Astral Pet Store (WN)

"…tickle you."

Su Ping couldn't help but shake his head; there were indeed all sorts of quirks that a man could have.

Since there was no key, Su Ping didn't give the Star Lord a hard time; he simply asked the guy to search for it along with them.

Half a day later

Su Ping found Diaz, and learned that all his senior brothers and sisters had died. They encountered a strong Star Lord; Diaz had only survived thanks to his special constitution.

Su Ping didn't ask why he had survived, even though he was the weakest; everyone had their secrets. He invited Diaz to join his team; it was already time to close the net, so there was no need to split up.

Diaz felt at a loss as he looked at the huge team Su Ping was leading. Both of them had participated in the same contest in the beginning, but their power gap had widened to an extreme.

Su Ping saw Shuai Qianhou shortly after; they had parted earlier, but the group found him in a deep space.

Shuai Qianhou was at the moment hiding inside a normal void beast in the seventh space. He would have escaped everyone's attention if Brian and two other men weren't as adept with the path of space.

"Senior Brother Su?"

Shuai Qianhou was rather stunned to see Su

Ping.

His befuddlement increased when he saw Su Ping's company.

Calivey, Qing Hongyue, Brian… Well, he had seen the last one.

But the two women had been major concerns for him. His master had shared intelligence on them too, asking him to pay attention to them.

He didn't realize that those two women would join hands with Su Ping.

Why are they at peace?

Shouldn't they be fighting one another?

Shuai Qianhou was puzzled.

"Junior Brother, it's too dangerous out there. The trial is about to end; you should come with us," offered Su Ping with a very gentle tone, doing the nice senior brother part.

Shuai Qianhou's lips twitched. You have two ultimate treasures, wouldn't you be the most dangerous person?

He said indifferently, "That's unnecessary; all ferocious animals walk alone. I…"

He was unable to continue.

It was because he saw Su Ping taking out more and more ultimate treasures, including Shen Huang's shield, Brian's golden flag, the purple fiery blade, the crimson dagger, the red feather…

"…I prefer to be a sheep; I'm docile and well tempered. Senior brother, we should go together!" said Shuai Qianhou solemnly.

Su Ping nodded and patted his ultimate treasures. "It's not a good thing to store this many treasures together; I have to expose them to sunlight now and then, otherwise they'll get moldy. Okay, it's done. Let's go."

He then stored the ultimate treasures, one after the other.

1111

Shuai Qianhou was lost for words.

He suddenly realized why Qing Hongyue, Calivey and the others would stay pbediently with Su Ping obediently.

That "senior brother" of his was the real ferocious animal herding sheep!

Shuai Qianhou then joined their team too.

Su Ping asked, "Junior brother, have you found the key?" "No." Shuai Qianhou shook his head.

Su Ping nodded. "I believe you. But going by the rules, I need to examine you. You wouldn't mind, junior brother, would you?"

"Examine me?" Shuai Qianhou became vigilant.

Su Ping didn't give him any time to react. He was about to take action, when a dazzling golden streak of light passed by. The object illuminated the sky in a radius of hundreds of kilometers like a shooting star! "That's the key!" Qing Hongyue instantly exclaimed.

"Let me!" Claudia offered and made use of the law of time, trying to reverse the golden light and block it.

But the next moment her expression changed, "Laws can't affect the key!"

Su Ping narrowed his eyes. Without further ado, he simply said, "Let's go!"

He took action as he spoke, being the first to chase after the golden light. The artifact moved extremely fast, soon entering the seventh space; Su Ping was unable to catch up to it, even though he was using Sun Chaser. After all, the laws he performed couldn't influence the key.

The golden light fell onto a mountain like a meteor shortly after.

Everybody tracked it down at full speed.

Su Ping landed where the golden light crashed. It was a stone temple.

The place was quite shabby. Once the golden light faded, a strange square stone plate fell into a pedestal and merged with it.

Then, the stone temple seemed to have been activated, creating barriers around it. "That's the key alright…"

Someone was delighted to see the plate, but they soon felt regretful.

Everybody looked at Su Ping, who would undoubtedly claim the prize.

The Star Lord—whose mind was searched by Su Ping earlier-and Diaz were both frustrated. If only the key had appeared sooner, they wouldn't have been "harassed"!

"I didn't realize that the key would appear out of nowhere. Nobody found a single trae earlier."

"What if the Celestials planned all this?"

"There are indeed no lucky factors in this trial. The Celestials have played all sorts of tricks; they arranged for the key to appear right this moment, all to make us fight for it. How vicious!"

Everybody looked at the key inside the temple with conflicted expressions.

They would have fought for the key, even knowing it was part of the Celestial's plan. However, the competition for the key was already over before it showed up; claiming it was the only step needed.

