Chapter 11: A New Choice

The knocking at the door took Li Mingxing quite by surprise. His mentor had no need for a key here, and Zheng Yuan already had one, so the person knocking had to be an outsider. Li Mingxing peered cautiously through the peephole and saw a man in a police uniform rapping insistently at the door.

He hesitated for a moment before finally opening it. No sooner had the door swung wide than the policeman presented his credentials and brandished a photograph of Zhao Wenbin. “Excuse me,” he asked, “have you seen this man before?”

Li Mingxing studied the photo for a long while and then replied with certainty, “Yes, I’ve seen him. He and some classmates came to this complex before. In fact, I moved here because of him.”

The policeman nodded, as if this was already known to him. He asked a few more questions, then took his leave.

Once the door was closed, Li Mingxing’s mentor, Raymond, appeared behind him. “That man just now carried the aura of Light.”

“A trainee hero?” Li Mingxing didn’t even look up. The questions just asked had already aroused his suspicion.

“Probably not. More likely a follower.” Raymond considered. “That’s typical of the Light—they don’t restrict their followers to the Otherworld alone, but also employ their powers in the real world.”

“Is there any way to find his trainee hero through that policeman?” Li Mingxing asked, tilting his head.

“Not easily. If the hero dares to send out his follower, he’s confident you won’t be able to trace him. If you try, you’ll likely alert the trainee hero. I think you’d do better to focus on strengthening yourself for now.”

“Then I’d better get back to taking on missions. How many are available this time?” Li Mingxing saw the sense in Raymond’s words and dropped the subject, turning instead to the matter of missions.

Having already completed two low-level missions in both the Otherworld and the real world, Li Mingxing now had more choices open to him: two low-level and one intermediate mission in the Otherworld, and likewise in the real world.

He didn’t immediately pick one, but scrutinized them all, even contemplating taking two at once. But since some of the missions conflicted with one another, he could only choose the one that best suited his interests.

As Raymond had explained, missions in the Otherworld mainly rewarded abilities, while those in the real world provided architectural blueprints. But in the Otherworld, there was always the chance of earning other rewards; with luck, one might even assemble a powerful army.

So, after assessing his current situation, Li Mingxing decided to forgo the real-world missions.

Next, he considered the three Otherworld missions. The intermediate one was tempting—offering both an attack skill and a support skill—but the difficulty was daunting: he would have to build his own city in the strategic layer of the Otherworld and claim a resource mine of each type. With his current forces, that was sheer fantasy; he struggled even with mid-tier monsters.

The two low-level missions were more manageable. One required him to capture a field barracks and a field training camp in the strategic layer and train a hundred soldiers. The other called for him to find a magical artifact called the Elemental Belt in the adventure layer.

Of these, Li Mingxing favored the adventure-layer mission. While searching for something wasn’t easy, his numbers could compensate for any qualitative disadvantage against the enemy, ensuring his safety at least.

The rewards were also attractive: apart from the Elemental Belt, which would be surrendered, he could keep any other treasure found along the way. Moreover, he would gain a skill—one that was particularly enticing.

Order Magic: the ability to learn and use spells of the Order school, mainly mental control magic—blindness, hypnosis, madness, amnesia—as well as illusions, mirror images, and other variant summoning spells, plus practical spells like reduction, precision, shifting, and field teleportation.

Most importantly, Raymond promised that if Li Mingxing completed the mission, he could keep the skill and pass it to a suitable candidate.

With this, Li Mingxing was confident he could train a great mage for himself.

Seeing Li Mingxing’s interest, Raymond handed him a badge-like token. “Show this to the Gatekeeper. He’ll open a passage to any adventure layer of the Otherworld for you. This time, there’s no time limit—you can stay as long as you like. So keep this badge with you. When you’re done, use it to notify the Gatekeeper to bring you back.”

Li Mingxing examined the badge carefully. It was a lump of pure blackness; holding it, he felt as though he were trapped in darkness. Yet he found nothing else unusual about it, and wondered how his mentor managed to communicate with the Gatekeeper through it.

After tucking the badge away, another thought occurred to him. “Mentor, do you have one of those legendary space pouches? Every time I lug around all this stuff, my subordinates are exhausted. It’s hardly an army at all.”

“No,” Raymond replied flatly. “There are only seventeen pieces of spatial equipment in the entire Alliance. Not only you and I, but even the Emperor-level heroes might not have one. You’ll just have to accept it. Everyone goes through this, so strong supply lines and cities at regular intervals are crucial.”

Amid their banter, Li Mingxing returned to the mysterious bar. Before entering the Otherworld, he sought out the beautiful bartender to turn in his two completed missions, delivering his reward of five units of medium-grade building materials to his city. The second-tier lesser warrior he’d just obtained now followed him as well.

He then picked up five new missions, including the minor tasks of collecting vengeful spirits and flesh—after all, he would have to fight anyway, so there was no reason not to accept them.

The other three missions were more challenging, requiring certain quantities of resources. These were easier to obtain in the strategic layer, but since Li Mingxing would be heading into the adventure layer, gathering them would be more troublesome.

The bartender didn’t ask any questions and assigned all five missions to him.

Just as Li Mingxing was about to enter the Otherworld, a woman at a nearby table suddenly stood and called out, “Who’ll take me as a subordinate? I can fight, manage cities—I can do it all.”

He glanced over, noting her impressive figure, but saw nothing else of interest. Shaking his head, he ignored her and headed for the great door to the Otherworld.

This time, the door was not as deserted as before. Two others waited outside, hoping to enter. As Li Mingxing approached, they shrank into the shadows, neither greeting him.

He waited half an hour before, after the other two had departed, he finally approached the Gatekeeper, showing Raymond’s badge as he surveyed the surroundings.

The Gatekeeper glanced at the badge and said nothing. The two Gatekeepers pushed with all their might; a hot wind rushed forth and a passage opened for Li Mingxing.

He glanced behind at the trainee hero tailing him, then cautiously stepped into the passage.

No sooner had he entered than a portal opened at his side, and his follower Yin Haitao, along with all his troops, emerged.

What really drew Li Mingxing’s attention, however, was the newly acquired second-tier lesser zombie.

According to his information, the Otherworld’s troop types were broad categories, but within them existed many variations, depending on the development of the Otherworld—Eastern, Western, technological, and special types.

Zombies were no different: among second-tier lesser zombies were ancient Eastern zombies, Maoshan battle zombies, Japanese zombies, Qing Dynasty zombies, Western undead zombies, Western patchwork zombies, and bio-zombies.

His own zombie seemed to be of the Western patchwork variety, the body covered in stitches, the left hand entirely replaced by a bloody iron hook.

From this zombie, Li Mingxing could see exactly where all the flesh he’d collected had gone. By his calculations, those thirty-five units of flesh could produce at least seven such zombies, yet he’d been given just one as compensation. The hero who issued that task had truly made a killing.