Chapter 308 - 307 "Retirees

Arriving quickly at Layer 60 of the bunker, Li Jing found it deserted and eerily silent.

All that was left were dried smears of blood and severely mutilated limbs strewn about the floor.

Li Jing walked down the rightmost central path. The 60th layer of the neighbouring path on the left contained implant experimentation centres; this ruled out the possible presence of Evlyn and Bei Yi.

The observation room laid further to the left, but he didn’t expect to find them there.

His goal was the cultivation rooms on the two rightmost paths.

Without hesitation, Li Jing reached the bottom of his path and enlisted the help of Xiao Ai to calculate the bunker’s structure. He then cut his way into the right corridor by wielding the Flying Sword Blue Edge.

Soon, he entered the nearby cultivation room.

On arrival, a nauseating stench overwhelmed him.

Caught off guard by the appalling smell, Li Jing covered his mouth and nose, while suspending the flying sword mid-air.

The smell was incredibly pungent.

It had similarities to blood, but it was significantly different.

The blood of humans or animals wouldn’t be this intense.

Could it be the smell of leaked or spoiled cultivation fluid?

Or was it the smell of artificial human blood?

Li Jing couldn’t conclude.

He didn’t know what artificial human blood smelled like.

The two artificial humans he had killed previously had been burnt to ashes by his Fire Thunder, leaving no remains.

What could be deduced at this point was that this astounding smell was rather "fresh".

Be it leaked cultivation fluid or the blood of artificial humans, it hadn’t been there for long.

If it had, the liquid would have dried up and the smell dissipated.

Without further consideration, Li Jing rode his sword deeper into the cultivation room.

With the situation at hand, there was no point in hiding anymore.

Having wielded the Flying Sword Blue Edge to create an entrance, there was no point in trying to stay hidden.

Should any person feel the presence of an Immortal Item in the room, they would be alerted.

Within a heartbeat, Li Jing located the source of the smell and paused a short distance away from it.

He found an artificial human cultivation room where the door had been blown from the inside out.

Inside and outside of the room, the remains of slaughtered artificial humans were immersed in a blue liquid.

A torrent of pain rushed through him at the sight of this.

Artificial human bodies were scattered everywhere.

Visually, there were at least a hundred.

How much experience were they equivalent to?

Who executed this?

Evlyn?

No, she wasn’t on this path.

She and Bei Yi wouldn’t have conflicted with artificial humans while ascending from the bottom layer of the bunker.

Could it be other adventurers?

Did they possess such capability?

It seemed unlikely.

For teams this expedition, the best would be those at the Sixth Realm.

Apart from Deep Blue, who were all at the Sixth Realm, other teams had only a few at the Sixth Realm, mostly made up of individuals from the Fifth Boundary.

The artificial humans in the bunker laboratory were all at least of the Sixth Realm.

More than a hundred of these Sixth Realm artificial humans were not something any of them could resist.

Furthermore, with the artificial humans’ ability to curse to death those of the Sixth Realm, they have no reason to deal with anyone face-to-face.

If a large number of artificial humans were battling face-to-face, it could only mean that their cursing art wasn’t effective.

However, Li Jing had experience with this.

The one who slayed all these artificial humans must be an extremely strong body cultivator.

Their cultivation level might be higher than the Sixth Realm.

Subsequently, an extremely crucial question arose.

It appeared as though Evlyn and Bei Yi had been here.

If they had not been here, there wouldn’t have been so many artificial humans here to engage in combat.

The deaths of these artificial humans were likely due to someone obstructing the two from proceeding and, thus, giving cover.

Just as he pieced the puzzle together, a clicking sound of a lighter broke the silence in the cultivation room, followed by the deep voice of a man.

"Who’s that outside?"

Li Jing was taken aback by the voice.

There’s someone in the cultivation room?! Why did his Primordial Spirit sense nothing?

Wait!

Why did this voice sound familiar?

Li Jing paused in confusion before responding.

"Wolf Hunter?"

From the direction of the cultivation room, there was a moment of silence before Wolf Hunter stepped out from the cultivation room, his expression odd.

"Archer?"

Seeing Wolf Hunter, Li Jing was equally shocked.

He hadn’t expected to run into Wolf Hunter here.

On further thought, those who entered through this path from Deep Blue was Wolf Hunter and another member.

