Chapter 384 - 384: Qian Bage Batto!

When the challenge notice dropped, all the Qian brothers sat up in shock and all heads swiveled to their family's youngest.

"...Ou?" Qian Bage blinked once. Then twice. He pointed at himself. "M-me?!"

The room exploded.

"Ahahaha! It's you, Xiao Ba, alright!"

"Yep! You didn't hear wrong! It's your name, loud and clear!"

Qian Bage clutched his head like it might roll off and groaned with a crying face. "Ouuu… Heavens! What did I do to deserve this?!"

"Hey, what you did, don't you know? Xiao Ba, just think about all the trouble you caused over the years. I'm amazed that it took this long for somebody to finally come knocking!"

"Right? Right? Ahahaha!"

"You—you—you—!" The shorty jumped to his feet and pointed around the room like everybody betrayed him. "How can you all still be laughing at a time like this?!"

"Sorry, can't help it! Hehehe!"

"Yeah! It's just too good! Ahahahaha!"

The eldest Qian Fusha can't help it anymore and his reprimanding gaze swept over the two.

"Alright, enough. You two rascals—quit making fun of Xiao Ba. He's nervous enough already."

That killed off the laughter—well, almost.

Watching the pair doing their best to suppress their laughter, Qian Fusha helplessly shook his head and turned to the youngest.

"Xiao Ba, this Sha Niu… someone from our father's generation, but he's just an old-timer stuck in the early-stages. Your cultivation shouldn't be far off. Think you can handle it? If not…"

Qian Bage blinked, then his eyes darted around from his older brothers who looked like pressure cookers about to burst then to his buddy observing all this with interest.

Ou! Can't lose face in front of his friend!

So instead of folding, he suppressed his inner cowardice and slapped his own puffed chest confidently.

"Ouu! Just a short-lived ghost with no future! Leave it to me! There's no need for you older generation to stand out so early!"

Qian Zhongta cracked a smile. "Ah! It's so rare to see Xiao Ba this confident! I like it! That's how a man should be!"

"Haha! Totally agree with Lao Si this time!" Qian Feifu applauded excitedly. "Alright, Xiao Ba, go forward bravely! Even if the skies fall, we brothers will support you!"

Right on cue, Bubai stood up and offered, "Brother Ba, I'll come with you?"

But Qian Bage rolled his eyes and patted Bubai's shoulder.

"Ouhaha, I appreciate the thought, Brother Bai. Truly! But no need. Just stay here and watch me teach that fossil his place! I'll be back real soon!"

Before Bubai could insist any further, Qian Feifu looped an arm over his shoulder and dragged him right back down to his seat.

"Brother Bai! Sit, sit! Stay with us! Only here can you get a good view!"

"Yeah! Yeah! Don't worry about Xiao Ba. It's not like he'll get lost!"

"Ou! Ou! Listen to them, Brother Bai!"

Bubai sighed inside. He meant to show support, but they didn't seem to want to let him go!

So Bubai didn't resist and simply sat back down.

That settled Qian Bage's heart. It's great that this big Buddha didn't run off to who knows where again!

Who knows how much brainpower and effort he invested to invite him here!

Don't give him any chance to make any excuses and run!

Do as he thought. Qian Bage cheekily did a little salute. "Oukay, wish me luck! I'm off!"

The shorty rushed out...

Once the door to the private door clicked shut, the laughing Qian brothers slowly put away their smiles.

Glances got exchanged and sound transmissions passed around.

"Lao Wu, I don't have a good feeling about this..."

"Me too. Lao Er, what do you think?"

Qian Fusha's finger drummed the table for a bit before passing back his own thoughts.

"I don't like jumping to conclusions... It's not unheard of for a no-name dark horse to throw fists at a clan. Quite normal for the greedy strong to stare at riches. But this time, I'm afraid…"

Any smile in Qian Feifu's eyes thinned out. "Ah. It's not simple..."

Though the brothers' messaging spree should be almost undetectable, their solemn moods obviously didn't go unnoticed by Bubai and it wasn't hard to sense something amiss.

"Fellow brothers, is there something wrong?"

The Qian brothers jolted back to reality. That's right! There's still a guest here!

The brothers quickly wiped the solemnity from their faces and slapped on cheerful masks.

"Ahaha! Wrong? How can there be!"

