Chapter 887: Refuse to Lend!

Li Yun stared at him for a few moments, and then a faintly mocking look crossed his face.

“Borrow it?”

“Exactly,” Zhang Kuanglie said, nodding eagerly.

Li Yun’s smile vanished.

“Zhang Kuanglie, do you really think I’ve never heard of you?”

The bearded man’s expression stiffened.

“If I hand this token over to you, what guarantee do I have that I’ll ever see another one?” Li Yun went on.

Zhang Kuanglie opened his mouth, but Li Yun did not let him cut in.

“We aren’t friends. We’ve never even spoken before today. Yet you show up in front of me, offer nothing of equal value, and expect me to give up the right to a precious middle-level secret technique because of a few promises.” His gaze turned cold. “Do you take me for a fool?”

“You…”

Zhang Kuanglie’s expression changed, but only for a moment before the friendly smile came back.

“Brother Li, you must have heard some exaggerated rumors. I, Zhang Kuanglie, have always kept my promises. Once I agree to something, I never go back on my word.” He laid a hand on his chest. “You can rest easy. If you lend me the token, I’ll definitely give one back after I clear the Everlasting Pagoda. On top of that, I’ll owe you a huge favor, and if you ever need help in the future, I’ll do everything I can for you.”

Li Yun shook his head. “That’s enough,” he said calmly. “Save those words for someone who’s willing to believe them. I’m not lending you the token.”

Zhang Kuanglie’s smile finally disappeared, and his face darkened. The honest, friendly expression vanished almost instantly and revealed the coldness underneath.

“Li Yun,” he said in a low voice. “I spoke politely because I heard you have some talent. I was showing you respect.” His eyes grew more and more vicious. “Don’t mistake that respect for weakness. I’ve been on Chronospace Island much longer than you, and if you offend me, I have countless ways to make your life here very unpleasant.”

He stared straight at Li Yun.

“I’ll ask you one more time. Will you lend me the token?”

Li Yun gave a cold smile. “Are you threatening me?”

Zhang Kuanglie did not answer, and Li Yun gestured at the island around them.

“This is Chronospace Island. People here can’t even kill themselves for good, so you can’t truly kill me either.” His expression stayed completely relaxed. “And if you try to take the Everlasting Trial Token by force, the commotion will almost certainly draw Lord Crimson Rift’s attention. When that happens, I doubt I’ll be the one who suffers.”

He looked at Zhang Kuanglie without the slightest trace of fear.

“So tell me, Zhang Kuanglie. What exactly are you threatening me with?”

The bearded man’s face grew uglier and uglier as Li Yun turned away.

“I’ve already given you my answer. I’m not lending you the token.”

Without wasting another moment, Li Yun stepped straight into the entrance of the Chronospace Vault. The Everlasting Trial Token floated out of his storage on its own, and a beam of pale azure light shot out from deep inside the cave and wrapped around him. His figure vanished in an instant.

Outside the entrance, Zhang Kuanglie stared at the empty space, and his expression changed again and again.

“This arrogant bastard…”

All of his earlier friendliness was gone, and his eyes had turned chillingly cold. Since most people on Chronospace Island already knew his reputation, deceiving newcomers had become harder and harder.

Even so, most of them still treated him with some caution because of his cultivation and seniority. Li Yun had shown him none at all, and that humiliation infuriated him.

“Fine,” Zhang Kuanglie said with a sneer. “I heard it was Feng Xuan who brought you to Chronospace Island, and from what I’ve heard, the two of you get along fairly well.”

His eyes narrowed. “You aren’t afraid when I threaten you directly. Let’s see whether you stay this calm when I go after Feng Xuan instead.”

His figure flashed, and then he was gone.

…

Li Yun knew nothing about what Zhang Kuanglie was thinking, because he had already entered the Chronospace Vault. From outside, the place had looked like an ordinary cave, but the moment he stepped in, he found that the inside was an entirely separate world.

Thirty-six enormous stone monuments stood across the vast space, and each one carried a different inheritance. Mysterious images flowed across their surfaces, and just looking at some of them made Li Yun’s soul tremble slightly.

The very first secret art surprised him at once. It was called the Heavenfiend Essence Devouring Art, and it let a cultivator forcibly refine objects that held enormous amounts of life energy, such as Ancient Dragon Eggs, Vajra Buddha Relics, and other powerful treasures of that kind.

Once they were refined, the essence stored inside them could be absorbed straight into the cultivator’s body, which led to astonishingly fast cultivation. Under the right conditions, a weak cultivator could rise several realms in a very short time.

The price, however, was just as terrifying. The technique worked by pushing a person’s cultivation higher than his own foundation could naturally support. Once he used it for a major breakthrough, his future potential would almost certainly be used up.

Unless he later found an extraordinary opportunity that could rebuild his foundation, further progress might become impossible.

Even with that drawback, countless people would gladly cultivate such a technique.

Most cultivators never had any realistic hope of reaching the highest realms. If someone who was destined to stay weak could get hold of an Ancient Dragon Egg and rise at once to the 9th level of Spirit Manifestation Realm, or even to the Dao Resonance Realm, giving up his future potential might seem entirely worth it. Li Yun, of course, had no interest in that kind of path, so he moved on.

The secret arts on the monuments that followed were just as astonishing. Only a single classification separated low-level secret techniques from middle-level ones, yet now that he had seen them for himself, Li Yun understood that the real difference between them was enormous.

It was no wonder the low-level techniques could be studied freely while the middle-level inheritances required such precious qualifications.