Examining the vaguely pale complexion of Wolf Hunter, and observing the piles of artificial human bodies at the entrance of the cultivation room, Li Jing expressed his doubts.

"Were these all killed by you?"

Wolf Hunter said nothing in response. He glanced at the Flying Sword Blue Edge in his hand, then thoroughly scanned Li Jing with a scrutinizing gaze.

Seeing this, Li Jing furrowed his eyebrows and put the Flying Sword Blue Edge away with a swing of his hand.

"I mean no harm."

The Wolf Hunter across fell silent for a while, and uttered woodenly.

"I’ve never heard of an adventurer in the Adventure Guild possessing an Immortal Item. Even the Six Realm would find it as hard as climbing the sky to get hold of Immortal Items. If everything proceeds without any accident, Sir, are you possibly a Seventh Realm infiltrator from outside the White Hawk domain?"

With that, he further analyzed.

"There have always been a good number of people trying to infiltrate White Hawk. However, to appear at the Desert Fortress at this critical juncture, it appears you must belong to Longyu?"

"Yes, I am."

Li Jing candidly admitted.

Since his Immortal Item had been seen, and it took him only a short while to infer that he belonged to Longyu, there was nothing wrong with this admission.

The quickness with which Wolf Hunter had figured things out also pointed to one fact.

He was from White Hawk Official, and not just a mere adventurer.

Normally, on encountering such a situation, Li Jing would be quite panic-stricken; after all, being identified by people from the White Hawk Official as a Seventh Realm coming from Longyu could be a serious problem.

However, as for now, it didn’t matter.

This fortress was too explosive.

With all the evidence in hand, White Hawk had no room to argue.

Importantly, after obtaining all the different pieces of information, Longyu had become the "victim" of White Hawk.

It was true.

A Seventh Realm like him shouldn’t have come to White Hawk.

But...what then?

When White Hawk covertly delved into research causing troubles in the manufacturing of artificial humans, and these artificial humans ran onto Longyu headquarters, what would be the explanation for that?

On the critical moment of Augustus’ death, White Hawk tried to use this incident as an excuse to make Longyu submit and thereby get closer to Quan Chang.

On this matter, White Hawk was undoubtedly in the wrong.

On the other side, upon seeing how straightforward Li Jing was in his admission, Wolf Hunter glanced strangely in his direction and asked, puzzled.

"How did you manage to find this place?"

"I came up from the bottom of the fortress."

Li Jing responded frankly, saying,

"I know all that I need to know."

He then narrowed his eyes slightly and asked,

"You are from White Hawk Official yet you joined the Deep Blue team at the last moment. Could it be that in fact, you..."

Before Li Jing could finish, Wolf Hunter shook his head in resignation, saying.

"I had no prior knowledge of Evlyn’s issue. However, White Hawk Official had foreseen that some discrepancies might have occurred. I was dispatched here in a low-profile manner to confirm. I didn’t expect to accidentally bump into the Deep Blue team and be tricked by Evlyn."

Wolf Hunter’s words were very straightforward.

Seeing his forthrightness, Li Jing once again glanced over the scattered artificial human corpses and said in surprise,

"So, you encountered Evlyn and Bei Yi here?"

"Bei Yi? Is there more to this problem than just Evlyn?"

Wolf Hunter furrowed his brows, then seemed to understand,

"True, if the problem only concerned Evlyn, she could have come all by herself without raising any suspicion."

After murmuring to himself momentarily, he looked over at Li Jing hesitantly and said,

"I haven’t had the chance to reach the bottommost layer of the fortress. I came to the sixtieth layer to inspect some old inventory, and then I ran into Evlyn. To my shame, I failed to identify the problem at first, which resulted in the tragic death of the Deep Blue team member who accompanied me. As I dared not recklessly use high-power tools within the fortress, Evlyn stole a Seventh Realm body and fled. When I tried to chase her, I was blocked by the artificial humans who arrived shortly afterward."

Explaining the situation, Wolf Hunter said,

"I have a rough idea about what happened, but my knowledge is limited. You seemed to have learned a lot at the bottom of the fortress, would you mind sharing your findings?"

In this regard, not to say, Wolf Hunter’s attitude was quite straightforward.

Everything worth saying, he said clearly.

Upon hearing his words, Li Jing nodded slightly.

