Warning! The evil god's minions are invading the eerie dungeon.

"Yes, it is. What's wrong?"

Qi Xie raised his eyes and calmly looked at the young man in the black special uniform opposite him.

The young man, who looked to be in his mid-twenties and named Lu Ran, was the action team leader transferred from the Anxia Province's Special Operations Bureau to provide support.

Each provincial bureau has a varying number of action team leaders, but the number of top-level action team leaders has drastically decreased, with even one per province.

The Anxia Provincial Bureau does not have a chief commander, but only four action captains. Lu Ran is the last action captain in Anxia Province, excluding Jiang Zhengyi, Lin Dong, and Wang Ling.

He was originally busy and couldn't get away, but he showed up because he heard that the Black Saint Guild's "spiritualists" were also involved in this mission in the ancient town.

The 'Spiritualist' had been matched with him in a dungeon earlier, where the two were competing for a dangerous and bizarre material, and the 'Spiritualist' was the one who ultimately won.

The material was a perfect match for Lu Ran's abilities, so he came specifically for the material on the 'Spiritualist'.

For this reason, he specifically put aside his work.

But who would have thought that by the time he arrived, everyone had been killed by Qi Xie, and the 'Spiritualist' had also been taken into Qi Xie's possession.

This made him find Qi Xie irritating no matter how he looked at him.

One reason was that someone suddenly appeared and intercepted him, and another reason was that he, as a member of the Weird Special Operations Bureau, was dissatisfied with Qi Xie.

This is our bureau's mission. You never come earlier or later, but the mission happened to be a day over, and the enemies in the ancient town were worn down by our people for a whole day.

And then you arrived.

And they rushed there before we could provide assistance.

This made him wonder if Qi Xie had deliberately gone there to take advantage of the situation and snatch the spoils ahead of time.

In some ways, he wasn't wrong.

However, Qi Xie valued different spoils of war than they did. His primary objective was to capture the supernatural, while other things were secondary.

Of course, while Qi Xie doesn't value these things, it's unrealistic to expect him to spit them out.

So at this moment, Qi Xie crossed his arms and looked at Lu Ran calmly, showing no intention of paying him any attention.

Seeing this, Lu Ran narrowed his eyes and looked at Qi Xie.

He had heard of Qi Xie from Jiang Zhengyi, but had never seen him in person.

According to Jiang Zhengyi's description, his half-brother was just as strong as him.

Lu Ran's strength is slightly inferior to Jiang Zhengyi's.

If we substitute the quantities, he felt that his strength was probably slightly inferior to Qi Xie's.

However, he was not worried about being at a disadvantage.

This is, after all, the Special Operations Bureau of the Weird, and Lin Dong and Wang Ling are sitting next to me.

If they can defeat Jiang Zhengyi without any problem, then by the same logic they should be able to defeat Qi Xie as well.

Of course, if you add Jiang Zhengyi, it won't work.

Therefore, he deliberately waited for Jiang Zhengyi to leave before launching an attack on Qi Xie, hoping to get his hands on the item.

He wasn't afraid if Jiang Zhengyi asked him about it later.

This was originally our operation, and our people also made contributions.

Logically and morally, it would be reasonable for us to share the spoils of war, right?

Therefore, Lu Ran looked at Qi Xie with full confidence and said in a slightly deep voice:

Aren't you afraid?

Qi Xie tilted his head slightly, a faint smile playing on his lips: "What are you afraid of?"

"You're afraid of me."

Lu Ran pointed to himself, then to Lin Dong and Wang Ling beside him:

"Or maybe they're afraid of us."

He braced himself on the table with both hands, leaning slightly forward, his eyes sharp as knives, attempting to intimidate Qi Xie.

"Jiang Zhengyi isn't here now, and you're surrounded by our Special Operations Bureau. There are three of us. If I team up with the other two..."

He didn't finish his sentence, but the meaning was clear.

Unexpectedly, after these words were spoken, it was not Qi Xie who reacted first, but Lin Dong.

The young man turned to look at him and said righteously:

"Are you kidding me? You want me to lay a hand on my savior? That would be no different from being an animal. I cannot condone that."

"Um?"

Lu Ran was stunned.

What's going on?

As far as he knew, Lin Dong didn't seem to have gotten any decent spoils of war.

When did this kid become so benevolent?

He then turned to look at Wang Ling.

