The clock was already ticking close to 9 a.m. and Aunt Jing would wake up any time.

Zi Yang was anxious now. Could it be this trut wanted his blood again? No, he couldn’t.

This body is miserable as it is. It certainly could not tolerate the addiction of another leech.

So, Zi Yang’s brain hole started spinning again and he soon took out a book and pen, and squeezed his scratched thigh discreetly to squeeze out a few tears.

“Okay, I spent so much effort for our past friendship but you don’t know my effort, right? Come here, let me explain to you the importance if this blood.”

Zi Yang can swear he has never squeezed out his brain except when fooling his master’s professor to give him three more days of extension, and well once in second of doctorate in the last life and no more.

He took the trut by his hand, made him sit on another tree branch – why not his shoulders where the trut was originally going to jump, you ask?

What if he sucked more blood? He’s weak as it is.

While drawing on paper, he explained, “Well, see camel head, snake neck, eagle claws, cow ears and pig’s…. ah… reproduction, yes. See what does this show?”

The trut looked at the image and saw a crudely but recognizable dragon. His chia seed like eyes rounded with shock.

What is this human saying? A dragon is made of different beast parts?

He hadn’t heard of that!

Seeing the shock in his eyes, Zi Yang nodded contentedly and said, “See no one told you right, imagine if you can transform into a wood dragon and soar into nine skies. How happy do you think Aunt Jing would be?”

The trut nodded repeatedly. But then shook his head and gestured that he didn’t have to exchange the leaf with him now that he knew. He could buy it himself.

Even though Zi Yang did not speak the language, he understood that this naturally evil trut wanted to take advantage of him and refused after knowing the secret.

“Oh, do you how to prepare the potion for the evolution and what ratio to mix to get dragon gene?”

The trut’s hat drooped and after much negotiation he agreed to share the leaf.

But Zi Yang wasn’t having it now. Now, he’s fooled the trut so much and was going to offer a fake potion formula.

Aunt Jing will definitely be angry.

With that, there would be no chance to exchange anything from this trut anymore, so he was going to squeeze him out.

Anyway, he’s already offended. Could it be Auntie Jing would fight him over this?

“Well, if Auntie Jing really comes… No Aunt Jing is kind of royal type lady. Mom also said she doesn’t care about almost all things. Then, she would definitely not come after me. But just I case, give this trut some good food to appease his emotions… Okay.”

A monologue again and Zi Yang shook his head again.

“This is a top-secret information; how can I give it to you for one tree leaf. You have to pay more.”

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“Empress, are you sure you want to see more? This kid is a bit of a swindler. Why don’t we go back to the Void Palace”, Dark Void had black lines hung on her forehead and they were getting darker as time passed.

If a real fortune telling swindler looked, he might yell – “Bad luck”

Void Empress did not answer that. She walked back to the room and came out with her own unique void bracelet which connects everything on the void net.

Dark Void was quite surprised to see this. To connect on the void net for a powerful individual like the Void Empress, spiritual thoughts are enough.

To connect using her unique authority bracelet meant that it’s a confidential message. After a moment of having done her business, the Void Empress replied again:

“Dark Void, train that trut hard for me. I don’t want to see the plateau of emptiness pawned by hm again.”

A flat tone with emphasis on ‘hard’ and a hyperbole – Dark Void understood that the empress was both embarrassed and amused by this combination of man and beast.

She looked back and saw that the trut had handed over four ancient tree leaves and a bottle of holy spring water. And he still has his lips curved up as if proud of his negotiation skills.

Zi Yang handed over the fake potion formula he made and the all the blood packets in a bigger container and trotted away with his exchange products.

Both parties were visibly satisfied with the exchange – at least for now.

The happiness exuded from the leafed hat trut made Dark Void pause and not break his fantasy. Let the fantasy continue a little longer, she thought with some sympathy.

She then spread spiritual thoughts to check her void mail and was not surprised to see an encrypted email a few seconds ago.

But the title of the email surprised her.

She opened the email which read:

[Title]: Hypothesis of a scientific gene modification and recombination to create and evolve beasts metaphysically.

[Content]:

Madame Dark Void,

We were pleasantly surprised to have received an email from Void Empress herself on suggesting a research study on checking if genes of different beasts could be combined to create or evolve other animals.

In particular, her example of a dragon having different parts resembling different beasts was intriguing. She commented that she gained this inspiration from a young prodigy named Zi Yang and recommended him to be the second author of the study.

Could you connect us with him? We would like be in contact if there he has any more ideas.

Please expect detailed for study, team, and material expenses in the next few days.

In your service,

Tian Kuo

CEO, Tinaxin Tech.

---------------------------

Dark Void was speechless.

So, you took a swindler’s bickering and made it into a research project as an answer?

Just what do you like about this boy so much that you extended efforts into making a seemingly false statement into a truth?

Tianxin technology is the biggest tech company with all kinds of weirdos with different types of iron parts. Now that they have project proposal by the Void Empress herself, there would definitely be a result out of it!

Good results at that.

Just need to see how many years it would take.

On the other side, Zi Yang tried squeezing the ancient leaves and the holy spring water bottle in the frozen capsule. Ultimately, due to lack of space after having two eggs stuffed in, he had to remove the bottle of water and keep it aside.

Now, he would only need to spend some money buying the fire-based resources – water-based resources are sorted for now.

The only concern is that now Zi Yang has incurred another debt from the leafed hat trut.

Even though it looks like that Zi Yang was pretty chilled while swindling resources for his benefit – he has always been clear on who has helped him and whom he owed favors to.

Both in previous and this life, Zi Yang hated owing favors. He would always find an opportunity to pay it back so as not to be entangled in all sorts of affairs.

Especially in a fantasy setting world like he is in now, owed favors can be deadly in time. Thinking of this, Zi Yang took out his notebook and jot down the leafed hat trut’s name below Aunt Lan’s.

Also mentioned the four leaves and one bottle of holy spring water that he “willingly” gave and he owed favor.

Well, owing favors is owing favors. He will never admit that he swindled it out of him.

If anything, to repay the trut’s excessive love (to reduce resentment), Zi yang decided to pay him back some more.

Looking at his brother’s peaceful smile while napping, Zi Yang felt the morning drama was worth it.

He had not had a family in his previous life and his mother left early in this one; so he had never had any really understood the emotions of a family even though he could imitate some of the them.

Only with Zi Ming’s presence could Zi Yang feel a touch of human warmth now.

He could now totally understand why Itachi, chose to save one life, at the expense of an entire clan.

If given the same choice in this world, I’m sure I’d do that too.

Be an Itachi to a Sasuke.