Chapter 565 - 312: Heart of Spiritual Light in Hand, Black Tuo’s Target

"That’s good. This way, I can rest a little easier." Ming Lin nodded.

As they spent more time together, others from Red Thunder Star, besides Ming Lin and Bu Siqi, also joined them in secretly selling Netherworld Mother Stone and buying Deceitful God’s Power. This greatly increased efficiency, but it also brought unexpected risks.

Although Su Chen’s status was growing ever higher, the hidden dangers of this operation had not disappeared. In fact, they were growing larger. It was imperative to ensure everything was foolproof, so he had performed the relevant inscriptions himself.

After replying, Teng Liang fell silent, standing quietly.

Bored of waiting, Ming Lin mumbled something and began to wander off, his eyes discreetly scanning his surroundings.

The Bronze Sect’s so-called inspection was, in reality, also mainly aimed at Deceitful Gods.

"We need to be inspected, too?" a rough voice called out. Ming Lin followed the sound and saw a group of individuals who had undergone semi-mechanical augmentation. More than half of their bodies gleamed with the cold light of metal.

’Mechanical Professionals?’ He raised an eyebrow; this type of Professional was relatively rare. He glanced at the emblem on their belongings—a silver-white mechanical iron fist surrounded by a pattern resembling electric arcs.

’Just as I thought, people from the Mechanic Martial Hall.’

The Mechanic Martial Hall was founded by a Morning Star Tier Professional who went by the title "Mechanic Martial Lord" and was quite famous in the Dust Star Sea.

However, it was clear that this lord wasn’t leading the group this time. The entire Peak Star Conference lasted for over a year, and someone needed to guard their headquarters.

"It’s standard procedure," the Bronze Sect representative replied, his tone neither servile nor overbearing.

The man grumbled a few words but didn’t say anything more.

’Around here, even dragons must coil and tigers must crouch.’

Ming Lin watched with interest for a moment before wandering off to another area, his gaze sweeping around... Dark Moon Group.

The flow of people converged, and a ceaseless stream of ships emerged from the Star Gate.

More than ten hours later, Teng Liang, who was scanning the surroundings, suddenly frowned and whipped his head around. He looked into the jostling sea of people.

The most eye-catching among them was a group of people in wine-red uniforms, an embroidered dark moon on their chests, who walked straight past him.

’Was I imagining it?’ Teng Liang hesitated for a moment, unable to find the source of the faint feeling of being watched.

’So that’s Teng Liang. He’s here too. He doesn’t seem special, but he was able to root out Black Zhao and Wuwang.’

Black Tuo walked straight past. He had learned what Teng Liang looked like from Black Zhao.

But he didn’t think much of it. Although he wasn’t a Faceless Ghost, he was still a Great Deceitful God. Unless a Morning Star Tier Professional personally inspected this body of flesh and blood, it would be difficult to spot any irregularities. He paid Teng Liang no mind.

"Brother Zhang!"

Ming Lin had already moseyed over to the Star Port’s back-end administration area and greeted one of the managers familiarly. "What’s the situation? Why is it still so congested?"

"It’s going to be backed up for several more days," the manager sighed. "In previous years, it would have been open by now. But this year, construction on Dragon Abyss Star caused delays, so they’ve all been stuck at the Hengdao Hub for days."

"How many factions have arrived?" Ming Lin clicked his tongue, casually flipping through the registration list in the back office.

The Dust Star Sea had numerous factions. Some had received invitations, while others were purely here to join the spectacle or to expand their networks.

"If not all of them, then at least eighty or ninety percent."

"Really?" Ming Lin was a little surprised. His gaze sharpened, locking onto an invited faction that had arrived half an hour ago—Dark Moon Group, person-in-charge: Zhao Cheng.

’That’s the one... The reason Su Chen had called him back was specifically to keep an eye on this faction.’

"Well, I’ll let you get back to it. I won’t bother you anymore." Ming Lin exchanged a few pleasantries, then casually wandered off. After greeting Teng Liang, he left the Star Port and boarded a Flying Device heading directly to Dragon Abyss.

There were far too many Flying Devices traveling back and forth. It took Ming Lin some time to reach Dragon Abyss. His gaze swept over the Peak Star Arena in the center. Four giant virtual screens hung around the cylindrical building; these were the preliminary ranking boards.

However, even though a constant stream of people was entering the Peak Star Arena to get ranked, the 100 spots on the boards remained nameless.

Ming Lin knew a thing or two about this. Due to the lack of data in the early stages, the preliminary rankings had a one-month lockdown period. The rankings would only be displayed after enough data had been collected.

This was to prevent some Tier Five and Tier Six guys from seizing the opportunity to get on the board early and causing some controversy.

’Dark Moon Group... an organization jointly founded by several Tier Nine Professionals. Main business: weapons, equipment, and mercenary services... Not exactly unknown in the Dust Star Sea. Resides in Sector A...’

Ming Lin got off the Flying Device and pulled up a map to estimate his bearings when he suddenly heard voices beside him:

"Why is the Bronze Sect’s preliminary selection method different from before? They’re collecting data through sparring dummies and then ranking based on that data. Can that really show the full picture?"

"It would be better to just set up an arena and have us fight it out, blow for blow."

The speakers were a few young people who were also getting off a Flying Device, looking up at the floating screens outside the Peak Star Conference venue.

"Frogs in a well!" the middle-aged man leading them snapped upon hearing their words. "It’s understandable that you don’t know, since the last time the Bronze Sect hosted the Peak Star Conference was 40 years ago. But couldn’t you have at least looked up the information?"

"The Bronze Sect’s Creation Copper Heart and its derivative challenge system can perfectly simulate any and all of a challenger’s data."

"I’ll even go so far as to say that if you fought your own challenge projection a hundred times, you might still lose once or twice, because it makes no mistakes, while you still do!"