Footsteps approached, and the teammates stopped beside the charred, carbonized human-shaped corpse. Red Chicken Bro kicked the body, sending up a cloud of black ash.

“Really dead, finally dead,” Red Chicken Bro laughed three times. “I can go home for soup!”

Except for Yin Ji, who remained relatively calm, the others' faces were filled with joy. Looking at the completely dead Little Emperor, they felt like they were in a dream.

S-level mission, cleared just like that!

“From now on, we'll also have the badge of clearing an S-level mission.” Xia Shuzhi Lian's cold and beautiful face couldn't hide her smile. She said, “This is a hidden rating, I'm referring to the official internal one. Sometimes, even if the merit points aren't enough, members who have cleared S-level missions will receive more attention and importance from the leaders than others.”

Xiahou Aotian, his face full of happiness, raised his chin. “This is the glory and badge that the protagonist must have.”

He was very happy, no, ecstatic. Experience points and rewards were secondary, the badge of clearing an S-level mission was the key.

Xiahou Aotian had only cleared two A-level missions in the past, and had always regretted not having the glory of clearing an S-level mission.

Now that the protagonist had obtained the glory that matched his status, he couldn't be happier.

“S-level…” Freedom Eagle muttered to herself. She took a deep breath, and the joy on her face was hard to suppress.

The “hidden rating” mentioned by Xia Shuzhi Lian also applied within the Heavenly Punishment Organization. This instance experience would become a stepping stone for her promotion to a second-level Gold Executive Officer.

“Yuanshi Tianzun, you're really amazing. I wish I could be matched with you in the future.” Yun Meng said happily.

Due to its internal structure and national attributes, the Qinghe Branch didn't value positions and benefits. Her joy was the purest, a narrow escape from death!

As soon as she said this, everyone couldn't help but look at Yuanshi Tianzun and the Subduing Demon Pestle in his hand.

At first, their impression of Yuanshi Tianzun was – he does have some skills.

But there was absolutely no admiration or reliance, until the battle at the bottom of the sea. Among Xiahou Aotian, who analyzed the formation, Freedom Eagle, the Plague God, and Yin Ji, who restrained the Yin Corpse army, he stood out and played an important role.

After landing ashore, the position of leader had actually been transferred to him in an intangible way.

Therefore, after the plan was made, almost no one objected, and they handed over their lives to him.

Now that I think about it, it's incredible.

He was clearly only level 4, but in the instance, he suppressed Xiahou Aotian at level 5 and Yin Ji at level 6. This was the real genius, far from being comparable to these elites of the same level.

Those could only be considered elites.

Xiahou Aotian was silent for a moment, then praised, “Yuanshi Tianzun, you, um… the item in your hand is very good.”

Would it kill you to praise me a few words… Zhang Yuanqing was speechless and could only hum.

Without the Subduing Demon Pestle, even with the Yin-Yang Wheel of Fortune's restraint, the team would have lost half its members.

No, in fact, at the bottom of the sea, if it weren't for him and the Yin-Yang Wheel of Fortune being compatible, half of them would have died then. And even so, Xia Shu and Yun Meng still died once.

Zhang Yuanqing said, “Speaking of items, the Xie family's Rule-type item belongs to me, no objections, right?”

Everyone looked at each other, some frowning, some hesitant.

Zhang Yuanqing added, “I will distribute the rewards for the two items to you according to your contributions. Everyone can exchange contact information.”

Hearing this, everyone felt much better and nodded.

In fact, even if Yuanshi Tianzun embezzled it, they couldn't do anything, because the items were all in the item bar, and even the most extreme act of killing and looting couldn't be done.

Now that he was willing to share some of the rewards, what could they say?

Immediately, everyone exchanged contact information.

“This protagonist's contribution is the greatest, it wouldn't be too much for him to give me 80 million.” Xiahou Aotian said with anticipation.

Eighty million? You want me to pay for your energy packs, right… Zhang Yuanqing saw through Xiahou Aotian's shallow intentions at a glance, and asked with a friendly expression, “Your main mission is completed, why hasn't it been settled yet?”

“It's already being settled.” Xiahou Aotian said.

“Get out of here, don't bother me.”

“…” Xiahou Aotian was about to retort, when suddenly his body stiffened, and a miniature pill furnace surrounded by clouds appeared on his forehead, his brown pupils turning purple.

