The camp, which had looked crude just yesterday, was now taking shape. A small, square fortress, roughly five hundred meters long and wide, was encircled by metal walls. Inside, several rows of prefabricated metal barracks, fuel tanks, a power generation room, a kitchen, and other structures had been erected. They even managed to lay down a four-hundred-meter makeshift runway from which two small attack craft were currently taking off.

Siren was inside one of the metal barracks repurposed as a command center, chuckling happily over a data report in his hands.

This planet’s bounty was beyond expectation: a perfect natural environment, a flawless biome, and astonishingly rich mineral deposits. It was a treasure planet gifted to the Sacred Unicorn Mercenary Corps. In just one night, unmanned reconnaissance drones had swept five hundred kilometers around the area, discovering five veins of the rare and precious Zakra energy crystal ore—so abundant that even Siren, with his cunning nature, couldn't help but let out a laugh. Not to mention the two large gold mines found almost in the form of natural gold nuggets embedded in the ground.

To hell with the Federation’s Interstellar Pioneering Act; this planet would become the Sacred Unicorn’s secret base. Give Siren ten years, and he would possess the strength to challenge the Federation!

“The world lacks neither geniuses nor heroes; they just need a little bit of luck,” Siren suddenly clicked his tongue, pulling at the corner of his eye to make a face. “Undoubtedly, I am a hero blessed with great luck, and I have never been short of fortune.”

With a sigh of deep satisfaction, Siren pointed his finger, and a flash of silver light streaked before him. A maiden with a delicate face and a fiery physique, clad in a traditional maid’s robe, materialized from the light. As soon as she appeared, the girl knelt reverently before Siren: “Great Master, your servant is willing to do anything for you.”

Siren grinned wickedly. He cupped the girl’s face, moving to bring her head toward his lower body, when suddenly the door to the command room was violently shoved open.

With a sharp crack, the girl dissolved into motes of silver light and vanished into the air. Siren glared angrily at the intruder.

Bursting into the command room was a tall, striking beauty with blazing red hair, agile as a leopard. She was Siren’s most trusted confidante, his adjutant.

“Uh, Aridya, next time could you knock before entering?” Siren’s gaze raked over the beautiful redhead’s heaving chest beneath her silver uniform, like the proboscis of a fly.

“I don't have time for that, Siren!” Aridya slammed a document onto the desk in front of him, two points of fire burning fiercely in the depths of her eyes. “A squad of nearly three hundred men sent to hunt down Gu Xichen was ambushed and slaughtered by him! Their leader, 'Hyena,' was severely injured. And what are you doing? Playing with your puppets again?”

“I am not!” Siren looked at Aridya with eyes as pure as a holy angel. “Those poor energy composites, how could I harbor any wicked thoughts toward them? Hmm, let me see the intel.”

Frantically snatching up the document before him, Siren quickly scanned the intelligence and then leaped up.

“Praise all the goddesses, this is good news! At least it proves this guy is no more than a hundred kilometers from us. He’s still nearby!”

“May all the gods who have blasphemed those goddesses burn in hell! This guy is a ruthless man who never forgets a slight! Deploy the ‘Dawn’ squad; eliminate him at all costs. If possible, capture him alive!” Siren waved his hand forcefully. “Killing him only earns us a batch of low-priced munitions; capturing him alive could allow me to extort the Gu Corporation at least three times!”

Aridya frowned. “The Dawn squad? That took you so much effort to assemble. You’re really going to deploy them?”

Siren walked up to Aridya and cautiously reached out to place a hand on her shoulder. “My dear little witch, their sole purpose is to serve me. Now is the chance for them to demonstrate that purpose. Why wouldn’t I deploy them? Hmm, Gu Xichen is still within our grasp—this truly is excellent news!”

Siren was in such high spirits that he ‘accidentally’ brought his head close to Aridya’s face, his lips ‘coincidentally’ brushing against hers. Even as he was engulfed in black smoke and blasted away by a sudden Blaze Bomb, Siren’s mood remained excellent.

This streak of good fortune lasted Siren only three days.

Five mercenaries moved cautiously forward in a standard dense forest search formation. Gu Xichen descended slowly from the tree branches like a massive python. His two arms, supple as if boneless, slipped around the necks of the five mercenaries. A soft yet resilient inner force erupted, and with a jarring crack, the necks of the five mercenaries rotated a full three hundred and sixty degrees.

A squad of twenty mercenaries cautiously approached a small pool. Three were left on a small earthen mound thirty meters behind as lookouts, while the others went to the water’s edge to refill their canteens. As if forewarned, Gu Xichen drilled out of a hole in the mound. Raging like a maddened tiger, he swiped three claws that tore open the chests of the sentries, snatched up a multi-barreled machine gun, and began to spray the mercenaries by the pool in a savage onslaught. By the time nearby search teams rushed over upon hearing the gunfire, only corpses littered the ground where they had been.

Two warriors of the Sacred Unicorn Mercenary Corps, leading over four hundred mercenaries, loudly pursued the trail left by Gu Xichen. A massive tree trunk suddenly exploded. Gu Xichen, who had been hiding in a hollow within the tree, burst out with a gust of wind behind the two warriors. His Snow Wraith Claws, radiating a biting cold, struck the vital points on the backs of the two warriors. Before they could cough up blood and collapse, Gu Xichen let out a dragon-like roar and plunged into the front of the mercenary line, cutting through to the rear before vanishing into the endless thicket, all while enduring the concentrated fire of hundreds. On the ground lay the bodies of over two hundred mercenaries, with another hundred moaning in agony, their bones broken and tendons torn.

