Chương 9: Killing Machine XC-3000 deployed!

After they finished eating and rested for a moment, Xiao Cai looked at the sky and said.

"Let's just hunt around this area until evening. Any further and the place will be too dangerous." The Martial Grandmaster level guard looked at the sky and nodded while curiously looking at Xiao Cai.

"What miss Xiao Cai said is right. We're almost entering the periphery of Endless Mountain. Once we enter, I couldn't guarantee the young master's safety due to the sheer amount of ferocious beasts around." Ren Qingquan simply believes whatever the two experts said.

"Then, let's continue hunting around this area."

"What about the remaining boar meat?" Fatty asked while pointing at the half-eaten meat.

"Just bury it and let nature handle the rest." One of the guards said with a smile while using a big branch to begin digging the soil. The surrounding guard followed suit and dug a hole for that boar meat. Suddenly, the group's expression changed as they heard several wolves' howls.

"Let's leave from this place. Encountering a wolf pack is quite troublesome. Especially this deep in the forest. For the wolf pack to stay here, that means their strength is pretty considerable." The Martial Grandmaster said while beckoning to the others to move. Xiao Cai said, "Too late. Those wolves have arrived." She pointed at a thick shrub with a pair of glowing eyes inside. After the pair of eyes, more and more pairs of eyes appeared around Ren Qingquan's group.

I felt quite curious after seeing two beasts attack. Compared to the animals that hardly appeared during Ren Qingquan's journey, the few minutes the group spent cooking and eating had already triggered two rounds of beast attacks. Is the smell of Fatty Zhang's cooking really that tempting? I thought animals have a different sense of smell and taste from humans?

While everyone is tense, many wolves slowly moved forward and surrounded Ren Qingquan's group. Once they had come nearer, my [Scan] could detect three Martial Grandmaster realm wolves, nine Martial Master realm wolves, and four Martial Apprentice realm wolves. The Martial Grandmaster level guard has probably sensed the power of those wolves as he began to sweat. Seeing the strongest among them look nervous, the other guard tensed up and slowly formed a circle to protect Ren Qingquan, Fatty Zhang, and Xiao Cai.

Even Fatty Zhang's round face began to tremble and sweat when the guards grew serious. The only ones remaining calm are Xiao Cai and Ren Qingquan, who knew there was a humanoid missile called Xiao Cai standing next to him. The guard in the Martial Grandmaster realm looked at the others and gave a bitter smile.

"All of you, guard the young master and find a way to return to the carriage!" The other guards quickly replied in a low voice.

"Captain, you should be the one to bring the young master away. It's easier for us to hold them with our number!"

"That's right, Captain. You have a much higher chance to keep the young master safe compared to us." The surrounding guards nodded along.

"You guys..." The captain looked at the other guards from the corner of his eye while keeping an eye on the wolves. His eyes turn slightly red from being overwhelmed by his feelings. While those guards were playing their drama, I saw Xiao Cai unsheath the sword at her waist and move gracefully like a leaf blown by the wind.

"Luckily I decided to tag along." I heard Xiao Cai mutter while she easily passed through the guard's formation and entered the wolf pack. Every time Xiao Cai passed through a wolf, a flash of light appeared, and a wolf's head would fall to the ground. On the outside, Ren Qingquan wore a dumbfounded expression upon seeing Xiao Cai killing the wolves easily. But internally, he is screaming toward me, 'System, activate [Devour]! Quick! Quick!'

If I hadn't heard his excited internal voice, I would've believed his shocked expression. What a drama king. (¬_¬) While Xiao Cai is killing all of the surrounding wolves, I activated Ren Qingquan's [Devour] and swallowed their souls. It seems that because the level of [Devour] is quite low, the speed of swallowing the wolf's soul is quite slow. Furthermore, I couldn't devour souls that are too far away from Ren Qingquan. This slowed the pace at which I gained points.

By the time Xiao Cai killed most of the wolves, leaving only one of the grandmaster level wolves that had fled with a large gushing wound on its back. I sent a notification to Ren Qingquan. [Ding! Successfully devoured 1 point! Note: Please get closer to the corpse to devour the souls that are located beyond Devour's current range.] Actually, the amount of points gained from Xiao Cai's slaughter has already accumulated to slightly more than 2 points. But I decided to separate Ren Qingquan's points from mine.

