IWYTBW - Chapter 51
Chapter 51
Unexpected Things Always Appear in Unexpected Places
The boy froze. The small snake he was so proud of, which he used to intimidate his subordinates, had just reared up on his shoulder when Yi Zhen grabbed it and flung it into the rustling bushes. A faint smell of blood soon wafted through the air.
Yi Zhen loved poisonous creatures, but unfortunately, he only loved his own. As a poison master who spent his days and nights with deadly weapons like the Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion and the beautiful Three-Smile Butterfly, Yi Zhen knew very well that carefully nurtured pets could never be used by others. So, even though all the poisonous creatures the boy had on him were rare and precious, he didn’t feel any pity.
The little prince of Azoth was starting to tremble, a mixture of fear and anger. His lips quivered, and his chest heaved, but he was very sensible. No matter how much he trembled, the part of his neck touching the armor remained motionless, like a frozen piece of wood.
“Crystal purple, with snake eyes like overlapping rainbow rings. Its venom doesn’t kill instantly but amplifies a person’s senses a hundredfold. Any slight touch feels like being flayed alive... The Purple-Fanged Dragon Viper. Little Prince, you’re quite generous.” Yi Zhen chuckled softly, his deliberately barely audible voice making it hard to distinguish his gender. “This is much more valuable than the Golden Nephila from last time, isn’t it?”
The boy’s pupils shrank, his expression as if he had been struck by lightning. “You! It’s you... It’s really you!”
“What a small world,” Yi Zhen smiled.
The boy wanted to struggle, but as soon as he moved, Yi Zhen tightened his grip. “Don’t move. This thing is very dangerous. If you accidentally break your neck by moving around, don’t blame me.”
Mineral Essence could easily tear through mechas, so what was a human body to it? His neck was immediately wet with blood, which dripped down profusely.
The boy froze. He slowly lowered his eyes. In the bright moonlight, he also caught a glimpse of Yi Zhen’s wrist, seeing the material that was neither silver nor gold, with an understated luster.
“...Mineral Essence,” he said hoarsely. “Who are you?”
His heart was in turmoil. He had always been proud of his sharp and discerning eye. This was what it meant to be of true royal blood: indifferent to the finest things, using them merely as embellishments for robes and crowns with an air of contemptuous entitlement
But at this moment, he wished he were blind.
What was Mineral Essence? It was both the mother of minerals and the emperor of ores. A whole ore star formed over billions of years might not even produce a drop the size of a fingertip. It was always found in the deepest part of a vein. A mine owner who spent his life mining might never see a trace of Mineral Essence.
Because of this, it was truly indestructible. It was the essence of the universe, the creation of the gods. The five S-grade mechas serving the royal family all had a drop of this substance melted into them during their creation, symbolizing the nobility and glory of imperial power.
If, before this second, someone had said to him, “Your Highness, do you know that there’s someone in the world who made an entire gauntlet out of Mineral Essence?” he would have burst into laughter and then granted that person a swift death. Because although he had lied and was suspected of deceiving the emperor, he had also provided a ridiculous joke for his amusement.
But after this second, he had to believe that such a ridiculous thing existed in the world... Someone had actually made an entire gauntlet out of Mineral Essence!
“Just an ordinary contestant,” Yi Zhen replied. “Didn’t I tell you before to stay away from me, or it would be dangerous? Why didn’t you listen? Did you have to learn your lesson the hard way?”
The boy gritted his teeth, his face twisting. In the past, he was the one who made others speechless with anger. The noblewomen of the court fawned over him, and young ladies were willing to be jealous for him, even if they claimed to like him, they only dared to gently tap his forearm with soft, fragrant feather fans. The ministers knew his temperament and didn’t dare to argue with him. As for the young maids, he would drag whoever he fancied to bed, and whoever he disliked would have their eyes gouged out and be drowned in an insect pit... Never had anyone, never had anyone, been as shamelessly infuriating as the rebel behind him!
Stay away from you... The entire galaxy was his family’s territory. Did he need to avoid this rebel to go where he pleased?
However, he didn’t dare to speak too loudly. The Mineral Essence gauntlet was already embedded tightly. If he got too agitated, the sharp fingertips would definitely slit his throat.
“Release His Highness!” a black-clad man said in a deep voice. “Otherwise, all your family and friends will be subjected to the most severe punishment!”