Gradually, as more and more mercenaries were killed or wounded, the inventory of lethal weapons available to Gu Xichen increased.

While resting in the dense woods, the search team suddenly heard five or six grenades fly in from a distance, tossing the mercenaries into chaos.

Several small attack craft zipped low overhead. Three missiles, trailing long plumes of fire, suddenly shot out from above the treetops, instantly blowing two of the aircraft apart mid-air.

By the third day, the situation had finally escalated beyond Siren’s tolerance. Early that morning, just after waking, Siren was brushing his teeth outside the command room when three shots rang out—bang, bang, bang. The three sentries stationed outside the command room collapsed instantly, each bearing a bullet hole directly in the middle of the forehead, sniped from long range.

In three days, the Sacred Unicorn’s mercenaries had suffered over thirteen hundred dead and over two thousand severely wounded; there wasn't a single lightly injured man. The first teams sent to apprehend Gu Xichen were almost entirely wiped out, and all nine Innate-level warriors were injured. The ‘Dawn’ squad Siren dispatched hadn't even caught a glimpse of Gu Xichen; they would arrive at the site of an attack only to find he had already fled several miles away. How could one find him in the boundless jungle?

Perched high on the crown of a giant tree soaring a hundred meters, Gu Xichen gazed down at the Sacred Unicorn camp. His body was smeared with moss and dust; he looked every bit a wild man. He slowly chewed on the field rations he had looted from the mercenaries, occasionally raising a small flask to take a sip of wine. A field pack, stuffed with sausage, bacon, cheese, chocolate, and canned wine, hung from a nearby branch—if the sky weren't overcast and brewing a thunderstorm, this would have been a delightful spring picnic.

On his back, another field pack was slung, filled with grenades and plastic explosives. All firearms contained embedded locator chips, which Gu Xichen couldn't remove, meaning every gun he used had to be immediately discarded. Only consumables like grenades and explosives lacked tracking functions, which allowed him to carry them.

“I need to give you a proper one.”

He carved a hole nearly a foot deep into the tree trunk with his finger, stuffed the empty ration wrapper inside, and sealed it firmly with a wooden sliver. All traces were meticulously cleaned away.

“I definitely need to give you a proper taste of it.”

A frail, trembling voice seemed to echo in Gu Xichen’s ear: “To survive, you must fight tooth and nail, blood for blood. When someone only wants to harm you, the best defense is to kill him and everyone connected to him first.”

“The old man was right!” Gu Xichen bared his teeth. He sat cross-legged on the branch, watching the camp, deep in thought. “I need to show you what I’m capable of, but... it’s a bit troublesome.”

Trouble arrived.

Gu Xichen watched several heavy mining vehicles, guarded by a large contingent of mercenaries, pour into the camp. Among these guards were thirty-some lean, sharp men clad in white uniforms. Gu Xichen recognized these white-clad figures; several times, within five minutes of him attacking the mercenaries, they would arrive at the scene. Every one of them possessed immense strength, an Innate-level master, and the refinement of their Innate Qi was no less than Gu Xichen’s. Any single man in white was capable of defeating Gu Xichen in a straight fight.

The mining vehicles stopped in the center of the camp, and their beds slowly lifted, dumping a large mound of raw Zakra crystal ore onto the ground.

Estimating from a distance, the pile of raw Zakra crystals was at least thirty cubic meters. After fine processing, this should yield twenty-five cubic meters of standard energy crystal blocks. Gu Xichen’s eyes immediately turned red. Twenty-five cubic meters of Zakra crystals—how much could this boost his cultivation? Not to mention that with these energy crystals, he might finally be able to fully awaken his Realm and possess the power due a Realm Master.

Siren walked out of the command room. He stood in the center of the camp and slowly raised his right hand toward the sky. As if aware that Gu Xichen was watching, Siren extended his middle finger straight up into the air. A long howl escaped Siren’s mouth, his abundant Qi carrying the sound wave far into the distance. Like a tiger roaring in the jungle, the surrounding dense woods rustled.

“Tch!” Gu Xichen paid no heed to Siren’s provocation, sitting casually with one leg crossed over the other on the branch, awaiting Siren’s next move.

A patch of silver light surfaced beneath Siren’s feet, and he floated above the heap of raw Zakra crystals. A beam of silver light shot from his eyes. The light wrapped around the raw crystals, and brilliant streams of energy continually poured into Siren’s body. The immense aura of power could be sensed by Gu Xichen, several kilometers away. Time ticked by, and slowly, streaks of silver light began to spray out from Siren’s body. Each streak of light transformed into a maiden clad in a silver uniform, wielding a long saber. These maidens immediately began shouting slogans of "Long live the Master!" as they lined up and marched toward the dense forest.

“Damn it!” Gu Xichen was stunned silent.

Streaks of silver light continuously erupted, and maidens—some flirtatious, some innocent, some graceful, some seductive—were ceaselessly born from the void.

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A new week, a new start... Comrades, bring your recommendation votes and clicks... Recommend, recommend, recommend!