Chapter 387: The Game Begins

After all the rules were explained and everyone had raised their questions, a slightly hoarse voice spoke up, “Since I must stay for ten years, does it mean it doesn’t matter whether I exchange anything or not during those ten years?”
Everyone turned toward the source of the voice. It was the third person to arrive here after Hong Lian.
“The crystal cores obtained cannot be taken out of this secret realm,” the voice in the sky said after a brief silence. “If you don’t want to exchange anything, I won’t force you.”
“So, you won’t interfere no matter what I do during these ten years?” the man in black continued to ask.
“I won’t interfere!” the voice replied simply. “I’m only responsible for managing the exchange of points. I don’t care about anything else!”
“Then I understand!” The young man in black lowered his head, glanced around the crowd again, paused briefly on Ye Feng, before leaving.
No one else noticed anything strange about him, but Ye Feng did. Although he couldn’t catch the other man’s gaze, he could sense hostility toward him. Since this guy asked such a question, he would surely attack him.
“I don’t care who you are. Since you’ve set your sights on me, be prepared to perish!” Ye Feng glared coldly in the direction the man in black had gone.
“Do you know that guy?” Hong Lian noticed Ye Feng’s hostile expression.
“No, but he wants to attack me!” Ye Feng turned away and shook his head.
“That makes sense. No matter how well one hides their murderous intent, at our level, we can tell if someone is hostile just by their aura,” Hong Lian said, not finding it strange.
“Let’s part ways then,” Ye Feng suggested. “I want to see what I can exchange for.”
“Then let’s compete to see who has more points by then!” Hong Lian said proudly, stroking Xiao Bai in his arms.
“With Xiao Bai on your side, I’m not afraid. Let’s compete!” Ye Feng smiled.
“If you lose, you have to do one thing for me!” Hong Lian seemed to have been waiting for Ye Feng here all along.
“As long as it doesn’t go against morality, I’ll agree!” Ye Feng replied readily. “What if you lose?”
“If I lose, I’ll also agree to do one thing for you! Is that fair?” Hong Lian smiled happily.
“Okay!” Ye Feng nodded in agreement. “See you then!”

After making the agreement, Ye Feng immediately disappeared. He had agreed to this bet so he could be alone. He guessed that if he refused, the little girl Hong Lian would likely want to form a team with him. After all, many groups had already formed among the crowd. But Ye Feng also knew that with that little white dog protecting her, she wouldn’t face much danger, unless she encountered someone as strong as Mo Jing. And for someone as powerful as Mo Jing, he would surely prefer to steal from a group rather than from a single girl.

Ye Feng continued to delve deeper into the forest. The deeper he went, the stronger the aura of those magical beasts became.

“With my strength, there’s no need to kill magical beasts at the peak of the True God level—they won’t grant any points,” Ye Feng frowned slightly. “And there are quite a few semi-god level strongmen here. According to the rules, they only need to kill divine-level magical beasts to earn points. Since everything around here is divine-level, I must go further!”

After about the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, Ye Feng successfully reached his destination—a habitat of over thirty magical beasts at the peak of the True God level.

Along the way, he noticed that all the magical beasts here lived in groups, which made him curse the shamelessness of the secret realm’s owner. Originally, one could only gain domain points by killing magical beasts that were one entire rank higher than oneself, a condition that was already quite harsh. With these beasts living in groups, completing this task became even more impossible. After all, those who could kill opponents beyond their own rank usually had special circumstances. From what Ye Feng observed, among these hundred people, only about ten could successfully kill magical beasts beyond their rank if acting alone. But now that the beasts were all gathered in groups, it undoubtedly increased the difficulty even further. Fortunately, most people had formed small teams, with only those who were extremely powerful or overly confident choosing to act alone.

However, this clustering of beasts made Ye Feng smile.

“Animals that live in groups are the most adorable!” With a sinister smile, Ye Feng slowly approached the herd of beasts. Once within range, he suddenly expanded his domain, enclosing those over thirty True God-level beasts.

Within his domain, Ye Feng concealed his presence and silently observed the chaos among the beasts. The dreams created by his domain didn’t just control their vision—they affected all senses, including smell, hearing, touch, even taste, and even perceptions beyond the five senses.

If it’s just visual, it might have a good effect on humans, but not on magical beasts, which mostly rely on smell to identify each other. If their appearance changes but their scent remains the same, the magical beasts may not attack, but if even their scent changes, they will surely attack frantically.

