Blind Box World - SSS-Rank Eye of Truth

The rain of fire poured down onto the battlefield.

Hundreds of red beams tore through the wind, each one hurtling along its own trajectory, precisely driving into the brass joints, the energy threads at the nape, the glowing cores hidden behind the chest armor of the four-armed puppets.

There were no screams. Puppets knew no pain, and knew no crying out.

They simply stopped mid-motion, then collapsed one after another, their joints coming apart, their wooden bodies splitting open. In the blink of an eye, over two dozen Silver-tier puppets had turned into a heap of scrap kindling strewn across the ground.

But the colossal wooden spider was still there.

It lifted its door-sized wooden face to look at the sky, its eight long legs driving into the ground, and Ethan immediately locked his eye onto it.

Through the [Eye of Truth], he saw a blazing red point deep in its chest, right below that wooden face. That was the operating core of the entire monster.

Laira received the information immediately.

She reached out a hand, and in her palm, the deep red flame coiled, drew out, condensed into a blazing spear over three meters long. All the energy remaining in her body poured into that spear, making it so bright that a whole stretch of sky was dyed red.

She twisted her body, and threw.

The flame spear ripped through the air, hurtling down at a speed that set the air along its path alight, leaving behind a long trail of fire like a shooting star falling to earth.

The wooden spider suddenly stopped short.

Then its eight legs contracted all at once, throwing its ten-meter body to one side at a speed utterly disproportionate to its size.

Boom!

The flame spear drove into the ground, right where it had just stood, and a colossal pillar of fire blazed up dozens of meters high, incinerating every remaining puppet within a fifty-meter radius.

The wooden spider escaped.

But one of its legs had been licked by the fire, a patch of it charred black, making it stagger back several steps, unable to advance for the moment.

That much was more than enough.

"Run!" Ethan shouted.

Laira immediately spun around, one arm scooping Ethan up and holding him against her, the other gripping Lěng Ruò Yān’s collar tight, then beating her wings and shooting away.

That scene, to be honest, was very hard to look at.

A red dragon flying at full speed, in her arms clutching a grown man like she was holding a child, and in her other hand dangling a black-haired girl thrashing and screaming.

"Put me down! I can fly on my own!" Lěng Ruò Yān yelled into the wind.

"Fly with what?" Laira snapped back. "Do you have wings?"

"Then let me on your back!"

"There’s no room."

"Then why does he get held while I get carried like a chicken?!"

Ethan lay in the dragon’s arms, his face flushed red, trying to preserve the last shred of his dignity by pretending he hadn’t heard a thing.

Xue Ji’s black wooden ship was still listing in the air, one corner of its keel hacked to pieces.

But she wasn’t looking at her own ship.

She was looking at the red dragon flying toward them, and at that rather pathetic spectacle.

Then she snorted with laughter.

It was a very light laugh, escaping her lips before she could stop it, and it left all five youths behind her staring blankly. They had followed the City Lord for many years, but had never seen her laugh like that before.

"I know you." Xue Ji said as the dragon flew close, her voice having regained its familiar lazy air. "The tiny little human being hunted by the Harpy Queen."

Ethan wriggled out of Laira’s arms, trying to stand up straight in midair, then clasped his hands.

"Last time you drove the Harpy Queen off and saved our lives." He said plainly. "This time counts as paying it back. From now on neither side owes the other."

Xue Ji raised an eyebrow.

She looked at the young man before her, his clothes in tatters, his face smeared with grime, who had just wiped out two dozen Silver-tier puppets with a single move, and yet the first thing he said was to demand settlement of a debt she didn’t even remember.

"Interesting." She laughed softly. "But I’m afraid you’ve calculated wrong."

She jerked her chin toward the colossal wooden spider in the distance, which was beginning to crawl back.

"Your dragon just burned all her energy on one spear. How much farther can she fly? And that thing over there doesn’t know fatigue." She pointed down at the deck. "Come aboard. My ship may have a hole in one corner, but it still flies faster than a dragon running on empty."

Ethan was silent.

He didn’t want to come aboard. The instinct of a wanted man told him to steer clear of every unfamiliar power, especially a power strong enough to maintain a whole flying ship and a batch of subordinates.

But he glanced over at Laira.

Her face had gone white. Her wings were still beating, but the rhythm had slowed considerably, and the torn wing was trembling in waves. That flame spear had wrung her dry.

If she flew on, she would fall.

Ethan closed his eyes for a second, then opened them.

"My thanks."

The three of them landed on the deck, and the black wooden ship immediately accelerated, leaving behind the colossal wooden spider and the churning pitch-black sea of puppets.

