Star Odyssey

Chapter 1048: Invitation

The Blaze Realm was not Lu Yin’s only enemy, as the Daynight clan’s grudge against him was even greater. In fact, in the past, Lu Yin had even built up his reputation by taking action against the Daynight clan. At present, the Blaze Realm had gathered several other powers to try to slander Lu Yin by claiming that he was a traitor of the Fifth Mainland, and they had taken these actions precisely because they were afraid of his abilities. 

Even the Blaze Realm and Daynight clan had to be wary of Lu Yin. After all, was there anything that they could be certain that he would not dare to do? 

Uncle Meng hesitated again and again, but eventually, he came to a decision. “To be able to help Mr. Lu would be an honor for our Gasfire Alliance. There are no conditions. Mr. Lu, you can rest assured that our Gasfire Alliance will find a way to ascertain the location of the Astral River Ark and provide some humble contributions to Mr. Lu’s cause.” 

Paige was surprised; when had his Uncle Meng been such a generous person?

Lu Yin was also astonished, but then he laughed and nodded. “Then, I’ll just say thank you very much. Gasfire Alliance, I, Lu Yin, will remember this, and you will be given just rewards in the future.”

Uncle Meng smiled. “Mr. Lu is too courteous. If you have any further requests, then you can just contact Paige directly, and our Gasfire Alliance will do its best to help.”

Lu Yin smiled. He then spoke a few more pleasantries before ending the call.

“Seventh Bro, that fellow’s quite smart. If he dared to attempt negotiating conditions with you, then it would have just ended as just a one-off, shortsighted deal where nobody owed anyone anything. But now, you owe him a favor,” Ghost Monkey commented.

Lu Yin smiled. “I don’t owe them anything.”

“What do you mean? They’re helping you unconditionally, so how can you say that you don’t owe them a favor? Seventh Bro, I find that you’ve changed—your skin has become even thicker,” Ghost Monkey said, mocking Lu Yin.

Lu Yin smiled. “Monkey, do you remember the first time we saw a corpse king transform?”

The monkey tried to recall the scene. “Yeah. At that time, we were being pursued by that Hunter, and we ended up falling into deep space. Afterwards, we crashed into a spacecraft that a corpse king was raiding. Why?” 

“At that time, there was a corpse king on the spacecraft that had severely injured a woman. There was also a youth on that vessel, and the youth from back then was Paige,” Lu Yin explained. He had only remembered this person after looking at Paige for a bit. Lu Yin would not baselessly have a sense of familiarity, so he knew that there was a reason behind it. 

Ghost Monkey cried out, “Are you sure?”

Lu Yin was certain. “Absolutely.”

“How interesting. So the kid from just now was rescued by you.” The monkey sniggered.

Lu Yin calmly replied, “I seem to remember that the woman from back then didn’t die. Thus, as long as she’s still alive, when she hears about me, they will discover just who owes who a favor.”

“Since they have a previous connection with you, Seventh Bro, then this group is destined to be the vanguard that deals with the Blaze Realm for you,” Ghost Monkey said. 

Lu Yin’s gaze trembled, if they could successfully deal with the Daynight clan, then the next on his list was the Blaze Realm. However, he could not rely on just the Gasfire Alliance for this endeavor. One other person came to mind: Yan Yan, who was currently one of the appointed captains of the Thirteen Imperial Squadrons. He was from Royal Frost Continent, which was located in Blazing Mist Flowzone. 

Ghost Monkey suddenly spoke up again. “How strange. Seventh Bro, since this Gasfire Alliance is the enemy of the Blaze Realm, then why were they being pursued by the Neohuman Alliance? And they even send a corpse king capable of transforming. Those beings are rare even within the Neohuman Alliance.”

Lu Yin had also considered this, as the corpse king Transformation was not an ordinary battle technique. Not every corpse king could use it, and those that could would only be mobilized for especially important missions. So, what was the reason behind sending such an elite corpse king to kill Paige? 

Perhaps the Gasfire Alliance was hiding something. 

There were too many secrets in the universe, and there was no need for Lu Yin to learn all of them. For him, it would be fine as long as this group helped him deal with the Blaze Realm.

Lu Yin’s foremost priority at the moment was to uncover the location of the Astral River Ark. 