Yi Zhen almost laughed out loud. He really wanted to say, go ahead, punish whoever you want among my family and friends. If you can punish Rong Hongxue, I’ll give you credit. If you can punish She Xin, you can also be considered capable... provided you can withstand his family and the bombardment of those old monsters from the Desna Star System. The first two are already incredibly difficult. As for the last one, Li Youdeng, I don’t think your claws can reach that far.
“Oh, oh, oh,” he said lightly. “I’m so scared.”
While Yi Zhen was attracting the attention of all the black-clad men, Li Youdeng stealthily circled around to the back, pulled She Xin’s sleeve, took off her mask, and mouthed to him, “Go!”
She Xin’s eyes widened. Li Youdeng didn’t wait for a response and started running towards the poison swamp area, dragging him along.
“Youdeng?! What are you doing here!” She Xin whispered. Seeing one of his few friends on this unfamiliar planet felt like a dream. “Why are you here?”
“Idiot, didn’t you know to be careful!” Li Youdeng scolded him angrily. “Do you know who that is? Why did you just rush in like that?!”
The treetops rustled with the wind as they ran. She Xin was silent for a moment, then said, “He’s AivanOriginal name was Ai Fan (爱凡), but it’s implied that his surname is Azoth, so Aivan Azoth sounds nice? Another suggestion was ‘Joffrey’ to reference the game of thrones character lol. I may change his name once I understand better ;w;, the youngest son of Emperor Azoth.”
Li Youdeng said in exasperation, “Now you know?”
She was still shocked. Aivan. Only five people in the entire world could use this noble surname. The emperor’s numerous illegitimate children couldn’t use it, nor could the relatives surrounding the throne. From this, it seemed that the boy did indeed have the capital to be arrogant. He was truly one of the rulers standing at the pinnacle of power.
“Then that other guy...” She Xin said as he was dragged along, recalling the scene from earlier.
“That’s Yi Zhen,” Li Youdeng replied, waving her hand to push aside the dense branches in front of them.
“Yi Zhen?!” She Xin was even more surprised. He quickly tried to break free. “No... then we have to go back and save him! There are so many A-grades. How can he handle it? Let’s go back. I can summon my home planet’s-”
“Just run!” Li Youdeng said unceremoniously, pulling him along. “If we go back now, we’ll only be a hindrance!”
Yi Zhen saw them running away and felt a sense of relief.
With the prince in his hands, it was like dangling a piece of fragrant meat in front of these dogs. They had no time to pay attention to who was leaving. They were all staring at Yi Zhen, their eyes glued to him.
Yi Zhen smiled. He held the little prince by the neck and slowly backed away. Because he was afraid of the armor on his neck, Aivan didn’t dare to resist at all. Often, when Yi Zhen took a step back, he would hurriedly take a step and a half back. From his actions, it looked like he was eager to stick to Yi Zhen.
Yi Zhen suddenly whistled. All the black-clad men’s bodies stiffened, but he was only calling the Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion back into his Mustard Seed Pouch. Hearing its keeper’s call, the Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion quickly abandoned the half-eaten snake corpse. After a moment’s thought, it picked out the venom gland and hopped onto Yi Zhen’s waist.
Yi Zhen smiled. “Let’s go!”
Before the word “go” was even out of his mouth, he had already turned into a dark whirlwind, carrying the boy and running dozens of meters. If an uninformed bystander saw this, they would surely think it was a scene of the Black Mountain Demon abducting a pure young man, reenacted thousands of years later.
The attendants shouted, “Chase him!”
The darkness of night was Yi Zhen’s best protection. His breathing was faint, his body temperature merging with the cold night. The Illusory Body of Mo Luo activated, making him completely blend into the swaying shadows of the trees. Moreover, he wasn’t just simply holding a hostage. With two crisp cracks, Aivan screamed loudly—Yi Zhen had dislocated both his arms. Like carrying a sack, he slung the boy’s limp arms and held the hostage face-up on his back, effectively stopping any attempts to shoot him from behind.
Aivan’s face was pale, his breath ragged, and cold sweat dripped down, wetting his hair. He wasn’t incapable of enduring pain. On the contrary, his sense of pain was very dull—which was why he couldn’t empathize with the suffering of others and regarded watching people struggle and wail as a form of entertainment.
But Yi Zhen wasn’t just dislocating his arms. While wearing the armor, he had forcefully squeezed and kneaded the boy’s arms and shoulders, his five fingers easily crushing the flesh like squeezing mud. Coupled with the dislocated joints, it was the first time Aivan had experienced such pain.
“I’m going to... kill you... kill... you...” he sobbed, his words broken. Yi Zhen ignored him and continued to run at full speed.