"The key…"

Shuai Qianhou looked at the key with glittering eyes; there was no telling what he was thinking

Su Ping didn't do anything recklessly. He checked with the team and asked two of the top Star Lords who had grasped perfect paths to break the barriers and fetch the key for him.

The two Star Lords heaved sighs; they had clearly turned into errand boys.

They couldn't resist, so they had to obey.

They started soon after, pushing the barriers with their perfect baths, but the protection remained as stable as ever.

"I think an ultimate treasure is needed."

Qing Hongyue realized what was going on, and glanced at Su Ping.

Su Ping also realized it. It was impossible to break the barriers with perfect paths; the keys had indeed been prepared for the twelve people who held ultimate treasures.

The families who had sent their descendants to the trial while sparing no expense would probably be furious if they knew of this. Still, even if they were angry, none of them would dare to resist. After all, the twelve Celestials of the universe had planned this together. They were the gods in the Federation!

Whoosh!

The next moment, Shuai Qianhou dashed out before Su Ping could do anything. A streak of purple light burst out from inside his hand. It was a short dagger, which was an ultimate treasure!

Su Ping was astonished; his junior brother had actually acquired an ultimate treasure. Did it mean that he hunted the leader of a star zone?

Bang!

Su Ping also took action quickly after. The broken sword plate appeared in his hand; even though it was too badly damaged to restrain the treasures in a certain range like before, it could still disable one of them.

Shuai Qianhou stabbed at the barriers with the purple dagger. He thought that the barriers would explode, but they were completely unharmed; the purple dagger in his hand quickly lost its power, becoming a normal treasure.

"Huh?" Shuai Qianhou was greatly shocked.

"Junior brother, what are you doing?"

Su Ping walked towards him, purple saber in hand and the golden flag on his back.

Shuai Qianhou's face stiffened; he had planned to break the barriers, loot the key, and then make his escape. After all, the opportunity to become a Celestial was right before his eyes. He really had a shot at it.

However… the purple dagger didn't work at the critical moment.

"Well, Senior Brother Su, I'm trying to fetch the key for you." Shuai Qianhou turned around with a smile.

Shuai Qianhou didn't want to fight Su Ping anymore, as the latter was holding many ultimate treasures. He would fail even if he was stronger than Su Ping.

He glanced at Qing Hongyue and the others standing behind his senior brother, all of them staring at him quietly. None of them tried to seize the chance to attack Su Ping. The situation was completely different from what he had anticipated.

Aren't they tempted in the slightest?

Shuai Qianhou found the situation so awkward that he didn't know what to say.

"Don't worry. I'll do it," replied Su Ping calmly. Then, he added, "The ultimate treasure is too dangerous for you to use, junior brother. I'll be keeping it for you." After that, he extended his hand.

Shuai Qianhou's lips twitched; his eyes showed an inner struggle

But eventually, he handed over the dagger to Su Ping, however unwillingly.

After much deliberation, he wasn't confident of fighting Su Ping, especially not when his ultimate treasure was no longer working.

Also, he vaguely guessed that his ultimate treasure's malfunction was probably Su Ping's doing.

After all, he had used it many times, and the artifact worked every single time…

"Smart, junior brother." Su Ping nodded, seemingly much friendlier than before. He put away the dagger without binding it, just after his junior had released his bond.

He already had enough ultimate treasures to crush anyone, unless the opponent's ultimate treasure was like the sword plate that Lin Xiu had.

Furthermore, such ultimate treasures would be useless after the trial; there were very few areas in the universe where Ascendant State items were banned.

Even if there were, Su Ping didn't have to go there.

"Junior brother, move out of the way; I don't want you to get hurt."

"Okay."

Shuai Qianhou obediently moved aside.

Su Ping made a slashing motion and the barriers instantly exploded.

He paused for a moment before picking up the key. He gave a slight nod upon seeing that Shuai Qianhou was still standing obediently.

Nothing unusual happened; the barriers were the last obstacle.

That final hurdle was meant to stop anyone else from picking up the key by sheer luck. It could also serve to have the participants fight outside the barriers.

Su Ping examined the key and confirmed it was real; it was made of similar materials used for the ultimate treasures. Furthermore, there seemed to be an ancient array inscribed on it. He had seen some of its patterns back when Joanna taught him.

Everyone lost all hope after Su Ping stored the key.

Shuai Qianhou wore a troubled expression; he couldn't have felt more regretful. He could only heave a helpless sigh in his heart.

Qing Hongyue and the others were the same. However, everybody held back their disappointment and congratulated Su Ping when he turned around.

Everything looked as if Su Ping would have returned triumphantly while everyone cheered.

Shuai Qianhou's eyes twitched upon seeing such a harmonious scene. It was very likely that none of the Celestials had expected such a peaceful ending to the last competition…