At the border area of Antu City, many soldiers from Andai State were on alert and patrol.
The orders they received were simple: absolutely no one was allowed to cross the border line into Beixing Country.
The higher-ups issued this command, naturally, to capture the Shadow who had caused chaos in Bandzhen. They believed that after burning down Basong's manor, the Shadow would definitely return to Beixing Country, so they set up checkpoints on all the likely routes.
Furthermore, people were stationed to keep watch on various streets throughout Antu City. As soon as anyone suspected to be a foreigner was spotted, it would be reported up the chain.
But in reality, this approach was completely ineffective.
Firstly, if Guan Tong wanted to return, by using the combination of his Shadow and Body Swap, any obstruction would be meaningless.
Secondly, Guan Tong had no immediate plans to leave Andai State.
Yes, he wasn't currently in the border city of Antu, but deep within a forest in Andai State.
As a country with a typical tropical rainforest climate, Andai State's territory contained vast expanses of dense, broad forests.
Many of these remained undeveloped. Guan Tong simply found one, burrowed deep inside, summoned his shelter, and temporarily settled down.
It wasn't that he didn't want to return to Beixing Country, but he was currently worried about how the Beixing authorities viewed him.
Before taking action against Basong, he had actually considered that by doing this, the Andai State authorities would definitely protest from a national standpoint.
How Beixing Country would respond was hard to say.
Previously, Guan Tong wouldn't have worried about being found by the authorities while staying on Mingdao Mountain, but the situation was different now.
Now, as long as he held the puzzle fragments, his location would be known to the other two holders.
This made Guan Tong worry about a specific possibility: those two fragment holders might actively leak his location information to the Beixing Country authorities.
This might seem far-fetched, but it was a real possibility. In fact, the possibility wasn't small.
The reason was that the other two fragment holders likely had the backing of major organizations, or even official backgrounds.
Whereas Guan Tong was just an individual Ascendant.
If the organizations the other two fragment holders belonged to engaged in negotiations with the Beixing Country authorities regarding the fragment transaction—and discovered during the talks that Beixing Country's fragment holder wasn't affiliated with the authorities—then, to facilitate the negotiations, actively informing the Beixing Country authorities of that holder's location would have a logical basis.
Considering this point, after much deliberation, Guan Tong decided it was better to stay outside for now.
—So, wasn't he worried that the other two fragment holders would reveal his location to the Andai State authorities, who were currently issuing a warrant for him?
Actually, he was worried about that too.
Guan Tong wasn't afraid of ordinary soldiers or Ascendants from Andai State coming to cause trouble, but he was afraid of long-range bombardment.
That's right, he could always monitor and be on guard against ground assaults through his Shadow's surveillance eyes.
But what if the enemy didn't attack head-on? What if, after roughly determining your location, they simply launched missile strikes from a distance...
Andai State might very well be capable of such a thing.
Guan Tong even felt that the Suroma Empire might have similar intentions.
This powerful empire had always acted with arrogance, preferring to use stealth bombers to drop various bombs for precision strikes from extremely high altitudes.
If Suroma's fragment holder was affiliated with the authorities and could mobilize Suroma's military forces, it was highly likely they would dispatch several large bombers to fly over based on the fragment's location and drop bombs from high altitude.
After all, the fragments possessed the "indestructible" property. They just needed to kill the holder and then retrieve the fragments.
To address this situation, Guan Tong had also prepared a contingency plan.
That was to separate himself from the fragments.
Yes, at this moment, his two fragments weren't on his person. Instead, they were wrapped up by a separated shadow line. This shadow line was far from his current location and buried deep underground, so there was no need to worry about them being destroyed during a bombardment.
This way, he could always sense the condition of the fragments while not having to worry about being bombed in his sleep one day—although he had a shelter, he felt its current defensive capabilities probably couldn't withstand a high-power missile strike.
Aside from the reasons above, during the two days since he went abroad, he also felt that doing many things was more convenient outside, so he planned to stay outside for a while longer before considering whether to return to his country.
Furthermore, he was also determined to obtain the other three fragments of the puzzle.
This meant that if he couldn't obtain them through other channels, or if the other fragment holders didn't actively seek him out, he might have to travel to the Suroma Empire or Sakura Prayer Country in the future. Setting out from Andai State might be more convenient then.
However, that definitely wasn't something to be done in the next few days.
Guan Tong believed that the other two fragment holders would definitely get the news and become vigilant. Trying to go directly to obtain their fragments now was unlikely.
Moreover, his trip to Andai State had left him somewhat tired. He planned to rest a bit and consider going after the other fragments only after the tenth rule ended.
In the evening, Guan Tong turned on his computer and logged into the Ascendant Home website.
"Haven't been on my site for a few days. Wonder if there's anything new."
He didn't know until he looked, but he found himself trending again. Many posts were related to him, one with a particularly high reply count.
"Breaking News! Shadow God wreaks havoc in Andai State's capital, Bandzhen, and is wanted by Andai State authorities!"
"OP works in the foreign affairs department. Just received a protest from Andai State's foreign affairs department, saying Shadow God killed over a hundred people in their capital, a serious crime, and demanding Beixing Country authorities assist in capturing Shadow God!"
"???"
"What's going on? Did Shadow God go on a killing spree abroad?"
"Didn't personal cross-border travel get banned after the Doomsday Rules started? How did Shadow God get out?"
"Are you stupid, person above? Shadow is the world's number one ranked Ascendant. You think something as minor as leaving the country would stop him?"
"This is getting serious. Wonder how the authorities will handle it."
"That Lucifer from Suroma also went abroad and killed a bunch of people, right? I saw Suroma only issued a warrant on the surface and didn't send planes or warships to capture him or anything."
"Don't compare my Shadow God to that murderer Lucifer!!! Shadow God must have had a reason for doing this!"
Users were enthusiastically discussing the matter, speculating about the reason Shadow went to cause trouble in Andai State and how the authorities would handle it.
Guan Tong read for a while before closing the post, as the general public didn't know the truth, and their baseless speculations weren't very meaningful. The only noteworthy point was the formal protest from Andai State's foreign affairs department, which threw the problem to the Beixing Country authorities.
Then, to his surprise, when he clicked into the commissions section, he saw a commission with an extremely high price, and it was related to the puzzle fragments.
"Commission Thread~ Those with the [Kimos Star Chronicle·Fragment] item, look here. I want to purchase them for 5 million Ascension Coins each. If interested or want to discuss, please private message me."
The user who posted the commission had the nickname "Primordial One".
The post had hundreds of replies, mostly from confused users.
"What is [Kimos Star Chronicle·Fragment]? How come I've never heard of it?"
"Wow, what item can sell for 5 million? Are you sure this isn't some made-up fishing attempt?"
"This is a meaningless commission thread, right? Administrator, why not delete it?"
These comments were perfectly normal, as there were only 5 puzzle fragments in total. Besides the holders, only a very small number of people would know about them.
Guan Tong didn't know if the poster was connected to the Sakura Prayer Country holder or the Suroma Empire holder, but he knew this wasn't a fishing attempt. These fragments were genuinely worth millions.
Looking at the poster's nickname "Primordial One
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