"I still don't know who my opponent is, but I'll give it my all."
Li Ban was confident, but he couldn't show it.
After all, half of his confidence stemmed from his hidden elements and having twice the elemental capacity of others at the same Tier.
"Giving it your all isn't enough."
Du An placed a small box on the table.
"How much more until your spiritual rhinoceros is full?"
Li Ban scratched his head. "I'm halfway there."
If he hadn't absorbed the main stem of the Cyan Silk Algae, his total capacity wouldn't even be a fifth full!
Du An pushed the small box toward Li Ban. "Zhai Liu should give you another one. Fill your spiritual rhinoceros as quickly as possible—the sooner, the better. If you can't reach the 3rd Tier, they won't let you participate."
Du An considered it for less than a second. "Fine. Focus all your efforts on cultivation during this time. Have Uncle Qin follow you. When you run out of Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruits, just tell him to come fetch more."
'Is this because of my excellent performance during the convoy robbery last time that he's raising the stakes?' Li Ban thought. 'Or did something happen to make them more anxious?'
Li Ban cupped his hands in a salute. "Yes, sir. I will go all out and fill my spiritual rhinoceros as soon as possible."
Li Ban took back the small box Du An had given him. Sure enough, it was a Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruit.
But Cat Girl had said only a 5th Tier Spirit Cultivator could condense Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruits. Where did Du An get his?
Could Du An have another hidden identity backing him?
Back in his room, Li Ban stared blankly at the Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruit.
Du An seemed to have a lot of Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruits.
Either he had a hidden identity just like Li Ban, or they were provided by the faction behind him.
Although Du An and Zhai Liu were temporarily at peace and Du An tacitly allowed Zhai Liu's presence, they were definitely not in the same camp.
Why did Zhai Liu want him to become a bronze token assassin?
And what about Du An?
The two men seemed to have reached a tacit balance, but he didn't know if they would eventually turn against each other due to conflicting goals.
As a pawn, Li Ban was given very limited information. Being caught in the middle was truly miserable.
Yet, ever since he transmigrated to this world, he had been used as a pawn at every turn.
Even his character itself was a pawn of the Laboratory.
The Laboratory Director claimed he and his mission were crucial, but never provided any substantial help.
Li Ban felt more like a stone tossed in to test the waters when crossing a river.
Perhaps he would only be able to take charge of his own life on the day his mission ended.
After Du An gave him a Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruit, Huo Jiang brought another one from Zhai Liu.
Besides the Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruit, he also brought Li Ban a magical tool.
Huo Jiang's eye twitched as he placed the ring onto the table.
After taking a moment to calm down, he introduced it to Li Ban. "This is a type of ring crafted by a special spirit practitioner. It's called a Plain Ring."
Li Ban looked down at the ring, his heart skipping a beat.
It looked incredibly similar to the ring Silver Kingfisher had picked out of the River of Forgetfulness.
They were both Plain Rings, and both had hieroglyphs he couldn't recognize carved into their inner bands.
Li Ban picked up the ring and pinched it between his fingers. "A spirit practitioner's element has this kind of ability?"
"The spirit practitioners you've come into contact with so far are just a tiny fraction of the whole. Your understanding of the Wizard World is also incredibly narrow, so don't act so surprised."
Perhaps out of sheer jealousy, Huo Jiang's tone lacked its usual feigned simple-mindedness.
"This type of ring can carry elemental abilities. Although I had heard of it once before, today is the first time I've actually seen one. You're competing to become an iron token assassin this time, so Lord Zhai lent it to you."
Huo Jiang told Li Ban to put the ring on so he could explain how to use it.
Li Ban slid the ring onto his left index finger.
The ring flashed and vanished, turning into a tattoo that circled the base of his index finger.
"Pour your spiritual rhinoceros into the ring until the Plain Ring turns completely black."
Li Ban did as instructed.
With plenty of spiritual rhinoceros in his body, he effortlessly filled the ring.
Watching the silver band on his index finger gradually turn black, Li Ban suddenly felt a slight burning sensation on his finger.
"Now you can use the Plain Ring's ability just like you would your own. The ability of this ring is 'Spider Web.' Lord Zhai said it can release a massive three-meter-square spider web with every use. It's highly resilient and sticky, useful for both attack and defense."
Had he become Spider-Man?
A three-meter-wide spider web—if its resilience and stickiness scaled proportionally, wouldn't this ring make him practically invincible among a group of wooden token assassins?
Even if a wooden token assassin was secretly a 3rd Tier spirit practitioner, this Plain Ring could effectively restrict their movements and help Li Ban secure victory.
"Can I go to the woods and test it? I need to confirm how the web is launched, as well as its resilience and stickiness."