"Sure, I have copied the data that White Hawk wanted, and I can give you all the files once we are out. But I have one condition, when you report to White Hawk Official, don’t mention me."

"That’s easy to handle, I never saw you."

Wolf Hunter responded crisply, glancing around and saying,

"Evlyn has already escaped, and I have to report this matter promptly. Since you can provide information, I don’t need to go to the bottommost layer of the fortress anymore. Shall we get out of here now?"

"Sure."

Li Jing nodded, then inquired,

"You seem to be injured, do you need some time to recover?"

"No bother."

Wolf Hunter waved his hand, replying,

"It’s not an injury, I was hit by a curse. This damn place researching artificial humans is really annoying, why would they study such a thing."

Speaking, he walked over and extended his hand.

"Let’s reintroduce ourselves. I am Jester, the former Director of the Sky Shield Bureau. I have already retired, but was temporarily pulled back into action."

Hiss!

Li Jing took a deep breath.

The self-introduction of Wolf Hunter, to be honest, had left him stunned.

Wolf Hunter, being called upon to act in an emergency situation, had a clear line of thinking.

His primordial spirit could sense his existence given that he was more than just a Seventh Realm, but a highly experienced and powerful Seventh Realm.

He must be a "retiree".

Li Jing had considered all these.

But he never ever expected that he was the former Sky Shield Bureau Director.

In Longyu, he held an equivalent position to Jiang Yini’s father!

Despite the "retired" status, there was no doubt that he was still a heavyweight official.

Feeling the urgency, Li Jing stretched out his hand and shook Jester’s hand briefly.

"Archer."

Seeing Li Jing not revealing his true identity, Jester gave a wry smile.

"You don’t have to be so cautious with me. I have long stopped managing things."

"Whether you manage things now is not important, what is important is that revealing my true identity would do me no good."

Li Jing smiled.

In response to this, Jester indifferently shrugged, not dwelling on the topic and said,

"Let’s go, we should get out. After we are out, please elaborate on the matter regarding Bei Yi."

After finishing his sentence, he added,

"You can take back to Longyu everything you got from here. I won’t stop you. Such inhumane experiments should have been stopped long ago. However, I have a request. Later, I’ll give you my contact information. After you submit the data to Longyu, please ask the person handling this to contact me. The ones in charge of this research laboratory in the fortress hold high ranks. Given the mess they have created, they should pay for it. But shaking them is not going to be easy, I need the help of Longyu."

"Sure."

Li Jing responded.

The research conducted in this fortress laboratory would be opposed by anyone with normal ethical values.

Only a few people involved would know what’s going on here.

Jester was clearly not involved.

If he were, he should have made a move when they met.

Once this mess was exposed, it would be hard to contain.

Moreover, if he were involved, he wouldn’t be eager to take this opportunity to bring down some people.

Li Jing wasn’t particularly concerned about whether Jester, a "retired" individual, had other motives for his enthusiasm.

But someone should put a stop to this kind of thing.

Otherwise, with the personalities of some of the top brass in the White Hawk, they might just repeat their mistakes.

You have to understand.

Evlyn’s success signifies that the feasibility of inserting Artificial Intelligence into artificial humans has been practically confirmed.

If nobody stopped them, and the matter was suppressed again, it would only be a matter of years before the White Hawk could mass "produce" artificial human soldiers.

By then, the world might descend into chaos.

...

The cause of the problem was clear, and there was nothing to see in the fortress.

Li Jing and Jester didn’t linger on their way out, and they soon arrived outside the fortress.

After leaving the fortress, Li Jing looked at the dozens of off-road vehicles parked in front of the fortress gate, and turned his head to inquire.

"Are we going to Kregar City, or...?"

"That’s it."

Jester said, stating.

"Quite a few adventurers went into the fortress. They may not all be dead, maybe they found something they shouldn’t have. I must stay here to ensure that certain things don’t leak out."

Li Jing nodded in agreement.

He then relayed his findings to Jester as a whole, omitting the details of Bei Yi being bloodstruck by his Silent Shadow.

After listening in detail, Jester was silent for a long time, then took out a strangely designed cell phone.

"Upload the data you copied to me."

As he said that, he added.

"You can rest assured, the information won’t fall into the hands of others while I’m in possession of it, and in the end, I will ensure these data will be destroyed."