.....

On the deck, the mood was very heavy.

Five youths in black sat in a row, none of them speaking. Some were bandaging wounds, some just sat hugging their knees and staring at the floor.

In one corner of the deck, two sets of black robes were folded neatly, laid side by side. There were no bodies. They hadn’t managed to bring the corpses back.

Ethan looked at those two sets of clothes, then silently turned away.

Xue Ji stood at the prow, her back to everyone, her hand on the railing. She stood like that for a long time, without saying a word.

It was only much later that she turned back around, and on her face there was no trace of anything left.

"Come inside." She said to Ethan. "Eat something. You look like you just crawled up out of the ground."

The ship’s cabin inside was far more spacious than Ethan had imagined.

The floor was laid with glossy black wood, lanterns hung on both sides giving off a soft golden light, and in the middle was a low wooden table already set with food. Not dry rations or roasted meat, but real food, with rice, with soup, with vegetables, with fragrant stewed meat.

Ethan swallowed.

He had been eating dry rations for so many days, and some days had had nothing in his belly at all. The smell of this hot food made his stomach let out a very loud growl, and his face burned with embarrassment.

Xue Ji sat down across from him, and now, beneath the soft golden lantern light, Ethan truly saw her clearly for the first time.

Out there, when she stood at the prow amid the Harpy flock, he had only had time to register two words: dangerous.

Now, sitting close, he realized how beautiful she was.

Her silver hair loosely gathered, a few strands falling down to frame a face white as snow. Her pale gray eyes, curving up slightly at the corners, always carrying a lazy trace of laughter as though everything she looked at struck her as funny. Her high black collar wrapping a long, slender neck, the high-slit hem revealing one snow-white leg as she sat down, and the silver chains at her waist faintly clinking against one another.

It wasn’t the brilliant, wild beauty of Laira. It was the beauty of a woman fully grown, who knew perfectly well she was beautiful, and couldn’t be bothered to care who looked at her.

Ethan hurriedly dropped his eyes, focusing on his bowl of rice.

Beside him, Laira quietly edged a little closer to him.

"So," Xue Ji poured a cup of tea, her voice unhurried. "What’s your name?"

"Ethan."

"Just Ethan?"

"Just Ethan."

She nodded faintly, not pressing further. "So then, Ethan, where did you come from?"

"I came out to train." Ethan answered, his voice level. "Then got lost."

Xue Ji raised the teacup to her lips, and her gaze flicked over him once.

Just one glance.

But Ethan felt it very clearly. That glance wasn’t suspicion, it was confirmation. Like she had just asked a question she already knew the answer to, only to see how he would lie.

"Training," she repeated, drawing the word out. "Mm. Training."

She set the teacup down.

"Someone out training would usually travel with a team, bring supplies, and have an anchor point to return to. And you have only three people, no baggage, clothes in tatters, and your dragon is carrying a wound in her wing that I’d guess she’s had for quite some time already."

She propped her chin on her hand, looking at him with interest.

"But never mind. Everyone has their own affairs, I’m not one to pry."

Ethan ate his rice in silence, his guard rising several degrees.

This woman was far too sharp. She had stripped his lie bare in three sentences, then laid it back over him with her own hand, as a way of telling him: ’I know you’re hiding something, but I won’t force it.’

That wasn’t kindness. That was skill.

"As for me," Xue Ji continued, "my name is Xue Ji. City Lord of Silver Moon City."

"A city?" Ethan lifted his head. "A Safe Zone?"

"Calling it a Safe Zone would be overstating it." She laughed softly. "It has no hundred-meter walls, and no protective field like those Council places. Calling it a base would be more accurate. Built by my own hand, sitting in an extremely out-of-the-way spot, far from every route of the major Safe Zones."

She looked at him, and her gaze carried a very clear implication.

"Out of the way enough that, if someone happened to be trying to hide from an enemy, it would be a very wonderful place to live."

Ethan set down his chopsticks.

"You’re inviting me?"

"I’m inviting you."

"We’ve known each other less than half a day."

"That’s right." Xue Ji nodded, so straightforward it surprised him. "So go ahead and be suspicious, I don’t blame you. But I’ll tell you the reason honestly too."

She raised a hand and pointed out toward the deck, where the five youths sat in silence.

"My base is short on people. Severely short. You’ve seen the youngsters out there, those are the ones with the most potential I’ve managed to gather, and yet today I lost two of them. I need combat strength. I need those who are truly strong."

And her gaze shifted to Laira.

