Chương 149: Glad Tidings from the Bodybuilding Circle! The Goblin King Begins Massing Up!

The Goblin King Begins Massing Up!

One week later, 100 li north of Poloya, right at the city's jurisdictional border. Li Qinwu sat in control of a local castle alongside over 200 soldiers of the Punishment Army. A little over a month ago, he had dispatched Jin Lanbo of the Merchant Association to deliver the hostage exchange terms to the Mage Guild. Meanwhile, he himself had headed north to this castle to await their arrival.

Over the past month, thanks to the vast abundance of livestock in Poloya, over 5, 000 new goblin recruits had joined their ranks. Equipped with a fleet of heavy supply wagons, Li Qinwu had already organized three separate 1, 000-man supply waves back to their home territory.

Before long, all remaining supplies in the city would be completely hauled away, allowing Li Qinwu to wrap up this campaign flawlessly, return home to focus heavily on farming, snowball his economy into overdrive, explode his population, and firmly secure his absolute grip over the Monster Forest. All that remained now was this single task—the prisoner exchange. Once the trade was finalized, he would pull out immediately. Li Qinwu was in a exceptionally merry mood.

His body was completely renovated: the old burn scabs had all sloughed off, revealing smooth, light-green skin, while his incinerated hair had regrown, completely erasing his previously terrifying, grotesque appearance. Having acquired an Super-Male Physique, Li Qinwu was determined not to waste his god-given talents—he was marching straight into the bodybuilding circle!

"AHH!! OH!! YEE!! SSHH!!" Li Qinwu lay flat on a bench-press rack, lifting a massive cast-iron barbell, roaring with every repetition. As the heavy iron bar traveled up and down, his chest muscles parted into sharp, shredded striations, bulging like inflated steel balloons. Drenched in sweat, billows of scalding steam blasted off his skin—the man looked like an overclocked engine running at absolute maximum capacity.

"AHOOOO!!!" Reaching his final rep, Li Qinwu slammed the cast-iron barbell aside. With a swift spring, he leaped to his feet, launching right into a standard mandatory pose routine: Front Double Biceps, Front Lat Spread, Side Chest, Back Double Biceps, Back Lat Spread, Side Triceps, Abdominals and Thighs, and a crushing Most Muscular. A flawless sequence of classical posing displayed every single massive muscle block on his frame.

Those steel-forged, iron-cast muscles seemed to silently proclaim: Anadrol, Dianabol, Trenbolone, Anavar, Winstrol, Trestolone, Synthol, Primobolan, Deca-Durabolin—possessed by Nine Dragons, the Steroid Chosen One is born! To which Li Qinwu simply wanted to say: No, no, no... I'm 100% natural, baby! Li Qinwu's grand display of muscular dominance drew thunderous cheers and applause from the surrounding goblins.

They were currently stationed in the central courtyard of the castle, which had been retrofitted into a massive open-air gym, crammed with all sorts of improvised lifting equipment scattered across the grounds. As the saying goes, monkey see, monkey do. Once Li Qinwu took up bodybuilding, every single goblin followed suit. Furthermore, Li Qinwu's manic posing habits had been faithfully copied by his troops—they had all stripped naked down to their waist, eagerly striking poses to flex their physiques.

Naturally, whenever someone lacked muscle mass, they would be ruthlessly mocked by their comrades. Consequently, a fierce rivalry erupted over who could build the biggest, gnarliest gains, sparking an epidemic of frantic iron-pumping. By now, any goblin off shift was aggressively pumping iron. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Immersed in this atmosphere of fanatical strength-seeking, Li Qinwu trained with manic passion himself.

In less than a month, he had literally snapped three bench-press bars in half. The results were astonishing. His frame had expanded significantly, brimming with surging, raw power. Best of all: not a single pimple or acne breakout! Beyond his physical transformation, his attribute panel had received a massive boost. His Vitality attribute had been brute-forced through lifting straight from 26 to 30, with Control at 20 and Endurance at 20—a colossal net positive upgrade!

The only mystery was why his Intelligence had dropped by 1 point. Touching the pointed tip of his green skull, he hadn't the faintest clue. Li Qinwu took a deep, heavy breath, feeling his blood surging through his veins after the workout—pure bliss. Glancing toward the goblins currently lifting, the crowd panicked for no apparent reason, scrambling frantically back to their respective stations to pump iron like slacking trainees caught red-handed by their drill coach.