"You may," Huo Jiang nodded. "However, a single Plain Ring can only use 'Spider Web' a maximum of five times. Even if you're just testing the ability, you need to keep that in mind. Use it well. Don't disappoint Lord Zhai."
After finishing his explanation, Huo Jiang left.
If he stayed any longer, he feared he wouldn't be able to suppress his jealousy and would murder Li Ban for the treasure!
Huo Jiang had actually used this Plain Ring once before.
Precisely because he had used it, he knew just how formidable it was.
For low-Tier spirit practitioners like them, it was practically a divine technique!
Moving swiftly and decisively, Li Ban packed his bags simply, brought Uncle Qin along, and drove a carriage straight out of the Death Prison. They moved to the outskirts of a mountain forest not far from the River of Forgetfulness for him to cultivate in seclusion.
Deep mountains were difficult to live in, but a sparsely populated hillside like this, which wasn't too far from the official road, was manageable.
With his current abilities, he had no fear of encountering wild beasts in the mountains.
Uncle Qin stayed in the carriage at the foot of the mountain, while Li Ban settled directly on the mountainside.
He didn't even have a house; he simply used broken branches to build a makeshift grass hut.
In any case, his physical constitution was high enough now that he didn't need to worry about falling ill from sleeping out in the open.
Li Ban spent almost the entire day immersed in cultivation.
Aside from essential eating, drinking, sleeping, and bathroom breaks, he never left the vicinity of his small hut.
Meanwhile, Uncle Qin was there to care for him in name, but his role was mostly to keep watch.
Now that Li Ban had taken so many good things from the big shots of the Death Prison, they were certainly afraid he would run away halfway through.
Of course, Li Ban had no thoughts of escaping; he just buried his head and focused entirely on cultivating.
Although he had obtained two more Spiritual Rhinoceros Fruits, they would take time to absorb.
To ensure he could compete for the iron token assassin identity, Li Ban had to maximize his strength in the shortest amount of time possible.
On the second day after moving to the mountain, Li Ban walked several hundred meters deeper into the woods. Once he confirmed no one was around, he raised his left hand toward a sapling.
"Spider Web!"
Li Ban chanted in his mind while mobilizing the spiritual rhinoceros within his body to activate the Plain Ring on his left index finger.
Instantly, his index finger felt slightly hot as heat gathered at his fingertip. Then, with a sudden thwip, a stream of white spider web materialized out of thin air, shooting rapidly toward the small sapling ahead.
Right before striking the trunk, the web—originally bundled together—suddenly flared open like a parachute, completely enveloping the small tree.
Li Ban stepped forward to examine the web's properties.
First of all, the web that just spread open in the air had a radius of nearly two meters. Its tension and speed were sufficient to ensnare a 1st Tier Spirit Cultivator in a single cast. Even a 2nd Tier spirit practitioner would find it difficult to completely escape the web's area of effect.
Furthermore, the web itself was extremely sticky. If someone tried to hack at it with a blade, even if they managed to cut through a strand as thick as a finger, the blade would get completely stuck. Coupled with the pulling force of the numerous silk threads, it would be impossible to retract the weapon.
However, this spider web also had a drawback: it was vulnerable to fire.
Much like strands of hair, it would instantly catch flame when singed.
At the same time, it couldn't endure prolonged freezing, as it would turn brittle. But using it suddenly in battle was more than enough to subdue an enemy.
Even for a higher-Tier spirit practitioner, getting their limbs glued together would severely hamper their mobility.
There was one more thing Li Ban discovered when he activated the 'Spider Web' ability.
Every time he used the spider web, he could control its size based on the amount of spiritual rhinoceros he channeled.
Launching a small web and launching a large web both consumed a single usage count, allowing Li Ban to customize the web's specifications according to the combat scenario.
It was extremely satisfying.
After testing the Plain Ring's 'Spider Web' ability, Li Ban pulled out the Plain Ring he had acquired previously.
He didn't know what ability this ring held.
Perhaps it was related to the characters carved onto it.
Unfortunately, Li Ban couldn't read the script, and the mission assistance system didn't offer a translation.
Li Ban slid this ring onto his right pinky finger.
The ring immediately transformed into a silver tattoo.
He proceeded to pour his spiritual rhinoceros into it.
However, this time, the tattoo didn't turn black; instead, it became transparent.
It looked exactly as if he wasn't wearing anything at all.
Since Li Ban didn't know this Plain Ring's ability, he could only test it once and hope that it had more than one usage count left.
He channeled his spiritual rhinoceros, doing his best to activate the Plain Ring.
The next moment...
He realized that he had disappeared.
Li Ban held up both hands in front of his eyes, but he couldn't see them at all.
He lowered his head, yet he couldn't see his own body either.