"Especially combat strength like hers."

Laira had been eating with her head down, and hearing this she lifted her head, her red-orange eyes looking at Xue Ji full of wariness.

"Dragon bloodline." Xue Ji looked at her and nodded. "And a Crimson Dragon at that. I’ve never seen anyone open this bloodline before. Which kind of Bloodline Blind Box did you open? Epic grade, or higher?"

Ethan stopped short.

"Bloodline Blind Box?"

"You don’t know?" Xue Ji was a little surprised. "It’s a special kind of item Blind Box. What comes out isn’t equipment or a skill, but a bloodline, and it merges directly into the body of the one who opens the box, giving that person the bloodline of some race or other."

She raised her hand, and in her palm, a six-pointed snowflake of ice slowly condensed, radiating cold.

"Like me. The Ice Princess bloodline. I opened it back when I was young, and it’s been with me ever since."

Ethan looked at the snowflake in her hand, shaken inside.

He had never heard of this kind of Blind Box. In Safe Zone Number Seven, people only spoke of Partner Blind Boxes and item Blind Boxes. No one had told him there was also a kind of box that could directly change a person’s bloodline.

The world beyond the walls, it turned out, was far vaster than he had imagined.

"She isn’t someone who opened a Bloodline Blind Box." Ethan said. "Laira is my Partner."

The teacup in Xue Ji’s hand stopped short in midair.

She lifted her head, and for the first time throughout the whole meal, genuine astonishment appeared on that ever-lazy face.

"A Partner?" She looked at Laira, then at Ethan. "A Crimson Dragon... is your Partner?"

"That’s right."

"Then her cultivation speed..."

"Depends entirely on me." Ethan answered plainly. "I’m Bronze Tier 5, so she’s capped there too. If I can’t go up, she can’t go up."

The cabin fell silent for a few seconds.

Then Xue Ji set down the teacup, and burst out laughing.

"So that’s how it is." She shook her head, her voice full of admiration. "And here I assumed you were just some lucky fellow being sheltered by a powerhouse. Turns out it’s the reverse. That fearsome dragon is one you raised."

She looked at Ethan intently, and this time her gaze was entirely different.

"All the better."

"You don’t find that a nuisance?" Ethan asked. "If you need combat strength, then a Partner limited by her master is clearly less valuable than an independent powerhouse."

"You’ve misunderstood." Xue Ji shook her head faintly, her pale gray eyes flashing. "I don’t need current combat strength. Current combat strength I can buy with resources. What I need is potential."

She pointed at Laira.

"A Crimson Dragon at Bronze tier is already this strong. So what about when she reaches Silver? Gold? Diamond?"

Then her finger shifted to point at Ethan.

"And for her to rise, all that’s needed is for you to rise. In other words, investing in you is investing in both of you. That’s a bargain, isn’t it? How could you call that less valuable?"

Ethan was silent for a long time.

He had to admit, this offer was far too tempting.

He had nowhere to go back to. Safe Zone Number Seven had Gerald Greaves and a younger brother being gnawed at by the Void out looking for him. Springtide Village he didn’t dare stay at long for fear of endangering them. And an out-of-the-way base, with resources, with protection, was exactly what he needed.

But it was precisely because it was so tempting that he had to be all the more careful.

"I need to think about it." He finally said.

Xue Ji didn’t show the slightest disappointment, nor push with even one more line. She only nodded, then took a small object out of her sleeve and pushed it across the table toward him.

It was a flat communication device, only the size of a palm, its outer shell black metal.

"The frequency of Silver Moon City is saved in this." She said. "Any time you change your mind, whether tomorrow or ten years from now, just call. I’ll send people to collect you."

Ethan took the device, turning it over in his hand.

He had no idea that, just a few hours later, this thing would become the tool that saved him from a great deal of trouble.

"My thanks." He tucked it into his pocket.

"Don’t mention it." Xue Ji stood and flicked her sleeve. "The rooms are already prepared. Go get some sleep, you all look exhausted."

She walked to the door, then suddenly stopped.

"Ah, one more thing."

She turned her head back, and the lazy smile on her lips this time carried something very hard to read.

"That rain of fire of yours just now, frighteningly precise. Not one shot off the mark, and all of them aimed at the joints and operating cores. I fought that puppet lot for half an hour and still hadn’t found their weak points."

She looked at Ethan.

"How did you do it?"

Ethan lifted his head, his expression unchanged.

"Just luck."

Xue Ji looked at him for a few seconds, then laughed and turned to walk out.

"Mm. Luck."

The door closed.