So, I taxed a portion of his income to fill my own pocket so I can do some personal experiment. Ahem 50% tax Ahem. Actually, forget about that tax matter. It isn't important~ After Ren Qingquan walked around the area full of wolf corpses. I've successfully devoured another half point. With this massive boon in terms of points, the amount of points I have has finally increased.

[Name: System Point: 9 Ability: Anchor, Devour, Scan, Calculate] This also makes me feel more relieved, as killing strong beasts with martial art attainment actually rewards me with more points. The gain from each wolf is around 100 times the amount I gained from the rabbit Ren Qingquan first killed! After feeling happy, I didn't forget to send Ren Qingquan a notification. [Congratulations on completing newbie mission 2! You've been rewarded with a System Mission Panel.] [Host may open the Mission Panel by thinking of 'System Mission' or through the personal panel.] If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Ren Qingquan saw the notification I sent and opened his panel. [Name: Ren Qingquan Point: 1 Realm: First Stage Martial Master Martial arts method: Flame Tempering Method. Martial arts technique: Iron Palm (Beginner). System function: Devour, Scan, Calculate, Map, Missions.] Then he opened the mission panel and saw it was actually empty. After all, I am still planning what kind of mission I should place there.

'System, where is the missions? Ain't a mission panel should be filled with mission?' [Please wait for the mission to refresh. The process might take some time to finish.]'Darn, did you just released a half finished function? It won't be filled with bugs right?' While Ren Qingquan is complaining to me, the guard captain said.

"With the existence of that powerful wolf group, there shouldn't be any more powerful ferocious beasts in this area. So, we could hunt safely." He occasionally stole a glance at Xiao Cai with an expression that was filled with admiration. It seems somehow Xiao Cai has gained several fans. Xiao Cai ignored the admiring looks of the surrounding people and asked Ren Qingquan.

"Does the young master still wish to continue?"

'This is a rare chance to hunt for points. So, I shouldn't waste it.' I could hear Ren Qingquan contemplate and nod. Xiao Cai sighed and told the guard to continue as is. She also told everyone to keep her ability a secret. After hearing Xiao Cai's words, the guards are smart enough to go on as if nothing had happened. Soon, evening arrived, and Ren Qingquan had gathered an additional point (tax included). While riding his horse on the way back to his carriage, Ren Qingquan said.

'System, open my personal panel.' [Name: Ren Qingquan Point: 2 Realm: First Stage Martial Master Martial arts method: Flame Tempering Method. Martial arts technique: Iron Palm (Beginner). System function: Devour, Scan, Calculate, Map, Mission.] After reading the panel, he silently closed it and watched the surrounding scenery. The journey toward the city is pretty calm. There is no sudden appearance of a robber, a blocked road, a random sexy female noble being in a pinch, or other cliched scene.

By the time Ren Qingquan's group returned to Burning Sky city, the sky had begun to darken. Yet, the main street of Burning Sky City remained busy. There are many stalls selling meat, fish, snacks, herbs, martial arts books, fake martial arts books, and many other trinkets. While I am scanning the surrounding scenery. I found a wild Ren Xuan, currently visiting a stall selling mysterious trinkets. While I am focusing my attention on him. I could hear Ren Xuan saying 'I finally found it' in a small voice.

What is this dude doing right now? Recalling my previous nonsense guess and Ren Qingquan's guess regarding Ren Xuan being a protagonist-like character. I decided to spend a point to activate [Anchor] and placed my [Scan] ability on him. Who knows? If Ren Xuan is indeed a protagonist-like existence, he might surprise me and give me a clue on how to leave this dark space and start my own adventure in another world. It's not like I hate the whole being a system thing I've been doing.

Becoming a hidden mastermind and secretly manipulating events is something I quite enjoy. But, I still kinda miss the feeling of controlling a body~ I also wanna sleep with arrogant young master and slap some jade beauties' faces. Wait, I get it mixed. I mean, I also wanna slap some arrogant young master and sleep with a jade beauty. By the time Ren Qingquan's carriage had passed Ren Xuan, I've successfully placed my [Scan] on him. I stopped scanning Ren Qingquan's surroundings and switched to Ren Xuan's [Scan].

