Chapter 47

However, before that, there is still a grand welcoming ceremony to attend.

In the evening, Wang Houyou piloted a flying vehicle, bringing Chén Chén and two others to the venue of the welcoming banquet, located at the center of Dragon Gate, which is also Dragon Gate's only restaurant, Nameless Pavilion.

Though called a restaurant, here besides offering the finest food and drinks on Earth, there are also many other services.

The food quality needs no elaboration; it matches that of the top chefs at the community center, and a gathering of elites costs several thousand Dragon Gate currency per plate.

As for the drinks at the banquet, they gather over forty of the world's most precious and renowned beverages, but the most popular are still the Imperial Jade Liquor exclusively brewed by the World Tree and Flower State's Du Kang liquor.

As the top newcomers among this batch, Chén Chén, Jiāng Jiāng, and Luofeng naturally cannot avoid being toasted.

Chén Chén, possessing the most perfect human body on Earth, plus already having the physique and core consciousness of a Senior War General as backup, saying he could drink a thousand cups without getting drunk is hardly an exaggeration.

Luofeng, an important reference for Chén Chén when constructing his human body, is a natural-born drinker; having just entered the martial path, he downed over ten catties of white liquor at a tavern with other martial artists, and easily holding his own at the banquet is no problem.

Ji Heng, from a young age, through some unsavory personnel's postnatal training, forced herself to develop an immortal's drinking capacity, making her the queen of the banquet.

Visibly, he has already taken down five or six who came to toast, including Mo Fan, who from childhood never had the chance to drink due to his family's poverty.

Jiāng Jiāng, refusing all toasts on the grounds that minors cannot drink alcohol, after all, alcohol to Jiāng Jiāng differs from poison only when used in cooking.

Even so, many martial artists from the Thunderbolt Martial Hall still came over to get to know Jiāng Jiāng, and affectionately bestowed upon her the nickname "little junior sister".

Jiang Ben originally wanted to refuse, after all, such social matters Jiāng Jiāng has always been bad at, and she doesn't want to be good at them. After all, human relationships are relationships of interest; rather than waste time maintaining these interests, it's more substantial to simply improve one's own strength.

But upon second thought, our initial plan with Chén Chén was to find a gullible power to resist the pressure from the World Tree's side.

That is the reason Jiāng Jiāng reluctantly attended tonight's banquet, so she merely went along with it.

"Jiāng Jiāng little junior sister, come come come, let me introduce you: this is our Thunderbolt Martial Hall's senior senior brother, and also the seventh place on the Black Dragon Ranking, Lei Dong."

In Dragon Gate there are many rankings, such as the points ranking for this newcomer assessment, the Sky Ladder Ranking of the Challenge Tower, the Combat Power Fluctuation Ranking, the Abyss Labyrinth ranking, and so on.

The Black Dragon Ranking is a comprehensive ranking compiled from all other rankings, and being ranked there also means Lei Dong possesses strength among the top ten of Dragon Gate's War God level.

"Cough cough, don't go bragging about being seventh place."

Lei Dong gave a dry cough twice and stepped forward.

"I'm also busy; I just returned from hunting outside the city, heard that little junior sister doesn't drink alcohol, so I substituted tea for wine."

"The Hall Chief has specially instructed that if little junior sister Jiāng Jiāng needs any help in Dragon Gate, encounters any difficulty, or even wants to go hunting together, she can ask the senior brothers and sisters for assistance."

Since he is the head of the Thunderbolt Martial Hall here in Dragon Gate, Jiāng Jiāng still gave him face, sharing a drink with Lei Dong and taking the opportunity to gauge his approximate strength.

Based on current information from all aspects of Dragon Gate, War Gods don't seem particularly rare… no, they should be said to be everywhere.

Moreover, at the banquet I also obtained a very crucial piece of information: some of the foods, limited in supply at the banquet, I can confirm I have eaten before, and not just a little. Through conversation with Lei Dong, just a few words reveal that these foods are unaffordable even for someone like him, the head of the Thunderbolt Martial Hall in Dragon Gate.

This shows how expensive those ingredients that Chén Chén has been freeloading on are, and moreover, about half of them have gone into my own stomach—I'm tapping my chest; calculating it down, I don't know how much money we've eaten from that World Tree powerhouse^

In other words, the more Chén Chén and I eat from them, the higher their expectations of Chén Chén become, making it harder for us to break free later.

