Edited by Aelryinth

The ingredients were complete, and Huang Tielan had studied the recipe of those two beast cards’ cultivation fluid repeatedly the past two days.

Everything was ready, only waiting for the eastern wind. They could start immediately when Zhang Che got back.

—

Aboard Dijiang-hao, the elemental queen was uncharacteristically not playing chess on her personal terminal. She asked Zhang Che curiously, “Master, can we break through that way too?”

The elemental queen was a little jealous seeing Zhang Che’s beast cards were able to level up through the cultivation fluid method.

Hearing the elemental queen’s anticipatory question, a streak of black lines appeared on Zhang Che’s forehead. Leaving the elemental queen aside for now, although his other pets could be recalled into his spiritual sea, that was the work of the rainbow crystal.

In other words, pets couldn’t exist inside his spiritual sea like beast cards did. Naturally they couldn’t increase their strength quickly through the cultivation fluid method.

As for the elemental queen, her lifeform was fundamentally different from exotic beasts. Zhang Che couldn’t even see her attributes; much less talk about increasing her level with that method.

As for the elemental queen killing exotic beasts being similar with Zhang Che’s pets, leaving only corpses behind, Zhang Che didn’t think it was related to her being his pet. It was mainly determined by her lifeform.

As such, Zhang Che directly shook his head to the elemental queen’s question, saying, “You’re not a subdued beast. How can you become stronger by using cultivation fluid?

“But, as a fire elemental spirit, you should naturally know what items are beneficial to your growth, right? I don’t recall hearing you say anything about that, though.”

Since they were on this subject, Zhang Che thought of this matter. He was very curious to whether the elemental queen had some unique methods to increase her strength other than absorbing the rainbow crystal’s energy.

Take the Darkfiend Abyssal Dragon, for example. That guy could devour all cold-attributed energy, exotic beasts, and spiritual herbs to quickly increase his strength.

The Umbra Wind God Leopard could also devour other dark or wind-attributed exotic beasts to power up.

However, those two fellow’s attributes were a little too rare. Finding large amounts of food for them was obviously not realistic.

Otherwise, with how many exotic beast corpses left behind during this period of intense exotic beast hunting, it should have been enough for those two pets to advance to divine-quality!

The elemental queen immediately displayed a look of helplessness at hearing Zhang Che’s words, saying, “Aiya, just talking about this saddens me. This servant can consume fire-attributed energy to increase my strength, but the requirement for that fire-attributed energy is too high! If Master can find me innate fire-attributed exotic beasts, or various flames of heaven and earth, I can indeed become a little stronger.”

Zhang Che immediately fell silent. What a joke! Zhang Che had entered countless beast worlds, and he had seen very few exotic beasts with innate fire elements! Even the Scarlet Flame Drake didn’t have its innate fire attributes when he first obtained it.

As for the natural flames, it was obvious they weren’t ordinary stuff just by the sound of it. The only thing that resembled flames of heaven and earth from what Zhang Che had seen thus far was the flaming mountains in the desert where he found the elemental queen.

Also, it was certain that the flame essence contained in the flaming mountains was all absorbed by the elemental queen, bringing about her epic-level combat ability. It was impossible for any to be left there, or the elemental queen would have brought the matter up earlier.

Although Zhang Che knew his chances were slim, he wasn’t willing to dash the elemental queen’s hopes of becoming stronger. He consoled, saying, “Hmm, then I’ll pay more attention to look out for information on this regard when we enter the beast worlds in the future. If we come across any innate fire-attributed exotic beasts, or discover any flames of heaven and earth, I’ll reserve them all for you.”

“Really? That’s great!” the elemental queen cheered. Afterwards, she mumbled softly, “Master, you sound so patronizing. Maybe you can fool the stupid exotic beasts with that, hahahaha…”

Veins popped up on Zhang Che’s forehead. -She’s really asking for a beating!-

His gaze settled on a certain unspeakable part of the elemental queen’s body for a moment, wondering to himself what it felt like if he slapped her there… But he decided to forget about it after thinking things through. Playing with fire would be troublesome.

