Almost all my stuff is gone; it’s a disaster. I spent years hoarding, err, gathering all those valuable goods! There were buildings that no one will ever see again. There were so many aurochsen in there. Mrs. Feathers’ life pouch was burned too; I don’t think she was keeping anything important in there. I’m pretty sure she carries an interspacial ring somewhere I can’t find. There’s no way she’s as poor as she pretends to be! Ahem, moving on, I also lost so many used panties, and my spirit stones! Gah! I had so many spirit stones!

“L-Lucia? What are you doing?”

Why does Baldie look so scared? “I’m beating up Kuang Feng.”

“…But he’s already dead.”

“I’m still angry at him!” If it weren’t for him, I’d still be rich and powerful and have tons of food on me! Well, I’m still rich and powerful since I took his stuff and was never not powerful, but I’d be even more rich. Hmm, I also have all the food that he brought over, which is probably more valuable. I also got a new cooking pot, but it disappeared in my body somewhere…. My wok! He burned my wok! I want my wok back; my ancestors left that for me! How did it break!?

“Lucia! That’s a precious ingredient! I could probably make an immortal-ranked hammer out of it for you! Stop bashing it so hard!”

Gah! This stupid, stupid person! Why was he so violent in the first place? I lost all my stuff because of a super-violent person! It’s making me so, so mad! I thought my Secret Phoenix Rebirth Technique was supposed to turn my anger into qi or something like that…. Am I so mad that the technique can’t keep up? Well, that makes sense! “My poor wok, I’ll miss you a lot.”

Hmm? Wait a minute…. I almost forgot; I left my wok at home! I was stewing some meat and didn’t want to take it off the fire before coming here. Phew! If I lost my wok too, I might’ve done something crazy. It’s a good thing I didn’t. Mm, anyways, it’s time to replenish my treasures! Ilya says these people are promising talents, and everyone knows promising talents have the second-best stuff on them. Right, their teachers have the best stuff. I wonder if I could hold them hostage and trade them for stuff? “Ilya, why don’t we hold these people hostage and demand a ransom?”

“They’ll send down a bunch of immortals and obliterate you with techniques similar to the one you got melted by.”

…Oh. “They won’t do that if we capture them all and never return them?”

“As long as they think everyone is dead, they won’t take the risk to avenge them,” Ilya said. “Well, there might be one or two immortals who aren’t rational and will come anyway, but to minimize the risk of being obliterated, we have to reduce the number of reasons for immortals to come here.”

I know Ilya’s smarter than me, and she probably has her reasons, but…. “If that’s the case, why don’t we let them go back?” Mm, I don’t want to be melted again. It was a very unpleasant experience. I’ll give up on some taxes if it means not being melted, mhm.

“Lucia.”

“Hmm?” It looks like Ilya’s about to start one of her chain of questions to try to lure me into thinking, but I’m not going to fall for it! Mm, but I’m a little curious. Can I figure it out without my head hurting? “What is it?”

“If you found a cave and a growl came out of the cave that made your tail stiffen, what would you think?”

This is easy! There’s no way this can make my head hurt. “It’s dangerous in there!”

“Now, Puppers is curious and enters the cave. He doesn’t come back out. What do you think about the unknown beast in the cave now?”

Oh, this is pretty tough. “Were there any sounds?”

“No, it was silent.”

That’s creepy as heck! “I’d think it’s super scary.” Mhm. Puppers goes in. No Puppers come out. He was eaten! “No way in heck am I going in there.”

“See? Okay, this time, Puppers goes in, and after a few minutes, he comes out. He tells you he found a large beast in the cave, but all it did was puff itself up without attacking him. What do you think about the unknown beast now?”

“It’s scared of Puppers! Is it actually weak? What does my tail say?”

“Your tail is uncertain now. It’s … bouncy? I don’t understand your tail-rigidity-to-danger chart.”

It’s a really simple chart! The stiffer it is, the more dangerous the thing. Hmm, but if my tail is uncertain, and the beast is just puffing itself up to look bigger, and Puppers survived after encountering it…. “I’ll go in there and see for myself!” Who knows? The beast might be delicious. What if it’s Sophia’s favorite food in the future? I’ll have to hunt it, mhm.

“Exactly. It’s the same for the immortals. If you let them go, it’s the same thing as Puppers coming out of the cave alive.”

This…, this is the first time Ilya’s weird questions actually made sense to me! “I got it! So, we have to hunt every last one of them and not let them escape. I can do that! I’ll be the unknown beast!” Mm, why does Baldie look so concerned? Does she think I’m going to attack her? I wouldn’t do that, nope, nuh-uh. I’d only do it if she tried to stop me, and why would she ever want to do that?

“To fool the enemy, you have to fool your ally first.”

Mm? What is Ilya saying? Which sucker is she going to fool? Well, whoever’s targeted by Ilya is going to have a bad time. It’s a good thing she knows not to fool me. Anyways, it’s time to collect some taxes and trap some people for the safety of the Immortal Continent. I love doing good deeds!