World version update

Chapter 2 The Unchanged

As the only constant in the world version update, Lu Yan is like a loophole in the entire world, gaining the ability to peek into the truth.

He can know the progress of the version update in advance through this string of text. When the progress bar of the version update is full, it means that the next version update will start.

Version updates mean endless variables, which is Lu Yan’s greatest reliance and the basis for his courage to resist.

Passing through the messy backyard, Lu Yan walked towards the warehouse, and at this moment a book in front of the warehouse door caught his eye.

The book seemed to have been left in front of the warehouse door, with three big characters "Changchun Gong" clearly written on the cover.

The first realm of a practitioner is the Qi training stage. Although "Changchun Gong" is a common method, it is known to be the most moderate and peaceful method of practice. There will be no hindrance no matter what method you choose to practice later.

Most practitioners also practice Changchun Gong first and use this method to enter the Qi training stage.

If the clerks in other shops were beaten and scolded by the shopkeeper all day long, they would be ecstatic when they saw this Qigong method. They would want to practice it immediately so that they can become practitioners and escape from this Lingfu shop.

But Lu Yan just shook his head and sighed, then stepped over the book "Changchun Kung Fu" on the ground.

“The twenty-first time.”

Lu Yan whispered softly. This was the twenty-first time he had seen the book "Changchun Kung Fu" in three months.

Almost every few days, this copy of "Changchun Gong" will be updated in different places.

Under the counter, on the shelf, in the kitchen, in the warehouse. There is a chance that Changchun Gong will appear almost anywhere.

At this time of time, the hot-tempered shopkeeper Chu would not be in the store, and Lu Yan had ample opportunity to secretly hide "Changchun Gong" or read and copy it.

But Lu Yan did not do so. It was as if he did not see this Qigong method at all.

Taking out a piece of rope from the warehouse, Lu Yan came to the long-abandoned dry well in the corner of the backyard, and easily entered the bottom of the dry well with the help of the rope.

The bottom of the seemingly dilapidated dry well had been hollowed out long ago, and the soft soil was built into a solid wall by the magic of turning mud into stone. This place was actually a basement.

As soon as he went down the well, the disgusting stench of decay and blood rushed into Lu Yan's nose.

He took out a piece of worthless lighting talisman from his arms, tore open the talisman, and the flickering spiritual light turned into a beam of fire that illuminated the basement.

The first thing that caught Lu Yan's eyes was the pile of bones in the corner and the bloodstains all over the ground.

The piled up bones seemed to retain some hideousness and distortion, as if they had experienced great terror before death.

The blood on the ground formed into a complex pattern that shone with blood light. In the center of the formation stood an arm-long black flag. The picture outlined by a few lines on it looked like purgatory.

This was not the first time that Lu Yan came to this dry well. Even though he had seen it several times, when he set his eyes on the flag, he could still feel a palpitation in his heart.

It was as if invisible wronged souls were entangled on the flag, wailing in a way that only the souls could hear.

Even though Lu Yan didn't know much about cultivating immortals, he had stayed in Zhulin Market for three months, and was able to recognize the magic weapon in front of him through what he saw and heard.

Demonic Soul Banner!

The most famous magic weapon among all the sects of the Demonic Path. It was rampant during the heyday of the Demonic Path a thousand years ago. The Demonic monks sacrificed living creatures on a large scale to refine a large number of soul flags, which overwhelmed many of the righteous sects.

However, using soul flags to sacrifice living beings is ultimately against the harmony of nature, and the divine punishment destroyed the Jiuyou Demon Sect, which was known as the holy sect of the demon path, and the demon path declined as a result.

The righteous path took advantage of the situation and began to block the Soul Banner. The various sects united to set rules that anyone who used the Soul Banner would be regarded as an enemy of the righteous path.

Even the orthodox sect of the devil doesn't dare to use the Soul Banner magic weapon in public, let alone the shopkeeper Chu who is only at the fourth level of Qi training.

After exploring the basement several times, Lu Yan had already figured out that the bones on the ground were all the guys who had disappeared from Lingfufang in recent years.

From the perspective of outsiders, Shopkeeper Chu had a bad temper and would beat and scold his shop assistants at will. Over the past four or five years, more than 20 shop assistants had escaped from Lingfu Shop.

But in fact, those seemingly ordinary guys were all mortals with spiritual roots selected by Manager Chu using secret methods.

Shopkeeper Chu abused his employees and intentionally scattered the "Eternal Spring Skill" to be obtained by these resentful employees.

In order to protect themselves, the shop assistants began to secretly embezzle the shop's spiritual stones to assist in their cultivation. After they were promoted to the first level of Qi training, they were taken by the shopkeeper Chu into a dry well to extract their souls, refine their spirits, and forge soul flags.

