Even though there were metal wheels on the bottom of Mei’s luggage and the floor was mostly smooth marble, it still wasn’t very easy for her to pull the damn thing. It must have weighed at least two-hundred pounds. There were all sorts of soaps, perfumes, preservatives, a folded up massage table, sleeping bags, way more clothes than either of us would ever need and other random shit that I can’t even remember. She definitely would have taken the furniture too, but the opening of the ‘Extradimensional Chest’ wasn’t quite big enough to fit anything.

The Throne Room was half a mile below the Residential District, which was basically hundreds of stories. Each floor had forty or so small apartments like the one that Mei and I had been living in. We only had to walk a hundred meters before we reached a large circular transparent platform. It was easy to see all the way down the elevator shaft, because the entire thing was lit up with Qi Crystals.

As we walked inside, a curved glass door slid over and created an air-tight seal. After panting for a few seconds, Mei called out “Throne Room!” and we started slowly falling downwards. Instead of pulleys, the elevator was a buoyant platform that would be lowered or raised by the water below it.

It took about three minutes to reach the bottom. Then there was a long hallway and finally, we reached a huge golden gateway. However, there weren’t any guards protecting it. When we walked closer, it seemed to open inwards on its own.

“Bull fucking shit! You come into our home and wreck the place, then demand that ‘we’ pay for the damages to your pathetic fleet?! Fuck you, fuck your mother, fuck your grandmother and fuck your entire family! If you don’t get the hell out of here this instant, I’ll tell Old Qiang rip your Holy Pegasus a new asshole!”

The first thing we saw was a huge silver octopus woman holding two severely wounded men with her gigantic tentacles. Instead of a mouth, she had a beak and while I was getting slightly turned on by the strange scene, Mei gasped in shock.

Queen Hua Jiang was screaming at an equally massive man who had the head of a grey-skinned elephant and was wearing thick bronze armor over his gargantuan torso. He had an enormous golden scimitar in each hand and seemed like he was about to charge towards the giantess at any moment.

However, a dude with lobster claws for arms stepped out in between the two of them. He was practically naked and covered with a greenish brown shell, but it still resembled the body of a Human for the most part. Even though he had really long feelers coming off of his forehead, I could still recognize him as ‘Bo’, the guy who yelled at us to hurry down to the palace.

“Release my subordinates immediately!” In response to the elephant’s furious roar, one of the men was thrown into his left tusk, while Jiang opened her beak and bit the other guy’s head off. As the brown-skinned man was impaled onto the giant ivory tooth, the elephant growled “You crazy bitch! Do you not even place my Ganesha Sect in your eyes?! Such arrogance and stupidity!”

Bo suddenly noticed me and shouted “Finally! It took the two of you long enough!” While he was walking over, the scimitar wielding colossus and the octopus lady began a chaotic duel. They were each calling out arbitrary names every time they performed any sort of attack. The marble floor was crumbling and the glass ceiling had cracks on it. Yet the humanoid crab was totally ignoring it all.

He stood there and looked down towards us, yelling “As you may have noticed! Seven days ago! There was an incident in the Medical District! Someone with the ability to break the Heavenly Laws appeared in our great nation! Sects, Clans and countries from all over Xian Dao are invading us in order to find that person! Fortunately, Hua Qiang and our naval fleet have been able to protect the palace so far! But, the Li Sect and Pao Clan are requesting reinforcements! We’re fighting wars on land and sea in our own damn territory!” Hua Qiang was the Rank-A Colossal Purple Enteroctopus that protects The Southern Islands.

“Agh~! Never would I have expected… To be defeated by such an ugly old hag! Ugh~!” The moment Bo stopped talking, that giant elephant man was ripped into dozens of pieces by those huge silver tentacles.

Queen Hua Jiang shrunk back to around six feet tall and her beak vanished, then she pulled a new azure robe out of her storage ring. It seemed like every time she grew, her clothes would be torn to shreds. That was one of the main downfalls to excessively powerful shapeshifting abilities.

She was grinning as she gazed down at me and Mei, “The two of you have done well these past few months. Although the fertility rate is low, at least three children have been produced so far. One was a female, Hua Jing… The mother died during the birth, but the girl was born with dark-green Innate Talent. I believe that she may have a chance to achieve Immortality! Hmmm~, the two boys aren’t quite as impressive. However, they both have dark-yellow Innate Talent! Hahahaha~! It is a shame that there are no decent partners for you to impregnate… My Hua Family has been declining for so long, yet now that we have such a huge chance to prosper, this motherfucking bullshit had to happen! Grah~! Damn it! The Heavens never let us enjoy ourselves!”

It was the first time that I saw her in months, but she had totally lost any bit of ‘royal’ elegance that I vaguely remembered her having. I asked “So umm, what did you want from us exactly? Are you ever going to teach me some Druid stuff? Or like, show me how to tame Beasts?”

“Hmph~! While war is incredibly destructive and dangerous, it is also the greatest way for a Martial Artist to forge themselves! Gentle Di may be your first teacher, but since he’s off doing who knows what, you’ll be under my tutelage for now… Now, kowtow to me three times and recite an oath to the Heavens in order to seal our master-disciple bond!” Mei, the giant dude and octopus-woman were all staring at me, so I did a few short stage-bows.

Then I complained “I swear to do something? Okay, I’ve got no clue what the actual fuck you expect me to say. Can we just move onto the part where you teach me shit and I’ll promise not to be a dick?”

Mei giggled softly and although Bo seemed angry at first, he started chuckling after glaring at me for a few seconds. Eventually, Jiang reached out and placed her slimy silver hand on my left shoulder. There was still a grin on her face, as she told me “Honestly, I’ve never encountered someone who was so disrespectful before… But, if I just consider that you have some sort of mental deficiency, I can’t even get angry at you for your shitty behavior. Besides, all that really matters in this world is power! With your Innate Talent, if word ever got out… I wouldn’t be surprised if Immortals or even Deities descended upon this world in order to recruit you!”

The four of us were the only people in that trashed Throne Room, but as an extra safety measure, the Queen brought us into a special Meeting Room. It was pretty spacious and there was a huge round table at the center of the floor, while all the walls and ceiling were white marble. There were golden runes all over the surfaces of everything. Mei sat down to my left, Bo stood behind ‘Her Majesty’ and the octopus granny wrapped her legs around what was essentially just a round stool.

She smirked, flipping her right hand over and making a white jade popsicle stick appear, I mean ‘slip’. After she slid it across the table, I picked it up and asked “Umm~, so how do I use this thingy? Lick it or something?”

“No!” Granny Jiang cackled, explaining “Just place it on your forehead and allow some of your Qi to travel through one end and out the other. I can’t believe that Di never taught you something so important! Although it may seem like I’ve been ignoring you these past few months, I was paying close attention the entire time… Urm, not the ‘entire’ time… I didn’t watch you and Little Mei fooling around in the privacy of your own room. However, I have been receiving reports about your exceptional cultivation speed and your Shamanic work ethic. In fact, since you’ve helped so many Li Sect disciples and Pao Clan members, the relationships between our three Factions has managed to improve rather dramatically. One of the Li Sect’s most talent core disciples, Li Na, had sent a few marriage proposals for you… I’m concerned that they may have discovered your Innate Talent, but now that you’ve become my personal disciple… Well, any women who wish to marry you or become concubines, would need to join my Hua Family. Uhum, back to what I was saying before… I’ve spent thousands of hours creating this jade slip for you.”

Next Chapter
Arigato?