First-Year Internship—And You Went to Site 749 to Contain Monsters?!

The young man rubbed the gourd, feeling its texture, then turned his head. ”Not bad, Miss Xie. You actually recognize Dragon Claw Hand. Since you know it, you should know who I am, right?”

Xie Shunan looked at the thin young man with sunken cheeks but piercing eyes. She already had an answer in her heart.

But she blurted out, ”I don’t know you, and I don’t want to. That thing isn’t yours—give it back.”

The young man was stunned. He hadn’t expected Xie Shunan to play dumb.

”If you don’t know me, then let’s get acquainted. My name is Ye Feng. I’m from Daheshan, and Ye Xuan is my cousin. As for this gourd—you think I shouldn’t have taken it?”

”My cousin Ye Xuan and my village elders all died in Yunhai, on your Sihai Group’s turf. Forget a Yin-Nurturing Gourd—if I took you, no one would dare say a word against me.”

Ye Feng played with the gourd as he spoke, stepping forward.

Xie Shunan stared at him indifferently. ”Since when did Daheshan people become this arrogant? Do you really think it’s still the past?”

”Hahahahaha, Daheshan people have always been this arrogant. Just because your Sihai Group’s business has grown, you think you can step all over Daheshan? Let me put it this way—this time, the other three families of Sihai Group have already given us a response. Only your Xie family has been silent.”

”So, tell me, how should we handle this?””A response? What response do you want from me? Whether it was Ye Xuan or Elder Huang, they were both killed by Lu Ding. If you have the guts, go find him.”

Crazy!

Go ahead and be crazy!

Xie Shunan had seen plenty of arrogant people before—take Tang Hu, for example. He was even wilder, lawless, flaunting his power, and was the local tyrant of Bao Fan District. And what happened? He couldn’t even die in one piece; they couldn’t even piece him back together.

And all because he courted death—by provoking Lu Ding.

Now, another arrogant one had appeared.

Xie Shunan could already foresee his fate.

Ye Feng’s grin faded slightly. ”Yeah, Lu Ding is strong, and he has 749 backing him. But I’m not afraid of him—I just don’t want to mess with 749. If he didn’t have their support, I’d kill him myself right now.”

His eyes swept up and down Xie Shunan. ”And don’t think about using a borrowed knife to kill me. I’ll tell you straight—I won’t go after him for now. The people died right under your Xie family’s nose, so I’m here to deal with you. You always go for the weakest target first, and you—you’re the softest one. I’m going to crush you.”

He held up three fingers. ”Three days. I’ll give you three days. Think about it yourself, or discuss it with your father—I don’t care. But in three days, I want to see your Xie family’s stance. If I don’t, then Sihai Group is about to become Sanhai Group. Don’t doubt me—I’m from Daheshan, got it, Miss Xie?”

”This Yin-Nurturing Gourd? Consider it interest—I’m taking it. If you’ve made up your mind, come find me in Caojia Alley.”

Watching Ye Feng’s departing figure, Xie Shunan sat in silence for a long time before slowly taking a seat. She didn’t know the full picture, but if the other three Sihai families had already sided with Ye Feng, then he wasn’t just bluffing.

He could really turn Sihai Group into Sanhai Group.

”Collapse always starts from within,” Xie Shunan thought bitterly.

The older generation ‘might’ not have done something like this, but the next generation? That was another story.

The fact that the other three families had taken a stance meant their elders tacitly approved of Daheshan’s actions.

Pathetic. Truly pathetic.

She pulled open the drawer in front of her, taking out a voice recorder. Then, she glanced at the hidden camera on the bookshelf.

With a mocking smile, she said, ”Bumpkin. Who still makes threats like this in this day and age? You took Lu Ding’s stuff and are even thinking about going against him? Go talk to him yourself.”

Without a second thought, Xie Shunan sent the video and audio files, unedited, to Gao Zhengliang, asking him to forward them to Lu Ding and have Lu Ding contact her after watching.

—

Meanwhile.

Looking at his Linghai Realm Second Layer cultivation and the absurdly large Linghai within him, Lu Ding was once again in doubt.

”I remember that a normal Linghai Second Layer shouldn’t have such a massive Linghai…”

A normal First Layer Linghai was about the size of a small pool—this was correct. His own had started at that size too.

With each realm advancement, the Linghai would expand based on talent, physical constitution, and the quality of spiritual treasures used—ranging from a minimum of doubling in size to a maximum of tenfold. This was knowledge accumulated over countless years.

But his Linghai at the Second Layer was dozens of times bigger than at the First.

This strange situation made Lu Ding fall into deep thought.

”The treasures I used were all top-notch, but not to the extent of breaking common knowledge…”

Then the problem wasn’t the spiritual treasures.

Could it be the cultivation technique…?

If the Flying Bear Visualization Diagram had this kind of effect, he never would’ve been able to access it in the first place.

And so far, none of the techniques he learned from the Flying Bear Visualization Diagram had shown anything this extraordinary.

So that wasn’t the reason either.

Then it had to be something within himself!

But looking at his ”golden finger,” the only thing he had that could directly aid cultivation was Oneness with Formlessness, which allowed him to manually activate the Oneness with Heaven and Man state for assisted cultivation.

”Could it be because of Oneness with Heaven and Man?”

Lu Ding opened the 749 App and began searching for related documents and forum posts.

After some digging, he finally found a few research papers that caught his eye.

[No One Told Me Expanding the Linghai Would Hurt This Much!!!]

The moment he saw the title, Lu Ding frowned in confusion.

Pain? But he hadn’t felt any pain.

[I really need to study more. I thought breaking through to the Second Layer of Linghai Realm would be just like the Zhaoxuan Realm—a natural flow of progress, just breaking through a small bottleneck to reach the next stage. But after using spiritual treasures, the pain was unbearable—felt like my body was being torn apart… So, to all my fellow cultivators preparing to break into the next stage, be mentally prepared—this is hard-earned wisdom!!!]

The comments below were lively.

[Hahaha, another one fell for it. This is hilarious. I wanted to warn people too, but since no one else did, I kept quiet. Misery loves company.]

[Second Layer and you’re already crying? Just wait—the pain gets worse as you go higher. Some people have even refused to advance further because of how unbearable it is.]

[Ever read cultivation novels? You know how in stories, breakthroughs come with tribulation lightning? Well, in real life, expanding the Linghai is our version of tribulation.]

[Cultivation is about defying the heavens. Natural growth is slow, but cultivation is like forcing an unnatural evolution. Of course, there’s going to be pain—especially at the Linghai Realm, which is known as the second major bottleneck.]

[There are painless breakthroughs, but those require rare opportunities. Ever heard of Oneness with Heaven and Man? If you happen to enter that state while breaking through, you won’t feel any pain.]

[But getting into Oneness with Heaven and Man at the exact moment of breakthrough? That’s pure luck.]