Spirit Cultivation

Rat widened his eyes the moment he heard the Arena Manager words and asked confused, "What? How come I can't pick up the Challenge Token? I was the one who reserved it before anyone else." He was slowly becoming stressed the moment he realised his plan could go wrong. 

They were currently in the Arena's Office where one could issue a challenge and choose their next opponents but Rat was here to finalize it for Saber Devil. 

The Manager who was also his friend, simply shrugged, knowing he couldn't do anything and explained, "I'm sorry Rat but Xiao Wen was removed from the Arena's database. She is no longer a participant you can pick." 

Rat started slightly panicking as his heart sank, asking right away, "What do you mean, removed? I was here yesterday and she was already here. You told me you will prepare the Token by today. I even picked the day for the challenge and now you are telling me she got removed? What happened?" 

The Manager patted Rat on his shoulder and said, acting mysteriously, "I know we are friends but I cannot tell you the specifics. I got an order from the higher-ups to cancel everything connected with Xiao Wen. There is no such person registered here anymore. Everything is gone."

"Impossible! You can't be removed from the arena, right? You are signed in the moment you join the Organization." Rat exclaimed in shock right away, questioning his friend but the manager smiled and replied, "You answered the question yourself." He couldn't say anything specific so Rat had to figure it out on his own. 

"What?" Rat got confused for a moment but then he repeated his own words once again in his mind and realised something, not even thinking it could be true. "Does that mean she left the organisation? Can you even do that?" 

The Manager only smiled and asked back, "You ask me? How would I know? I'm just carrying out orders." Only the golden-robed youth that was hanging around with their Milady could cancel someone's membership and he would only do so on the Milady's orders. Naturally, he couldn't say anything about that so the Manager played dumb, even in front of his friend.

Rat turned silent for a second, trying to think of a reason behind it and suddenly asked, "Wait, don't tell me she is dead?" He couldn't think of any other reason why would the higher-ups gave out such an order. This was the most common reason why someone would disappear. 

Unfortunately, the Manager shook his head this time as well, denying, "No, she is not. That much I can tell. When someone dies, we receive different notice and their data is still stored inside my database. The reason must have been completely different but I am too low in the power ladder to know about it." 

Hearing that even his friend was powerless, Rat finally broke down, realising what kind of mess did he fall into and cried out for help as he kneeled on the floor, "Bro, what do I do then?! You gotta help me! I am here on behalf of the Saber Devil! It's not me who wanted to fight her. If I go back and tell him that he can't fight her, he will definitely kill me!"

When the name of the member of five devils was brought up, it was when the manager finally got serious, "Saber Devil… Bro, why the hell did you mess around with him? You know that it's a suicide…"

The Rat felt like crying when he heard that and begged while wailing, "Bro, you need to help me else I'm a goner! Please!! At least give me something I can tell Saber Devil that will shift the blame away from me…"

The Manager let out the deep breath and advised, "Sigh… What would you do without me? Just tell him that it was Milady's order. She was the one who took Xiao Wen's restrictions off. Saber Devil will know who I am talking about. He shouldn't try to kill you." 

"Alright." The Rat nodded, noting down the message in his mind and asked to confirm something, "Can you tell me if there is a person called Xuefeng already registered?" 

The manager created a ball out of his Fate Qi and placed he hand on top of it, looking as if he was searching something inside and shook his head, denying, "No, there is no one with that name. I never heard of him either. I am the one in charge of placing every new member into the arena's database. I would remember if I wrote it down." 

Knowing that Xuefeng was never registered, this flashed some light onto the situation. Rat cheered up as he found out what he should do now and stood up, exclaiming as he hugged his friend, "Ha! I know now! Thanks bro! I owe you a favour!" 

He didn't wait for the Manager's reply and rushed out of the office, running straight towards Saber Devil's place. The moment he appeared in front of Saber Devil's doorstep, Rat called out, "Boss! I have some news!" 

"Enter!" Saber Devil called out from the inside and asked without opening his eyes from meditation when Rat entered, "Did you bring the token? They should respect you if you told them my name." Saber Devil was still suffering the side effects from failing in the breakthrough so he had to slowly regenerate himself back to the peak of his strength. 

Rat was a bit out of breath from all the running but still called out with urgency, "I did go to the arena to pick it up but there is a problem! Xiao Wen is no longer available to be chosen in the challenge!" 

Just as he finished speaking, Saber Devil's eyes snapped opened and he asked coldly, glaring at Rat, "What do you mean by that…?" 

Gulp.

Rat swallowed his saliva upon feeling the pressure Saber Devil created by using his gaze and passed the news before he would die, "I got informed that Milady completely erased Xiao Wen from the Arena Database! She left the whole Fate Organisation!" 

Those were naturally some shocking news which made even one of the five devils stand up and call out while picking Rat up by his shirt, "What? Milady did? What else you know?! Talk!" 

Rat didn't dare to dilly dally and explained what he figured out, "I found out that Xiao Wen's new lover, Xuefeng, wasn't forced to join the organisation as well! I suspect that he was the one who convinced Milady to take off Xiao Wen's restrictions. Xuefeng doesn't seem to be weak as we thought. For Milady to go as far as letting one of the top members leave, Xuefeng must have offered her something good. Either that or he has huge backing behind him that even Milady is scared of."

Thud. 

Rat's body was thrown on the floor with a dull sound and Saber Devil questioned coldly, "Where can I find that Xuefeng? I will fight him instead. There is no need to go through Xiao Wen. We will settle it like real men."

Sighing in relief that he was able to save his life, Rat quickly reported, "He should be currently in the Xiao Family, cultivating but I heard that he is trying to move his clan members into Tang Family's palace. I doubt he would come out to fight Boss right now as there is a clear disadvantage in Stages. I think he will first breakthrough before even leaving Xiao Family." 

Only then did Saber Devil finally stop releasing his pressure, letting Rat breathe before returning to his mat, sitting back as he said, "It's alright. I can wait. Once I defeat him and take his Fate Ability, I will be able to breakthrough without problems. This is much better than forcefully breaking through again. Tell me when you have any news about him leaving Xiao Family. I will pay him a visit." 

He stopped bothering with Rat at this point and the one knew he should quickly leave at this moment, doing exactly that after bowing deeply, "Yes, Boss!" 

.... 

At the same time, inside Xuefeng's courtyard, Nuwa and Xuefeng were already out in the garden, taking quite a bit of time, playing around with the towels as well as their clothes. Xuefeng found a lot of enjoyment from teasing Nuwa during helping her put on the clothes back on. 

Unfortunately, every action had its own consequences. He could have expected that seeing Nuwa accept all of his teases, he would soon get back the same from her and even more. Just as they left the bedroom, Nuwa turned back into a serious teacher who was ready to squeeze all of the juices out of him. 

Throwing ten training swords on the ground, Nuwa called out to him as she created a circular Earth Qi disk on top of her palm, "Alright, let's train. You can only defend by using the swords and your bloodline ability! Start!" 

Just as she said so, the Earth Qi disk launched straight into Xuefeng who didn't have time to defend against it. He raised the one sword upwards to block but the disk dodged it, forcing him to defend by using his hand, smashing the disk apart. 

"I told you to only defend using your bloodline ability! What's the point if you still use your hands!" Nuwa quickly scolded him as she suddenly appeared behind him, forcing his hands behind his back and bound it with an Earth Qi handcuffs. 

Returning back to her place, she glared at him sternly as she created another disk and shouted before launching the disk at him, "Use only your new power! Control your swords and defend yourself! Again!"