If he wanted to devour the legendary whale, Ji Minghuan would have to contend against an entire nation.
Even assuming Li Qingping stood on his side, relying solely on a shark and a red dragon to defeat the six Anecdote Envoys of the Royal Court Squad would be incredibly difficult.
Not to ntion the nurous Anecdote Envoy soldiers trained within the Whalegarden, who truly ford the backbone of this nation.
However, if he could successfully guide the White Raven Brigade into the Whalegarden, his side's combat power would beco far more formidable, perhaps even giving them a fighting chance.
'If the Leader knew about this, there is no way he would let such an excellent exploitable opportunity slip by. This is the treasure of a nation, hundreds of tis more valuable than the items at the auction,' Ji Minghuan pondered. 'But the problem is... how do I let Qi Yuanli know about this information and convince him of my words?'
At that thought, the shark rolled over inside the crystal ball. 'It seems I can only try contacting him through the Black Cocoon. If he brings the White Raven Brigade to the Whalegarden, my and Li Qingping's odds of winning will surely skyrocket.'
Xize'er lay quietly on his bed, an arm draped across his forehead, his white hair spread out beneath the moonlight.
After a long silence, he suddenly spoke up. "Yagubalu, I am so worried about Royal Father."
"Why is that?" the shark asked.
"Royal Father is sick. It is a very serious illness."
"What kind of illness?"
"I do not know what it is, but I heard others say it was caused by a bad guy nad Bernardo."
"Bernardo?"
Ji Minghuan's heart skipped a beat. He suddenly recalled that during the character creation phase, his first character's background ntioned soone nad Bernardo Edward.
That was the holder of the Generation-tier Anecdote Fragnt, the Black Death.
'Judging from this, the King must be suffering from an enhanced version of the Black Death?' he reasoned. 'No wonder... I was puzzled as to why the First Prince and Second Prince would dare act against the favored Third Prince if the King was perfectly healthy. So it is because the King is bedridden that they found an exploitable opportunity.'
"What will happen then?" the little shark asked. "If the King dies of illness, will this nation not fall into total chaos?"
"The Holy Grail."
"The Holy Grail?"
Xize'er nodded. "It is highly likely that only the Generation-tier Anecdote Fragnt, the Holy Grail, can cure Royal Father's illness. I suspect Li Qingping has been staying outside all this ti to help Royal Father search for that Anecdote Fragnt."
"So that is how it is..." the shark mused.
"I am deeply concerned that bad guys will target Royal Father. Many people covet the Scepter in his hands."
"Scepter?"
"The White King Scepter. It possesses the power to disarm any Anecdote Fragnt below the Mythic-tier."
"Even Generation-tier Anecdote Fragnts would be neutralized before that Scepter?" the shark asked curiously.
"Royal Father said that only a handful of Generation-tier fragnts can forcefully break through the Scepter's suppression, and even then, they would be severely weakened. Aside from those, the vast majority of Generation-tier fragnts would be disard. As for Anecdote Fragnts of lower tiers, there is no need to even ntion them; all Common-tier Anomalies and Ubiquitous Anomalies would be instantly neutralized by the Scepter," Xize'er explained. "Obtaining the White King Scepter... is equivalent to standing at the absolute pinnacle of the Whalegarden."
He paused for a mont. "Therefore, there are many who covet the Scepter in Royal Father's hands."
"Do not worry. I will eat the White King Scepter, and then the bad guys will never be able to find it," the shark declared with righteous indignation.
"There you go again."
"I was just joking." The shark's righteous indignation vanished in a flash.
Xize'er murmured, "Royal Father has always been so good to , but his health is poor. I cannot leave this place, but I truly wish I could help him find the Holy Grail. That way, he would not have to be bedridden every day."
"Then while the King is sick, couldn't the White King Scepter be stolen by soone?"
Xize'er shook his head and lowered his voice. "Royal Father hid the Scepter in a special vault. Only the Ruler of the Nation can open it."
"Alright then," the shark said. "By the way, since you are so naturally gifted, even if you do not cultivate, does no one teach you the knowledge of Anecdote Envoys?"
Xize'er sat up, cradled the crystal ball in his arms, and slipped out of bed, walking over to the balcony.
"Do you see those pointed buildings?" Xize'er leaned against the railing and pointed at the strikingly tall structures on the island over the sea.
"What are they?" The shark followed his gaze.
"Those are Anomaly Academies. Children born with the talent of an Anecdote Envoy go to school there; their curriculum is entirely different from ordinary children," Xize'er said. "I really want to go to school there and learn Anecdote knowledge alongside the other children."