He had already reached his maximum speed. Since the start of the preliminaries, he had put all his system reward points into agility. Although he hadn’t yet broken through B+, with the enhancement of the Illusory Body of Mo Luo, his speed was doubled.
The Jade Alchemy of the Eastern Sea circulated madly, his internal energy burning rapidly. He was no longer like a person. He was like a whirlwind, rushing towards the poison swamp area at a speed invisible to the naked eye.
“Want me to let go?” Yi Zhen panted, a cold smile on his face. “Isn’t that simple? I’m only holding your two arms now. If you sever your arms, you can roll off my back, can’t you?”
[The destination is 1.6 kilometers away. Based on your current speed, you will enter the target area in about 3 minutes. ]
When he pointed out the map to Li Youdeng, they were already very close to the poison swamp, just circling the periphery.
Yi Zhen listened to Tai’a’s navigation. He was constantly thinking, should he kill this youngest prince of the empire now?
He was clearly planning some kind of conspiracy. Anyone could see that. Connecting his previous words, this plan was already in motion. If killing him alone could stop the mastermind behind the scenes, that would be great, but was it really that easy?
From the perspective of a contestant, he should kill him. But from the perspective of the world’s protagonist, did he need to keep this seemingly important supporting character alive to ensure that the hidden plot could continue to develop?
[I think your concerns are justified,] Tai’a said. [After all, the original novel didn’t spend any ink describing the conflicts of power within the empire. Whether this is a truly hidden world plotline or the result of external interference, you can’t tell at this moment.]
Yi Zhen frowned, his throat filled with the taste of blood. Every breath required him to forcefully pump the air out of his lungs. The attendants were hot on his heels, their spirit bodies running even faster than their physical bodies, repeatedly trying to overtake him and block his path.
Aivan hissed, “You... kill me, and you won’t change this situation... won’t change... the outcome of this planet!”
“What situation?” Yi Zhen recalled what Rong Hongxue had said. “The Crown Prince is to be appointed... so none of you can sit still?”
Aivan immediately fell silent. This question was more effective than cutting out his tongue. Yi Zhen sneered. He finally made a decision and said in a deep voice, “Kid, don’t think you’re the only one who knows how to play with poison.”
He exerted force with his arms and abruptly threw Aivan off. At the same time, as if brushing away a fallen flower, Yi Zhen’s forefinger dipped in something and gently smeared it on the little prince’s childish yet vicious face.
It was just the saliva that the Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion used to build its nest. But as soon as it touched his skin, it was like adding a fizzy tablet to cola, causing a large area of festering blisters to erupt. Aivan screamed and was flung into the nearby bushes by Yi Zhen.
Half of the attendants stayed behind to check on him, while the other half continued to pursue Yi Zhen relentlessly. Without the noble shield of the prince, their attacks became even more unrestrained, as if they were determined to kill Yi Zhen on the spot.
They knew very well that the humiliation the prince had suffered at the hands of this masked man tonight was unprecedented. If this person didn’t die, they would be the ones to die.
The rays from their weapons almost formed a dense net, determined to claim Yi Zhen’s life.
The dual enhancement of the Jade Alchemy of the Eastern Sea and the Illusory Body of Mo Luo made Yi Zhen like a fish in water at night. Assassins were the dancers of darkness, the wanderers of shadows. Therefore, the overwhelming beams of light only singed his hair, burned his clothes, and grazed his right hip, causing no fatal damage.
The trees and the creatures in the forest gradually became sparse. A faint purple mist filled the air. Yi Zhen had already run into a forbidden area that was extremely unfriendly to living beings. Here, breathing was dangerous, movement was dangerous, and even living was dangerous.
Those pursuing him also felt this. One of them shouted, “We can’t go any further. It’s the poison swamp!”
“We have to chase him even if it’s into the heart of a volcano!” another roared. “Get into your mechas. If we can’t capture him alive, we have to bring back the head of this traitor!”
In one night, Yi Zhen had gone from “a brilliant new star in the preliminaries” to “traitor of the empire.” But they weren’t entirely wrong. Based on his actions tonight—kidnapping the youngest prince of the empire, injuring him, and then disfiguring him—calling him a traitor wasn’t an exaggeration.
Yi Zhen’s mental power formed a net, covering his face. His mental power could extract the concept of toxins, so it could naturally block this thin purple mist.
