Chapter: Chapter 357
“Oh dear, oh dear, I really splurged today. Half of the reward from this commission went to treating everyone to a meal.” That night, Leticia, who had thoroughly enjoyed her meal, realized something as she tallied her accounts: happiness wasn’t free.
“A moment of joy from treating others, followed by eternal regret when the bill comes!”
“My heavens, sister, where did you take them for dinner? It costs this much for just one meal?” Kira, sitting opposite Leticia and engrossed in a book with a gaudy cover, peeked over. Her eyes widened to saucers upon seeing the number on the bill.
It was only for four people, and that too without Bailin participating, yet the cost of a single meal was so incredibly high, far exceeding Kira’s expectations.
“I just picked a place nearby with good reviews. Who knew the dishes there would be so expensive? Though, I must admit, the taste was indeed excellent.” If she regretted it, it wasn’t exactly regret, as the food at that restaurant was truly superb. The saying “you get what you pay for” was indeed true. It’s just that seeing the bill still gave her the fleeting illusion, “Am I being ripped off?”
“Ah well, the money’s spent now, so regretting it is useless.” Leticia wasn’t one to nitpick. She was very generous with her friends. Since the expense was due to treating them, she only voiced her “big loss” verbally. The next time she treated, she would undoubtedly choose a restaurant that offered excellent quality but at a less-than-reasonable price.
Kira understood her sister’s temperament. After a sigh, she brought up another matter, “Sister, what about the other thing you did today? How did it go?”
Leticia hadn’t kept her dealings with Yin a secret from Kira. She needed her intelligent sister’s help in strategizing. Moreover, letting her sister know that they still had a chance to return to the Demon Realm was also a very important matter.
As for why she didn’t tell Bailin?
That’s a story for another time. The primary reason was that Leticia felt it wouldn’t be very good for Bailin to know about her cooperation with Yin. While her relationship with Bailin was good, her relationship with the person behind Bailin was far from ideal.
Even though Leticia was diligently acting as a hero and completing missions, deep down, she was still a pure demon. Her attitude towards other humans couldn’t be described as very good.
“I managed to buy some things, but I couldn’t find the most important thing, the blood and flesh crystal. I might have to search in a higher-level area.” After all, it was the blood and flesh crystal of a wilderness behemoth. That item was in high demand, and if one didn’t actively hunt for it, it might take months to find even one.
These days, very few S-rank heroes would go out to hunt wilderness behemoths.
“Hmm, how about I just go kill one in the wilderness?” Kira raised her right hand, revealing the shimmering golden thin chain on her wrist. “With Ancestor here, I should be able to easily solo a weaker behemoth. If your guard also comes to help, the success rate would be very high.”
In terms of combat power, Kira and A’kari were both on par with the Four Heavenly Kings. This level was slightly stronger than ordinary S-rank heroes, but far inferior to Leticia and Bailin. However, they were more than capable of dealing with wilderness behemoths.
This was indeed a good idea, but it was best to let Yin try her best first. If that didn’t work, she could then ask Kira for help to hunt a behemoth in the wilderness.
Besides, Kira carried the divine artifact of Infino with her. After defeating the behemoth, she could either directly store the carcass in the artifact’s space and bring it back, or Kira could extract the blood and flesh crystal on the spot. In the field of alchemy, Kira’s mastery was no less than Leticia’s.
The difference between them mainly lay in the quality of their magic power, which resulted in Kira’s alchemical items being slightly inferior in quality to Leticia’s. In terms of pure skill, Kira was truly not inferior to Leticia.
Her sister was very capable; she believed in her.
“No rush. She’s the one who asked us, so let’s let her try to find it herself first. Maybe she’ll find it.” Leticia yawned and stretched. She had been running around all day and was starting to feel sleepy.
Seeing her sister looking like she could fall asleep at any moment, Kira wisely ended the conversation. “Sister, why don’t you go to bed first? It seems Miss Bai is working overtime today.”
“I wasn’t waiting for her, but it is getting late, you know.” Leticia reflexively retorted, then glanced at the time and realized it was indeed getting late, close to ten o’clock at night.
After a bath, it would be past ten, just in time for bed.
Ever since she started acting as a hero, Leticia felt that she couldn’t stay up late anymore. Every time it passed ten or eleven, she would become drowsy and completely unable to concentrate on playing games.
“I’m getting old. I can’t stay up late anymore,” Leticia lamented inwardly. She used to be an all-night gaming champion, but now she had become like this. It was truly regrettable.
She arrived outside the bathroom, took off her clothes one by one, and put them into the laundry basket. Leticia then stepped into the bathroom.
The warm yellow light dispelled the chill. It was already autumn, and the temperature was dropping day by day. People had basically changed into autumn attire, a significant difference from the scenery of summer.
The maids had already prepared the hot water for bathing. Leticia reached out to test the water temperature, and it was just to her liking. Truly worthy of being elite maids she brought from the Demon Realm.
With a splash, Leticia jumped into the bathtub. Her body was embraced by the warm, slightly fragrant water, eliciting a low groan of enjoyment from her.
“Hoo-ha, a bath at the end of the day is truly enjoyable.” Lazily soaking in the hot water, Leticia raised her right hand before her eyes, examining it closely. This was something she enjoyed doing every day.
Her fingers were slender, her skin a white with a hint of redness. Her fingernails were a deeper color, as luminous and transparent as jade, complemented by a subtle flesh tone. They were simply like works of art.
Nodding with a hint of vanity, Leticia was very satisfied with her beauty. Who would dislike being beautiful? She certainly wouldn’t.
After soaking for nearly half an hour, Leticia felt as though the accumulated fatigue in her body had been completely absorbed by the hot bath. As she stood up from the bathtub, she even had the illusion that she could battle her fellow netizens until dawn.
