Volume 2: Setting Out on the Journey - Chapter 31: Making Money is Really Fast!

Su Yu was responsible for the first half of the night from 10:00 PM to 2:00 AM, while Wang Jue took charge of the second half from 2:00 AM to 6:00 AM.

Perhaps because someone was keeping watch, Shen Feng and the others slept exceptionally well.

Meanwhile, Wang Jue practiced his cultivation while keeping watch.

He mainly discovered that he could actually use cultivation to replace sleep, and the results were even much better than waking up naturally fully rested.

Time slowly slipped away.

The sky outside gradually grew brighter.

Wang Jue stopped his cultivation, checked the time on his wristwatch, and saw that it was already six o'clock in the morning.

Afterward, Wang Jue walked over to the balcony of the twentieth-floor lobby.

The morning air of late autumn and early winter was filled with a lingering chill. Touching his face, the freezing temperature caused Wang Jue's entire body to perk up instantly.

"I didn't expect winter to be almost here in the blink of an eye."

Shen Feng walked over with a smile: "You've kept watch for most of the night, would you like to take a break now?"

"No need. I practiced cultivation while keeping watch last night, and I'm wide awake right now."

Wang Jue looked down through the balcony, pointing at the various astral beasts searching for prey below: "Tsk tsk tsk, to be able to see so many astral beasts early in the morning—Captain, look, there are a total of eighteen astral beasts within my field of vision. Among them, only four are tier two, and the remaining ones are actually all tier three astral beasts."

"Indeed."

Shen Feng also smiled: "Still, there's nothing particularly strange about it. These are all relatively weak tier two and tier three astral beasts without any subordinates following them! Powerful tier three astral beasts, or even tier four ones, always lead thousands of subordinates by their sides!"

"With our squad's current strength, we can only deal with these stragglers. As for those moving in packs, we simply can't afford to provoke them."

As is well known, some tier two astral beasts generally lead hundreds of tier one astral beasts as subordinates, while others prefer not to bring any subordinates along.

The supply camp where Wang Jue had previously trained was just like this. Basically, he always singled out tier two astral beasts that had no subordinates. As for those big bosses surrounded by retinues and looking extremely majestic, he naturally wouldn't go out of his way to provoke them.

After all, he wasn't going to joke around with his own life!

Under normal circumstances, a tier three astral beast would lead hundreds or even thousands of tier one and tier two astral beasts!

The fewer high-tier astral beasts there were in a place, the more low-tier astral beasts each scarce high-tier astral beast would lead!

In the ruined city, even in the suburbs, a tier three astral beast typically led only two or three tier two astral beasts, and some were even completely solitary commanders, while the majority of the remaining tier three astral beasts chose to become subordinates of tier four astral beasts.

Wang Jue smiled and said nothing.

In his view, the captain's choice was undoubtedly correct.

One knows best about one's own family affairs.

Don't let the fact that everyone in their squad had recently broken through fool you; while dealing with ordinary tier three astral beasts was not a problem, it was hard to say whether they could truly win if they encountered a formidable tier three astral beast.

Let alone going to look for trouble with tier four astral beasts that had thousands of subordinates.

To actually do that would be no different from courting death!

Shen Feng looked at the astral beasts downstairs with a burning gaze, then turned around and shouted to the others: "Is everyone pretty much awake? Let's go, it's time to go down and hunt some astral beasts!"

"Let's go then, everyone let's go make some money," Su Yu couldn't help laughing.

Jiang Yunyan's eyes glowed: "As expected of a ruined city, it's too awesome! Tier two and tier three astral beasts are practically walking all over the place!"

"The more astral beasts there are, the greater the danger it represents," Jiang Yunxin reminded involuntarily.

The ruined city was extremely dangerous!

However, do not forget that crisis and opportunity sometimes coexist.

There were simply too many powerful astral beasts here; if one's strength was insufficient, it was very easy to meet one's end.

Even with strong strength, once surrounded by a beast horde, one could still perish.