The soul of a cultivator is far stronger than that of an ordinary person. Even if he is only at the Qi training level, he is still much stronger than an ordinary person. He is a precious material for refining magical instruments.

Under normal circumstances, the disappearance of a large number of monks would inevitably attract the investigation of practitioners in Zhulinfang City.

But the employees of Ling Fu Fang were all from mortal cities, and no outsiders knew about their advancement to the first level of Qi training. Therefore, the cultivators of Zhulinfang City only believed that some mortals could not stand the beatings and scoldings from Manager Chu and secretly escaped.

Shopkeeper Chu usually disguised himself well, and his employees were just ordinary people so no one cared about his whereabouts. As time went by, no one paid any attention to him.

Relying on this trick, Manager Chu secretly collected the souls of more than 20 monks over the years to refine soul flags.

Lu Yan, who was chosen by Manager Chu, was naturally one of the alternative materials.

Perhaps it was because of his contempt for Lu Yan's mortal origin, or perhaps it was because the Soul Banner was about to be completed that made Manager Chu's vigilance drop, and his disguise was not effective.

On the third day after entering Lingfufang, Lu Yan realized that Manager Chu intended to expose the "Eternal Spring Skill" to him.

At first, Lu Yan just thought that this was a bait deliberately placed by Manager Chu, so he pretended to be honest and took the initiative to remind him, but he was beaten up by the furious Manager Chu.

After recuperating in bed for several days, Lu Yan began to observe secretly and finally discovered that Manager Chu often came to the deserted backyard at night, and at night there would be the sound of evil spirits crying and howling under the dry well.

Taking advantage of the fact that Manager Chu was out, Lu Yan searched the basement under the dry well, and saw the unfinished Demon Soul Banner and the method of refining it.

The so-called "Eternal Spring Skill" is simply a quick-learning method of "Sacrificing One's Life and Concentrating One's Mind" that was deliberately modified by Shopkeeper Chu. After practicing it, the guys will consume their own vitality to strengthen their souls, so as to extract the souls and spirits to make soul flags.

After several years of sacrifice and refinement, this soul flag is about to succeed.

The moment Lu Yan chooses to practice the "Eternal Spring Kung Fu" and steps into the first level of Qi training, that will be the day when Manager Chu's soul flag is forged.

After discovering that there were demonic monks refining soul flags behind the Lingfufang, Lu Yan did not choose to report it to Zhulinfang Market.

Lu Yan knew very well that Manager Chu was only a cultivator at the fourth level of Qi training. In the eyes of ordinary people, he was considered a great figure, but among real cultivators, he was only at the bottom.

If he didn't have a backer, how could Shopkeeper Chu obtain the secret magic techniques and refine such a precious magic weapon as the Soul Banner?

There must be a big figure of the demon world behind Shopkeeper Chu, and it is very likely that he is in the Bamboo Grove Market.

Borrowing the help of Shopkeeper Chu to refine the Soul Banner was only to avoid being contaminated by karma.

Lu Yan is just an ordinary person. If he rashly reports and gets involved in the struggle between the righteous and evil monks, he will most likely be killed.

Rather than pinning his hopes of survival on the upper echelons of Zhulinfang City to handle the matter fairly, Lu Yan would rather believe in himself.

He still pretended to know nothing, ignored the baits thrown by Manager Chu repeatedly, and secretly recorded Manager Chu's travel time.

After observation, Lu Yan discovered that every ten days, Manager Chu would leave the Ling Fu Fang for a while, seemingly to report the progress of the soul flag refining to the person behind the scenes, and this was Lu Yan's opportunity. Lu Yan wanted to take advantage of this period of time to take away valuable things and wait for the arrival of the version update before escaping from Zhulinfang City.

There was nothing displayed in the basement. Apart from the Soul Banner Formation and the corpses, there seemed to be nothing else.

Lu Yan reached out and took out a gradeless soul-seeking talisman. He tore it open and a ray of spiritual light spread throughout the entire basement.

The soul-seeking talisman is the lowest-level, ungraded talisman that can be used even by mortals. Its greatest function is to assist mortals in perceiving traces of spiritual energy.

As the soul-seeking talisman was activated, Lu Yan immediately looked towards the corner of the wall, where there was a faint trace of spiritual energy flowing.

After rubbing it for a while, Lu Yan pulled out half of a loose brick and found a palm-sized bag behind it.

The bag seemed to be made of some kind of animal skin, with cloud patterns outlined in gold threads, and it looked quite luxurious and extraordinary.

After staying in Zhulin Market for three months, Lu Yan immediately recognized that the gold-thread bag was a storage bag, and from the outside it did not look like a low-grade item.

"Manager Chu is not qualified to use this high-end storage bag. Since it is hidden here, it must have come from an illegal source and he dare not take it to the outside world for use. This is a good deal for me.