On the other side, a hazy and mysterious nebula lit up on Yin Ji's forehead, and the power of stars overflowed from her body.

The process lasted for more than ten seconds. When the surging aura in the two calmed down, Zhang Yuanqing found that their aura had become much stronger.

“As expected of an S-level instance, it actually added 18% experience at once. If I clear another instance next month, I can reach level 6.” Xiahou Aotian said excitedly.

Looking at the envious and expectant expressions of his teammates, Zhang Yuanqing thought to himself - oh, is it only 18%? Every time I clear an S-level instance, I get a reward of 30% to 40% experience.

At this time, Yin Ji looked sideways and said, “I'll go back first. I'll contact you when I find a suitable item.”

Zhang Yuanqing nodded. “Don't leak the information about the item I got.”

He needed to discuss with Fu Qingyang how to use the item to bargain with the official forces. Don't let the headquarters and the people from the Jianghuai branch be waiting at Fujiawan as soon as he returned to the instance. That would be very passive.

The experience in Jinghai City made him realize that although merit points were good, they had a fatal flaw.

They couldn't offset sins, and it was likely that an accident would happen before the merit points could be exchanged, such as not being able to be promoted within a year.

Of course, this was mainly because he leveled up too quickly and earned merit points too quickly.

For ordinary official Night Wanderers, the benefits of merit points were greater than money and other benefits.

“Okay,” Yin Ji nodded heavily.

In the next second, she and Xiahou Aotian disappeared from the instance and returned to reality.

After the two left, Red Chicken Bro's face changed. “Damn, our main mission is to survive for 36 hours. The time isn't up yet, we can't get out. My chicken soup…”

Are you just realizing that? Zhang Yuanqing glanced at him.

“We entered the instance about 16 hours ago. There's still plenty of time. Let's search for materials together. There should be a lot of valuable materials in this instance.” Xia Shuzhi Lian said.

The materials sold outside are all collected by Night Wanderers from instances.

“It's a pity it's been burned to ashes.” Freedom Eagle looked at the Little Emperor's remains, her face full of regret.

At this time, she noticed that Yuanshi Tianzun was walking towards the palace, so she shut up and quickly followed.

Xia Shuzhi Lian took a few quick steps, walked side by side with Zhang Yuanqing, and speculated, “The monsters in the instance are concentrated at the bottom of the sea, so the palace might not have anything to gain.”

“I'm not here for the materials.” Zhang Yuanqing crossed the threshold and entered the palace.

“Then…” Xia Shuzhi Lian frowned.

Zhang Yuanqing didn't answer, crossed the courtyard overgrown with weeds, and arrived outside the gate of the main palace, the Ciyuan Palace.

The palace was very small, rectangular in shape, about 100 meters long and more than 30 meters wide. It had three halls in total, the central one being the Ciyuan Palace, which was the residence of the Little Emperor's mother.

The layout of the hall was simple. On the left was the bedroom, and on the right was the outer room, furnished with simple furniture and bookshelves, unusually poor.

Zhang Yuanqing walked around the bedroom and the outer room and asked, “Xia Shu, can you see anything?”

Xia Shuzhi Lian looked at the stack of official documents on the bookshelf and said, “The most valuable things are those.”

Zhang Yuanqing hummed and walked straight to the bookshelf.

The Ciyuan Palace was simply furnished and easy to see at a glance. He could naturally see that the most valuable things were the official documents, but that was all he could see. If there were hidden compartments, inconspicuous clues, etc., he couldn't see them. He needed a scout.

“Help me take a look together.” He took out an official document and patted off the dust.

“Look at what?” Xia Shuzhi Lian asked.

“I don't know, let's take a look first.” Zhang Yuanqing shook his head.

There was a lot of content in the official documents, and the matters were very complicated, but when divided, they could be divided into three categories: war intelligence, market in the imperial court, and correspondence between Yuan and Song.

In the war intelligence, Zhang Yuanqing saw information about many ancient practitioner organizations. At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, the orthodox path was weakening. The Yuan army had recruited many heretics and orthodox sects active in the north and conquered the south.

While negotiating with the Yuan army, the Southern Song court secretly sent letters to those sects, hoping that the extraordinary people and strangers could return to the court and resist the Yuan together.