"Oh!"
A bit excited, he took a couple of steps forward.
Although invisible, the soles of his feet could still clearly feel the uneven texture of the pebbles on the ground.
When he stepped on dry branches and leaves, he could see the branches snap and hear the faint crunches of the leaves.
"It's Invisibility... It's actually Invisibility!"
Sensing that the Invisibility Plain Ring still had two uses remaining, Li Ban was filled with excitement.
He wasn't in a hurry to deactivate the ability; he wanted to see how long a single use of Invisibility could last.
Li Ban headed straight down the mountain, carefully shifting his feet to avoid making too much noise.
He quickly arrived beside Uncle Qin and squatted to the side, observing him.
Uncle Qin was boiling water.
Being stared at so intensely by Li Ban, the old man seemed to sense something. He stood up and glanced left and right.
However, there was absolutely no one to be seen in the vicinity.
After looking around warily for a moment, Uncle Qin sat back down on the large rock.
"It's close to the River of Forgetfulness here. Always feels so gloomy and eerie," Uncle Qin muttered to himself, rubbing the goosebumps that had prickled on the back of his neck.
Li Ban finally looked away, letting the nervous old man off the hook.
He had been standing just three meters away from Uncle Qin.
Standing right out in the open, with absolutely no cover in front of or around him.
Moreover, checking the spiritual rhinoceros capacity of the Plain Ring, Li Ban realized he could remain invisible for at least another two hours.
Li Ban immediately bypassed Uncle Qin and sprinted off into the distance.
This place was close to the River of Forgetfulness.
And the River of Forgetfulness was Li Ban's personal "scrapyard"!
Furthermore, with the corpses submerged in the River of Forgetfulness, Li Ban didn't have to worry about someone inspecting the bodies and noticing that their original creation-type or living-type elements were missing.
Only with zero risk of exposure could he go all out.
Because fully matured Cyan Silk Algae had been discovered on the nearby riverbed, the Myriad Ancient Pagoda had clearly reinforced their patrols over the surrounding waters.
No matter what time he came over, Li Ban could always see people rowing small boats along the river.
Not everyone here was a spirit practitioner. There were also people specifically assigned to guard the waters, preventing anyone who had caught wind of the Cyan Silk Algae from coming here to try their luck.
Since Fanggu Pagoda had yet to give up the search for the Cyan Silk Algae's shed seed disc, they naturally couldn't relax their guard.
As soon as Li Ban approached, he spotted a small boat roughly ten meters away.
A corpse retriever was standing on the boat.
While absentmindedly inspecting the corpses floating on the river's surface, he occasionally glanced left and right to check if anyone was sneaking into the river.
Because the River of Forgetfulness was shrouded in fog year-round, the Myriad Ancient Pagoda had deployed quite a lot of manpower to keep an eye on the water's surface.
But this time, Li Ban swaggered right up to the riverbank.
To prevent his wet clothes from leaving obvious traces, he stripped completely naked.
After confirming once again that the other party couldn't see him at all, Li Ban seized the moment a wave crashed onto the shore, using the churning water as cover to dive beneath the surface.
He remained undetected by anyone.
Thanks to Lu Qinghe's training, Li Ban felt no discomfort whatsoever when facing the floating corpses in the water.
Carefully utilizing the current, he pushed aside the floating corpses in front of him, dived deeper, and gradually made his way to the riverbed.
This spot was still some distance from the section of the riverbed where the Cyan Silk Algae had been found.
The riverbed was paved with small white stones.
Upon closer inspection, one would realize that they weren't stones at all, but bones.
Under the constant washing of the river water, they had turned into round, yet still rough, bone pebbles.
Knowing this was a rare opportunity, Li Ban gritted his teeth and assimilated the 'Sea Bream Gills' element he had recently purchased from Hai Dakui.
Now, he could stay underwater for the better part of a day!
However, he still needed to leave before the Invisibility Plain Ring lost its effect; he couldn't afford to leave any hidden risks for himself.
The degree of decomposition of the corpses on the riverbed was much higher than those on the surface.
The probability of finding a living person or usable elements was also correspondingly lower.
But who could deny that there were far more corpses submerged in the river?
The corpses floating on the surface barely made up a fifth of the total number in the river.
Though the corpse density was lower underwater, the sheer volume of the river meant the total quantity was vastly greater.
What he lacked in probability, he would make up for in volume.
Li Ban reached out to grab a corpse drifting near him and immediately began inspecting it for elements.
For a corpse already in his grasp, as long as no one else was fighting him for it at the moment, the mission assistance system defaulted to recognizing the corpse as belonging to Li Ban.
Therefore, it would initiate a scan.
The first scan yielded zero discoveries.
