The Attack of the Wastrel

“Next, we have five Spirit Moulding Pills with four attributes each. There is one of every combination and each of them starts at a price of 1000 spirit stones. Could willing parties place your bids please?”

Hearing the organiser of the auction say this caused Gu Lingzhi’s eyes to light up.

After so long, her things were finally on the bidding table. Hopefully, they would sell for a good price.

Rong Yuan saw Gu Lingzhi’s expression and thought she was interested in the five Spirit Moulding Pills as he squinted.

“Xiao Hei, did you want these Spirit Moulding Pills?”

Just as he finished speaking, he pressed the button beside his seat to place his bid. Gu Lingzhi hurried to dissuade him.

“No, I don’t want them!”

“But I want them,” Rong Yuan insisted, assuming that she felt bad to ask. He bought all five Spirit Moulding Pills for 7000 spirit stones.

When Rong Yuan shoved the Spirit Moulding Pills to Gu Lingzhi and said that it was a gift to her for accompanying him, Gu Lingzhi could not help but let out a deep sigh and cover her face.

She had wanted to test her luck and see if she could earn anything from it, but now someone had bought it and forced it upon her as a gift.

Rong Yuan felt that Gu Lingzhi’s reaction was slightly puzzling and could not help but take one of the Spirit Moulding Pills out to take a look. He then felt slightly embarrassed.

This handiwork was familiar, wasn’t it someone’s specialty?

To someone like Gu Lingzhi who was relatively new to the art of Alchemy, she might not be able to tell the difference. However, Rong Yuan, who possessed five Spiritual Roots and was a relatively good Alchemist, he could differentiate Spiritual Medicine according to the way they were made. Every Alchemist had a slightly different way of cultivating medicine which created slight differences in their end product. In addition, Gu Lingzhi uses a special method of cultivating that was passed down from the Spirit Tribe and therefore, the differences in her Spiritual Medicine were more obvious.

He just needed to concentrate on feeling the Spiritual Medicine to sense the difference in Spiritual energy from hers and the Spiritual Medicines made by others.

He never thought that Gu Lingzhi’s talent would exceed his expectations, to think that she would be able to create a low grade Black-Level Spiritual Medicine in such a short time! If this was to be known by that crazy Alchemist who practiced all day in the Alchemy Tower, wouldn’t he go crazy from happiness?

Rong Yuan suddenly felt a sense of pride.

It seems like whoever he takes a fancy to were certainly out-of-the-ordinary.

When he saw Gu Lingzhi use gold spiritual energy in the Town of the Brave, he was already very surprised. It meant that Gu Lingzhi did not only have three Spiritual Roots but four, like him, which was exceptionally rare.

It seemed that Gu Lingzhi kept surprising him. She was even hiding her talent in Alchemy from him.

This made Rong Yuan have a feeling that should Gu Lingzhi suddenly demonstrate five Spiritual Roots one day, he would not be surprised.

“Thank you, Your Highness, for your kind intentions, but I do not want these Spirit Moulding Pills.”

Taking advantage of his shock, Gu Lingzhi returned all the Spirit Moulding Pills back to him.

Rong Yuan looked at the sky wordlessly, he did not need them either.

“I already bought it, even if you don’t use it now, maybe you will get the chance to use it in the future. If you really dislike it, you can sell it,” Rong Yuan then pushed the bottle back at Gu Lingzhi, his affirmative tone signalling that he would not take no for an answer.

Knowing that there was no way that she could reject his kind intentions, she had no choice but to accept it. She started to worry about how she would return his kind gesture.

With the few thousand spirit stones that Gu Lingzhi obtained from Rong Yuan buying the Spirit Moulding Pills, for the rest of the auction, Gu Lingzhi was finally able to place her bids for items that were sold at the auction. She bought a few materials that she needed to forge weapons and create medicine. At the end of the auction, she was rather satisfied with her collection.

On the other hand, Rong Yuan who initiated coming to the auction could only think of how to talk to Gu Lingzhi throughout the auction and did not even pay attention to what he wanted to buy. He only purchased some useless stuff at random when the auction was about to end. Yuan Zheng could not bear to look at him any further.

For someone who was a prodigy, he was an idiot when it came to relationships.

As they exited the Store of Many Treasures, Gu Lingzhi immediately headed back to her inn. In the following days, she realised that she was bumping into Rong Yuan more often.

In the past, he would only appear once every two to three days, but now, it seems like he wanted to spend all 24 hours with her. It was to the point that when anyone talked about Black Thorn, they would not fail to mention Rong Yuan as well. The result of this… was her getting targeted.

Seeing the masked man blocking her way, Gu Lingzhi laughed coldly under her mask.

Wasn’t this scene similar to when she returned to the city as Gu Lingzhi and got attacked? She wondered who was the one behind this attack.

“Black Thorn?” The guy wore a metal mask and asked in a strange voice.

Gu Lingzhi laughed coldly, “Didn’t you already confirm my identity before you appeared?”

“That’s right,” the masked man replied, taking one step forward. An iron weapon pierced the air in front of her, flashing under the light.

A Level Nine Martial Student!

Gu Lingzhi relaxed a bit, feeling slightly assured that he was at least still of the Martial Student rank. Even if she was not able to beat him, she could probably escape unscathed.

After assessing her opponent’s abilities, Gu Lingzhi’s feet quickened as she narrowly dodged her assassin’s attack. She unsheathed her Qingfeng Sword and stabbed towards her opponent’s rib at a tricky angle.

The masked man immediately retracted his attack on Gu Lingzhi’s chest and blocked Gu Lingzhi’s attack. The two weapons met in the air creating a shower of sparks. A quick twist of his hand and he once again attacked Gu Lingzhi’s throat. Every move was intended to take her life! The technique he used was the one taught by the Royal School to combat demon beasts.

He was a student from the Royal School…

With her new identity of Black Thorn, she had yet to make enemies and those who wanted to kill her could only be because of one reason… the Third Prince.

She knew that nothing good would come out from hanging around the Third Prince. Even after she switched her identity, she was still hindered by him. Didn’t he know how many women had fallen for him? He was always finding new ways to create trouble for her, he was definitely a jinx!

Clang!

The two swords clashed in the air creating a myriad of sparks. Gu Lingzhi’s arm suddenly went numb from the strength of that hit. The force pushed her backwards and she lost her footing, causing her to be momentarily dishevelled.

Her assassin’s eyes lit up as he took the chance to attack her lower body, preventing her from being able to regain her footwork.

There was a big difference in their cultivation levels to begin with. The attack when she was disoriented caused her, who was already disadvantaged, to suffer a huge blow. Blood spilled out of the hole in her calf. In that moment, as Gu Lingzhi faced imminent peril, she concentrated on directing spiritual energy into her Qingfeng Sword. The result was a cold, blinding ray shooting out of her sword, forcing the masked assassin to have no choice but to back off. Gu Lingzhi’s leg was severely injured.

He was definitely not a normal student from the Royal School!