Cultivation Pet Shop

Right before that ball of dark energy could be released, there was a large sound that rang out.

The demon was caught off guard and didn't shoot the ball of dark energy. Instead, he turned in the direction of the sound and saw that there was something strange coming towards him.

It looked…like the bottom of a shoe.

Before the demon could react, the bottom of the shoe hit him right in the face and he was knocked down to the ground.

At the same time, the demon lost consciousness without a single clue what had just happened.

Lin Fan's group was also surprised by this sudden attack on the demon. But the attack had been so strong that it had actually shattered the ground and there was dust that was raised up, so they couldn't see who it was.

Once the dust settled, they weren't surprised to see that it was the Lin Astral Emperor standing there.

With this kind of power behind the attack, only the Lin Astral Emperor could do something like this.

However, he had made sure to hold back enough not to kill the demon.

Once that demon was taken care of, the guards that had come with him picked it up and suppressed it before taking it away. The Lin Astral Emperor didn't pay any attention to it as he turned to look at the two withered corpses on the ground.

After seeing the state that they were in, he couldn't help knitting his brows.

He still waved his hand and there were two guards that came forward to take these two corpses away.

As for the rest of the guards, they started searching the area to see if there was anything else left.

Once that was taken care of, he turned back to Lin Fan to ask, "Are you alright?"

Lin Fan nodded but he didn't take down his barrier right away.

Even though it seemed like he was safe, the enemy had an ability that was just too strange that he didn't dare let his guard down.

The Lin Astral Emperor didn't mind this and just left Lin Fan alone as he went to supervise the clean up of this room.

Only when they were completely alone did Lin Fan finally release the compass' barrier.

After releasing the barrier, the first thing that Lin Fan did was…clean himself up and then leave the room.

There was no doubt that the appearance of the demon would have caused some commotion, so he was going to deal with that. Otherwise, if both the host of the Lin Astral Emperor and the guest of honour of Lin Fan were gone from the hall, it would spark rumours.

So he didn't have any time to waste.

He had to get there before people started talking.

There was only so much that the prestige of the Lin Astral Empire could do to stop people from talking.

Once he arrived, he was naturally surrounded by people once again.

The cousins were also kept in the dark about this matter, so they all couldn't help looking at him with strange looks, but Lin Fan didn't have time to tell them anything.

For the rest of the ball, he had to calm the guests one by one.

Of course, the fake news that he had was spread instantly by the first few people that he talked to.

The fake news that the Lin Astral Empire had come up with was that it was an explosion caused by a pet going wild. The pet had already been captured and everything was taken care of.

There were people who clearly didn't believe this, such as the two from the Astral Empires, but no one said anything to expose this lie.

This was the Lin Astral Empire's territory, so respect had to be given to them.

With this, the ball ended without a hitch and everyone was sent off safely.

At the end, the Zi Stellar Kingdom group had tried to make an appointment to meet Lin Fan, using the excuse of meeting Zi Ling, but Lin Fan turned this request down. He gave them the excuse that he was busy with handling the affairs after the ball, but in truth, he just didn't want to meet them or let them meet Zi Ling.

Zi Ling didn't know any of this since Lin Fan had Angela distract her.

After all of this was done, Lin Fan went back to the palace and immediately met with the Lin Astral Emperor.

When he arrived in the room, he found that the Lin Astral Emperor was waiting for him alone.

At the same time, the moment that he entered the room, he could feel the array around him.

This was a very powerful array, but he didn't resist at all as he let it work its effects on him.

After raising an orb that had been beside him and seeing something in it, the Lin Astral Emperor gave a satisfied nod. He raised his other hand and gestured for Lin Fan to sit down.

Lin Fan just sat down without a word and then he looked at the Lin Astral Emperor with a questioning look.

The Lin Astral Emperor gave a sigh and said, "It's a Soul Searching Array. We created a soul jade for you when you first came if you remember and we used this array to search your soul for a match with the soul jade."

Lin Fan gave a nod in response before asking, "What are the results?"

The Lin Astral Emperor was silent for a bit before shaking his head. With another sigh, he said, "We weren't able to find a single thing."

He pulled out a folder that he placed on the table and slid over to where Lin Fan was sitting.

Lin Fan picked up the folder and knitted his brows as he read it.

According to the reports, the autopsy showed that…they had the exact same DNA and everything as the people they disguised as. It was as if they were identical twins.

This was a technique that had never been seen before, so they really didn't know what to make of it.

The only thing that they could find was different were traces of different souls. These were different from the souls that existed in the bodies of the ones that were copied by these assassins.

Luckily, they had only knocked out the ones that they had copied.

If they had to guess what it was, it was most likely that they had to keep whoever they were copying alive to keep copying them.

Of course, they couldn't test this by killing the ones that had been copied since they were guards of the Lin Astral Family.

So in the end, they couldn't figure out what this technique was.

The only real thing that they had learned in the end was that this technique couldn't affect the soul. That was why the Lin Astral Emperor had installed this Soul Searching Array in the first place.

But this was ineffective since it cost a lot just to make these Soul Searching Arrays and they only had the materials for so many of them.

So this was only a temporary solution.

After seeing that there was nothing else that they could do about it, Lin Fan changed the topic, "Do you have any idea who it was that sent them?"

The Lin Astral Emperor knitted his brows again, but this time he gave a nod in response to this before saying, "We interrogated the demon that was caught, but he didn't know anything about them either. All he told us was that he was captured by some humans, but he didn't know who those humans were."

Lin Fan stroked his chin before saying, "There wasn't anything else that you found? Was this it?"

The Lin Astral Emperor revealed a bitter smile when he heard this, but he didn't say anything.

The silence was more than enough as an answer.

Lin Fan also fell silent and the two of them just sat there in silence for a long time until he finally asked, "What do we do then?"

The Lin Astral Emperor didn't answer right away. He just remained in thought for a while before saying, "For now, we can't have you leaving the empire's territory. I wanted to have you head off to the Stellar Kingdoms and then our allied Astral Empires to exchange notes with the younger generation and raise your prestige, but now that there's this wrench thrown into the mix…"

Lin Fan nodded in agreement with this.

In the first place, he wouldn't have wanted to do this.

After all, the best way for him to become stronger was to stay at the store and earn as much as possible. Only by earning more would he be able to buy things from the store that made him stronger.

Not to mention…the store really was the safest place.

Even the Lin Astral Empire's palace wasn't as safe as the store.

But if his great grandfather really wanted him to go, he would have gone in the end.

After all, it wouldn't be bad for him to get familiar with the Stellar Kingdoms and the Astral Empires for the future.

So either way, it wasn't bad for him.

But now that there was this hidden danger, it was better for him to stay.

The Lin Astral Emperor didn't have anything else to discuss with Lin Fan, so he didn't stay here any longer. He had something else to do, something that the Lin Astral Emperor had just assigned him.