The Innerverse would not send the ark across the Astral River in the normal place, as they would definitely want to catch him off guard. Right now, it all came down to who would catch who unprepared. 

Before much more time passed, the universal armor that Lu Yin had been waiting for was finally fully assembled. 

The model that was presented to him looked quite simple, but it had been made from many different rare materials, and Lu Yin was quite satisfied with it. This was his best universal armor to date.

Ban Jiu himself was very proud of the armor and of the effort that he had poured into it. “Your Highness, this universal armor was created from an alloy containing over a hundred different materials, and only through precise calculations were they able to be perfectly integrated together. Their various natures do not conflict at all, and also quite a few of them actually came from that strange machine that you provided. 

“It can defend against a Hunter’s attacks, and moreover…”

Ban Jiu rattled off many details of the armor, and he wanted to continue boasting, but Lu Yin eventually chased the researcher away. 

If not for his die’s three pips: Enhance, there was no way Lu Yin would use this universal armor, as its defense could not even compare to just his physical body.  It would only become useful after he upgraded it with his die’s Enhance. 

After chasing Ban Jiu away, Lu Yin entered the secure room, screened Ghost Monkey off, and then began rolling his die.

His first roll was one pip: Pilfer, which yielded a useless weapon. The second roll was two pips: Blackhole Disassembly, which was also useless at the moment. His third roll, surprisingly, was three pips: Enhance. 

Lu Yin sighed emotionally. If he could control what he rolled on his die, then things would be much easier. But as they were, Lu Yin had no confidence in rolling what he wanted on his die.

At the least, he had still rolled three pips: Enhance.

Lu Yin quickly placed the universal armor on top of the light screens and then began to throw out star essence in a frenzied manner. It was as if he was completely unafraid of spending money.

At this moment, he truly was unafraid of spending too much money, as he had more than twenty million star essence, making him quite wealthy. 

If the armor’s base materials were of a high enough quality, then Lu Yin might be worried about not having enough money to fully upgrade it. However, while the materials used in constructing this universal armor were quite decent, they were still within Ban Jiu’s ability to work with. Additionally, the materials salvaged from disassembling the mechanical creature’s corpse had not been thoroughly studied yet. 

Still, Lu Yin was satisfied.

Once.

Twice.

Thrice. 

After upgrading his armor seven times, Lu Yin heaved a sigh of relief when he saw that the universal armor could not be upgraded any further. It had managed to undergo seven upgrades, and Lu Yin smiled upon seeing its rune lines he saw, as they were about comparable to the massive mechanical right arm’s. This meant that this universal armor was almost able to defend against an Envoy’s attacks. 

So far, Lu Yin had upgraded three different sets of universal armor. The first had been infused with the precious metals that he had obtained after joining the Lockbreaker Society. That had allowed his universal armor to be upgraded to the point where it could defend against attacks with power levels of around 400,000, which had allowed Lu Yin to forcefully receive Millions City’s cannon strike. His second set of armor had been able to defend against attacks with power levels of about 260,000, but this third armor was the best so far. 

Since this universal armor could withstand an attack from an Envoy level powerhouse, it meant that there were only one or two individuals in the entire Outerverse who could breach Lu Yin’s defense now. 

However, those one or two people were already on his side.

In other words, Lu Yin could wander anywhere he wished in the Outerverse without fear.

However, this round of upgrades had also cost him a ridiculous sum of star essence: around three million. If he hadn’t recently acquired almost twenty million star essence, he might not have been able to afford fully upgrading the armor. 

When he put on the universal armor, Lu Yin suddenly felt like the entire universe belonged to him. 

Eh? His gaze suddenly trembled as he looked beyond the three rings of mainland, where he saw an incomparable amount of rune lines appear. They numbered no less than what he had seen on Yu Mu. 

Lu Yin’s gaze grew sharp. There should not be a powerhouse of such strength this close to Zenyu Star, and this person was most likely an enemy since they had arrived unannounced.

After thinking about it, Lu Yin decided to keep his universal armor on as he headed out to take a look. 

However, right when he decided to leave, a person arrived outside of King Zishan’s palace: Ku Wei. 

Lu Yin had actually forgotten about this person who was from the Ku family of the Seven Courts. 

