The next two days were spent in peace as they prepared to head off to the Phoenix Race homeworld.
The elders made sure to send someone to keep Lin Fan up to date on what the preparations were, so they never had to ask about it.
When the two days were over, Lin Fan put everyone into the Pet Storage Space and brought the rest of them with him as he went to meet the elders again.
The elders already knew about the people that had been in the secret room with Lin Fan, but since they were companions of the Void God's successor, they didn't choose to question it.
Even though they felt some familiar auras from those people…
The one that felt the most familiar to them was of course Hong Long.
Hong Long had been struggling the entire time he had been on the Dragon Race homeworld. He didn't know if he should reveal himself or keep himself hidden for Lin Fan's sake, but in the end, it was Lin Fan who told him that it was fine to reveal himself.
So on the final day, before they left, Hong Long made the decision to reveal his true identity.
When they walked into the elder hall, the one that came forward was Hong Long who had a cloak over himself.
The elders just silently watched Hong Long stand in front of them and waited to see what he had to say. After all, they could all feel the familiar aura that was coming from him.
When Hong Long revealed himself, the elders in front of him weren't shocked at all. Rather, most of them revealed knowing looks since most of them had already guessed who he was based on his aura.
But when he revealed himself, some of them couldn't help feeling happy.
Hong Long was the past generation's Red Dragon Tribe head, so he was someone that many people in the Dragon Race knew.
The current Red Dragon Tribe head was actually Hong Long's nephew, his younger brother's son. He had inherited the position when Hong Long had disappeared after his fight with the Outers.
So by right, Hong Long should be one of the elders right now if he had survived.
Once he lost the position as the Red Dragon Tribe head, he would have joined the elders of the Dragon Race. That was how there were so many different elders in the Dragon Race.
The Azure Dragon Tribe head would also join the elders once he passed on his position as the head of the Azure Dragon Tribe.
The ones that were happy were those that came from the same generation as Hong Long and Qing Di, they had become elders before the two of them even though they were around the same age as them.
As those who had grown up with Hong Long, naturally they were very happy to see that he was still alive.
The two Great Elders looked at Hong Long with narrowed eyes.
It was as if they were seeing Hong Long for the first time.
But that wasn't strange since there was a strange feeling that was coming from Hong Long…
That was because of his contract with the system.
After he signed the contract, part of the system's power entered him, transforming Hong Long. Part of it was being used to maintain his access to the store's system and the other half was used to hide his cultivation.
So even now, the two Great Elders couldn't see how strong Hong Long was.
After a long silence, the left Great Elder asked, "Elder Hong, how did you survive?"
The right Great Elder said with a nod, "Last we saw of you, you sacrificed yourself to take down one of the Outer Rulers."
The elders all focused on Hong Long when they heard this, with many of them nodding in agreement to this.
Hong Long shook his head and gave a sigh when he heard this.
It wasn't that he didn't want to answer it, it was that he didn't know how to answer it. Rather, he didn't know how much he was able to say without revealing Lin Fan's secrets.
Even if he was loyal to the Dragon Race, there were things that couldn't be said now that he had signed a contract with Lin Fan's master.
So after another long silence, Hong Long said, "It's a long and complicated story. I'll tell you what I can say." After saying this, he turned to look at Lin Fan with a meaningful look.
This look wasn't for Lin Fan, but rather for the elders of the Dragon Race.
It was so that they would understand that there were certain things that he couldn't say because it was related to Lin Fan. Or rather, it was related to the secret behind Lin Fan.
The elders all knew that there had to be some kind of secret behind Lin Fan's abilities, but they didn't pry since he was the Void God's successor.
Now that Hong Long showed the same difficulty, they understood what he was in.
The two Great Elders nodded in agreement to what Hong Long said.
So Hong Long started telling them everything about what happened to him after he sacrificed himself.
He told them about how he had landed on the Blue Star Planet and what happened before his meeting with Lin Fan.
Then after that, he started telling the story of his journey with Lin Fan, but now he started leaving out many things. The one thing that he didn't leave out was that he knew about Xiao Feng's bloodline as soon as he met him.
There were a few elders who couldn't help criticizing in a low voice after they heard this.
"If he knew about the true descendant, he should have contacted us much sooner."
That was the number one complaint that these elders had.
As soon as Hong Long heard this, he stopped his story midway to look at these elders.
These elders couldn't help being taken aback when they heard this and they just looked at Hong Long with a strange look.
Hong Long met those gazes for a bit before turning to look at Lin Fan with a complicated look.
This action made it clear what he was suggesting and all of the elders understood why he hadn't tried to contact them.
After that, Hong Long stared at these elders a bit longer before continuing his story.
Just like how he had friends among the elders, he also had people that he couldn't get along with. The elders that had complained about Hong Long just now were some of those people.
They hadn't gotten along when they were younger and even now, they still couldn't get along.
These elders had celebrated when they heard that Hong Long was dead and they were disappointed when he showed up alive again.
After he finished his story, the two Great Elders gave nods before the left Great Elder said, "Elder Hong, it has been hard on you."
The right Great Elder said, "I'm sure that you have some things to take care of first, but our Dragon Race will welcome you back with open arms."
Hong Long shook his head when he heard this before saying, "I have no intentions of coming back to the Dragon Race. I've already found a place to work at, so I will be staying there."
The two Great Elders looked at each other in surprise before nodding in response.
Hong Long had told them about Lin Fan's store, but not about where it was. But even if Hong Long was working at Lin Fan's store, they figured that he could split his time between the Dragon Race and the store.
In fact, they had even planned on sending Hong Long as their informant on Lin Fan by having him spy on Lin Fan for them.
But they never expected him to cut off all relations to the Dragon Race like this…
Still, they didn't blame him since they figured that he had his reasons for this.
From what they had heard about Lin Fan's store, they knew that it definitely wasn't a normal store.
After hearing this, there were a few different reactions from the elders. Some were happy about this and some were sad about this.
Once this was settled, the two Great Elders gave an order to one of the elite guards and the elite guard disappeared.
It didn't take long before that elite guard came back with the current head of the Red Dragon Tribe.
This current head was called Hong Gui and was Hong Long's nephew.
When this head of the Red Dragon Tribe was called in, the first thing that he did was kneel down in front of the elders to show them respect. The look on his face made it clear that he already had the worst case scenario on his mind, so he didn't hesitate to flatter them ahead of time just to save himself and the Red Dragon Tribe.
All of the elders couldn't help revealing bitter smiles when they saw this.
Even Hong Long revealed a bitter smile when he saw this.
He knew what kind of personality this nephew of his had, so he knew exactly why he was acting this way.
Hong Gui couldn't help feeling awkward when he saw that no one was saying a thing to him.
So Hong Gui couldn't help peeking up at who was in this room.
His expression was normal at first until he saw…Hong Long standing there.
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