However, the demise of the Southern Song Dynasty was an inevitable trend, and no one responded.

“Oh!” Xia Shuzhi Lian suddenly handed over a document and said, “Take a look at this.”

Zhang Yuanqing took the official document and read it carefully. It was military intelligence, but it was not about the movements of the Yuan army, but about practitioners.

It said that the practitioners of the Nine Poison Sect in the north and the Dark Shadow Building in the western regions had suggested to the Yuan army commander: Refine the remaining dragon energy to suppress the mountains and rivers.

That was it, no details.

“This is what I'm looking for.” Zhang Yuanqing smiled.

“Is that thing very precious?”

Red Chicken Bro, who was behind him, eagerly came up.

Xia Shuzhi Lian and others looked at him with questioning eyes. Yuanshi Tianzun didn't collect materials, he came to the palace to find this document?

Did it contain some secret?

“It's not precious, I'm just satisfying my curiosity.” Zhang Yuanqing looked around at his teammates. “Do you remember the instance introduction?”

Yun Meng answered quickly: “To prevent the resurgence of the Southern Song Dynasty, the Yuan army sent extraordinary people and strangers to set up a Dragon Locking Formation, so that the soldiers at the bottom of the sea would never be able to be reincarnated.”

"But the real purpose is to refine a Lord-level Yin Corpse, refine the remaining dragon energy to suppress the mountains and rivers, which is what it means." The Subduing Demon Pestle said eloquently:

"At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, the spiritual power of heaven and earth was exhausted. Well, you should all know this secret, after all, you are all Saints. If you don't know, consider it a free gift."

"Back to the topic, at the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, the Lords of the cultivation world should have died almost completely. The extraordinary people and strangers in the Yuan army wanted to take advantage of the change of dynasties and use the remnants of the Great Song to refine a Lord-level Yin Corpse."

"It's a pity they failed. It was too much trouble to deal with tens of thousands of Yin Corpses, so they simply abandoned them. That's why the Little Emperor was left at the bottom of the sea."

Red Chicken Bro suddenly understood. "So that's how it is. This is the complete plot of the instance."

"Yes." Zhang Yuanqing sighed: "It's a pity that this hidden mission has been triggered, and the rewards have nothing to do with us."

"Hidden mission?" Red Chicken Bro was stunned.

Zhang Yuanqing said, "Otherwise, why do you think the last team was wiped out here?"

Xia Shuzhi Lian suddenly understood:

"You mean that the last team triggered the hidden mission and was wiped out, which led to the change in the difficulty of 'Yashan Sea', rather than their failure to clear the instance and the loss of items in the instance, which caused the difficulty of the instance to change."

The meaning is similar, but the cause and effect are different.

In fact, the Devil Lord survived, but he didn't seem to have told Yin Ji about it. Looking at it this way, did that guy secretly plot against his teammates at the time? Otherwise, why would he sigh "the performance exceeded the target" in the Cat King Speaker... Zhang Yuanqing's mind turned, and his expression was calm:

"That's right."

With a sudden realization, Red Chicken Bro borrowed a transcendent-level Water Ghost item from Yun Meng and went to the seaside with his teammates.

Not to mention anything else, the materials in those Yin Corpses, tens of thousands of Yin Corpses, were enough for them to make a fortune.

Unexpectedly, just as they walked out of the palace, they saw that the blue sky was covered with golden light.

A vast and majestic, upright and domineering aura shrouded the entire Yashan Sea.

"What's going on?" Red Chicken Bro was shocked, raised his head to look at the sky, his expression panicked: "Is the instance starting again? Did we trigger a hidden mission?"

Under such a deep abyss-like pressure, even the Fire Master couldn't raise the will to fight and the desire to fight.

Xia Shuzhi Lian's face was solemn, and she silently summoned a short sword.

Freedom Eagle and Yun Meng were facing a great enemy, and the panic on their faces was hard to hide.

"Don't be afraid, this is the supreme existence I summoned, the great and holy, dignified and beautiful, noble and elegant Mountain God, and I am her favorite junior." Zhang Yuanqing said in an incomparably pious tone.

Yuanshi Tianzun's words, heard in everyone's ears, were simply the most beautiful sound in the world.

He summoned such a great existence at that time?