From it, I saw him holding a plant while muttering how he could now join the Martial Spirit sect and immediately become the disciple of an elder-level figure after concocting some pills. Because the information I could get from Ren Xuan's [Scan] was quite confusing. I decided to return my focus to Ren Qingquan. While scanning his surroundings to increase my database, I recalled the information about the Martial Spirit sect from the original Ren Qingquan's memory.

It didn't take much time before I found some information. The Martial Spirit Sect is the top sect in the world. In terms of influence, it is only half a level lower than the whole Great Azure Empire. The sect's headquarters is located somewhere in the Endless Mountain. And just like the Great Azure Empire, they constantly fought against the beasts inside Endless Mountain to guard the living space for humans.

The Martial Spirit Sect is pretty much similar to the sect I've read in xianxia and wuxua novels from my past life. So, an elder-level figure should be someone of pretty high status there.

After arriving at the Ren family's residence, Ren Qingquan immediately bid Fatty Zhang farewell and entered his courtyard. He took a short bath, then fell asleep in his room from exhaustion. As for me, I am busy deciding what step to take next. I spent a whole night contemplating several plans before deciding to send two missions for Ren Qingquan. The moment he woke up the next day, I sent the screen I had been preparing all night. [2 new missions have been added to the mission panel.] Ren Qingquan's half-opened eyes quickly opened wide, and he checked the mission I sent. [Mission: Collect books about general knowledge, martial arts methods, and martial technique! Detail: 0/10 general books recorded. 0/10 martial arts methods recorded. 0/10 martial techniques recorded. Deadline: 1 day. Reward: Library function. Punishment: -1 point. Note: This mission will be released daily until the host completes it.] [Mission: collect 100 points within 30 days! Detail: 0/100 points collected. Only the latest 30 days are counted. Deadline: None. Reward: 1 point. Punishment: None.] I sent the first mission to learn more about this world. After Ren Qingquan finished the newbie mission to [Scan] the whole Ren family's residence, and passed by the library, I had already thought of this mission. Because the mission is extremely easy, I decided to add a deadline to test Ren Qingquan's response. As for the second mission, it's to force Ren Qingquan to seek a steady source of points.

I really need more points to experiment with my abilities. After reading the missions I sent, Ren Qingquan complained as he racked his brain to finish them.

'System, why do I need to finish missions to open your function? Did I guessed it right and you're indeed a defective system that got released before being completed?' Your family is the one that's defective! Holding my urge to curse him, I give him some nonsensical explanation. [The system functions are separated to give the host some sense of achievement.]'Well, whatever.' Ren Qingquan said while opening the system map.

'System, can you mark the location of Ren family's library?' What a lazy guy. Can't he read the map on his own? I complained while creating a book like mark on the system map. [Ding! Location has been marked.] After reading the notification I had sent, Ren Qingquan opened the system map again and saw the mark I had added. Walking along the road leading to the library, Ren Qingquan unfolded the map and checked the dot on it.

Every time he saw a person within the 11 meters range of his [Scan], Ren Qingquan asked me to [Scan] them and show their status. [Name:? Level: Sixth/Seventh Stage Martial Apprentice. Description: Servant of the Ren family.] [Name:? Level: Eight/Ninth Stage Martial Apprentice. Description: Servant of the Ren family.] [Name:? Level: First Stage Martial Master. Description: Servant of the Ren family.] After repeatedly scanning the many people he met, Ren Qingquan compared the size of their dots on the system map with their martial arts level as shown by the [Scan] result. By the time he arrived in front of the library, I could hear Ren Qingquan praising himself as he now could guess the target's approximate level from the size of their dots in the System map. Hearing him endlessly praise himself, I could no longer bear it and sent him a message.

[Actually, the host may activate 'Scan' on a target through the system map. So, whatever skill you just learned is actually useless.] While walking into the library, Ren Qingquan's faint triumphant smile froze.

'Why didn't you tell me since the start!' [Host didn't ask.] Ren Qingquan: (⁠ノ⁠｀⁠Д⁠´⁠)⁠ノ⁠彡⁠┻⁠━⁠┻ Seeing angry Ren Qingquan makes me happy. Who asked you to call me a defective system!