Jester was sincere in his words.

Yet for Li Jing, this wasn’t enough.

He didn’t care whether or not the data would be destroyed.

After all, even if it were destroyed, there would be backups in the supercomputer in the lower level of the fortress.

Li Jing didn’t ask the Artificial Intelligence to delete the data.

Not because he neglected it, but because it was meaningless.

Even if the existing data was deleted, it could be recovered, the question was just whether they were willing to spend that much manpower and resources.

All that the White Hawk would do if they were determined to destroy themselves, they would still do.

Therefore, Li Jing allowed Jester to make a copy of the data.

But what Li Jing found lacking...

Wasn’t due to the issue of the artificial human.

Li Jing casually took out the main body of the artificial intelligence from his storage space, and gave a restrained smile.

"This mission appears to be worth five million Spirit Crystals?"

"..."

Jester.

His formal interaction with Li Jing was only limited to their meeting in the fortress up to now.

There wasn’t much communication between the two before entering the surface.

After initially negotiating, he felt that Li Jing was a rather honest and smart man.

But in the end, when Li Jing came out with this demand, he didn’t expect it.

Five million Spirit Crystals...

If you really wanted to say it, indeed it should be given.

After all, the mission was indeed posted to the Kregar Adventure Guild, and Li Jing did indeed complete it.

But this money wasn’t supposed to be given by Jester!

But if you say let Li Jing go find the person who should pay, it won’t work!

Why?

Because the person who posted the mission and is supposed to pay, is precisely those people that Jester planned to bring down.

They were still unaware of it at the moment.

If they went there, wouldn’t they hand over the data to them and let them know in advance about the disorder in the fortress?

Such a move would inevitably make them cover up all traces and even destroy the Desert Fortress to distance themselves from the incident, in order to preserve their own position.

At that point, dealing with them would be difficult.

Refuse to acknowledge it, not give the money?

Then Li Jing might go find the person who should pay...

Once he spoke up, wasn’t he determined to get the money?

Giving the grinning Li Jing a speechless look, Jester’s mouth twitched, and he robotically said.

"Give me your account, I’ll transfer it to you."

With this attitude from Jester, Li Jing was very pleased.

At this moment in his eyes, this seemingly young but age-mystery "retired employee" from the Sky Shield Bureau appeared extremely amicable.

Without saying anything else, Li Jing reported his unregistered account on the dark web black market.

Jester didn’t expect to learn Li Jing’s real identity through the account. He took his cellphone and after hastily operating a few times, he reluctantly pressed the confirmation key.

Following that, a mechanical sound came from the Artificial Intelligence in Li Jing’s hand.

"Spirit Crystal Bank deposit, five... million."

This five million, articulately pronounced, made Li Jing feel clear-headed and refreshed.

Jester, on the other hand, was covered in metaphorical black lines.

This money was out of his own pocket.

Once the Spirit Crystals were received, Li Jing didn’t hesitate and said.

"Open up wireless transmission, I’ll send the data over to you."

Jester complied accordingly.

Without needing Li Jing’s command, the Artificial Intelligence took the initiative to begin the transmission.

To avoid drawing suspicion, he pretended to do some operations.

A few minutes later, the data transmission was complete.

Jester held the smartphone and double-checked, then pressed a #1 key to call and then hang up, before looking back at him.

"Sky Shield Bureau’s rapid response team will arrive soon, and they will completely seal the fortress and start investigating Bei Yi and Evlyn’s whereabouts. You have five minutes to leave. If not, you will definitely be questioned, and no one can guarantee that you can leave then."

Facing what could almost be considered a trick, Li Jing simply laughed.

"Alright, I will leave now so as not to disturb."

With that said, he conjured the Flying Sword Blue Edge, which transformed into sword light and zapped away.

Jester was a Seventh Realm cultivator, and the Silent Shadow might not necessarily work on him.

In that case, naturally he wouldn’t frivolously expose his Thunder Tactics.

After this incident, Jester would undoubtedly hold a grudge against him.

Although he wouldn’t necessarily go after him because of this, he would definitely try to uncover his identity.

If his identity is revealed, Li Jing feared that he won’t be able to wander around freely anymore.

Pulling out the Flying Sword Blue Edge was more appropriate at this juncture.