While sighing in relief, everyone felt an unspeakable envy and jealousy. Being able to summon this level of existence in the instance, it was difficult for Yuanshi Tianzun to die even if he wanted to.

Compared to other people's envy, Freedom Eagle thought more. Could this be the reason why Yuanshi Tianzun leveled up so quickly?

Where did he get the opportunity?

This was extremely important information that could allow the organization to better understand the reason for the rise of a genius.

I like the look in your eyes... Zhang Yuanqing was calm on the surface and said, "You guys go to the seaside first."

After everyone left, the golden light in the air quickly shrank, condensing into a stream of light and descending to the entrance of the palace.

In the golden light, a pure and dignified goddess stood gracefully, wearing a gorgeous neon dress, her blue hair like a waterfall, and that elegant and dignified face carried a hint of a smile.

Like a flower growing in the immortal world, simple and noble, it fluttered and landed in the human world.

Zhang Yuanqing bowed down and said loudly:

"Goddess, please forgive me."

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess was slightly surprised and asked:

"What is the sin?"

Zhang Yuanqing said, "This junior should not evaluate the goddess in front of outsiders. The goddess is peerless and unparalleled in ancient times. How can this junior describe her at will?"

The smile on the Third Dao Mountain Goddess's beautiful face seemed to deepen a bit, and she said lightly:

"Bring the Subduing Demon Pestle here."

Zhang Yuanqing offered it with both hands, raising it above his head.

The Subduing Demon Pestle turned into a golden light and disappeared into the goddess's body.

Alas, our fate is over, I have to walk my own way in the future... Zhang Yuanqing felt a strong reluctance in his heart. The Subduing Demon Pestle and Red Dance Shoes were his first items, and they were also important tools for him to rely on to make a name for himself and kill enemies.

There is no emotion.

The old hag flicked her finger, and a parchment scroll flew lightly to Zhang Yuanqing.

"This is a simplified sacrificial ritual. Whether in the real world or in the instance, you can communicate with me, and it can be used repeatedly." The Third Dao Mountain Goddess's voice was clear and pleasant.

"Goddess, this junior has one more request." Zhang Yuanqing solemnly put away the parchment scroll and said, "This junior has recently been plagued by inner demons, acts biased, and is difficult to control. I would like to ask the goddess for a magic weapon."

"Inner demons?" Her delicate eyebrows frowned slightly, and she said, "What is it?"

"The Ghost Mirror of Princess Yinyao." The Subduing Demon Pestle said.

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess said: "Okay, within ten days, I will give you the mirror."

She didn't even hesitate, and sent her disciple's important magic weapon as she said.

After all, even her disciples, she would send as she said.

Great! A smile appeared on Zhang Yuanqing's face, and he tentatively asked:

"Did the goddess have something delayed?"

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess shook her head. "I am already in Sumeru Mustard Seed."

Before Zhang Yuanqing could speak, she warned in a deep voice, "The path of cultivation is to fight with the heavens and fight with humans. You can borrow power, but you cannot rely on external forces blindly. From now on, I will not help you with anything in the instance."

"Thank you for your guidance, Goddess. This junior will keep it in mind." Zhang Yuanqing's attitude was very good.

Alas, I can't cheat in the future.

He immediately asked, "Goddess, when you merge with the Yang Soul in the Subduing Demon Pestle, will you be able to leave the Lingjing? Have you ever thought about rebuilding the Pure Yang Sect in the real world?"

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess said, "I will not leave the Lingjing in the short term."

"Why?"

"If I leave the Lingjing, I will not have a character card and it will be difficult to return. And the Lingjing hides the hope of advancing to Human Immortal." She did not hide it.

"I wish the goddess will advance to Human Immortal as soon as possible, live as long as the heavens, and be immortal." Zhang Yuanqing bowed down.

Sure enough, this junior never let her down.

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess smiled lightly, "Is there anything else?"

"Respectfully send off the Goddess." Zhang Yuanqing did not get up.

The Third Dao Mountain Goddess nodded lightly, turned into a golden light and disappeared into the sky.

……

After nearly twenty hours of collecting materials, the people on the shore, organizing the spoils, heard the familiar instance prompt sound.

[Ding, congratulations on completing the multiplayer Lingjing mission - Yashan Sea, No. 012, difficulty level S, calculating rewards...]

……

ps: Fix the typos first and then change them.