Grasping Evil

Ning Fan was stunned. This elderly man who was currently grumbling and complaining gave off an extremely strong aura force. To Ning Fan's surprise, he was actually an old monster at the Void Inquiry Stage!

However, judging from this man's words, he did not harbor an evil motive towards Ning Fan at all by concealing himself in this place as he was just sleeping here.

After pondering carefully, Ning Fan found it logical too.

When he ascended to the fifth floor from the fourth floor through the teleportation formation, his landing point was random. How could it be possible for someone to hide somewhere around his landing point beforehand to ambush him?

Thus, he concluded that this old man was really just sleeping here while keeping his presence concealed and that was it. The latter did not have the intention of sneak-attacking Ning Fan at all.

The only person who was to blame for this situation was the elderly man for not choosing a more appropriate place to sleep but rather the place where Ning Fan landed.

To every cultivator, if they suddenly sense a strong expert hiding near them when they have just descended somewhere, they would certainly be nervous and vigilant as well.

Ning Fan had already given enough face to the elderly man as he did not directly deliver a fatal blow to him but only forced the latter out of his concealment.

"Why would an old monster of the Void Inquiry Stage appear on the fifth floor of the lightning tower… According to Hong Yi's information and the memories of the lightning lords on the previous four floors, there should be no creature of the Void Inquiry Stage in the first ten floors of the tower. Could it be that this elderly man is an expert who had come down here from the upper floors beyond the tenth floor? His name is Lei Shiyi, huh…?"

While Ning Fan was contemplating, he activated his lightning star and lightning diagram to guard against the elderly man from attacking him at any time.

An old monster of the Void Inquiry Stage could equally fight against several Void Glimpse Stage experts at the same time.

Even though Ning Fan was able to kill three experts of the Void Glimpse Stage throughout his journey, he does not have a chance against an expert of the Void Inquiry Stage. What he could do at most was to conceal himself and flee with the help of the Heaven Deceiving Cloak.

However, what Ning Fan had never expected was that although he had disturbed the elderly man's sweet dream and made him wake up with resentment, the latter's killing intent instantly dissipated after taking a deep look at him.

Ning Fan was observing the elderly man while the latter was also doing the same.

He sensed a hint of danger from Ning Fan's lightning star. He did not know that it was the Tai Su Lightning Star but he was aware that it had a heaven-defying restraining effect on him.

The elderly man's gaze turned away. He had a rough estimation of how strong Ning Fan was and no longer had the intention of making him an enemy.

He opened his mouth and revealed his yellowish teeth. His smile made him look rather wretched. He then took the initiative to strike a conversation with his fists cupped.

"Little Friend, you are strong, aren't you? Hehe. Are you an undead spirit which moved up here from one of the four floors below? This old man is Lei Shiyi and I came from the eleventh floor. Let's be friends, what do you say?

"Eleventh floor!" Ning Fan's eyes flashed with sternness and a hint of surprise.

This elderly man is indeed an expert from the floors beyond the tenth floor.

He was filled with rage at first. However, after he inspected me, he wore a friendly smile and greeted me politely. I suppose he is intimidated by my presence.

That elderly man was no doubt very strong. Since he did not plan to rush at Ning Fan, the latter would also not ask for trouble by taking the initiative to attack a Mid Void Refinement Realm being like him.

As for the elderly man's suggestion of befriending him…

Ning Fan did not say yes or no. Instead, he cupped his fists and said.

"Please excuse me!"

He actually wanted to walk away without giving him an answer.

He did not have the intention of becoming friends with the elderly man. The only reason why he came here was for the lightning bamboo leaves. He did not want to cause any other unnecessary troubles.

"You are gathering the dark golden bamboo leaves?" The elderly man's eyes suddenly flashed with surprise. The creepy and mischievous bearing in him disappeared at once.

"…"

Ning Fan did not answer. The seriousness in his expression became more intense. Internally, he felt astonished.

How does this old man know that I am gathering dark golden bamboo leaves?!

