"What? You've taken care of the magical beasts already? How is that even possible?" Yu Rou said.

Then she peeked her head outside the carriage window to look at the front.

​​

"W-What?!" Yu Rou exclaimed in a shocked voice the very next moment, startling Xia Jingyi.

"What happened?!" Xia Jingyi asked her.

"T-The magical beasts on the road have all been killed!" Yu Rou said.

She pulled her head back inside the carriage before turning to look at Yuan with a look of disbelief on her face.

"H-How did you do that? What did you do?" she asked him.

Yuan lifted his palms and removed the camouflage that kept the Starry Abyss invisible, revealing to them the secret.

Yu Rou looked at the beautiful black dagger hovering above Yuan's palm and said, "Wait a minute… I have seen that dagger before. You used it to remove materials from magical beasts before!"

"Yes, and I can control it without needing to wield it, allowing me to attack from a distance. It's very convenient."

"Wow… As expected of you, brother…" Yu Rou mumbled in a low voice, her eyes filled with admiration.

Xia Jingyi was also impressed by his prowess as well, and she wondered what cultivation level he was at, but she was too shy to ask him, so she could only imagine it inside her mind.

Sometime later, the carriage began moving again after the driver snapped out of his daze.

And for the rest of the journey, Yuan would take care of the magical beasts before they could even reach the road.

About three hours after they left Seashell City, their carriage finally arrived at the Orange Lands.

"Wow, no wonder why they named this place the 'Orange' Lands. There's so much orange color in this place…" Yuan mumbled as he admired the orange scenery.

From the grass to the trees and the flowers, they were all orange in color, almost like this place was experiencing autumn while the rest of the world was in a different season.

"Do you know where are the Black Horn Bulls?" Yu Rou asked the driver.

He nodded and pointed to the wilderness in the distance and said, "You can find them a few miles in that direction. I will be stationed here until tomorrow or until you're all ready to return to the city."

"Alright. Thank you."

Sometime later, Yu Rou and the others followed the driver's directions and disappeared into the distance.

Once they were inside the orange wilderness, Yuan said, "Xiao Hua, can you look for the Black Horn Bulls for us with your Divine Sense? Mine is still too weak to search for them efficiently."

"Sure thing, Brother Yuan," she said.

"What?" Xia Jingyi raised her eyebrows after hearing Xiao Hua's words.

Did she just call him 'Yuan'?

It was at this moment that Yuan realized that Xia Jingyi wasn't aware of his identity and that he didn't tell Xiao Hua to not call him 'Yuan', as he wasn't prepared for Xia Jingyi's presence.

Meixiu and Yu Rou also realized this, but they couldn't think of any good excuses to make so quickly.

'Xiao Hua, call me Brother Yu Tian!' Yuan quickly used his Divine Sense to speak with Xiao Hua.

"B-Brother Yu Tian?" Xiao Hua said.

When Xia Jingyi heard this, she thought to herself, 'Oh, so I really heard it wrong… Their names sound kind of similar, too.'

After all, there was no way that Yu Rou's brother would be that famous Player Yuan.

'Hopefully, she didn't find out…' Yuan sighed inwardly.

However, he then wondered to himself, 'Wait… Do I really need to hide my identity from her? I think she's trustworthy enough to know about my identity…'

But it was a little late since he's already tried to hide his identity from her.

A moment later, Xiao Hua said, "Brother Yua— Yu Tian, there's a couple of Black Horn Bull half a mile in that direction."

"Okay, let's go."

They started moving in the direction that Xiao Hua pointed towards.

About ten minutes later, they stopped moving.

"Wow, there's so many of them— at least a dozen. How should we take care of them?" Yu Rou asked.

"I can kill them with the Starry Abyss, but I doubt you'd want me to do that…" Yuan said.

"That's right, brother. If you do everything for us, it wouldn't be fun. We're here for the experience, after all."

Then she said, "I am going to use wind blades to take out as many as I can. Jingyi, you'll take care of the ones that I miss."

"Okay." Xiao Jingyi nodded her head before taking a seat on the ground and retrieving a familiar-looking object from her spatial ring.