It might have simply lacked elements, or the elemental breakdown process might have failed.
It all came down to probability.
This wasn't a video game where you could just reap elements and farm a fixed amount of experience at will.
Coming up empty on his first try, Li Ban immediately tossed the corpse aside and grabbed the next one.
Nothing again?
Next!
With the corpses flowing constantly westward with the current, Li Ban planted his feet deep into the riverbed to anchor himself, then literally embraced every corpse that drifted his way.
Grab, inspect, release.
After inspecting over a dozen corpses, Li Ban finally found his first element.
The moment the element was extracted, it instantly degraded, turning into a waste element.
But waste elements were exactly what Li Ban needed right now.
Thus, in a great mood, he absorbed the waste element.
He chose to let his new element, the 'Sea Bream Gills,' absorb it first.
His 'Right Eye' and 'Flute Sound' were elements he used openly, and he planned to rest normally as much as possible to prevent anyone from noticing his abnormal progress speed.
As long as today's haul could fill his 'Sea Bream Gills' element with spiritual rhinoceros, he would break even.
Anything beyond that would be pure profit.
For the next hour or so, Li Ban scavenged corpses in the River of Forgetfulness.
Only a tiny fraction of them possessed elements.
And after the system decomposed them, every single one turned into a waste element.
'I have to admit, the probability of extracting a normal element from a corpse is just far too low.'
Although Li Ban only needed waste elements at the moment, he hadn't expected to fail to obtain even a single normal element... Yet, as it turned out, there really hadn't been a single one.
'No wonder the Myriad Ancient Pagoda, with its trade secrets, is the only one in the corpse business. Anyone else trying to extract elements would just be wasting their time.'
'Then that Blazing Flame Art I extracted last time... either my luck was through the roof, or the Blazing Flame Art itself is just incredibly resilient.'
Seeing that his time was almost up, Li Ban prepared to leave the River of Forgetfulness.
Although he hadn't acquired any normal elements, his 'Sea Bream Gills' were now full of spiritual rhinoceros. He even had an extra waste element left over to feed to his other elements.
Estimating the remaining duration of his 'Invisibility' ability, he got ready to go.
Li Ban left a little buffer time to avoid any unexpected hiccups on his way back.
As it turned out, right as he was about to swim to the riverbank, an accident—actually happened!
A massive splash suddenly erupted from above.
Li Ban quickly halted his movements and looked up.
He saw a massive, slender figure suddenly crash into the river water.
It sank quite a distance, nearly hitting the riverbed before it began to float back up.
Even amid such a sudden turn of events, Li Ban's Right Eye allowed him to clearly see the creature's appearance.
It appeared to be a giant serpent, over ten meters long.
Yet it had a pair of wings.
A pair of featherless, fleshy wings.
The giant serpent's head was shaped like an inverted triangle, and its orange-yellow eyes were as large as human heads.
When it blinked underwater, two layers of eyelids rapidly snapped open and shut in a truly terrifying manner.
Two pairs of venomous fangs protruded from its upper and lower jaws, undoubtedly capable of easily piercing a skull.
Li Ban was terrified that the winged serpent might release venom into the water due to its battle, but he was even more terrified that moving recklessly would alert it to his presence. Thus, he could only float motionlessly in the water like a corpse.
Fortunately, the winged serpent seemed to have another enemy.
After adjusting its fleshy wings to regain its balance, it immediately charged toward the surface.
Li Ban didn't dare to surface. Seeing the winged serpent leave, he instantly swam toward the shore, keeping his head hidden beneath the floating corpses on the river's surface.
He could only hear incessant roars echoing above the river, interspersed with the sounds of clashing metal and stone.
A full half an incense stick of time passed before the noise finally ceased.
The originally churning, turbulent river also finally returned to its initial calm state.
Li Ban waited underwater for a moment longer before using a corpse for cover to cautiously peek his right eye out and look up at the sky.
There, suspended in the air, was a giant, black, tiger-like beast.
Its equally black wings were spread wide, gleaming with a metallic luster under the sunlight.
It was the Black-Winged Qiongqi belonging to the tower master of the Myriad Ancient Pagoda!
At this moment, a person was standing on the Qiongqi's back.
He had broad shoulders, a thick back, and slightly dark skin.
A full beard grew wildly and aggressively across his face.
The winged serpent that had just fallen into the River of Forgetfulness was now limp, being hoisted up by the man with a single hand.
Li Ban took one look, immediately withdrew his gaze, and continued to cower in the water pretending to be a corpse.
The man standing on the back of the Qiongqi should be the tower master of the Myriad Ancient Pagoda, Wan Chengming.
He was also the former superior of the jailer, Du An.
And he was currently Li Ban's newest suspect for the identity of the "General"!