"You don't have to be nervous. I am just guessing as I sensed the smell of bamboo leaves from your body. Hehe. I always have a sharp nose… Besides, I have not only smelled bamboo leaves… Hmm? I also smell some lightning jades from you. 156 pieces. No. There are 157 pieces of silver jades! Four of them have almost reached the standard of a golden jade… Little Friend, you are very rich. Hehe."

As soon as the elderly man mentioned the word "rich", his eyes immediately burned with enthusiasm.

"I don't understand what you mean!" Ning Fan's tone was cold but internally, he was somewhat surprised.

This elderly man really has good means. He can even tell how many silver jades I have just by the smell.

"Lightning jades are supreme treasures for undead spirits that can help raise their cultivation bases. They are also the currency in use on the floors beyond the tenth floor. On the eleventh floor itself, those who possess 100 silver jades are all Void Refinement Realm experts. Judging from your expression, you didn't seem to have heard of the lightning jades being the currency in the upper floors, did you?" The elderly man sounded a little astonished.

"It's my first time coming to the fifth floor."

"No wonder. No wonder… So that's how it is. Hehe. *Dry coughs*…" The elderly man rubbed his hands, absorbed in his thoughts.

He saw through Ning Fan's cultivation base which was at the Half-Step Void Refinement Realm but he only thought of the latter as an undead spirit.

Naturally, he could not understand why a Divine Transformation Realm undead spirit like him would not choose to devour the 157 silver jades in his hands.

After all, 157 silver jades contained an extremely large amount of magic power to undead spirits.

Or did it mean that Ning Fan had never planned on devouring the silver jades in the first place and he just treated them as currency?

However, Ning Fan had also never been to any floors beyond the tenth floor and he was not aware of the rules and regulations of the upper floors. It made the whole situation seem weird.

The elderly man found it even more confusing as he continued to think about it and thus, he chose to stop pondering on these tiny details.

The current him only had a single motive in mind.

Ning Fan's riches were not little as he had accumulated 157 silver jades in total. Moreover, he was quite strong.

Hence, Lei Shiyi figured that Ning Fan could become one of his customers!

Lei Shiyi was a merchant who travelled around the eleventh floor.

What he was obsessed with was using the useless trash from the upper floors to exchange for lightning jades from the experts on the lower floors.

Of course, whether he would be willing to trade or not still depended on his customer.

If Ning Fan was slightly weaker, he could directly kill him and seize his jades. Why would he even bother to trade with him?

However, the fact that Ning Fan could force him out of his concealment and the sense of danger he could give him made him feel a little afraid. He did not have the idea of underestimating Ning Fan at all.

As such, it was still safer for him to carry out a proper trade with Ning Fan. It could not be any better to refrain from making an enemy out of him.

"Hehe. My name is Lei Shiyi. What's yours?"

"Zhou Ming."

"Oh, it's Little Friend Zhou. Please excuse me for being ill-mannered earlier. Little Friend has quite a lot of money. Are you interested in buying something from me? I am a merchant and I have some good things with me. All of them were obtained from the eleventh floor. Perhaps there is something that Little Friend might need!"

"Buying your things?! What do you have?"

Ning Fan was a little dumbfounded. He had obtained quite a lot of lightning jades from killing the undead spirits. However, these lightning spirits were of no use to him.

Could those lightning jades which were useless to him actually be used to buy something? It couldn't be better.

Seeing Ning Fan was interested in his offer, Lei Shiyi immediately revealed a greedy smile because he knew business had come to him.

He untied his storage pouch and took out the items one after another. There was no shortage of magic treasures, pills and cultivation methods among them.

Undead spirits did not know about treasure refinement and pill refinement in the first place. All of these pills and magic treasures were once the belongings of those who had died.

Most of the magic treasures were broken and their destructive power was greatly reduced. A majority of the pills had expired and their medicinal power had dissipated.

To the undead spirits in this tower, however, these items were extremely scarce and precious.

Cultivation methods were especially even more valuable.

To the low-grade undead spirits, a set of good cultivation methods would definitely help them break through to a higher grade.

