Chapter 89

Facing He Dayou's burst of strength, Zhang Yu smiled slightly, already having a clear idea in mind.

He thought to himself: "The competition team really is formidable; after all these days of progress, He Dayou's physical strength is actually a bit higher than mine. But..."

The reason Zhang Yu chose to compete in strength was precisely to test the results of his own training over the past few days.

At that moment, as Zhang Yu's muscles suddenly exerted force, his body twisted like a rope, with every muscle squeezing and levering against each other, ultimately transforming into a terrifying explosive power that transmitted from his entire body to his hands.

Under the enhancement of the Level 10 Crimson Marrow Primordial Qi, with Zhang Yu's control over his entire body's muscles, the physical strength he could instantly unleash... far surpassed that of an opponent with a similar physical level.

With a loud bang.

He Dayou only felt an irresistible force slam into his body, sending him tumbling backward until he crashed to the ground with a heavy thud.

Once again, the familiar shaking view, the hard and cold ground, and the pain all over his body.

He Dayou climbed up in a daze.

This feeling was so familiar.

Had he been taken down in an instant again?

Just like the last time he fought Zhang Yu, after his physical strength had greatly increased, he had lost once more?

He suddenly looked up, his wide eyes staring at Zhang Yu in disbelief, still finding it hard to accept: "How can he have so much more strength than me? Has his physical strength already surpassed mine?"

Not far away, Qian Shen and Zhao Tianxing also looked over, watching He Dayou who had been thrown off, their eyes shimmering with amazement.

Qian Shen: "Has Zhang Yu improved even more than He Dayou?"

Zhao Tianxing thought to himself: "How did he do it? How much physical strength did Zhang Yu actually gain in such a short time? Is it even better than the special training plan?"

And after school that day, He Dayou went to the sports competition team's practice ground and told Lan Ling about what had happened.

Lan Ling frowned and said, "His physical strength cannot be higher than yours."

"The reason he could beat you is probably because his technique for exerting force is better than yours, while you..."

Lan Ling glanced at him, then casually lifted He Dayou and gave him a shake, making He Dayou feel like he had lost control of all the muscles in his body.

Lan Ling set him down and said calmly, "Your control over your own muscles, especially the transplanted ones, is too poor; you haven't been able to unleash your true strength at all."

"Continue with the surgeries and training. Once you've transplanted more muscle fibers and can exert more of the transplanted muscles' power, you won't lose to Zhang Yu again."

At the same time after school.

Zhang Yu was circulating the Crimson Marrow Primordial Qi as he walked toward his rented room.

But the moment he opened the door, he was slightly startled by the ragged cloth doll lying on the bed.

"Evil God?"

It was a tattered cloth doll, with two button eyes looking like dark holes, staring fixedly at Zhang Yu who had opened the door—it was none other than the evil god he had made a wish to before.

And just as Zhang Yu was caught off guard, the ragged doll spoke: "My good servant, kneel before me—this is my wish."

With the ritual screaming in his mind, Zhang Yu could only half-kneel to the ground with a thud.

The doll on the bed laughed heartily: "Unexpected, truly unexpected."

"In just two or three months, that casual move I made back then has actually grown up."

"If I hadn't heard that you, a student of Songyang High School, had won first place in the martial arts competition, I probably wouldn't have imagined you could improve so fast..."

At this point, the gloom in her heart suddenly dissipated a great deal.

The reason she came back to find Zhang Yu was partly because of his achievements, and partly because... she had discovered that she couldn't go back.

She thought about how she had once stood at the pinnacle of evil gods, having achieved financial freedom and cultivation freedom, only to be forced to re-enter the workforce and return to the front line after a failed investment in retirement.

But she hadn't cared at first—since her peak couldn't be retained, she would just retrace her steps!

With her years of business acumen in the fraud industry, she had thought it would be a tale of a supreme evil god returning to the city, a max-level account reorganizing the workplace.

Who would have thought that the anti-fraud measures of the major sects would evolve so rapidly, causing even her, a treasure of the evil god realm, to suffer heavy losses? Added to that was betrayal, and now she was stranded on the first layer of Kunxu, her power plummeted to rock bottom, with no way to turn things around.

"Dammit... if I get caught and repatriated, it's over... who betrayed me?"

"Power is draining so fast, I feel my intelligence dropping again. If this continues... I'll really become a stupid toy."

So at this moment, she came to Zhang Yu again, intending to use this dark horse to rise anew.

"To think that a pauper could win first place in the martial arts competition—he must have developed incredible potential thanks to me."

"Hehe... I thought it was a losing proposition, but it turns out I bottom-fished a bull stock."

And thinking that Zhang Yu still owed her a wish, the cloth doll became even more excited.