What had he come here for? 

Lu Yin was in no hurry to leave, as the powerhouse above Zenyu Star had hidden themselves, and their rune lines had reduced to number those of an ordinary cultivator. Lu Yin would no longer be able to find the person even if he moved out.

Since that person had not immediately barged into Zenyu Star, it showed that they had a few misgivings. Thus there was no hurry.

Within the palace’s garden, Lu Yin ordered some of Zhao Ran’s special drinks. Ku Wei entered, and he revealed a full smile the moment he saw Lu Yin. “Your Highness, congratulations on defeating one of the Ten Arbiters! Your name will be known throughout the universe from now on. Even the Neoverse will learn of your great name. It’s quite impressive.” 

Lu Yin smiled faintly at Ku Wei. “What did you come here for? Aren’t you staying with the Tenth Squadron to drill the new recruits?” 

Ku Wei moved closer and rolled his eyes. “About that, Your Highness, have you ever considered going to the Neoverse to play around?”

Lu Yin replied, “As an Honor Chosen, I’m qualified to join the Astral Tower’s competition.”

“Let’s go together! We can compete for the Astral Tower and then take a tour of the Neoverse. We two can also go look for graves while on our tour—just think of how satisfying that would be, right?” Ku Wei’s voice betrayed his expectations despite his best efforts to put on a harmless expression. 

Lu Yin’s expression grew bizarre. “Graves? Are you talking about Progenitor Chen’s Mausoleum, which your Seven Courts are guarding?” 

Ku Wei nodded. “Let’s go together! You can treat it as a tour while representing the Yu family. Nobody will make things difficult for you.”

Lu Yin had learned that it wasn’t the Court of Seven Names that had pursued the Yu family, but rather the Neohuman Alliance. The so-called “Seven Courts” were actually separate families that had united to resist the Hall of Honor and maintain control of Progenitor Chen’s Mausoleum. If Lu Yin could represent the Yu family and visit that place, then nobody should make trouble for him. 

Also, Lu Yin knew Brother Hui Kong. Although the old man had not explicitly stated that he was from the Hui family, they should be one and the same. 

“Why would I need to go to that place? Didn’t the Yu family already give you their quota to enter the tomb?” Lu Yin asked. 

Ku Wei felt embarrassed. “That- Well, actually, the quota was given to me, but I’ll do my best to win the Ku family’s space for you. If the two of us go in there together, then we wouldn’t need to be afraid of anyone.” 

Lu Yin grew amused. “You want me to help you fight for the Ku family’s spot and then give me the Yu family’s so that I can take care of the others for you while we’re in the tomb?”

Ku Wei nodded and helplessly said, “Each of the Seven Courts’ heirs has a secret technique, and their power levels are unbelievable. They are not people that an average cultivator can deal with. So even if I have the Yu family’s spot, I’ll be out of luck the moment I enter the tomb, which is why I need to find a helper.” 

“The Ku family’s heir for this generation can’t help you?” Lu Yin was puzzled.

Ku Wei grinned. “As long as they don’t try to seize my spot, you can help me take his instead. Then, the two of us can head in together. After all, we’re on the same side, hehe.”

Lu Yin shook his head. “Let’s discuss this in future.”

Ku Wei replied, “No, Your Highness, you don’t understand what Progenitor Chen’s Mausoleum represents! There are arts, battle techniques, secret techniques, and even Progenitor level power vessels inside! Anything that you could find in there would be unmatched in the current universe.”

“Then why haven’t your Seven Courts ever defeated the Hall of Honor?” Lu Yin retorted.

Ku Wei was left speechless. “We have! Do you think that those people in the Neoverse are all as limited in experience as you people from the Innerverse and the Outerverse? Many people in the Neoverse have secret techniques, just like those invaders from the Sixth Mainland. And once they use a secret technique, nobody can survive. Your Highness, your secret technique must have also saved you countless times.”

Lu Yin understood this quite well, as the people from the Sixth Mainland’s Progenitor of Secret Arts’ Territory were all disgusting. With their Secret Technique Reversal Cycle, it was basically impossible to kill any of them. On top of that, they also had their secret technique, Power Transfer, which caused their strength to increase drastically. There were definitely other even more shocking secret techniques.