Unfortunately, all of these items could not catch Ning Fan's attention.

He was not an undead spirit after all, but a genuine living cultivator. He did not need these poor cultivation methods, broken magic treasures and expired pills.

Seeing Ning Fan show no interest or desire when his eyes scanned past the pills and magic treasures, Lei Shiyi frowned with a hint of surprise. Other than the feeling of surprise, there was also a hint of admiration.

He did not even set his eyes upon these good items? He really has deep insight. Perhaps he is also an expert in this line!

Lei Shiyi thought to himself.

If he is really an expert in this line, then I really have to take out the good things to sell to him.

But just as this thought rose in his head, he was nearly choked to death after hearing a single sentence from Ning Fan.

"Oh? You also have primordial lightning?"

Ning Fan's eyes glinted with interest. He saw tens of traces of primordial lightning which were in a sealed state from a jade box.

These traces of primordial lightning were excellent items to cultivate his Primordial Lightning Armor!

"Hehe. Of course, I have primordial lightning… You want to buy them?"

Lei Shiyi's face was filled with confusion. Vaguely, there was also a hint of contempt.

What bulls*** is this? How is it possible for him to be an expert in my line of work? He doesn't know about items at all. He didn't want the magic treasures and pills but rather trash like primordial lightning. What kind of insight does he have?

In Lei Shiyi's eyes, primordial lightning was trash, utter trash.

It was because undead spirits were unique entities that made them incapable of devouring primordial lightning. Usually, only a minority of undead spirits which cultivated uncommon cultivation methods would need primordial lightning.

Other than that, primordial lightning was just something of very insignificant value.

Undead spirits could obtain a trace of undead spirit lightning power from the primordial lightning and consume it by paying a great price. However, this trace of lightning power was just equivalent to one-hundredth of the lightning power in a lightning jade.

Spending too much cost and effort to obtain just one-hundredth of the lightning power in a lightning jade was indeed somewhat wasteful. No one would do such a silly thing.

Hence, primordial lightning was useless rubbish to undead spirits.

Since Ning Fan had set his eyes upon trash and he even wanted to buy it, Lei Shiyi naturally would regard him less importantly.

"How do you sell these primordial lightning?"

"One silver jade for three traces of primordial lightning!" Even though Lei Shiyi's heart was filled with disdain, his face still wore a generous and friendly smile.

One lightning jade for three pieces of garbage was considered to be an exorbitant price. He clearly wanted to swindle Ning Fan.

Besides, Lei Shiyi was certain that Ning Fan was just a novice that had yet to experience much in this world. He was also sure that it would be very easy to deceive him.

"One jade for three primordial lightning?" Ning Fan sounded a little surprised.

He could get a trace of primordial lightning and a lightning jade by killing a Divine Transformation Realm undead spirit. Logically speaking, the primordial spirit and the lightning jade should have equivalent prices.

However, the price that Lei Shiyi offered was one piece of silver jade for three traces of primordial lightning. It was a little too cheap to be honest.

This shockingly low price caused Ning Fan's mind to be filled with thoughts. Without needing much time, he began to understand that primordial lightning was not as precious as silver jades in Lei Shiyi's eyes.

When he took another glance at Lei Shiyi's face, he found that there was a bit of contempt on his face even though it was hidden very deeply. It was as if he was teasing Ning Fan for buying a trash item.

Inwardly, Ning Fan guessed.

Could it be that primordial lightning doesn't have much use to undead spirits and that's why they are being sold at such a cheap price?

"One silver jade for ten traces of primordial lightning." Ning Fan tried to bargain.

"What?! Ten for one jade? Little Friend, it's already very cheap to sell you three traces of primordial lightning for only one silver jade. I'm actually offering you a price that will give me a loss! How could you still want to bargain with me?"

Lei Shiyi was dumbstruck for a while. He did not expect that Ning Fan would bargain with him.

"Twenty traces of primordial lightning for one silver jade." Ning Fan once again lowered the price.

"Wait! I'm really at a loss in selling twenty of them for one jade! This is literally killing me. So it's a no! I can't accept selling at this price!"

