I went to the living hall after I logged off. As mentioned earlier, He Yi and Murong Mingyue had returned with two boxes of hot, steaming pizza and… an Anhui stinky Mandarin fish, a steamed bullfrog, and several white buns. The complex mix of smells made everyone feel indecisive as well.

"OMG, which one should I eat first…"

At the dining table, Beiming Xue hesitated for a long time before finally picking up a slice of pizza and taking a bite out of the Anhui stinky Mandarin fish. She beamed. "It’s so tasty…"

He Yi smiled back. "We bought it from that old Anhui restaurant when we passed through the new district. It’s pretty renowned far and wide, you know? It only sells 30 dishes of Anhui stinky Mandarin fish a day. I had to book it with my phone to buy one."

I spread my arms for a moment before rubbing the gauze between my fingers with a frown.

Seeing this, Murong Mingyue immediately rose to her feet and grabbed my hand. She asked, "Is it still hurting?"

"It’s okay. The wound is almost fully scabbed," I replied with a smile. It was the injury I inflicted upon myself when I was trying to dig out Murong Mingyue that day, and there hadn’t been a day gone by where she wasn’t worried about it.

"You should avoid getting water on your wound as much as possible. It’ll scab faster that way," said Murong Mingyue.

I laughed. "How am I going to avoid water while bathing, for example? Or are you going to wash my back for me?"

Murong Mingyue smiled sweetly. "Sure! If even you don’t mind, why would I?"

I immediately sounded the gong of retreat and escaped to the seat next to He Yi. I picked up a slice of pizza, sauced it with a bit of stinky mandarin fish sauce, and… mm hmm, the combination of flavors was truly exquisite!

The next food combo I went for was white buns + steamed bullfrog.

…...

Half an hour of ferocious eating later, we were all filled to the brim.

"What did you do today, Lu Chen?" He Yi asked me with a wide smile on her face.

I thought for a moment. "I accepted a quest from Xinran that I haven’t finished yet. The next quest in the chain is to kill a lot, and I mean A LOT, of Level 165 ancient mobs. It’s difficult, and the enemies are so strong that I can’t AoE them like I used to, which means that grinding will be very slow. Luckily, this quest can be shared with two other players, so I want you and sis to come online and join me later. It’s been a long time since the two of you went online, right? This is the perfect time for you to catch up in levels!"

He Yi replied pleasantly, "Sure. It so happens that Mingyue and I don’t have any important business to attend tomorrow. We can afford to sleep late tonight. We’ll join you on your grind."

"Mn. I’ll party the two of you once I go online. With your mount, it should take you only 20 minutes or so to reach my location. Don’t forget to teleport to Floating Ice City first."

"I know!"

"Don’t forget to restock your Health Potions and Magic Consumables…"

"Mn!"

……

After the meal, we drank a few glasses of water and went back to our rooms for a new battle.

Swhoosh!

My vision brightened, and I was back at the ruins of the Roland Empire. I climbed out of my tent and looked around me. The sky was gray dark, and the barely alive Knight Captain Mengchuan was still lying beneath the wall and waiting for me to complete my quest. I couldn’t bring his remains to Xinran unless I completed all the quests he had given me. Of course, this was a golden opportunity to grind some levels, one that not many people could come by.

Beep! Beep! The moment He Yi and Murong Mingyue came online, I immediately sent them a party invite, since it had no range limitations. They accepted it immediately, and I could see the two dots representing them moving toward me on the world map. The Snow Domain Windchaser had great movement speed, so I was sure that they would reach me in 20 minutes or so. All I needed to do was wait for them to arrive.

I walked out of the capital city and went to the camps. Even from a distance, I could see the place crawling with Undead Roland Soldiers. There had to be tens of thousands of them at least, which was more than enough to fulfill my quota. I was in no hurry to complete the quest, however. The more I killed, the more Roland equipment set I could collect, and this place was overflowing with mobs!

You know what? I’m going to kill some of them until He Yi and Murong Mingyue arrive!

And so I baited eight Undead Roland Soldiers to my side and killed them slowly and methodically. It was much harder to create an advantageous position for myself without the Sky Obsidian Greedy Wolf to help me, but it wasn’t beyond my capabilities. It cost more resources than usual to fight, but a worthwhile grind like this wasn’t bad at all.

After killing a bunch of mobs, I took a seat atop a pile of magic stones and two low-grade items to rest. I brought up the guild channel—

Xu Yang: "God damn, three Famous Generals in an hour? Was there a bug in the system or something?"

Li Chengfeng: "Nah, it’s just going through a seizure…"

Chaos Moon: "Three Famous Generals and not a single one of them is ours. So sad!"

I asked hurriedly, "What happened? Did someone say that three Famous Generals appeared in the past hour?"

Chaos Moon: "Yes, and that’s not all. Check the Famous General Rankings. All three of them learned the same Famous General Skill called ‘Soul of the Foot’. It’s quite bizarre…"

"Soul of the Foot?" I was confused.