But in the next moment, she suddenly paused in surprise. Zhang Yu, who should have fallen to his knees after her wish... was slowly standing up?

"What are you doing?!" "Have you gone mad? Get on your knees now, or do you want to die from the ritual's backlash?"

Zhang Yu, however, silently felt the changes in the ritual power within his body.

After she made the wish for him to kneel, as he knelt on one knee, the chill from the ritual had originally dissipated.

But just a few seconds after he knelt, that idiotic ritual started crying out again.

Zhang Yu was momentarily stunned, then realized: "Is this urging me to cultivate?"

"But the other wish was to kneel?"

"Are the wishes conflicting?"

Curiosity arose in Zhang Yu's heart: "So... in this situation, which wish takes priority?"

So he tried to stand up, and immediately a ritual sound rang out, urging him to kneel quickly.

Zhang Yu could feel the ritual power splitting into two streams: one urging him to cultivate quickly, the other urging him to kneel immediately.

!.

"So they really are conflicting."

And when he activated Crimson Marrow Primordial Qi and entered a cultivation state, all the yelling stopped.

"But in the end, cultivation takes priority over kneeling. Is it because of... the order of the wishes?"

Seeing Zhang Yu standing up, the cloth doll initially thought he had gone mad and was throwing away his life.

But seeing his calm demeanor, she immediately realized something was wrong.

However, the cloth doll was different from Zhang Yu, who had been accompanied day and night by the ritual's 24/7 care for the past two months.

Although the cloth doll remembered the two wishes she had imposed on him, she hadn't realized for the moment that under the ritual's power, a series of plans to fulfill the wishes—getting into a good university, joining a major sect, working hard to earn money to buy the antiques in the shopping cart—had been integrated into every moment of Zhang Yu's life.

However... although she hadn't immediately thought of the details and how they conflicted with the 'kneel' wish, once she sensed something was wrong, she promptly made her next wish.

"I command you not to harm me!"

But the moment the cloth doll spoke those words, with a roar in the air, a large hand wreathed in layers of white celestial energy had already grasped the doll in its palm.

The doll shouted angrily: "I command you! Release me immediately."

Zhang Yu's hand relaxed slightly, but in the next moment, even more surging celestial energy swept in, squeezing the doll around like a training prop.

And Zhang Yu, feeling the changes in the chill in his heart, thought to himself: "As expected, when wishes conflict, the key is the order of the wishes?"

"Studying, training, getting into university, joining a major sect... these series of plans triggered by wishes, because of their order, have priority over subsequent wishes."

"That is to say, as long as I maintain a state of cultivation and study, then subsequent wishes that contradict the 'cultivation, study state' can be temporarily suppressed..."

And at this moment, Zhang Yu was practicing Formless Cloud Celestial using the ragged cloth doll as a prop. In this situation... he discovered that the ritual was not urging him to kneel or release the cloth doll.

Thinking this, Zhang Yu looked at the doll, who still wanted to speak, and said calmly: "Shut up."

As the Formless Cloud Celestial ebbed and flowed, it gently pressed on the cloth doll's surface, as if it could tear the doll apart completely in the next moment.

At the same time, Zhang Yu's voice continued.

"What you just said was 'do not harm... you.'"

Along with the friction of the Formless Cloud Celestial, the cloth doll felt the force squeezing her gradually increasing, as if it would truly harm and attack her in the next moment.

"So that means if I destroy this cloth doll now, I can harm you, right?"

Feeling Zhang Yu's gaze—full of killing intent and battle spirit, yet eerily calm—the cloth doll's heart sank: "Damn... he caught on so fast? No, could it be that my intelligence level dropped again?"

The cloth doll hastily warned, "Zhang Yu, if you truly harm me now, you will certainly be devoured by the ritual and die!"

"You should be able to feel it, right? The power of the ritual is already watching you."

Zhang Yu did not speak, but in his recent attempts, he found that as soon as he had the intention to harm the cloth doll, the ritual would cry out in alarm.

Zhang Yu thought to himself, "This rule of not being able to harm the evil god seems to take priority even over the wish."

But he understood that this was no time to show weakness, so he immediately continued to fully operate the Heavenly Martial Heart-Refining Art, bursting forth with a fighting spirit that risked death.

One must adopt an attitude of tearing down the roof to possibly achieve the result of opening a window.

Then Zhang Yu continued, "Then we might as well both perish. Otherwise, if I become your servant for life, what meaning is there in living?"

Feeling Zhang Yu's fearless aura under the effect of the level 10 Heavenly Martial Heart-Refining Art, the doll's heart sank again.

In the other's gaze, she seemed to truly sense a fighting spirit willing to risk life itself.