Chapter 1299: Unsheathed Sword

Unsheathed Sword

"Achoo——!!"

Sun Bumian sneezed fiercely.

While rubbing his inexplicably itchy nose, he muttered suspiciously:

"In just this short while, I've already sneezed several times... Could something big have happened?"

"Crunch—— Crunch—— Crunch..."

"Before I left, the Integration Faction had already found the train tracks leading to the South Sea Domain. Calculating the time, they should have roughly entered the South Sea Domain by now."

"Crunch—— Crunch—— Crunch..."

"Could an unexpected turn of events have happened on their side? It stands to reason that with Hearts personally taking action, there shouldn't be any problems..."

Violent chewing sounds repeatedly interrupted Sun Bumian's train of thought. Veins bulged on his forehead as he turned his head and scolded the two figures behind him who were madly gnawing on candied haws like starving ghosts:

"Eat, eat, eat!! All you know is to eat!!! Weren't you guys scorning my candied haws before? Now you can't stop eating them, huh?!!"

Under a huge boulder squatted two vagrant-like figures.

One person was wrapped in bandages all over, looking as if he had rolled in the mud hundreds of times. The originally pure white bandages were almost as black as dirt. His soft, long white hair was also full of messy knots, looking like a black mummy that had just been fished out from a stinking ditch.

The other person had disheveled hair and a dirty face. The fabric on his body looked like it had experienced beast bites an unknown number of times and had long fallen off mostly. He could only use withered grass from nowhere rubbed into ropes to patchily tie around his body. Even so, large patches of skin were still exposed, with scars of varying depths spreading all over them.

Right now, the two of them were both hugging over a dozen candied haws each like starving ghosts, madly gnawing on them skewer by skewer, as if they hadn't eaten half their lives.

As Sun Bumian's words fell, Jiang Xiaohua silently raised his head:

"Diamonds... give me some more."

Sun Bumian: ...

He spoke not because he was embarrassed to eat, but because he had finished eating.

Sun Bumian opened his mouth wanting to complain about something else, but seeing Jiang Xiaohua's craving and pure eyes, he still silently conjured another handful of candied haws and stuffed them into his arms.

"Don't you not need to eat? Why are you still this hungry?"

"Oh, it's probably because he has a taste in his mouth... He just soaked at the bottom of a swamp for three days, his mouth has gone completely bitter." Beside him, Jian Changsheng, after eating twenty candied haws in a row, finally touched his belly in satisfaction and let out a loud burp.

"???"

Sun Bumian looked at Jiang Xiaohua, who was blackened all over, and silently took a half-step back, seemingly a little disgusted.

"He soaked in a swamp for three days. What about you? Weren't you with him?"

"I didn't have time. I was being chased by an Eighth-Tier Calamity in the Sighing Wilderness."

"..."

Sun Bumian carefully examined the two for a long time, and finally couldn't help but ask, "Just what have you two experienced in this past half year??"

"Nothing much." Jian Changsheng counted on his fingers and said calmly, "Swam with the bastards in the Forbidden Sea, fought with the pumpkins in the Bitter Flesh Forest, dug dirt with the scorpions in the Ghost Mockery Abyss, became sworn brothers with the weasels in the Vain Mountains... Hmm, and then ran with the lions in the Sighing Wilderness."

Sun Bumian widened his eyes in astonishment.

"You... are you for real??"

Jiang Xiaohua mercilessly exposed Jian Changsheng, "It's real, but we never won. We were chased and killed from beginning to end."

Sun Bumian: ...

"I admit I somewhat underestimated you, Spades." Sun Bumian let out a long sigh,

"When you said you were going to temper yourself in the Gray World, I thought you would at most just find two Calamities to fight with and come back soon... I didn't expect you to actually force yourself to this extent."

Jian Changsheng was just about to say something when Jiang Xiaohua at the side once again beat him to it:

"He wanted to go back on the fifth day he came out. It's just that he got lost while being chased and couldn't find the direction back to the Integration Faction."

"Clubs!! I've tolerated you for a long time!!" Jian Changsheng also stood up with a swish, cursing as he spoke, "Would it kill you to say a few words less!! I've suffered outside for half a year, what's wrong with letting me act tough for a bit!"

"So in this past half year, it's not that you didn't want to return to the Integration Faction... but you got lost?" Sun Bumian's expression was a little strange. "No wonder you left distress marks on the tracks around the South Sea Domain... Were you counting on us to come save you after discovering them?"

The corner of Jian Changsheng's mouth twitched, and he silently looked into the distance, as if appreciating the scenery of the Gray World.

Sun Bumian asked again, "But how did you know we would come to the South Sea Domain?"

"We didn't know, so we left marks on the tracks of all three Domains: South Sea, Heavenly Pivot, and Hidden Cloud." Jiang Xiaohua answered earnestly.

"Oh~ So that's how it is~"

Jian Changsheng truly didn't want to continue this topic anymore. He stood up, patted the dust on his body, and pretended to ask casually:

"Having been away for so long, I kinda miss everyone in the Integration Faction... Say, Diamonds, how do we get to the Integration Faction?"

Sun Bumian shook his head. "The Integration Faction... is no longer in the Gray World."

The moment this sentence came out, Jian Changsheng and Jiang Xiaohua were both stunned.

"What?"

Sun Bumian told the two exactly what had happened during this period, including the matter of him leading the Integration Faction crowd through the Gray World and arriving near the South Sea Domain... After listening, Jian Changsheng was thoughtful:

"You're saying the Integration Faction has already been forced to relocate to the South Sea Domain?"

"Mhm, calculating the time, they should have already entered."

"The South Sea Domain is good too!" Jian Changsheng looked at him eagerly. "There's food, drink, and baths. It's simply the life of immortals."

Jiang Xiaohua beside him nodded repeatedly.

Seeing the craving of these two "savages" before him for civilized society, Sun Bumian felt it was somewhat funny, and also somewhat admirable...

No matter what, Jian Changsheng and Jiang Xiaohua had truly tempered themselves in the Gray World for a solid half year, almost coming into contact with all the Calamity territories. One must know that Jian Changsheng was someone blessed with bad luck. If one were to say he really just casually fought two battles with Calamities and retreated unscathed when going to these Calamity territories, Sun Bumian would absolutely not believe it.

And after provoking one Calamity territory and suffering a loss, Jian Changsheng actually dared to continue provoking the next one. This kind of abnormal Mental Fortitude truly couldn't be explained away with just the word "lost".

Jiang Xiaohua seemed to be undermining Jian Changsheng, but wasn't this also their self-mockery of their experiences over the past half year?

What they had experienced was definitely far, far more than he imagined.

Most importantly, Sun Bumian could faintly sense... Jian Changsheng's eyes were different from before.

Sun Bumian had the most experience, and his perception of human nature was also the most sensitive. If the previous Jian Changsheng was a nouveau riche who possessed a treasure trove of Killing Intent but didn't know how to use it, a college student who had just entered society with only determination and hot blood... then now, the Killing Intent seemed to have seeped into his bones.

He was like an unsheathed sword, radiating a sharp edge in this desolate and dead world that even Sun Bumian felt threatened by.

"What are you looking at me for??" Jian Changsheng was truly starved of good food. He put his hands together and pleaded bitterly,

"Big Brother, Big Brother Diamonds, I'm begging you, okay? Quickly take us to the South Sea Domain... I want to eat something good!"

"..."

Sun Bumian waved his hand speechlessly. "Follow me."