I brought up the Famous General Ranking quickly and saw three new Famous Generals on the list as mentioned earlier. The stratagem they learned was called Soul of the Foot, and it increases the attack power and defense power of all physical-based players who were on foot by 25%. The cap was 100% for both attributes. It wasn’t a unique Famous General Skill, meaning that more people could learn them. At the current stage of the game, it was very useful because not many people were on a level they could ride mounts. A 100% boost in attack power and defense power was extremely powerful to say the least.

All three Famous Generals belonged to Wind City. After I investigated their profiles for a bit, I was astonished to find that all three of them were members of Candle Dragon. More specifically, one of them was a member of the main guild, and the other two, members of the first subguild. Candlelight Shadow must be smiling so much that he looks like Joker right now, isn’t he?

I let out a chuckle before replying, "Golden Age Hero, Blood Slash, and Song of Pig are all players from Candle Dragon, but it’s fine. Soul of the Foot demands its players to be on foot, but in the future most people will be riding mounts for the massive stat boosts, meaning that Famous Generals with Soul of the Foot must choose if they want to ride a mount or use Soul of the Foot. Hehe, they’re the ones who're going to have a headache, not us!"

Li Chengfeng also added with a hearty laugh. "That’s right, all our Famous General Skills, Knight God, Knight General, Martial God, Royal Road, Bow God and the like are many times stronger than this Soul of the Foot. This is especially true in the case of Knight God. I’m sure that the endgame meta will still revolve around Little Gui’s Knight God, Lu Chen’s Martial God, Beiming Xue’s Bow God, and Eve’s Royal Road!"

High Fighting Spirits joined in. "Yes, Li is correct. The three ‘Gods’ and Royal Road are our trump cards. Candle Dragon can never compare to us in this regard."

I nodded. "Right. Let’s grind harder while we still hold the advantage. I heard that Candle Dragon has been organizing a lot of leveling events as of late. We can’t fall behind them."

Gui Guzi: "Okay, me and my thousand-man cavalry party will be heading out in a jiffy, hehe!"

……

After the short conversation ended, I continued killing mobs while waiting for He Yi and Murong Mingyue to arrive. Throughout the fight, I didn’t summon the Phantom Wolf King because its level was too low and would only require extreme protection. I would only let it out when He Yi and Murong Mingyue showed up, and we found a choke point to grind the mobs en masse. Hopefully, the little wolf could leech enough experience to level up to 100 before the end of the day. Considering that it was an Immortal Rank boss pet, it should have enough stats to help out by that point.

It was at this moment I heard the sound of galloping hooves. A snow-colored warhorse was heading my way, and its riders were none other than He Yi and Murong Mingyue. He Yi was swinging her sword and controlling her mount. Murong Mingyue was hugging the magic knight’s waist tightly and looking like she was in a bliss or something. It was a very beautiful yuri moment to say the least.

Stop!"

I ran up to them and stopped them before they could get any closer. Then, I pulled Murong Mingyue down the horse and greeted, "Great to see you both. Now, the mobs are Level 165 ancient mobs, so don’t be complacent when you heal us later, sis. We will die if you make too many mistakes."

Murong Mingyue nodded. "Got it. How should we do this?"

"With our numbers? We AoE them down, of course!"

I looked around. After searching for a very long time, I finally found a somewhat usable choke point for the party. Specifically, it was two imperial totem pillars that had broken down and crossed each other at a 75 degree angle. It was big, but He Yi, I, and the girls’ pets were just barely enough form a triangular choke point where Murong Mingyue and the Phantom Wolf King could be protected.

I pointed at the choke point, and the girls understood my meaning immediately. After we got close, I told them where to take their positions. He Yi stood outside and summoned her Firelight Mouse to occupy some space. Murong Mingyue’s pet was the cruel, melee-oriented Ironwing Dragon. It was now Level 107, and it was big enough to take up about a 2x2 square of space. It also had massive Defense, so it could absolutely be used as a meatshield. Although the Ironwing Dragon was a Heaven Rank boss pet, it was still weaker than my Phantom Wolf King.

After the pets were in place, I left an empty space for myself and He Yi. He Yi blinked her beautiful eyes before asking, "Why is the space next to Mingyue empty?"

"Ahem, that’s because there’s one more guy who’s going to share our experience!"

"Oh? Who’s that?"

I waved my hand and summoned a magic formation. A wolf cub that looked like a furball immediately crawled out and wagged its tail rapidly. It was clearly very eager to acquire He Yi’s attention.

"Wah! What a beautiful little doggie!"

Both He Yi and Murong Mingyue were beaten by the Phantom Wolf King’s cuteness immediately. He Yi even got off her horse and carried the Phantom Wolf King in her arms. The little wolf looked like it was having the time of its life kneading its paws against He Yi’s breasts, but I was the complete opposite. Pulling it away from He Yi and dropping it next to Murong Mingyue, I said, "This guy needs some experience."

"Oh, I see. Did you get a new pet?"

"Yes."

"You mean this cute little doggie? What skills does it have? Is there something like ‘Kill the World with Cuteness’?"

"..."

Dumbfounded by their reactions, I said nothing and simply posted the Phantom Wolf King’s stats screen in the party channel. The girls’ mouths immediately turned into an O-shape.