Of course, it was merely an illusion.
…
“You seem to be doing fewer missions lately, don’t you?” The girl with long white hair asked, taking a bite of bread, her expression filled with confusion. “Have you saved enough money and don’t want to work anymore?”
After several days of busyness, Miss Bai had finally returned to her state of being a socialite and had come to Leticia’s house to mooch off her for a meal again.
Coincidentally, Leticia was also too lazy to go out and do missions today, which led to Miss Bai’s question.
After all, Leticia’s enthusiasm for work had been very high in the past few days. Whenever Bailin came to find Leticia, Leticia was already preparing to head out. Today, however, the Demon Lord Miss was even wearing her cute pajamas, which clearly indicated that she was too lazy to go out today.
“Do you think I was being lazy while you were working? I’ve completed quite a few missions these past few days, you know. Today, I simply wanted to take a day off.” Leticia popped a grilled sausage into her mouth. The rich aroma of meat exploded into the air, causing her to close her eyes in bliss.
This was the advantage of being a hero: extremely flexible working hours. You could work when you wanted and rest when you wanted, without worrying about a supervisor holding you accountable. It was truly comfortable.
If there were urgent matters requiring overtime, the overtime pay would be given faithfully and honestly. It was truly conscientious.
“So, you’re not planning on going out today?” Miss Bai asked, resting her chin on her hand.
“Yep. You aren’t thinking of dragging me out somewhere, are you? Let me tell you, no way! I’ve already made plans with the Commander for a showdown until nightfall.” Leticia immediately stated her plans for the day, which was to play games with the Commander.
One could only say that it was a very Leticia-like choice, wasn’t it?
“Is that so? I was originally planning on asking you to accompany me out, but since you’ve made plans with the Commander, I won’t steal your thunder.” Miss Bai sighed, inwardly regretting not having reserved Leticia in advance, thus allowing the Commander to snatch up Leticia’s scarce free time.
If the Commander and Bailin didn’t have a good relationship, then Bailin could have made some moves to take Leticia for herself. However, the Commander and Bailin had a decent relationship, and she was even a very talented junior in the Hero Association. Bailin wasn’t so shameless as to do that.
It was just one day; Miss Bai could afford to wait!
“Speaking of which, what have you been up to these past few days? You’ve been so secretive.”
“Hmm, you’ll know soon enough. I can’t say too much specifically, but I can reveal a little now,” Bailin lowered her voice, saying to Leticia with a mysterious air, “It’s something to counteract the gods.”
Upon hearing this, Leticia’s eyes widened. Something to counteract gods?!
She was also a god, after all, though not a complete one yet. However, the divine tag was already attached to her and couldn’t be removed. Wouldn’t this thing to counteract gods also affect her?
As if sensing Leticia’s concern, Bailin quickly explained, “Don’t worry, it won’t affect you. That item is still being installed, and it will take a lot of time to activate. Plus, with debugging and such, it’ll be at least a few months before it’s fully operational.”
A few months wasn’t that long either!
Moreover, after the incident where the spatial portal closed prematurely, Leticia had developed a psychological shadow regarding such vague timeframes. It was supposed to be a month, but it closed in a week. Now they said a few months, but perhaps it could open in a few days?
“Can’t you reveal any more? It’ll take me at least half a year to accumulate enough energy to break the seal. What if I get caught in the crossfire by mistake?” Leticia said to Bailin with a worried expression. If she didn’t have this cursed seal on her right now, she wouldn’t care about something to counteract gods.
No matter how wide its range of influence, could it be bigger than Central City? If this place doesn’t keep me, I’ll find another place. Leticia could simply leave Central City.
But by chance, Leticia couldn’t do that. Other deities used divine artifacts as vessels for their seals. Those divine artifacts were generally small items that could be carried by a single person, with the largest being a trident like Xi’s. But Leticia was different. She didn’t know if it was due to her excellent luck.
Although her seal had been partially released, allowing her to freely enter and exit the spiritual world, she was still confined to Central City, like a prisoner within a painted cage. If that thing to counteract gods was lethal, then Leticia would absolutely be among those caught in the crossfire.
“Hmm, then I’ll help you ask tomorrow. If it really is an indiscriminate lethal item, I’ll try my best to postpone its activation date.” Bailin decided after a few seconds of thought. The activation of that item was something she couldn’t prevent and had no reason to prevent. After all, most of the gods nowadays were hostile forces, and there were simply no friendly gods to Central City’s faction.
To resist gods who possessed unreasonable power, Central City must find a way to compensate for the disparity.
At the very least, it should enable heroes to resolve invading gods within Central City.
“Alright, I’ll have to trouble you then.” Upon hearing this news, Leticia’s mood immediately shifted from happy to worried. A sword of Damocles hung over her head; no one could possibly smile.
She had to speed up the process of breaking the seal, Leticia decided inwardly. She had initially planned to accumulate energy gradually, but now she realized she might not have that much time.
It seemed she needed to increase the time spent searching for energy sources in the dreamscape every day, Leticia calculated in her mind. She had found quite a few stable sources of “customers” lately, and the energy she accumulated daily wasn’t insignificant, but there was still a very, very long way to go before completely removing the seal.
“Now I finally understand why that Dream God was in such a hurry before. If I were in that situation, I’d be anxious too,” Leticia muttered, covering her head. “Miss Bai, please try your best to stall for time, otherwise, I really will have to resort to desperate measures.”
Upon hearing Leticia’s words, Bailin could only offer a helpless smile. “Then I can only promise not to go all out and strike you when you’re desperate.”
“As if you could defeat me.”
“You wouldn’t bear to hit me?” Miss Bai widened her large, watery eyes, looking pitiful.
“You… Shameless, utterly shameless!”