Once those magical beasts were enclosed by Ye Feng and brought into his domain, they fell into complete chaos, attacking each other desperately. Their limited brain cells couldn’t detect the source of this mutation; they only wanted to drive out outsiders or turn them into corpses before throwing them out.

In just the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, almost all the magical beasts lay exhausted, gasping heavily, looking resentfully at their peers.

Ye Feng appeared with a smile and began to eliminate them one by one.

After effortlessly dealing with a group of True God-level beasts, he hesitated for a moment before continuing deeper. “One only earns a little points. Even if I kill all the peak True God-level beasts, the total points won’t be much. If I use my domain, I don’t need to fear the herd of Heavenly God-level magical beasts either. Let’s start with those at the early Heavenly God level. If that doesn’t work, I can always come back and kill the peak True God beasts later.”

Avoiding several groups of peak True God-level beasts along the way, Ye Feng finally found the first batch of early Heavenly God-level magical beasts—nearly fifty in number. He approached carefully and, after confirming that all of them could be instantly enclosed in his domain, activated it.

All fifty-plus early Heavenly God-level beasts were instantly trapped in the golden domain. The beasts were momentarily stunned. Just as they noticed the change in their surroundings, they saw that many of their peers had turned into humans. Thus, another frenzied attack ensued.

This time it took a little longer, possibly due to the strength of the magical beasts or because of their different nature from before. In total, he obtained fifty-three crystal cores, equivalent to 530 points. Adding the 32 beasts from before, the total was 563 points.

Ye Feng planned to check on the others but found that the range of his mental energy had been reduced, allowing him to detect only areas within 100 kilometers. And within that 100-kilometer radius, there was only himself, a human. Still, he could guess that many others hadn’t even killed a single magical beast, as it had been less than an hour since they arrived.

“The early-stage gods are no problem; let’s try the mid-stage ones!” Ye Feng delved deeper. After slaughtering a group of mid-stage and late-stage god beasts, Ye Feng accumulated a total of 36,163 points—resulting from killing 33 late-stage god beasts and 35 mid-stage ones. “Even late-stage gods aren’t a challenge, but it’s getting a bit tough. Some alert beasts can actually sense danger…” Ye Feng frowned slightly. When he infiltrated the territory of late-stage god beasts, despite suppressing his aura to the extreme, he was still detected by a few alert beasts, which warned their entire herd, causing them to flee in panic. It took him three attempts before he finally managed to capture a group of late-stage god beasts using the Realm Refining technique. However, he also noticed that this level of alertness depended on the type of beast. Generally, beasts similar to felines were extremely alert, able to detect the slightest movement immediately. The species he succeeded in attacking were plump beasts similar to rhinos, which appeared rather foolish. Thus, Ye Feng focused on this type of beast, aiming for the peak versions of these gods. In just one morning, Ye Feng earned over 30,000 points, while many others gained nothing. “Damn, this is way too hard!” a tall, muscular man couldn’t help but curse. “Isn’t this just making things harder for us? These beasts are already a whole rank above us in strength. We might not even be able to defeat them in a one-on-one fight. And here they come in groups, with at least twenty in each group. There are only three of us—what’s the point of forming a team? It’s good if we don’t get eaten by these beast packs!” “Lao Gao, stop complaining. It’s all our own fault for not being strong enough. Look, at first, Daofeng was still killing peak True God-level beasts within dozens of kilometers of us. We haven’t even moved that far, yet he’s already out of sight. He must have entered deeper areas!” a young man dressed like a scholar calmly waved his folding fan and said with a wry smile. “This place also suppresses mental strength. With our abilities, we can only detect about twenty kilometers. Otherwise, we might as well see how others do it and learn from them!” Another thin young man sat on a large rock, holding his chin in frustration. Just then, the sound of footsteps came from not far away. The three of them looked over warily—it was the young man in black robes who had asked the last question.

“Are there three of you?” The young man in black robes smirked slightly.
“We don’t have a single crystal core yet; you don’t need to think about attacking us!” The young man dressed like a scholar said nervously. The three of them could clearly sense that their opponent was at least a god-tier powerhouse.
“Is the BladeBladeThe translation of “：BladeFeng nearby?” the young man in black robes asked coldly.
“It was in that direction before, about eighteen kilometers away from us. We just don’t know where it is now.” The scholar pointed in a certain direction.
The young man in black robes smiled. “Thank you. As a reward… I’ll ensure you die without too much pain…”
“We really don’t have any crystal cores, not a single one!” This time, it was the thin young man who spoke.
“Who said I wanted crystal cores?” The young man in black robes wore a sinister smile. “I’m just enjoying a feast of hunting…”