The other person crossed their arms and remained silent, giving him a look that conveyed the meaning:

Don't drag me into your bragging.

what's going on?

Why doesn't anyone want to get involved?

Lu Ran looked aggrieved.

None of them are loyal when they're out in the game!

But he couldn't bear to give up the opportunity he had finally obtained.

He was truly unwilling to give up without trying.

Thinking that the two were evenly matched and why not take a gamble, he slammed his hand on the table and said to Qi Xie:

"Let's go to the arena and have a one-on-one duel! You dare?"

"If I win, you have to give me 'The Spirit Medium' and everything on her! If you win, I'll give you five thousand Weird Points!"

Oh my?

Qi Xie tilted his head, the curve of his lips becoming increasingly pronounced:

"make a deal."

Lu Ran was taken aback when Qi Xie agreed so readily, then gritted his teeth and said:

"Okay! Come with me!"

He then turned and left, while Qi Xie leisurely got up and followed behind.

Wang Ling, who remained where she was, watched the two figures disappear, then turned to Lin Dong and asked curiously:

"When did Lu Ran become so brave? Doesn't he know Qi Xie?"

"know."

Lin Dong silently took a sip of tea:

"Jiang Zhengyi told him that his brother, the one who threw steel coils like projectiles, was about as strong as Jiang Zhengyi himself."

Wang Ling's lips twitched slightly.

You actually believe what this vain, reckless teenager says?

Don't worry.

Lin Dong said:

"That man should give Jiang Zheng some face and not let Lu Ran ruin his work."

Upon hearing this, Wang Ling felt relieved and sat down to wait quietly.

Ten minutes later.

Three figures quietly approached the table and sat down.

It was Qi Xie, Lu Ran, and Jiang Zhengyi, whom they happened to meet.

Qi Xie picked up the still-warm tea and took a sip, still maintaining his elegant demeanor.

Lu Ran's face was bruised and swollen, looking like a pig's head, as he stared straight at Jiang Zhengyi.

Jiang Zhengyi lowered his head slightly, feeling guilty and not daring to meet his gaze.

Lin Dong leaned closer to Lu Ran and said with a wicked smile:

"How was it? A truly exhilarating battle, wasn't it?"

"What a load of rubbish! I was beaten so badly I was practically having a replay in my mind's eye. I vaguely saw my grandma waving at me."

Lu Ran was so defeated by the beating that he had no temper left.

At that moment, Jiang Zhengyi was passing by the audience. While being brutally beaten, he shouted an accusation that Jiang Zhengyi had lied about military intelligence.

After figuring out the situation, Qi Xie laughed for a full minute before continuing to beat him up.

"Don't forget the five thousand weird points."

Qi Xie chuckled and said:

"Also, I have a use for the 'Spiritualist' skill, but if you want to buy that dangerous-grade material, add another five thousand Weird Points."

Upon hearing this, Lu Ran, who was glaring angrily at Jiang Zhengyi, was taken aback:

"This...this is a highly dangerous and bizarre material, are you willing to sell it?"

It was precisely because the number of rare materials classified as restricted or higher was decreasing exponentially on the market, and most owners were unwilling to sell, that he didn't consider buying them. Normally, owners of items of this level wouldn't sell.

But for Qi Xie, the "spirit medium" also has other parts that are contaminated by strange energy, which can be used to feed the evil god.

As for a dangerous-grade material, he could just sell it; it didn't matter. After all, he originally fed the evil god to exchange 'blessings' for strange points.

Of course, this cannot be said.

"This is out of respect for Jiang Zhengyi."

Qi Xie said calmly.

This time, it was Jiang Zhengyi's pride that led him to lie about military intelligence, which caused Lu Ran to lose 5,000 strange points.

Now that he has caused trouble and losses to his companions, it's understandable that people will resent him.

So when he said that, he was also conveniently giving credit to Jiang Zhengyi and helping him out of a predicament.

Jiang Zhengyi was also stunned for a moment, then cast a touching glance at Qi Xie.

"It feels like taking care of a child... You need to get along well with the other students in kindergarten, right?"

As Qi Xie pondered this, he chuckled to himself.

After chuckling for a while, he put down his teacup and said seriously:

"Alright, enough of that, let's get back to business."

"I want to know, why was the Black Saint Guild's ambush specifically targeting Jiang Zhengyi this time?"