The meeting room was silent.

Shinichiro Nakamura raised his head, his eyes wide, his mouth half-open, and he was completely stunned.

"Wh...what?"

He even wondered if there was something seriously wrong with his ears.

"Lord...Lord, Lord?"

Nakamura scrambled forward half a meter, pointing at the box on the ground: "This...this is the Yasakani no Magatama! It's a true ancient artifact! It possesses the power to destroy the heavens and the earth! You...you're sure you want to sell it?!"

Zhou Huai leaned back in his chair, watching Nakamura's comical expression of shattered faith, and snorted.

"What? You don't understand my orders?"

"No, no, no! Your subordinate wouldn't dare!" Nakamura trembled with fright, but the overwhelming sense of common sense still compelled him to remonstrate: "But my lord, this thing is far too precious! When the Ōmiya family guarded this divine artifact, they treated it like an ancestral temple, even building a special shrine to house it. It's incredibly valuable! Even if it were to be sold... who in this world could afford its price?"

Nakamura felt his worldview was collapsing rapidly.

Others fight tooth and nail, even exterminating their entire clans, for this divine artifact. Yet their own lord disdains it and wants to sell it!

Just how much does our lord despise this divine artifact?

"It's a divine artifact, but it's not exactly a good thing. Keeping it will only bring trouble." Zhou Huai interrupted him. "Just sell it. The price doesn't matter. Even if you exchange it for a bunch of ordinary cultivation resources, you must get rid of it as far away as possible within three days! Understand?"

"Yes, Your Majesty! Your Majesty obeys!" Nakamura dared not say another word and could only stretch out his hands to hug the hot box back into his arms.

In fact, it wasn't that Zhou Huai's standards were so high that he looked down on even divine artifacts.

Rather, he knew better than anyone else that in order to avoid having any further involvement with that monster, Mr. Duan, before he became truly powerful, he had to get rid of this super bomb with its tracking function far, far away!

Now, in Mr. Duan's mind, he is already a dead man who was reduced to ashes in the explosion.

If, at this moment, I or my forces were to keep this Yasakani no Magatama, and if Mr. Dandan sensed its location and followed the clues to find me, he would discover that I was not only alive but also thriving and developing my power...

Then the other party will definitely not tire of crossing half the globe again to come and destroy them once more!

"My only way out now is to keep a low profile and develop gradually," Zhou Huai warned himself.

Watching Nakamura carefully put the box away, Zhou Huai calmed himself down.

"Besides this piece of junk, is there anything else you need to report?"

Shinichiro Nakamura swallowed hard, trying to calm himself down after the shock.

"Your Majesty, there is another very strange thing."

Nakamura straightened up and reported truthfully: "In the past two days, a group of out-of-control professionals have suddenly appeared in Tokyo and several other surrounding cities."

"Out of control?" Zhou Huai asked. "How so? Is it a psychological breakdown caused by war trauma?"

“No, it’s not just ordinary mental instability!” Nakamura shook his head. “These people are causing chaos and destruction in the city. What’s even stranger is that they keep chanting some ancient language that no one else can understand. They’ve completely changed!”

"Moreover..." Nakamura paused, his tone becoming extremely strained, "Their strength has undergone an incredibly terrifying surge! Some of them were originally just low-level professionals at the C or D rank, but after losing control, they were able to unleash destructive power comparable to A rank or even near-S rank!"

"The city guards tried to capture and control them, but they were no match for them and suffered heavy casualties. Currently, these people are still wandering around the city, leaving a trail of destruction wherever they go. The city guards had no other choice but to seek the highest level of assistance from our Divine Dynasty."

Upon hearing these words, Zhou Huai sat up straight on the throne.

"An out-of-control professional... a surge in power... an ancient language I can't understand..."

Keywords quickly connected in Zhou Huai's mind.

"Could all of those people be ancient awakened beings?!"

"What ancient race?"

Shinichiro Nakamura knelt below him and looked up at him.

This word was too unfamiliar to him.

Zhou Huai waved his hand casually: "Don't ask what you shouldn't ask."

"You don't need to worry about this."

"I will handle it myself."

Shinichiro Nakamura lowered his head.

"Yes, sir! I understand! I'll take my leave now!"

He kowtowed repeatedly, hugged the sandalwood box containing the eight-foot-long jade jewel, and bowed as he left the meeting room.

The doors closed, and the conference room fell silent.

Zhou Huai leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

Tokyo is now teeming with his informants, tens of thousands of them.

These tiny creatures act as nerve endings extending from Zhou Huai, gathering every movement in Tokyo into his mind in real time.

A massive stream of data whizzed through and filtered through Zhou Huai's consciousness.

"Found it."

A few seconds later, Zhou Huai smiled.

He effortlessly identified three targets with extremely abnormal behavior from the chaotic information network.

The three men were on a dilapidated street in Tokyo's Kita Ward, surrounded by hundreds of heavily armed city guards.

Through an information insect hovering over the battlefield, Zhou Huai descended with his consciousness, sharing its vision.

The image below appeared in his mind.

The battle was exceptionally fierce.

"Fire! Don't stop! Turn these monsters into sieves!"

A city ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) guard officer roared hoarsely, his high-level magic-powered rifle spitting fire wildly.

A dense barrage of firepower lashed out, creating a deadly hail of bullets that rained down on the three figures in the middle of the street.

However, the behavior of those three was chilling.

One of the gaunt men, dressed in ordinary clothes, unleashed a power disproportionate to his size. His eyes were bloodshot, and he let out a low growl. With a casual wave of his hand, he sent a multi-ton armored vehicle flying!

"Bang!"

The armored vehicle crashed into the city guards' formation, crushing the bodies of more than a dozen soldiers, the blood and screams mingling together.

"You lowly ant! How dare you desecrate me with such a inferior weapon?!"

Zhou Huai couldn't understand what he was saying, but he could sense a familiar aura emanating from him.

That was a unique spiritual fluctuation belonging to the ancient race! It was exactly the same as the Extreme Ice Queen who possessed Ye Xi before!

Beside the gaunt man, two other people also displayed astonishing destructive power.

One could manipulate raging whirlwinds to tear any approaching city guards to shreds; the other was covered in an indestructible layer of rock armor, braving dense magical rays as it rampaged through the enemy's territory as if it were nothing.

These three people were originally just low-level professionals at the C or even D level.

Zhou Huai quickly retrieved the information on the three people in his mind.

But now, their combat power has approached the threshold of near-S-level.

This clearly fits the characteristics of the ancient awakened ones.

Looking at the ancient remnants of the race who had gone mad in the scene, Zhou Huai suddenly felt that he had discovered a glimmer of hope to break the deadlock.

"Since I can't find the Dawn Guild's headquarters myself, is it possible to get someone from the Dawn Guild to point me in the right direction?"