After all, it is a revealed Immortal Item, he wouldn’t expose it unless necessary in the future.

...

After travelling some distance away from the fortress, Li Jing put away the Flying Sword Blue Edge in a raging sandstorm area and continued on with the Silent Shadow activated.

A few minutes later, he arrived at Kregar City, shoved the Adventurer Certificate into storage and hailed a taxi that took him straight to the local airport.

Things have reached this point, there is no point staying in White Hawk any longer.

Evlyn and Bei Yi were problems that White Hawk had to figure out. As an outsider, it wasn’t appropriate for him to meddle.

Finding out where Evlyn and Bei Yi were hiding would be quite challenging.

After all, he was still in White Hawk at the moment.

He could not utilize many of the resources available to assist him.

Even if he did find out, he had to avoid the people of White Hawk.

It was too much of a hassle.

Having encountered Jester, the "retired staff" of Sky Shield Bureau, Li Jing wasn’t willing to hang around in White Hawk for long.

Jester promised not to expose him, which he found trustworthy.

If a person as dignified as a Seventh Realm grandmaster didn’t even have this amount of credibility, it wouldn’t be worth mentioning.

But the key issue was,

When he first arrived at White Hawk, he shut down the air defense network...

Jester might not realize that he was the one who did it, but if he figured it out, their agreement would probably be void, and they would dig three feet into the ground to find him.

After all, this matter involved White Hawk’s external defense mechanism.

The people there would at least need to understand how the air defense network had been shut down.

While it hadn’t reached that stage yet, Li Jing felt it would be best to slip back to Longyu sooner rather than later.

...

Two hours later, Li Jing boarded a plane at the local Kregar Airport and set off on his journey back to Longyu.

About when the plane had left White Hawk’s territory, he saw news online about the lockdown and control of Kregar and nearby cities by a large team from Sky Shield Bureau.

Seeing this news, Li Jing breathed a sigh of relief, thankful that he got out fast enough.

White Hawk’s actions were obviously not directed at him but were attempts to find Evlyn and Bei Yi.

But if he’d been sealed in Kregar, he might not have been able to get out for some time.

...

Just after 11 p.m. that night, the flight that Li Jing was on made a smooth landing at Shangcheng International Airport in Jianghai City.

Once he was back on familiar territory, Li Jing didn’t dawdle.

After leaving the airport, he directly dialed Chen Jing’s number.

Not long after he called, someone picked up.

Then, Chen Jing’s doubtful voice came through.

"Li Jing? Why does your number show that you’re in Jianghai?"

"Yes, I’m back."

Li Jing responded.

"Back!? "

Chen Jing was startled, then said,

"Did you find anything in the Kregar Desert Fortress?"

About the matter of Kregar Desert Fortress, Li Jing had informed Chen Jing about his interaction with Evlyn via an encrypted message sent through Little AI to Chen Jing’s supercomputer.

In fact,

On the plane back, Li Jing had verbally given Little Ai the details to be recorded along with the obtained data, ready to be transmitted as soon as they connected to the Longyu network.

At this moment, in response to the question, Li Jing did not hold back and said,

"The harvest is huge, I have basically figured out what happened. I will now let Little Ai send over the processed information to your supercomputer, Uncle, and we can discuss it after you have a look."

"Alright, send it over. I will check it immediately."

Chen Jing replied and said,

"Come to my home for a bit, it will be easier to communicate."

"Alright."

Li Jing concurred and hung up the call.

Little Ai sent the information without needing any instructions, and Li Jing took out his Sky Control Bureau ID, took flight, and flew straight to Chen Jing’s home.

This wasn’t the end of the matter after the investigation.

The Artificial Humans in Longyu had to be found.

Li Jing had a lead on this.

He didn’t know about it before and hadn’t paid much attention to it.

The grand occasion when he encountered Jester informed him that the blood of Artificial Humans was blue and smelled foul.

Finding them wouldn’t be too difficult with this information.

Just ask foreign nationals to undergo blood tests, and it would be done.

But putting this into action wouldn’t be scientifically feasible.

Not to mention that the Artificial Humans would likely not willingly submit to such a test, foreign nationals wouldn’t be willing to comply with such a request.

Even before finding the Artificial Humans, foreigners might already start causing a ruckus.

This matter needed to be discussed with Chen Jing.

...