Chapter 22: Subsystem and Cornerstone (Patreon)

[March 7th: It actually worked?!]

[Lumine: Can two humans really go through the Pledge of Love with each other?]

[Mobius: Why would you think this guy counts as human?]

[Mobius: Have you forgotten? This guy stopped being human ages ago — he's an Ultimate Life Form now.]

[Lumine: So it's because he's an Ultimate Life Form that the Pledge of Love actually worked?]

[Mobius: Can't say for sure, but that's probably it.]

[Jing Yuan: Since he's an Ultimate Life Form, the Bitter Love Tree must have judged him not human but yao — which is why he could form the Pledge of Love with Miss Wise, who is human. That's actually a reasonable explanation.]

[Silver Wolf: So after going all the way around, it worked out because he stopped counting as a person? Dying laughing.]

"It... it actually worked?" Belle's voice jumped a full octave.

Beside her, Feixiao looked every bit as stunned.

A Pledge of Love between two humans — this had never happened before.

After completing the Pledge of Love with Wise, Gusttave pulled Belle along and started the ritual with her too.

Watching this, Feixiao scoffed, "Don't bother. The Bitter Love Tree, true to its name, would never let one person have two Pledge of Love partners."

Gusttave smiled. "That's not necessarily true."

Then he brought up their earlier bet: "If I pull this off, you're putting on that outfit and coming to my room tonight."

"Hmph, fine, I'll wear it! There's no way the Bitter Love Tree lets one person have two Pledge partners!" Feixiao shot back immediately.

"Then I'm in for a good night tonight."

With that, Gusttave began the Pledge ritual with Belle.

"I'm willing to swear on one-tenth of my own mana that we'll meet again in the next life."

"I... I'm willing." Belle hesitated a moment before answering.

Then, under Feixiao's horrified stare, the Bitter Love Tree answered Gusttave's plea once more.

Feixiao burst out, frantic, "No way! Bitter Love Tree, what are you playing at?!"

"How can one person have two Pledge partners?! You're breaking the rules! Do you understand — breaking the rules!"

Naturally, the Bitter Love Tree didn't answer her. A few petals simply drifted down, landing on her puffed-up fox ears, as if patting her head in half-hearted apology.

Gusttave grinned in a way that just begged to be punched. "A bet's a bet, General Feixiao. Who was it that said she'd wear that outfit to my room if I pulled it off?"

"Wh-who agreed to any bet!" Feixiao smacked his hand away, her ear tips flushed nearly to bleeding. She stiffened her neck and stepped back — only for Belle to lunge in from behind and hook an arm around hers.

Belle swung her arm back and forth, her pink ponytail whipping through the air, grinning until her eyes crinkled into crescents. "Hey, hey, hey, a promise is a promise! You slapped your own chest and made that bet yourself — you can't welch on it now. Besides, if the Pledge could go through, what's a little outfit?"

"You pink-haired brat, quit gloating!" Feixiao reached out to pinch Belle's cheek, and in an instant the two girls were tangled up in a scuffle.

Off to the side, Wise watched the scene, a smile tugging at her lips as her pale fingertips brushed lightly over her chest.

The success of the Pledge of Love filled her with anticipation.

At some point Tingyun had appeared from behind the tree, fanning herself with a folded fan. Her peach-blossom eyes curved into crescents, and her voice drifted out, unhurried. "Oh my, I merely stepped away to handle a bit of clan business, and I come back to find our benefactor's made quite the headline under the Bitter Love Tree. Truly remarkable."

At the same time, Huohuo appeared, expression flat. "Congratulations to you both."

The Pledge's success meant that in their next lives, Wise and Belle could still be with Gusttave.

Though the Pledge of Love wasn't guaranteed to succeed every single time, given Gusttave's abilities, it likely wouldn't be a problem.

In the days that followed, Gusttave enjoyed a rare stretch of peace and quiet.

With Jin Chenxi captured by Gusttave, Li Muchen had no chance to stir up trouble.

As for Wangquan Baye and the others, after being harshly punished by their elders back home, they finally settled down and threw themselves into cultivation.

By the time Wangquan Shouzhuo and Dongfang Guyue had grown old, Wangquan Baye and Yang Yitan had both grown into powerhouses capable of standing against Yao Sovereigns.

Li Zizai had once shown enormous potential too, promising to grow into a Yao Sovereign-level power, but unfortunately he died too young.

The rest of the Masked Daoists likewise grew into powerhouses on par with Great Yao Kings.

Among them, Li Quzhuo, driven by his own convictions, started looking for ways to let ordinary mortals make use of magic treasures too.

This had, in fact, always been the Way of Great Peace's mission — crafting simple magic treasures so mortals could gain the power to protect themselves.

Li Quzhuo's involvement accelerated that process to some degree.

Drawing on his past experience, he also developed the Mother-Child Mask System.

In this system, the Mother Mask held the abilities of the human race's great powerhouses, while a Child Mask could summon out any of the Mother Mask's full range of powers.

This mask system quickly became a crucial pillar of humanity's defense against creatures from Beyond the Circle.

One of the masks, in particular, carried Gusttave's own power.

After years of cultivation, Gusttave's power had reached the very peak of the Great Yao Sovereign realm, surpassing even Fan Yunfei at his prime by a fair margin.

The mask forged from his power was naturally the strongest of them all — but precisely because of that, only Wangquan Baye and Yang Yitan could bear its might.

[Aventurine: A system similar to the cornerstones?]

Seeing the mask system, Aventurine immediately thought of the cornerstones carried by Ten Stonehearts.

Each of Ten Stonehearts held a cornerstone of their own, and within it lay a portion of the authority belonging to Diamond, Emanator of Preservation.

Whenever the need arose, they could invoke their cornerstone to draw on a portion of Diamond's authority.

It bore a certain resemblance to the mask system.

The livestream went on.

During this time, Nanguo suffered heavy losses Beyond the Circle because of Huandu Qingtian's rash actions.

This stirred fresh rebellious ambitions among the Seventy-Two Grotto Yao Kings under him, who already harbored ulterior motives.

But since it was the hundred-thousand-strong yao army that had suffered devastating losses, and not Huandu Qingtian himself, they never actually went through with rebellion.

After all, none among the Seventy-Two Grotto Yao Kings was a Yao Sovereign-level powerhouse.

Though Huandu Qingtian ranked at the very bottom among the living Yao Sovereigns, his mastery of poison made him thoroughly nasty to deal with.

Much like a certain Poison Douluo — he might not be able to beat other Titled Douluo in a straight fight, but he could poison an enemy force down until only its Titled Douluo were left standing.

Huandu Qingtian was the same. He couldn't beat other Yao Sovereigns head-on, but he could whittle down an enemy force until only Yao Sovereign-level fighters remained.

Which meant human-wave or yao-wave tactics were useless against him.

With wave tactics rendered useless, rashly confronting Huandu Qingtian was simply suicide.

Having suffered heavy losses of his own, Huandu Qingtian was forced to halt his expansion Beyond the Circle, and quietly sent people to the human realm to learn how to deal with creatures from Beyond the Circle.

After all, being far too proud, he could never bring himself to openly ask humans for guidance.

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