The sound of pursuing mecha could be heard from behind. The soft, wet ground nearby would soon be unable to support the weight of the mechas, but Yi Zhen didn’t care and continued to run deeper. After a few leaps, the density of the surrounding mist became visibly thicker. The Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion, with the Three-Smile Butterfly on its head, curiously poked its head out of the Mustard Seed Pouch.
“Get down!” Yi Zhen scolded. He could only run, run faster, and try to reach a place where the density of the poisonous fog was so thick that it was impossible to see one’s own hand in front of one’s face. The aerial bombardment had already begun. The only consolation was that they couldn’t use heat-seeking missiles.
Yi Zhen was running for his life. Air superiority was indeed the most important thing on a frontal battlefield. Fortunately, Tai’a was constantly analyzing the concentration of toxins in the air, telling him to specifically seek out the thickest areas, or else he would have been blasted to death by now.
“We can’t fly any further!” the guards shouted. “The further we go, the thicker the fog. Even the protective shields won’t last long!”
“Yeah, he doesn’t have a mecha. Running to this place is suicide. The innermost fog is said to be able to corrode even bones. This person is dead for sure!”
The leader cursed, “His Highness’s personality is to see the person alive or see the corpse dead. If you return empty-handed, you might as well jump out of your mechas and die here!”
“Let’s extract a sample of the air here,” the most composed one said. “Take it to His Highness. At least it’s something.”
Yi Zhen almost ran straight into the vortex of the fog.
[The pursuers have stopped, Player,] Tai’a said.
He finally slowed down, coughing up a mouthful of blood from exhaustion.
It was a sorry sight. His hair was scorched, his clothes were in tatters from the explosions, his internal organs felt like they were on fire, churning and tumbling inside him, and he was limping, like a firefighter who had just escaped a burning building.
At this time, the best thing to do would be to immediately sit down, regulate his breathing, and smooth out the chaotic and depleted network of his internal energy. However, Yi Zhen didn’t have the luxury to do so at the moment. He had entered a forbidden zone for humans. The Jade Alchemy of the Eastern Sea had to be kept running constantly, keeping his skin as hard as jade.
He popped a handful of oxygen tablets into his mouth. These white, vitamin C-like tablets were also given to him by Li Youdeng. In case he needed to fight underwater, keeping them in his mouth would provide enough oxygen for seven minutes of normal walking.
Yi Zhen didn’t need them originally, but he took them because they looked fun. Who would have thought that they would come in handy right now? Although the Jade Alchemy of the Eastern Sea could seal off his breathing, a large supply of oxygen was still beneficial for his internal circulation at this moment.
He braved the thick purple mist and slowly moved forward.
The crisis was temporarily averted. The Bone-Eroding Spirit Scorpion and the Three-Smile Butterfly came out. The two little creatures were like fish in water in this environment, frolicking freely.
Yi Zhen held the oxygen tablets in his mouth and activated his mental power to extract the concept of poison from the mist. According to the concepts of martial arts or cultivation novels, wherever there were strange environments, there must be rare treasures. This poison swamp area had been formed for an unknown number of years. For Yi Zhen, it was like an unknown treasure chest of poisons, waiting for him to explore and excavate.
His foot suddenly stepped on something raised. Yi Zhen looked down and saw a curved, dark vine, half sticking out of the ground. He couldn’t tell how large the main plant was.
Yi Zhen was immediately intrigued. The soil of the swamp was soft. He followed the direction the vine was extending from. The further he went, the denser the poisonous fog became. Ordinary people wouldn’t be able to reach this place without turning into a pile of bones, but Yi Zhen wasn’t afraid. His hands kept parting the flowing purple mist. Just as he was about to push aside more, he suddenly found himself pushing through empty air.
There was no poisonous fog in the innermost area!
Yi Zhen hurriedly stepped inside. After he brushed away the mist clinging to his body and looked up, he was stunned.
Before him stood a strange plant, more than two people tall, with a stem as thick as a bowl. The stem was translucent purple, and the leaves were a vibrant green, the color deepening from top to bottom, like a precious jewel carved from amethyst and jade. It was wrapped around a long-dead, withered tree, glowing brilliantly.
—The 72nd most poisonous plant in the Book of Poisons, the Jade Cloud Wisteria.
Yi Zhen suspected he was dreaming or had accidentally traveled through time. Otherwise, how could a rare poisonous plant that should only appear in the martial world be growing on a remote planet in the interstellar age?
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It's more that... posting every chapter is a daunting task, we are up to chapter 106 on patreon, where I post everything first. I post 3 chapters at a time since they're so short, but then fixing the formating and posting each one here tires me out xD.
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