousand Lightning Plant due to its fruit capable of bestowing the Second Order Lightning Movement skill.
After finishing, he went to his room and then returned with a very small plant that was carefully placed in a pot. Although Shangguan Bing Xue and the others had not seen Bai Zemin carry such a plant on the entire way, with the Infinite Reduction treasure, it was not weird since he could simply hide it wherever he wanted and no one would ever notice.
The mutated plant, now the size of a palm (its natural size), currently had seven fruits in total; apparently, this was its maximum for now. Among those seven fruits, two of them were healthy red while the other five were slightly pink; clearly, they had yet to fully ripen.
After Bai Zemin's meticulous care, the Thousand Lightning Plant continued to provide him with precious fruits steadily. This natural treasure was like a baby to Bai Zemin as he never forgot to water it every day, letting it absorb sunlight whenever possible.
Thanks to this treasure and the meticulous care he had supplied it every day, Bai Zemin had successfully given a fully ripe fruit to Cai Jingyi, Fu Xuefeng, Kang Lan, and had two more ripe fruits; all this without counting himself.
Shangguan Bing Xue sucked in a breath of cold air, which caused her ample bosom to swell slightly forward and if not for everyone being focused on the mutated plant before them would definitely have attracted more than one set of eyes.
Before everyone realized what this little plant really meant, Shangguan Bing Xue had already figured out how valuable it was just by listening to a fraction of the explanation given by Bai Zemin.
"This definitely can't get out of here." She took a deep breath and looked at Bai Zemin with an extremely serious expression, "Although it might not be that much of a problem now since our faction has quite a bit of weaponry and also powerful soul evolvers, you never know what kind of enemies we will have to face in the future, and this plant is definitely enough to provoke a war."
"Is it that big of a deal?" Nangong Lingxin exclaimed with surprise in her voice and looked at Shangguan Bing Xue with an incredulous expression.
Bai Zemin looked at Nangong Lingxin and said in a deep voice, "At the beginning of the apocalypse, the skill I obtained was a First Order level 5 skill. That skill alone gave me the ability to fight and kill a First Order level 30 evolved beast when I was just level 15. Now, the Lightning Movement skill is a Second Order level 5 skill. Do you understand how powerful that skill is? As if that wasn't enough, it even grants the ability to create new clones that possess a certain part of the user's power. Definitely, this reason alone is more than enough for many factions to attack us."
To evolve a skill, one first needed to have that skill, and the easiest way to learn skills was through scrolls; scrolls that in themselves were not easy to obtain, much less high-quality ones. However, by using a scroll one would be taking up valuable space to learn active skills and you would have fewer and fewer empty spots.
But with the Thousand Lightning Plant such a thing did not happen; not only did it grant a powerful skill directly in Second Order at its highest level, a skill that could evolve into an extremely terrifying one in the future, but it was also a skill that did not consume any external active skill slots!
Approximately within two weeks, the plant would produce seven fully ripe red fruits. What did this mean? It meant that every 7-14 days, the possessor of the Thousand Lightning Plant could foment 7 soul evolvers!
The fruits could be used to create new soul evolvers directly with an extremely strong skill right from the start or to help others grow even faster.
For faction leaders, it was an invaluable treasure!
"Don't worry, nothing will come out of my mouth." Nangong Yi promised in a solemn voice.
"The same goes for me." Nangong Lingxin hurriedly added. After listening to Bai Zemin's explanation and reasoning a bit, she finally came to understand how terrifying the secret she had just been told was. "Since you trust me enough to let me hear this, I definitely won't let you regret it."
Bai Zemin smiled slightly. To be honest, the two Nangong siblings were his biggest problem.
He wasn't worried about Fu Xuefeng revealing the secret; the young man was practically his fan at this point and he was incredibly grateful to him.
As for Kang Lan... Since she was his Loyal Follower, it was impossible for her to betray him in any way.
As for Shangguan Bing Xue, even though Bai Zemin had only known her for about 1 month and 1 week, he had already come to understand the kind of woman she was. She would definitely not divulge anything she heard here even if she was threatened to death; that was her pride and arrogance.
"Alright, since everything that needed to be said was said, then let's start with these two." Bai Zemin picked the two fully ripe fruits and smiled slightly before looking at Nangong Yi. "Nangong Yi, your First Order Barbarian Strength skill grants you a terrifying amount of Strength points. I think if you add to that a powerful movement skill your total might will definitely shoot skyward with a single step."
"I-I?!" Nangong Yi exclaimed in a state of utter shock. Then, he pointed out, "I only joined your faction a little less than half a month ago, are you sure of this?"
Bai Zemin shrugged, "You may have only joined recently, but I think you're one of the few people with practically 0% chance of betraying me."
"You..." Nangong Yi smiled bitterly. However, he soon put on an extremely serious expression and nodded, "Since you trust me so much, let me prove to you that your trust will not go to waste."
Bai Zemin smiled faintly and his eyes flashed with a hint of coldness that soon disappeared.
What he didn't say was that another reason why he was sure that Nangong Yi would definitely not betray him, was because his aged father was in Beginning Village and was always being watched by a sniper.
After all, it was impossible for Bai Zemin to completely trust people he barely knew; since he had been locked up in his workshop when the pair of siblings arrived at Beginning Village.
If Nangong Yi dared to have the slightest thought of betrayal, Bai Zemin had a hundred ways to make him regret being born.
Maybe it was cruel, but from Bai Zemin's point of view, being cruel and harsh was the only way he could survive in this world without being trampled by others. He was not interested in being trampled by anyone and would rather die than be suppressed by someone else; therefore, he had to have the power and be determined enough to take actions that might seem selfish or evil to others.
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