THE MARTIAL KING, VOLUME 4 - Season 12 Episode 44

Zen was extremely pleased to have such a shrewd woman like Camilla help him take care of the ores. The value of the ores did not matter and he couldn’t care less about the commission.

“I’ll leave this to you then!” he told her before he left.

Camilla knew her own strength. Her might as a martial artist only allowed her to mine treasures from the 19th to 20th floors but even if she worked hard, it was highly unlikely for her to find anything good. It was better for her to stay and take care of Zen’s ores. Maybe it was in business that she’d be able to display her talents more.

She smiled gracefully at the people that waited in front of her, “My friends, you can choose as you please. You can also enjoy a preferential price! But the life stones come first!”

The warriors rolled their eyes. Besides the first person who managed to bag a good bargain, they all knew that the rest of them were already one step behind. It was fortunate that the price charged wasn’t too outrageous so a lot of them still surrounded Camilla and her wares.

Zen, on the other hand, was already busy climbing the pyramid. Soon enough, he reached the 30th floor.

The 30th floor was usually reserved for Life and Death Realm masters but Zen would take his chance today. He easily passed through the narrow door and found himself landing on one of the leaves.

The leaves on the 30th floor were twice as wide as those on the 29th floor. Here, the higher the leaves were, the larger, darker, and harder they were to break.

Zen had gone inside the 30th floor for treasure but as soon as he landed on the leaf, he immediately felt a strong wave of killing intent.

“Squeak, squeak, squeak…”

He wasn’t alone.

Beside him was a large insect that had been sitting quietly on the leaf before he arrived. The insect had six legs and was as tall as two people combined. It had a pair of brown, compound eyes and abdominal scales that shone and flickered with green light.

Zen carefully stood up from his spot, keen to avoid the insect’s wrath but even the slightest movement was enough to alert the bug. It immediately pounced towards him!

Zen frowned upon seeing this giant bug. He thought that all the creatures in the Feather Holy Sea had perished in the blood sacrifice. What was a living bug doing here?

“Crack!”

The bug had thrust its spear-like foreleg towards Zen and pierced a clean hole through the leaf.

‘That front leg is sharp! What a great power!’ he thought to himself.

And indeed, the bug’s leg was no joke. Back in the 29th floor, Zen would need to activate more than one hundred dragon scales to be able to break the leaves with his mining pickaxe which was already a low-level sacred weapon. The 30th floor surely had tougher leaves than the ones below.

But this bug was able to make a hole on the leaf with just the use of its own leg which meant that it was probably as sharp as a sacred weapon. This six-legged insect was probably no weaker than an ordinary Life and Death Realm warrior!

Zen now understood why Randy had mentioned that the 30th floor was not a place for ordinary Virtual Tribulation Realm warriors to explore.

The bug was not deterred when it missed Zen. It spread its wings and quickly charged towards him, eager to land an attack this time. Thankfully, Zen’s quick reflexes allowed him to dodge the sharp forelegs that thrust towards him.

Back in the Eastern Region, Zen had dealt with a lot of blade locusts and, though the strength of those locusts was nothing compared to that of the bug in front of him, he learned something valuable from his experience. An insect’s weakness was in its abdomen.

The moment the bug raised its awl-like forelegs, Zen took his chance to get close to its abdomen and strike it with his palm.

As his forceful energy burst out, the strike shattered the green abdominal scales that protected the bug’s belly with a loud cracking sound. His move was quick and clean.

“Squeak squeak…”

it let out a shrill cry and quickly spread its wings and retreated backward.

“Eh?”

Without the green scales, the bug’s abdomen now appeared in front of him. Its belly seemed to be transparent and Zen noticed that it was filled with numerous, colorful ores.

‘Does this bug live off ores? Is this thing a creature?’ Knowing the treasures it held in its stomach, Zen couldn’t just let this bug get away. His figure flashed, and he didn’t slow down in the slightest to chase it. Since this bug had quite a few ores within it, he didn’t need to search for them one by one on the leaves.

However, just as he was about to chase it down, the bug waved its wings and jumped onto another leaf! The bug was so cunning.

.Ah, Zen had lost his chance…

Leaving the leaf wasn’t the ideal option. There was a strong gravitational force that would pull him down and make him fall out through the light circle. He’d have to climb up the pyramid again in order to enter through the narrow door.

There was no way he could follow the bug by jumping from one leaf to another as he was unable to resist the huge gravitational force.

“Squeak! Squeak!” The bug was cunning and also intelligent. It actually raised its two spear-like forelegs in an attempt to mock Zen now that it knew the young man couldn’t easily follow to the next leaf.

The mockery made him scoff. Zen was someone who possessed strong will. He would not care if some warriors provoked him, so he could more or less ignore the provocations from this oversized bug. A good amount of ores remained on the leaf so he began to search if he could find life stones there.

If the bug ever dared to come over, Zen would make sure to catch it.

A quick search throughout the leaf’s surface yielded no evidence of any life stones. However, there were still a lot of beautiful and eye-catching ores around so Zen wasted no time and quickly got to work. He waved his mining pickaxe and quickly dug them out.

The leaf was tougher than the ones on the 29th floor but still very much within the range that Zen could handle. He only needed to activate three hundred dragon scales in order to break through the leaf.
Meanwhile, the bug continued its activities on the leaf next to him. The bug would use its sharp, front legs to cleanly poke a hole on the leaf, then it would lower its head to swallow the uncovered ore in one gulp.

‘Sure enough, this big bug lives off ores!’ Zen’s eyes couldn’t help but glance at the bug’s transparent abdomen. Now that he looked at it carefully, he noticed about a dozen life stones that were mixed in with the other numerous ores inside the bug’s belly. There were at least fifty to sixty in total!

Zen couldn’t help but clench his fists at the sight. “Life stones!”

A decision had been made in Zen’s head the moment he saw those stones in the bug’s belly. He must kill it. He had to do it for the life stones. With this in mind, Zen willingly jumped down from the leaf and took a look at the bug. It didn’t seem to care about anything else other than the ores that it kept munching on.

Shortly after falling into the light circle, Zen appeared at the side of the pyramid. He was just about to climb back up when he heard Camilla’s voice call out to him, “Thad! I’ve already gotten ten life stones for you! As well as two thousand supreme life vitality crystals!”

The divine-level talents had a lot of supreme life vitality crystals but not many life stones.

Zen nodded in approval before tapping his space ring. Seven to eight ores shot out towards Camilla instantly just as he charged straight up to the pyramid.

“Ah, Violet Crystal, Crescent Moon Stone, and Jade Heart Stone…” Camilla listed down the ores’ names before they landed in front of her.

It was an effective marketing strategy as the other warriors instantly rushed towards her. The jealousy was apparent in their faces as they looked at the ores.

“What kind of luck does this Thad have? Even if he’s on the 30th floor, it would be impossible for him to dig out so many valuable ores in just one go!”

“A few others have also entered the 30th floor but they only got a few ordinary items and two broken pickaxes. Why is he so lucky…” “He’s strong, powerful, and he also has good fortune. It’s so unfair!”

If someone was able to attain something through strength and willpower, people would usually admire him. However, if someone achieved something through luck, people would often feel jealous and moan about the unfairness of life. They did not know that luck could also be considered as strength for a rare group of people in this world.

Meanwhile, Zen was already on his way. He had to quickly kill that bug and get the stones. He quickly located the narrow door he had gone through earlier and entered the one right next to it.

Each door corresponded to a leaf and taking the door next to the one he entered earlier meant he would be able to land on the leaf that the bug was on. If he was fast enough, the bug would still be busy eating ores and he could get his chance in eliminating it.
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