Furthermore, in Dragon Gate, ingredients regarded as treasures, the other party can actually provide Chén Chén and me with three meals a day, even as staple food supplies.

Even Dragon Gate's top War Gods can't afford this food, yet Chén Chén and I stuff ourselves with it daily—how can you bring yourself to eat it, Jiāng Jiāng^

Looking at it this way, the big shot who favors Chén Chén is at least planetary level, possibly even higher; as a lowly commoner ignorant of the secrets of the higher world, this is completely normal.

Just as before coming to Dragon Gate I didn't know that above War God is called the planetary level, after leaving Dragon Gate it's entirely possible for several major realms to suddenly appear.

It seems that whether it's the plan to cling to a strong thigh or breaking through my own strength to the War God level, both must be put on the daily agenda, otherwise I'll definitely be insufficient to face the upcoming difficulties.

Besides the central drinking party, there is also a chess and card entertainment area, but martial artists prefer to gamble on the fighting stage rather than traditional cards.

Of course, in the restaurant real fighting is impossible; instead there is a scoring game called "Black-White Fist".

The game's rules are very simple: two martial artists step onto the stage, one as attacker, the other as defender.

The attacker can use "Black Fist" and "White Fist" to attack; the defender must judge whether the opponent's fist is black or white, then respond by dodging or blocking accordingly—if the defense succeeds, the defender gets a point; if not, the attacker gets a point.

Black Fist is solid, White Fist is feint; a solid fist must be dodged, a feint must be blocked—a very simple guessing game that also subtly contains the principles of offense and defense.

On stage there are people sparring, while off stage naturally there will be people placing bets.

"According to win rates, left side 76 wins 22 losses, right side 13 wins 65 losses, left side odds 1.17, right side odds 7.46."

"Back then Chen Daozai could turn twenty into thirty‑seven million; today I use one thousand Dragon Gate currency to win one million, no problem."

The tall and thin martial artist said while putting all one thousand Dragon Gate currency on the right side.

Mixed-use sauna room.

"Huff, it's so hot."

"Ah, I'm also so itchy~"

Because it's mixed-use, everyone inside is male.

……

As the only public entertainment facility in Longmen, the Nameless Pavilion could almost provide all the entertainments available from outside within its limited space, but even so, aside from banquet times, very few people came here to enjoy themselves.

The banquet in the main hall on the first floor lasted over two hours, and Chén Chén, using his heaven-defying social skill, got most of the attendees to remember him within just those two hours.

Jiāng Jiāng gathered all information that might be useful in the future through her extraordinarily heaven-defying observational power—whether it was how to schedule each day, Longmen's contribution system, which side of the four city gates was safest, whose thigh was the strongest in Longmen, and so on.

After the banquet, there will also be a special newcomer welcoming ceremony: together they will watch a 'film' in the screening hall on the second floor of the Nameless Pavilion.

Unexpectedly, many of the 'old people' who had come rushing in like thunder also did not leave, but joined in watching this film screening.

They entered the cinema one by one and took their seats; the cinema was somewhat dark, and Jiāng Jiāng quietly tightened her grip on Chén Chén's sleeve—not because she was afraid, but simply because she wanted to hold on.

Everyone's self-discipline seemed quite high—there was not a whisper of discussion in the screening room; after everyone was seated, the central screen gradually began to show images.

On screen was a warrior in black metal combat armor, both hands gripping a huge hammer as wide as a basin's mouth; with one strike he smashed the monster's head—big as a train car—into fragments.

The view gradually zoomed out, revealing the surrounding scene.

This monster had just been taken down when another five or six came surrounding it; from their build it was easy to see each was at least quasi‑lord level. The black‑clad warrior spun and struck again with a hammer, dodging the pounce of a monster behind him while, with just that blow, he also heavily injured another monster.

Not far to the side, a huge toad tried to seize the chance to spray poison and ambush, but was first shattered by a blue light beam.

And by following the source of that blue light beam, one could see the Longmen border wall that all newcomers had just seen when they first entered the city.

And all the 'newcomers' also realized that this was probably not an ordinary film, but a real battle scene outside Longmen.