"Thirty traces for one jade." Ning Fan became even more certain that primordial lightning was extremely worthless to undead spirits!

"Wait! Little Friend, let's discuss properly. What about trading the primordial spirit at the previous price? Ten traces for one silver jade… What do you think?!" Lei Shiyi's expression became nervous. Ning Fan was bargaining very fiercely with him and the price he offered became lower and lower.

"Forty…"

"Wait! Alright! Thirty traces for one jade. Deal!" Lei Shiyi finally agreed with Ning Fan to end this sale. He was considerably afraid of Ning Fan now.

If he continues to bargain with Ning Fan, perhaps he could not even sell one hundred traces for a single silver jade.

Lei Shiyi stared deeply at Ning Fan. Now, he could tell that the latter was not a naive individual and he was not easy to hoodwink.

However, what Lei Shiyi found even more hard to understand was why an undead spirit who had a normal level of intelligence would be willing to use the extremely precious lightning jades to buy a pile of rubbish.

"What's the point of thinking about that…?" Lei Shiyi shook his head.

All in all, these primordial lightning were just garbage to him. As long as he could sell them to Ning Fan and earn some money, that's enough for him. He was lazy to even care about what Ning Fan was going to do with them.

"I have one thousand and two hundred traces of primordial lightning in stock. It'll be forty silver jades. Please make your payment, thank you!" Lei Shiyi passed a storage pouch to Ning Fan with a smile and rubbed his hands together.

"If you have some primordial lightning next time, sell them all to me." Ning Fan gave him forty silver jades and showed a satisfied smile.

"Don't worry! This old man will take a trip back to the eleventh floor now to purchase more primordial lightning and then sell them all to you! This is my 'Thunder Sound Jade'. If I amass enough primordial lightning, I will certainly contact you again." Lei Shiyi gently thumped his chest and reassured Ning Fan.

With that elderly man's status and connections, it was definitely not difficult for him to purchase some primordial lightning on the eleventh floor.

Moreover, the price of acquiring primordial lightning there would surely be really low. It could be one hundred traces of primordial lightning for one jade or possibly cheaper. Since they were considered trash in the eyes of the undead spirits, they could probably be obtained in many places.

Lei Shiyi felt rather satisfied after he managed to sell trash like primordial lightning to Ning Fan at such a high price.

I think I should get some more trash goods. Perhaps this little friend just loves buying them…

Ning Fan also shared the same mood as Lei Shiyi.

To the latter, primordial lightning might be trash. To Ning Fan, however, lightning jades were the true useless and worthless garbage.

Be it the silver grade lightning jade or the golden grade lightning jade, Ning Fan was unable to devour them like the undead spirits.

Hence, Ning Fan had without a doubt made a huge gain by exchanging one thousand and two hundred traces of primordial lightning with just forty pieces of garbage.

If he refines the one thousand and two hundred traces of primordial lightning, it would be a piece of cake for his lightning armor to break through to the fourth level. Moreover, it would even have a chance of advancing into the golden grade!

If Ning Fan gathered the one thousand and two hundred traces of primordial lightning himself, he would have to slaughter one thousand and two hundred Divine Transformation Realm undead spirits on his own.

Not to mention the danger and difficulty in performing such a large-scale slaughter, if he has to kill 1200 Divine Transformation Realm creatures, try to imagine how much time he would need to find them all and did he even have that much time to do so?

"Lei Shiyi… This profiteering merchant is quite useful to me. With him around, I don't have to trouble myself in searching for primordial lightning." Ning Fan muttered to himself.

He briefly scanned past the miscellaneous items that Lei Shiyi had taken out and his eyes suddenly flashed with interest again.

Among the pile of miscellaneous items, he discovered a cloud of dark sea green cold qi.

Lei Shiyi had placed that cloud of cold qi at an insignificant corner like trash. It was as if he did not regard that item as important at all.

To Ning Fan, however, that item was definitely not trash!

"Heavenly Cold Qi!"