He fell silent for a mont. "But Royal Father said that a Prince cannot attend school with commoners, as that would cause an overstepping of status."
"Then who teaches you?"
"The butler," Xize'er replied. "The butler cos to give
lessons every week, and he is also responsible for my als."
'A butler...' Ji Minghuan thought to himself. 'Could he have already been bought off by the First Prince and Second Prince? After all, not every butler is as dedicated as Oda Takikage.'
"Next ti your butler cos over, could you share the food he makes for you with ?" the shark suggested.
"Of course. I have a very small appetite anyway."
The boy and the shark chatted softly under the veil of night, while schools of fish drifted over their heads like a gentle breeze.
A short while later, an elderly man in a black butler's suit and white gloves opened the bedroom door, stepped inside, and offered a slight bow.
"It is ti to rest, Your Highness."
"Okay, I will go to sleep right away."
Xize'er hugged the crystal ball, returned to his bed, and closed his eyes. Seeing this, the butler quickly turned on his heel, left the room, and quietly shut the bedroom door.
"Is the castle safe while you sleep? Could soone sneak in?" the shark whispered.
"Do not worry," Xize'er replied. "While I am sleeping, the Floating Castle is protected by a barrier. No one can sneak into the floating city."
"That is good."
"Goodnight, Yagubalu."
"Goodnight, Xize'er." Cradling the crystal ball, Xize'er slowly let his eyelids droop, and within monts, he drifted into a deep sleep.
The shark could hear his soft, steady breathing close by.
Watching Xize'er's gently rising and falling chest and confirming he was sound asleep, the shark swam upward and silently nudged open the top of the crystal ball.
Then, it unleashed this avatar's skill—Dark Current Surge. Blackish-blue water gushed out, enveloping the shark's body from all directions and propelling it to fly through mid-air.
Spiraling through the current, it flew onto the balcony, gazing silently at the brightly lit island over the sea before its eyes finally locked onto the roof of the Royal Court Hall.
If it could completely devour all the Anecdote Fragnts left behind by historical mbers of the Royal Court Squad, it would not be surprising if this shark's true size instantly grew to several hundred feet.
The problem was how to get close... In movies and television shows, places like that were generally either heavily guarded or layered with ancient barriers. Once an intruder touched them, they would be reduced to ashes in an instant.
Just then, from the corner of its eye, the shark caught sight of an incomprehensible scene.
Within the darkness-shrouded night sky, a suspended staircase continuously stretched upward. Soone was treading upon these steps, slowly closing in on the castle.
Upon closer inspection, one would find this staircase incredibly magical: for every section it extended upward, the bottommost section would vanish. The extended portion and the disappearing portion were perfectly equal.
As a result, the total length of the staircase remained constant.
The stealthy silhouette walked along the seemingly endless suspended staircase, inching closer to the castle step by step.
'This person must be an assassin sent by Xize'er's two wonderful older brothers... But how is he able to get close to the castle? Didn't Xize'er say that when night falls, every floating city is protected by an invisible barrier?' Ji Minghuan wondered.
As the floating staircase drew nearer and nearer to the castle, the uninvited guest's face gradually reflected in the shark's pupils—it was a man draped in a black cloak, his face obscured by a mask that revealed nothing but a pair of eyes.
'He must be using the Anecdote Fragnt "Moving Staircase,"' Ji Minghuan deduced. 'I recall it being a single-use fragnt that disappears after activation, but this is far too convenient.'
At that mont, the intruder paused on the suspended steps.
He turned his head, scanned his surroundings, and locked his sights on the castle's balcony. Stepping off the stairs, he slipped from the balcony into the castle's bedroom, glancing sideways at Xize'er, who was sound asleep on the bed.
The man crushed a Common-tier Anomaly card in his hand. The silver luminescent patterns on the back of the card flashed fleetingly in the dark.
Imdiately after, a humanoid figure entirely covered in dense black fur materialized in the shadows, its muscles quivering faintly like a revving engine.
With the head of a wolf, the body of a man, and blood-red eyes, it was undeniably a werewolf.
Beneath the moonlight, the werewolf's muscles rippled like tidal waves. It let out a low, guttural snarl and stalked toward the bed, step by step.
In the next second, a shark roughly ten feet long viciously lunged out from the darkness. Its jaws suddenly expanded, becoming inexplicably larger than its entire body, transforming into a massive, abyssal maw.