"That's… a zither? You can play the zither?" Yuan was surprised to see Xia Jingyi pull out a zither.

"Yes." Xia Jingyi said as she placed the zither on her lap.

And she continued, "The zither is similar to some of the instruments I play, so I picked it as my main weapon."

"We can talk about this later. Let's deal with the Black Horn Bulls for now before they notice us or run away." Yu Rou said to them.

"Are you ready?" She then asked Xia Jingyi.

"I am."

"Good, then let me begin!"

After taking a deep breath, Yu Rou began fanning her fan many times in quick succession, sending out many wind blades at the herd of Black Horn Bulls that were eating the orange grass on the ground.

The wind blades went straight through the trees that blocked their path, knocking them down.

In just a few moments, Yu Rou had slain a little over half of the magical beasts.

When the other Black Horn Bulls saw this, they immediately stopped eating and pointed their pointy black horns in their direction.

"Jingyi, they are coming!" Yu Rou warned her.

"Got it!"

Xia Jingyi then pulled the strings on the zither with spiritual energy applied to her fingers and the zither itself.

The next second, many ripples began appearing in the area.

And the moment the ripples touched the magical beasts, they stopped moving and coughed up blood before falling to the ground in a lifeless manner.

"Wow… What kind of technique is that? This is my first time seeing it." Yuan asked her afterward.

"It's an Earth-grade zither technique that allows me to attack my targets internally," she said.

"What? That sounds overpowered, attacking them internally… Doesn't this mean you can easily defeat all of your enemies?" Yuan said.

"Not really. My attacks can easily be repelled if someone has enough spiritual energy protecting their body. Also, it doesn't have much of a range, so I can only use it when I am close to them with someone protecting me…"

She then said, "Do you want to learn the technique? I can lend you the technique if you want."

"Really? You won't mind?" Yuan asked her.

"I don't mind. I bought it with my own money, and I have already learned it."

Xia Jingyi then took out the technique from her spatial ring before handing it to Yuan casually.

Yuan was speechless. He didn't think she'd be willing to give him an Earth-grade technique so easily and completely for free.

"You're too generous, Jingyi." Yu Rou chuckled.

"I owe you," Yuan said to her.

He then opened the book and started reading it.

"Eh? You're going to study it now? It took me almost two weeks to learn it…" Xia Jingyi said to him.

"It's okay. I have already learned the technique." Yuan said as he closed the book literally half a minute later.

"W-What?" Xia Jingyi stared at him with a baffled look on her face.

"Hahaha… You should look at your own face right now, Jingyi. Did you forget? My brother is a once-in-a-thousand-years genius who has mastered multiple instruments at a young age." Yu Rou said to her.

"Oh, right… I forgot about that… Sorry."

"Why are you apologizing? Here's the technique. Thanks again." Yuan returned the technique to her after holding it for less than a minute.

"Let's harvest their horns before we continue." Yu Rou then said.

After spending a couple of minutes removing the black horns, Xiao Hua used her Divine Sense to look for more Black Horn Bulls.

"A mile that way," she pointed to the south a moment later.

"Alright, let's go. I want to test out my new technique already." Yuan said, eagerly heading in that direction.

While they walked, Xia Jingyi asked Yu Rou in a low voice, "How does she do that? Locating the Black Horn Bulls from so far away. And who is she? I have been wondering for a while now."

"Xiao Hua? Hmm… How should I explain this…" Yu Rou pondered for a moment before continuing, "Well, she's an NPC— a really powerful one at that, and she's currently traveling with my brother for some reason."

"What? She's an NPC? I couldn't tell at all…" Xia Jingyi said.

"That happens a lot in this game— too often, in fact."

Sometime later, they found more Black Horn Bulls traveling slowly in a group.

"Great. Now let me test out this new technique…" Yuan said.

"Do you want to use my zither as well?" Xia Jingyi asked him.

"It's fine, I have my own zither. Thank you for the offer, though."

He then retrieved the Soul Ensnaring Zither.

"Wow… What a beautiful zither…" Xia Jingyi muttered in awe when she saw his zither, thinking to herself that it must be a high-grade treasure.