Ning Fan's heart was filled with amazement. He did not expect that he could actually find a type of Heavenly Cold Qi at this place. Well, since he had found it, he, of course, would want to acquire it.

His face did not reflect his internal feelings. He raised his hand casually and pointed at the Heavenly Cold Qi disdainfully. Then, he asked with an unconcerned tone.

"What is this? How much will you sell it for?"

"Oh? Is Little Friend asking about this? It is a type of Fifth Grade cold qi. But I don't really know much about it. Little Friend, you should know that cold qi belongs to the water element whereas us undead spirits who were born in this lightning tower manifested from the lightning element. To us, the treasures and items of the water element are completely useless… Do you want to buy it?"

Lei Shiyi's eyes glinted. Indeed, his judgement was correct.

Ning Fan was a strange person. Even though he was not easy to deceive, he particularly loved buying different kinds of trash.

What bloody use would a Fifth Grade cold qi have for undead spirits? Only a fool would exchange it with lightning jades.

However, if Ning Fan wanted to be that kind of fool, Lei Shiyi would completely have no opinion about it.

Since Ning Fan expressed his desire for this cold qi, Lei Shiyi would surely make an exaggerated boast about it as if it was falling flowers no matter how worthless this item was in the first place.

"Hehe. Little Friend really has good taste. Even though this cold qi is useless to our kind, it could also be refined into a magic treasure to enhance its destructive power. However, this item is something that was left to me by my beloved wife. It always reminds me of her whenever I see it. Thus, I am really reluctant to part with it. However, if Little Friend really wants it, the only option I have is to reluctantly give it up… Mates' rate, twenty pieces of lightning jades!"

"Five pieces of lightning jade." Ning Fan indifferently replied, ignoring Lei Shiyi's long-winded speech.

"Little Friend, selling this cold qi for five pieces of lightning jade is really a bit low…"

"Three pieces of lightning jade!" Ning Fan began to reduce the price.

"Fine! Three pieces of lightning jade. It's a deal!" The elderly man became smarter this time. He knew that if he continued to bargain with Ning Fan, he would not have hope of selling this cold qi for even one lightning jade.

Since it was just a piece of garbage, it was already profitable selling it for three pieces of lightning jade.

Hence, why not agree to that price? Besides, how could it be possible for Lei Shiyi to refuse selling it?

Now, he was even more certain that he must gather countless trash in the future and sell them all to Ning Fan, a king in collecting garbage!

Ning Fan paid for the item and kept the Heavenly Cold Qi. Being despised by Lei Shiyi all this while was not comfortable at all.

However, since the latter could sell him some good things, he did not intend to make a fuss about how he felt.

Forty silver jades for one thousand two hundred traces of primordial lightning. It was a good trade.

Three silver jades for a type of Heavenly Cold Qi. If cultivators in the outside world find out about such a good deal in this place, they would certainly rush to this place to exchange for it without any regard for other things.

Other than these undead spirits like Lei Shiyi who lived in this Black Lightning Tower, who else would treat the Heavenly Cold Qi as trash?

The Heavenly Cold Qi is really undervalued here…

"Hehe! This old man is going to make a move now! When I gather some good things, I will come and trade with Little Friend again." Lei Shiyi gave Ning Fan a wretched smile and disappeared.

Ning Fan did not care. He only stared at the cloud of dark green cold qi in his palm, carefully identifying it.

"Is it… the Long Sentiment Tears, a Heavenly Cold Qi which is ranked second of the twelve? A drop of tear creates affection, another drop of tear severes the affection. According to rumors, if one refines this cold qi, the Dao Heart of a cultivator will be as firm as a rock, just like a loyal and faithful young lady whose heart will never be swayed by any external things."

"Just depending on this divine effect of fortifying one's Dao Heart, this item can at least sell for five hundred million immortal jade in the Endless Sea!"

"Unfortunately, Lei Shiyi really does not know about how good this thing is… Buying a casket of pearl but returning the pearl and keeping the casket instead. That saying really fits the description of this person."

<strong>Translated by Tommy, edited by Roel</strong>