Yet the tier three astral beasts here generally had no subordinates following them.

Because of this, the difficulty of hunting tier three astral beasts was reduced by a huge margin!

...

Wang Jue stood at the stairwell, poked his head out to check the corners on both sides, and after confirming it was safe, he waved his hand and said: "Safe, no sign of astral beasts."

At ordinary corners, astral beasts were very prone to lurking and launching sneak attacks!

Since Luo Feng was the fastest in the squad, the role he played within the team was similar to that of a scout, specifically responsible for blazing the trail.

"Hehe, this is great!"

Su Yu chuckled: "In the past, the job of scouting could only be done by me. Now that Wang Jue has joined, it naturally falls on him, and all we have to do is follow right behind him."

"Everyone pay attention, don't make any noise."

Shen Feng glared at Su Yu: "The astral beasts hunting right now have very sharp ears. As long as we make the tiniest bit of movement, it's very likely to attract a lot of astral beasts."

Su Yu, who had been 'called out' for being too cocky, immediately shut his mouth.

Wang Jue took the lead, while Shen Feng guarded the rear.

Su Yu and Jiang Yunxin were on the flanks, with Jiang Yunyan, holding the heavy-hitting Thunder, right in the center!

"Huh?"

Wang Jue's footsteps paused as his gaze landed on three canine-like astral beasts about a hundred meters away.

The leader among them was huge in size, covered in pitch-black fur, with thick limbs, sharp claws, and terrifyingly large fangs.

All of this pointed directly to its identity—a tier three astral beast, the Saw-toothed Hound!

"That's the one."

Wang Jue said in a low voice: "Captain, there are three Saw-toothed Hounds ahead. My target is that tier three Saw-toothed Hound. Everyone stay alert and watch the surroundings, I'll take care of it."

As his words fell, Wang Jue charged forward first. The other four naturally dispersed according to their formation, staying vigilant for any other astral beasts or human martial artists who might come to cause trouble.

"Awooo..."

Seeing a human charge straight at it, that tier three Saw-toothed Hound immediately let out an angry roar. Its speed surged instantly as it opened its mouth wide and lunged viciously to bite Wang Jue!

With this massive size combined with the terrifying impact force, even if one wasn't bitten, simply being rammed would undoubtedly break several bones, and it might even crush someone to death instantly!

Watching the oncoming Saw-toothed Hound, Wang Jue gripped his Blood-Thirst Sword, maintaining his usual speed.

The two crossed paths!

In an instant, Wang Jue's speed skyrocketed wildly. With a misstep of his feet, a centimeter-precise dodge caused the Saw-toothed Hound to miss him entirely.

"Whoosh."

Meanwhile, the Blood-Thirst Sword in Wang Jue's hand delivered a direct, diagonal upward slash!

In the process of executing the sword strike, two consecutive speed boosts made the Blood-Thirst Sword instantly become blurry and ethereal, transforming into a hazy sword light!

"Rumble..."

A chilling sword light swept across the Saw-toothed Hound's neck, and then that sword light vanished instantly like dreamy mist!

"Splatter!"

"Splatter!"

Wang Jue's seemingly casual and simple two sword strikes instantly slit the throats of the other two tier two Saw-toothed Hounds.

"Boom rumble..."

The tier three Saw-toothed Hound, its life force already extinguished, continued to bolt forward for more than ten meters by sheer momentum before crashing to the ground with a loud 'bang'. It slid across the ground for several meters and slammed into a thick landscape tree by the roadside—one that had grown for an unknown number of years—causing the entire large tree to vibrate a few times before finally coming to a halt.

"Tsk tsk tsk, good kid, you wiped out a tier three astral beast relying purely on sword techniques."

"Two months apart, little brother Wang Jue's strength has grown even stronger!"

"So awesome!"

Su Yu and the others had already gathered around.

"Wang Jue, it looks like your independent training over the past two months has brought huge progress!"