From the dark fortress on Longmen protrudes an energy‑cannon barrel over two meters long; from it can be fired a laser beam over one meter in diameter, each shot capable of directly killing a lord‑level monster.

Lasers filled the sky, one after another, yet not all of those killed head-on were lords; the monsters couldn't possibly have that many lord-level ones, relying on numbers has always been the monsters' practiced tactic.

The camera pulled up to above the city wall.

Countless beast soldiers and beast officers launched a fearless charge toward the city wall; the city, over forty meters high, was flattened by the monsters' corpses in just over ten minutes.

The monsters used corpses as a ladder, one after another, continuing their death-or-glory charge toward the fortress atop the wall.

Just then, a root system and vines suddenly shot up from under the monsters' feet, either piercing or entangling, and in an instant swaths of the monsters' charging formation collapsed.

This is humanity's ally, the Nature Spirit.

The Nature Spirit's support covered a radius of several kilometers outside the city, exactly the distance at which the monsters gathered to launch their charge.

However, such wide-range attacks have a drawback: they struggle to effectively strike monsters at the level of senior war commander and above.

Even so, the monsters must keep sending out low-level monsters to die; otherwise, if the Nature Spirits' attacks focused on war-commander-level beings, the monsters would lose their capacity to attack.

It's a matter of soldier versus soldier, general versus general—Old Wang looks at Old Wang.

Low-level monsters absorb the laser cannons and the Nature Spirits' firepower, while lord-level monsters band together to slaughter war-god-level warriors.

Yet while executing this tactical slaughter, they too are the hunted; the screen constantly switches between different warriors' perspectives—some strike down a monster with a single blow, while others can't block and begin to get injured.

As the scene cuts and the battle continues, the battlefield's background shifts from noon to night; some can't endure fatigue and retreat into the city, while others, despite being covered in wounds, remain active in the battlefield's center.

Many of those scenes switched to the protagonist, who is now sitting in the viewing stands, but some people can only remain on the screen.

The view then pans far to a warrior wielding a battle blade.

His combat uniform is in tatters, his arm half severed; a nearby warrior tries to lend aid, but more monsters block him, and while the laser cannons on the wall seek to help, endless monsters sacrifice themselves to block them.

Perhaps, for the monsters, the situation is even more heroic.

The final strike cuts down another high-ranking lord, and the image ends with the battle blade falling to the ground.

The final black screen shows white text: 'Today we lost another 37 comrades; Dragon Gate's total casualties are 1,833, of which 73 are war gods.'

Only then did the newcomers realize that the so-called elite personnel are those who have reached war-god level.

After the screening ended, Wang Hou again sought out Chén Chén three times for final instructions.

"This is the beast tide you encountered two days before arriving; thereafter, such a large beast tide will occur every one to three months, but you needn't worry……"

"Wang Hou hadn't finished speaking when Jiāng Jiāng interjected: 'Because we don't have to fight at the start, right? Hahaha.'"

"No, I mean at least the beast tide has just passed; you still have plenty of time to develop."

Jiāng Jiāng sighed unwillingly.

The banquet here continued, and on the route into Dragon Gate in Australia, a battle had just drawn to a close.

"You only brought this few beasts this time, so don't stubbornly hold on, woof—just hurry up and flee, woof."

A large black-and-white dog stepped onto the sea surface, speaking with a voice slightly mismatched to its huge body.

Most of the monsters surrounding them resembled seafood, and at their forefront was a king-level monster, the Spine Dragon King, exposing nearly a hundred meters above the water.

The Spine Dragon King's voice shook the surrounding sea, raising wave after wave of huge swells.

"If you want us to let you go, it's simple—just hand over that human you're carrying."

"We originally planned to cut off this batch of human geniuses, but I didn't expect you to come running to your deaths. Beast traitors, and even a human genius, Doctor Miss."

Wave upon wave of huge swells.

"Wahaha woof woof woof… cough cough cough, are you spouting some dog joke, woof? I can see you completely don't grasp the situation, woof."

On the back of the black-and-white dog, a person clad head-to-toe in blue combat gear, holding a pair of scissors over a meter long, only revealed to be a woman when she spoke.

"What Gua Dabai said is correct—it's about who lets whom go; you all seem to still not get it."

"You're so weak; we originally intended to keep you as a junior to practice on."

"Since you're so eager, just treat this as your graduation task."