——

Zhang Che didn’t encounter any incidents on this trip back to Bei Du. It was a smooth journey.

It went without saying that exotic beasts at the shadowy beasts’ level were rare. Zhang Che was already very lucky to have run into them twice and killed a total of four of them. How could he keep running into them?

Zhang Che was about to arrive at Bei Du when his mother Sun Lan gave him a call, surprising him. The parents of his cousin’s girlfriend actually travelled to Bei Du from Tian Xing City, and came to the villa for a visit.

Speaking of which, when his great aunt’s family shifted to Bei Du, his uncle Xi Wenshan’s girlfriend came with him and had been helping out at Premium House.

Zhang Che had met the girl before. Her name was Qu Wenjing, and like her name suggested, she was gentle and quiet, but she had strong opinions.

( TL Note: wen jing means cultured and quiet)

It made sense, thinking about it. Her parents were extremely against it when she first started dating Xi Wenshan, but she insisted on being together with him. Although she met with much resistance from her family, she never left Xi Wenshan’s side.

This kind of girl was very admirable. After all, Qu Wenjing’s family was rather influential in Tian Xing City, and was in a much better position than Sun Shaoying’s family.

Afterwards, the Qu family slowly understood the changes to her family, and gradually loosened their resistance to the two’s relationship, especially after learning Zhang Che’s identity.

Her parents’ purpose for coming to Bei Du was, on the one hand, to visit their daughter after not seeing her for so long, and on the other hand, for the two’s marriage. After all, the two were already in their late twenties. They weren’t considered young anymore.

Sure enough, when Zhang Che returned to his home in Bei Du, he saw Qu Wenjing and Xi Wenshan’s parents discussing the marriage of the two.

The Qu family elders were helpless about it. Their daughter had followed her boyfriend to Bei Du, and stayed for a few months, only returning home once very briefly recently before heading back to Bei Du in a hurry. It was obvious she was treating Bei Du as her home now.

Not only that, when Sun Shaoying’s family returned to Tian Xing City for the relocation of the graves, they had paid a formal visit to the Qu family and raised the matter about the two’s marriage. That time, Qu Wenjing’s parents didn’t give them a clear answer. Them visiting Bei Du indicated they had already made their decision.

While the elders were discussing about Xi Wenshan and Qu Wenjing’s marriage, naturally it wasn’t appropriate for Zhang Che to listen in as a junior. As such, he and Huang Tielan walked over to the villa next door and started concocting the cultivation fluids for the Purple Jade Condor and the Dark-Scaled Lizard Commander.

Seeing the childishness slowly fading from Huang Tielan’s face and her looking more and more mature, Zhang Che started thinking to himself. -Tsk. Should I ask great aunt to find a day and make a trip to the Huang family to propose marriage?

-Hmm, this matter should be put on the agenda as soon as possible. Father-in-law would be happy to see that, right?-

Zhang Che was right on the money. As he displayed greater and greater strength, and his talent shone brighter and brighter, Huang Juyun had already acknowledged Zhang Che as his son-in-law. He did feel complicated about it, not willing to see his daughter married off elsewhere, yet hoping to see the two settling down as soon as possible.

“Zhang Xiaoche, why do you keep looking at me like that?” Huang Tielan asked coquettishly blushing slightly after seeing Zhang Che staring at her. She thought he was daydreaming about something dirty again.

“Hmm, Tielan, I realize you seem to have become much prettier after not seeing you for a few days!” Zhang Che replied glibly. Naturally he wouldn’t say what he was thinking directly.

“Tch, your words lack sincerity. You don’t even make any practical moves!” Huang Tielan quipped, rolling her eyes at him.

“Tsk, tsk. You want practical actions? Of course that goes without saying!” Zhang Che chuckled, scanning left and right. The two had already walked into the lab, and he immediately hugged Huang Tielan, bringing his mouth to her face…