With his hands behind his back and his chest puffed out, Li Qinwu began a slow, deliberate inspection walk. Every time he strolled past a goblin, that creature would accelerate their lifts dramatically, terrified of drawing the Boss's personal scrutiny. Li Qinwu spoke softly, his weathered, gravelly voice echoing in the ears of every goblin present:"Someone once asked me how one should approach bodybuilding, and I told them: discipline.

Then another asked me what discipline truly means, and I told them that discipline is simply: Guyo-bula, let a fart, let a fart, baka baka let a fart, baka baka let a fart! Guyo-bula, let a fart, let a fart, baka baka let a fart, baka baka let a fart! Xie-e, xie-e, xie-e, xie-e, xie-xie-e, xie-xie-e, xie-ge-xie! Wo-ge-ou, tu-zhe-lei-xiu, wo-ge-ou, tu-zhe-lei-xiu! Go go, A-Wang A-Wang, go go, let's go, let's go! Go go A-Wang A-Wang, go go, let's go let's go! Su-wei su-wei su-wei, su-wei-a-lu-wei............."

He charged right up to a goblin doing bicep curls with a dumbbell, snatched the 10 kg weight out of his hand, and hurled it clean over the castle walls.

"Are you fucking doing cardio here?! Up the damn weight for me!!" He grabbed a pair of 30 kg dumbbells and slammed them into the goblin's hands, nearly causing the poor creature to drop them onto the floor. Next, he spotted a goblin bench-pressing who looked like he was approaching failure. Li Qinwu flew into an instant rage. Storming over, he yanked the barbell straight out of the goblin's hands.

"What the hell are you even lifting?! A pathetic weight like this is what I use for bicep curls, you useless worm!" Saying so, he actually executed several strict bicep curls with the heavy barbell right on the spot, leaving the bench-pressing goblin utterly dumbfounded. Wait... my bench-press weight is what the Boss uses for bicep curls?! While the goblin was still reeling in shock, Li Qinwu slammed the barbell back onto his chest.

"Keep pushing, damn it! Put on some real weight!" Li Qinwu grabbed two 30 kg iron plates and slammed them onto the bar with a loud clang-clang, nearly snapping the goblin's arms in half. Next, Li Qinwu stepped up behind a goblin performing squats.

"Fuck! What kind of squat are you doing with this baby weight?! Zero pump!" He snatched four 50 kg iron plates and slapped them onto the bar. Saddled with over 300 kilograms of iron, the squatting goblin's eyes nearly bulged straight out of his sockets from the crushing load.

"Watch closely! This is how you train legs!" Li Qinwu wrapped his arms around the goblin's waist from behind, using the squatting goblin himself as a piece of gym equipment to do squats. Li Qinwu threw the entire courtyard gym into absolute turmoil. Every single goblin was pushed past total muscular failure, left slumping on the ground like wet mud. Li Qinwu nodded in immense satisfaction. Watching them sweat profusely, he felt this was fantastic.

Goblins were naturally overflowing with restless energy and desperately needed a healthy outlet; bodybuilding served as a brilliant avenue. As long as he guided them properly, established this lifting culture, and introduced organized competitions—like bodybuilding shows, combat sports, and full-plate armored fighting—wouldn't the goblin martial spirit be firmly cemented? Just as Li Qinwu was lost in his grand daydreaming, a lookout goblin posted on the battlements suddenly sounded a frantic warning.

"Boss! In the sky! Up in the sky... there's... there's..."

"There's what?!" Li Qinwu frowned in confusion. If there's something up there, spit it out! The lookout goblin was practically jumping up and down in anxiety.

"Aiya! Boss, come see for yourself! I don't even know what this thing is!" Li Qinwu sprinted up the battlements, following the direction of the lookout's trembling finger. Sure enough, floating far off in the sky was a massive airship, slowly drifting toward the castle. Li Qinwu possessed exceptional eyesight.

He immediately estimated the airship to be under 100 meters long, roughly 30 meters wide, cruising at an altitude of around 500 meters, traveling at a modest speed of roughly 25 kilometers per hour—though he couldn't tell if that was its top speed. As for its color, he couldn't tell either—he was colorblind. The airship was heading straight toward the castle, currently about 5 kilometers away. Li Qinwu immediately roared at the top of his lungs: "Enemy attack! Everyone, prepare for battle!"