Its razor-sharp fangs refracted the moonlight, the corners of its eyes drawing a fierce, brutal arc in the shadows.
Accompanied by a deep roar, the shark swallowed the werewolf whole in a single gulp, then snapped its jaws shut. The nearly seven-foot-tall werewolf instantly lost all signs of life, unable to so much as put up a struggle inside the shark's belly.
"Werewolf, delicious." The shark let out a burp and voiced its praise. Then, it turned its head to look at the trembling intruder. "As for humans... I feel like they wouldn't taste very good."
"What the hell is this thing? Hey, he never ntioned there would be a creature like this here!" The man froze, his mind slowly registering the situation as sheer terror filled his eyes. He stumbled backward unsteadily, muttering, "Monster... A monster, it's a mon—"
But before he could unleash a terrified scream, the shark, enveloped entirely in dark blue currents, lunged forward in mid-air. Spinning and dancing like a falling leaf, it closed the distance to the masked man at a speed imperceptible to the naked eye.
Lowering its body abruptly, the shark's dorsal fin carved out a razor-sharp arc. Cleaving downward like an executioner's long saber, it slashed cleanly through the assassin's body, bisecting him perfectly from top to bottom.
Manipulating the pitch-black currents, the shark lifted the assassin's bisected remains and the spurting blood. Just like that, it moved the two halves of the corpse to the balcony and tossed them over the edge into the sea below, taking all the bubbling, gushing blood right along with them.
"Perfect... Both the floor and the walls are completely clean."
Turning back, the shark spotted a card etched with silver luminescent patterns resting on the floor—it was unmistakably the Common-tier Anomaly: "Werewolf." Using the dark blue water to levitate the card, it popped it into its mouth as casually as tasting a scoop of ice cream.
[Successfully devoured a "Common-tier" Anecdote Fragnt. Triggering the effect of the exclusive cultivation system "Anecdote Gluttony." Your true size has increased by 6.5 feet.]
[Size change for Proxy Body No. 3 — Eternal Abyss Shark "Yagubalu": 328 feet → 335 feet.]
"A single Common-tier fragnt adds over six feet in size. Surpassing the legendary whale is just around the corner!" The shark's eyes lit up.
Right at that mont, Xize'er rolled over on the bed. Pressing his face into the pillow, he mumbled groggily,
"What is going on... It's so noisy."
The shark hastily shrunk its size, morphing back into the appearance of a Nobel Shark. Enveloped in the water current, it darted straight through the opening at the top of the crystal ball, then manipulated the water to lift the lid and seal the gap back up.
Xize'er slowly opened his eyes, staring at Shasha inside the crystal ball for a mont before asking softly,
"Yagubalu... was it you making those noises just now?"
"Xize'er..." Yagubalu said gently, "Soone is trying to kill you."
"What are you talking about? Who would want to kill ?" Xize'er yawned.
"Your two older brothers," Yagubalu murmured. "They tampered with things, shutting down the barrier protecting the floating city from the inside, and then let an assassin in to take your life. If this happens once, it will happen a second ti."
"Stop spouting nonsense... Yagubalu." Xize'er hugged the crystal ball and closed his eyes. "Goodnight."
His white eyelashes drooped low; in sleep, his peaceful face looked less like a young boy's and more like a girl's.
Yagubalu gazed intently at Xize'er's sleeping face in silence, thinking to himself what a pitiful child this was. If he knew that his two brothers were desperately racking their brains to erase him, his innocence would probably shatter in an instant.
Thinking of an even worse possibility, perhaps the First Prince and Second Prince had colluded with Bernardo Edward, the holder of the Black Death fragnt, from the very beginning.
And it was exactly because they plunged the King into a bedridden state that they could find an opportunity to eliminate Xize'er, the one most likely to inherit the throne.
'Seriously, Li Qingping, you pig, what exactly are you protecting? If I hadn't been here, wouldn't the Third Prince have t his maker tonight?'
Yagubalu grumbled inwardly.
Although Xize'er possessed a Generation-tier Anecdote fragnt, his ntal fortitude was nowhere near sufficient to handle combat calmly.
He was like a little boy entering a forest to hunt for the very first ti; even with a hunting rifle in his hands, he would be so startled by a charging porcupine that he would completely freeze up, lacking even the courage to pull the trigger.
'Whatever, ti to sleep... Su Zimai has already returned ho, so the most pressing matter right now is figuring out how to tornt her alongside Big Brother.' At this thought, the shark sprawled out at the bottom of the crystal ball, closed its eyes, and before long, dozed off in the warm seawater.
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