The King of Black Fog

"Sword Beak?" Li Qianxia reached for a bird's beak, "What's the use of it being so small?"

Yang Qinglan picked up another one, and the dark black beak in her hand grew and elongated like a sprouting seed. In a moment, it had grown about one meter long and transformed into a sword.

The blade was slender, deep black, except for a section illuminated by the sun that shone with a dazzling emerald light.

"Big, big, yours is so big!" Li Qianxia got excited, then puzzled, "Why doesn't mine work?"

"Why don't you let your brother try?" Yang Qinglan casually suggested, her eyes still admiring the Emerald Sword in her hand.

Not to mention its sharpness or sturdiness, just the jade-like luster alone was enough to make countless people obsessed and intoxicated. Her mere appreciation revealed her indifference—and her wealth.

"For my brother?" Li Qianxia glanced at the beak in her hand and then at Li Changzhou, and hesitantly handed over the Sword Beak to him.

She hadn't checked the Hummingbird's Identity Card, and neither had Yang Qinglan, but they guessed that the Sword Beak was gender-specific by the fact that the Hummingbirds came in pairs.

Li Changzhou reached out and took it, and, as expected, the beak grew and lengthened in his hand, becoming a sword.

His sword was a bit longer than Yang Qinglan's; hers had a blade of 70 centimeters and a hilt of 12 centimeters, while Li Changzhou's blade was about 75 centimeters, and the hilt was 15 centimeters.

The blades were the same, very slender;

and the color too—in the shadows, they were black, but in the sunlight, they were emerald green.

"Why though!" Li Qianxia complained, taking the sword back, and the sword instantly shrank again.

"That one's not for you." Yang Qinglan handed her own sword to her.

This time it worked, and Li Qianxia happily obtained the enlarged sword.

"Ha! Watch my Heavenly Maiden Sword Dance!" she swung the slender sword like a gun.

The sword glowed emerald green like the sea, and when the tip touched the rock wall, it sliced through like a hot knife through butter.

For a moment, all three were somewhat breathless.

"...from today onwards, I'm not practicing martial arts anymore!" Li Changzhou declared right then.

Yang Qinglan glanced at him sideways, meaning: No ambition. She found it amusing, this man was never serious.

"Weapons indeed have their reason for existence, all those Great Strength Bull Fist, the painstakingly practiced Bull Horn Spiral Force—my sword could split your arm in two between your index and middle finger!"

Li Changzhou had become a fanatic of weapons, devoid of those lofty beliefs about being 'invincible with one punch' often found in various stories.

Li Qianxia made several more swift strikes with the sword, matching her constitution and strength, leaving several holes in the rock wall.

She also couldn't bear to part with it but decided to return the sword to Yang Qinglan.

"Qing Lan, you use it!"

"You don't want it?"

"I have the Blood-sucking Gun, and in critical moments, I can even use my brother as a blood bank. The sword is just sharp, can't compare to my little gun."

"Really?" Yang Qinglan's mouth curled into a faint smile, sensing her reluctance, "I can manage without a weapon too."

"Oh!" Li Qianxia was exasperated, "If I use the sword, wouldn't all my time spent training with the gun be wasted? I only realized today what it means to fear marrying the wrong man. Qing Lan, let me tell you, you must keep your eyes wide open when you look for a man in the future..."

"Ahem."

"Oh, my brother can be exempted. I've tested him for you for twenty years. Except for being a bit stubborn at times, everything else about him is fine."

"It's hard to trust the words of someone with the Twins talent," Yang Qinglan drawled, taking the Sword Beak and liking it more and more.

It looked less like a sword and more like a treasure.

"Qing Lan, think about why I would have the Twins talent. Isn't it because he's good? If he were emotionally cold to me, would I like him? No, don't you think I'm right?"

"Hmm, very sincere, but too subjective."

The Emerald Sword reverted to Sword Beak, and Yang Qinglan swept her hair up, fixing the Sword Beak in it as a hairpin.