"Yeah, everything's fine! Brother Bai, don't worry so much! Just sit tight and watch closely! Our family's Xiao Laba is finally taking the stage! It's about to get loud!"

"Loud, huh?" Bubai didn't know what they meant by that, but it's pretty loud and clear these brothers were hiding something from him.

He didn't pry further though. There's no need to, because some matters were already pretty obvious.

The Qian clan lost almost half of their foundation builders during the recent secret realm expedition.

It wasn't surprising if their clan comes under fire.

Of course, there could be other reasons—other secrets he had no clue of.

But that's okay. He can afford to wait. Just go with the flow.

What must be known will rise to the surface eventually.

As for now? Well… alliances weren't built on sincerity alone.

It's a good time to gauge the battle power of this Qian clan to estimate how deeply they should cooperate in the future.

Time skipped forward.

The arena soon welcomed both contestants: a plump, well-fed shorty versus a wrinkly-skinned, middle-aged man who looked like a ghoul that hadn't eaten in weeks.

Who held the upper hand? That looked obvious at a glance.

But honestly though... that mob character Sha Niu definitely looked more like a cliché demonic cultivator than the shorty.

Of course, books should never be judged by their covers.

"Begin!"

Just when Bubai thought his NPC buddy down there was about to whip out some professional, orthodox skills, the shorty grinned and cracked opened his pouch...

Almost instantly, a black river gushed out from the mouth, splitting into twin forks that flowed protectively around the shorty!

No—hold up! Wrong! It wasn't water at all! That black mass was… a swarm of insects!!!

Scarabs, to be precise!

Observing them more closely, Bubai found them to be awfully familiar. "Those are… echo bugs?"

"Correct!" Qian Feifu applauded and slapped him with flattery again. "Brother's insight isn't bad at all!"

Really Echo Bugs?!

Remembering what these spy bugs were used for, Bubai felt a bit confused inside.

He heard plenty about poisonous insects used in cultivator battles, but a nonpoisonous type that even a mortal spy could handle on a daily basis?

Dear Merlin, what's going on? Could there be… other secrets involved?

"This…" Bubai looked for an answer. "I've never heard about these little ones being used for battle…"

"Of course you haven't!"

The honest-faced Qian Zhongta grinned like a proud uncle and didn't bother hiding anything. "As everyone knows, that's something unique to our Qian clan's Gu Refinement Arts!"

"By refining a special Gu we share affinity with, we can control insects to do our bidding, from scouting to fighting! And Xiao Ba just so happens to have a rare special affinity with an Echo Bug queen!"

Qian Feifu looked exasperated at his honest brother who ran his mouth but went along with it.

"Yep. I still remembered when that silly crybaby picked that... At first, we thought it was an odd joke that was useless except for playing spy at home."

"But later? Turns out that Lady Luck must be smiling upon our Xiao Ba! Big time!"

"Don't underestimate those little things and think they're harmless. On their own, echo bugs don't do much except deliver messages, but once enough are gathered together…"

Right on cue, Bubai saw the swarm of beetles gather over the shorty to form two trombone-like masses that perched on either side like shoulder cannons—both aiming at the Sha Niu dashing over.

But that demonic man barely reached half-court when he got blasted back by some invisible attack!

Next thing he knew, the man was staggering around and covering his bleeding ears as if he got hit by some ultrasonic sound wave!

This!!! Bubai sat up in shock! Echo bugs can actually do this?!

Holy Merlin! What ridiculous supernatural BS is this?! Sound wave attack? Isn't that just broken?!

But just when Bubai thought this sort of game-breaking skill was unsolvable, the background character on the other side slapped his pouch and out came a little bronze bell no bigger than a peach!

In the blink of an eye, that grew into a full-size temple bell!

Ignoring his bleeding ears, Sha Niu held onto that big bell like a megaphone and screamed right back—GONNGG!

Whatever came out from that bell was so loud it could almost be heard through the arena barrier!

Accompanying that gong was ring after ring of sound waves that rippled out, seemingly nullifying a great part of the bug's sound attacks!

But that wasn't all! It even showed signs of pushing back!

Unsolvable sound attacks? Now it looked like a tug-of-war!

FWUUUM! Robes flapped wildly on both sides. The clash of sound waves even caused visible shockwaves throughout the arena as dust and everything got blasted back!