Shen Feng was also exceedingly happy. The stronger Wang Jue's strength was, the greater the benefits for their squad!

At this moment, Su Yu had already taken the initiative to dissect the corpses of the astral beasts.

"I didn't expect that combining footwork, sword techniques, and rich experience would make killing a tier three astral beast this effortless."

Wang Jue sighed inwardly.

Because he had previously slaughtered over ten thousand tier two astral beasts, Wang Jue could maintain absolute calmness when facing these astral beasts now, applying his footwork and sword techniques with the utmost precision.

Using the minimum amount of effort to instantly resolve the opponent!

"Alright, harvesting complete."

Su Yu revealed a smile: "Judging by the current situation, we can hunt quite a few tier three astral beasts in just a single day today."

"The more, the better."

Wang Jue smiled: "Let's go, to the next one."

The entire Hurricane Squad was brimming with high spirits.

...

Although Wang Jue had long anticipated that his efficiency in hunting astral beasts within the ruined city would be very high, once the actual combat began, Wang Jue discovered that this wasn't even hunting astral beasts anymore.

It was fundamentally a massive gold mine!

They could probably hunt here for a full month without seeing the number of astral beasts decrease in the slightest!

Moreover, making money was truly fast!

For a tier three astral beast, some ordinary materials on its body could generally sell for 5 million to 10 million.

More important materials could usually sell for 10 million to over 100 million.

If they were lucky enough to acquire an astral bone, it would start at at least 600 to 700 million!

Of course, there would occasionally be exceptions.

For instance, some extremely special astral beasts, or ones that were technically tier three astral beasts but possessed strength close to tier four—the prices of their materials would naturally rise accordingly.

However, the vast majority fell within the aforementioned price brackets.

...

Wang Jue and his team fought continuously for ten days.

During the first three days, they hunted nearly fifty tier two and tier three astral beasts every day, mostly consisting of tier two astral beasts with fewer tier three ones.

Later on, due to pricing considerations, the group discussed the matter and decisively abandoned the tier two astral beasts, specializing instead in hunting tier three astral beasts. Every day, they could manage to hunt nearly twenty tier three astral beasts!

During these days, they killed a total of over 160 tier two astral beasts and nearly 150 tier three astral beasts.

Mainly, the tier three astral beasts they hunted were of the relatively common variety, with the most expensive materials costing only twenty to thirty million. Still, lacking in individual quality, they made up for it in quantity. The total price was estimated to be around three billion-plus!

Ten consecutive days of high-intensity combat left Wang Jue and the others quite mentally exhausted, so they took a full day to rest properly before continuing their hunt for astral beasts!

Following their frantic slaughter, the number of tier three astral beasts in the area surrounding the house where they rested had noticeably decreased quite a bit.

On the fifteenth day.

In the twentieth-floor living room, Wang Jue and his group were all resting here.

"Captain, we rarely see tier three astral beasts around our area anymore," Su Yu said with a hint of helplessness.

"Now, if we want to hunt tier three astral beasts, we have to walk for a while, which clearly slows down our hunting speed!"

"Hehe, nothing we can do about it. Who told us to kill so ruthlessly during this period!"

Shen Feng chuckled: "However, you don't need to worry either. Astral beasts move around in large numbers. Based on my estimate, in just a few more days, the number of tier three astral beasts in this residential compound will increase again!"

"Right now, all we need to do is stay quietly here. After all, through these past few days, we've basically gotten familiar with the environment around this residential compound. Rather than going to places we aren't familiar with to hunt astral beasts, we might as well take a good rest."

Hearing Shen Feng's words, Wang Jue also nodded inwardly.

Although the Jinxiu Residential Compound was large, over the past ten days or so, Wang Jue and the others had basically explored most of it.

"I have to say, making money in the ruined city is truly fast!"

Jiang Yunyan couldn't help sighing: "I was originally worried that my bullets wouldn't be enough, but I never expected that after more than half a month passed, I would still have over half of my ammunition left."