Compared to when her long hair was flowing freely, she now appeared graceful, with a hint of an aristocratic matron.

"So beautiful!" Li Qianxia exclaimed, her beauty was the kind even women would admire.

"Should we name our treasure?" Li Changzhou was still gesturing with the Sword Beak.

"Emerald Bee Sword, 'emerald' as in the green, 'bee' as in hummingbird," Yang Qinglan decided firmly, not allowing him to waste any more time on this.

After putting away the Emerald Bee Sword, Li Changzhou studied the skills on the Identity Card.

He was interested in "High-Speed Movement", "Special Flying Skills", and "Thunder Roar", but the black mist could only transfer skills to a white card, and the six skill slots on the white card were already full.

"Concentration", "Control Dopamine", "Photo Transmission", "Healing", "Earth Tunneling", "Flame Wave" – he didn't want to discard any of them.

"I wonder if there's any player so greedily inhumane as to awaken the instinct of 'Unlimited Skill Slots'," he sighed.

"If there truly is one, whether we can defeat them is another matter," Li Qianxia was not very optimistic.

Yang Qinglan said to the struggling Li Changzhou, "Wait and see, wait until the game is over, many skills can be exchanged for game coins."

"Can it be free…" whispered Li Changzhou.

"Better not say that," Qing Lan advised.

"If I can dine and dash, why should I pay? I can't bear to use my game coins," Li Changzhou sighed, putting away the Identity Card.

He carried a small box that was just the right size for holding the Identity Card (probably designed for ID cards or transit cards), fastened at his back like a "Pokemon" carrying Spirit Balls, very secure and not affecting movement, and not visible from the outside.

"What do we do next?" Li Qianxia asked.

"First, let's observe the situation," Yang Qinglan looked out of the cave.

The moment her sight landed on the smooth cliff opposite them, a sudden chill struck, and her 7-point Perception prickled her skin, her instincts screaming crazily in her ears.

Danger! Danger! Danger!

The sense of crisis was a hundred times more intense than when she was ambushed by a chameleon by the waterhole in the desert!

A shadow fell, casting over her head, and within the shadow, her face pale as the first snow, gained a cold deathly beauty.

Her eyes turned blue, and her body fell backwards.

It was too late.

The speed of "Attract And Repel" wouldn't be fast, nor slow; without external force interference, the initial speed at which a person falls due to Earth's gravity will always be 9.8 meters per second.

For the first time, she felt so close to death.

She wondered what would become of her bookshop in the end; if it closed down, what about the books inside?

What about Qian Xia and Li Changzhou? She hoped they could continue to survive.

A Golden Eagle dived down, its talons like iron hooks, glinting coldly, snatching lightning-fast at her head.

Suddenly, an arm reached out, gripped her shoulder, and with a strong pull, whisked her away from the channel of "Attract And Repel", pulling her out of danger.

The wind raised by the talons cut across her cheek like a knife, followed by the sound of flesh being penetrated, blood splattering.

Yang Qinglan heard Li Qianxia cry out in panic, a warm flow streaming down her own shoulder.

Besides her cheek, her most painful spot was her shoulder, as the person who grabbed her had used a lot of strength.

She looked up to find herself being pulled into a corner by Li Changzhou, his face covered in cold sweat.

Yang Qinglan turned her head to see that his left arm, which had embraced her shoulder, was gouged out by talons, as if a beast had viciously taken a bite, leaving a crescent shape.

Blood streamed, and bones were gruesomely exposed.

"You..." she was at a loss for words.

"Brother!" Li Qianxia threw herself towards him, her voice choked with tears, her eyes brimming.

"Don't cry, no crying!" Li Changzhou scolded, grinning through the pain, "Wait until I eat that beast, this injury will naturally heal!"

Yang Qinglan looked at his furious eyes and the cold sweat flowing down his temples. After three seconds, she took a deep breath and steadied her emotions.

The Golden Eagle, missing its strike, flapped its wings vigorously, flying back to the sky, circling overhead and not leaving.