This storage bag might contain most of Manager Chu’s wealth.”

Lu Yan couldn't help but reveal a smile.

Normally, mortals who have not entered the Qi training stage do not have any strength and cannot use storage bags.

However, there are some tricks in the market that use spirit stones to open storage bags. Lu Yan also knows a thing or two, so opening a storage bag is not a difficult task.

Having got the thing in his hand, Lu Yan looked at the progress bar of the version update. The progress on it has reached 99.9%, and it is only one step away from the version update.

As long as the version update is completed, Lu Yan can escape from this devil's cave with the help of the changes in the version, but Lu Yan is not in a hurry.

He just stood quietly beside the soul flag, as if waiting for something.

A quarter of an hour later, there was a noise outside the dry well, as if someone was rummaging through something in the yard.

Then a fat figure jumped into the dry well with extraordinary agility and appeared at the door of the basement.

There is no doubt that the person who came was Manager Chu.

"How did you find out?"

Shopkeeper Chu stared at Lu Yan fiercely, the fat on his face trembling. At this moment, he had lost his usual sharpness and harshness, and the aura of a cultivator in the middle stage of Qi training was floating around, like a ferocious beast that was ready to eat its prey.

In the gloomy basement, black fog lingered.

“I thought he was a hopeless idiot, but I didn’t expect he could find his way here.

If I had known earlier, I should have reported to the adults in advance to kill you, and then use new materials to refine the soul flag."

Shopkeeper Chu took a step forward and slowly walked towards Lu Yan, with a bloodthirsty smile on his face:
"But it's not too late now. After I kill you, it won't be too late to find new materials!"

In the dark basement, the Qigong cultivator felt an increasingly heavy sense of oppression.

Seeing that Manager Chu was able to come back at the last minute, Lu Yan finally revealed a satisfied smile.

Standing next to the soul flag, he stretched out his right hand and reached for the soul flag that had not yet been refined.

Manager Chu's pupils suddenly shrank, and then he grinned:
"Idiot! The Soul Banner is a magical tool that is difficult for ordinary cultivators in the early stages of Qi training to control.

There is only one outcome for ordinary people who rashly touch the Soul Banner, and that is being devoured by the resentful souls created by the Soul Banner!"

However, Lu Yan's expression remained unchanged. In his eyes, on the virtual interface that outsiders could not see clearly, the version update progress had reached 100%.

[The version update progress is full. You can choose one of the following versions to update.

Apocalyptic version: What is left in the world after the end of the world?
Cyber ​​version: When the world's giant corporations built the sky canopy, even sunlight became a luxury.

Urban version: This is the best era, but also the most boring era. 】

At the moment when Lu Yan's palm touched the Soul Banner, a soft whisper came from his mouth.

"Update, urban version!"

In an instant, the world seemed to be at a standstill.

Around Lu Yan, the dark basement filled with corpses collapsed suddenly, and the space expanded several times in an instant.

The pale light from the ceiling illuminated every corner of the basement. The soil underfoot was replaced by hard concrete floor, and the piled up bones turned into cold and stiff corpses.

There were several medical beds placed above the original magic formation, and a freezer nearby contained freshly removed organs.

The eerie scene of the magic tools forged by the demons has disappeared, and has been replaced by a bloody factory where human organs are harvested.

Not far in front of Lu Yan, Shopkeeper Chu was wearing a white coat and holding a blood-stained scalpel.

There was still an incomprehensible look of doubt on Shopkeeper Chu's face.

He didn't understand why the prey, who was supposed to be lying on the medical bed waiting for his organs to be removed, was wearing strange clothes and there was a black flag on the ground next to him.

"Wouldn't it be better to just donate your organs and then die?"

Shopkeeper Chu had a gloomy look on his face, and his fat body walked towards Lu Yan step by step.

Facing the pressing manager Chu, Lu Yan smiled.

He could clearly sense that Manager Chu's cultivation level of the fourth level of Qi training had long since disappeared completely. At this moment, he was no longer a cultivator of the magic path, but a doctor who sold human organs.

With the changes in rules as versions change, no matter how great your skills are, you can only follow the changes in rules and be like everyone else.

He raised his right hand slightly, and a low-grade talisman was torn into pieces in his palm. In an instant, a layer of golden light appeared on the surface of Lu Yan's body.

Little golden talisman!

The golden light blesses it to be invulnerable to swords and it is the life-saving item most relied upon by ordinary nobles. Although it is a low-grade talisman, its value exceeds that of an ordinary low-grade talisman of the first rank.

In the astonished eyes of Shopkeeper Chu, Lu Yan, whose body was glowing with golden light, smashed Shopkeeper Chu's head with his right fist.

The fear and depression of the past three months broke out at this moment.

"Now, it's my turn!"

(End of this chapter)