Chapter 1271: A Dead Knot
"You're even willing to copulate with a mammoth—isn't that bestiality?"
Li Feng cried out, "How many times do I have to say it? She's an alien, no different from Li Qianlin and the others!"
"Can your body handle it?"
Li Feng grinned. "She's not as strong as I am."
Everyone glared at him disdainfully. This meant that they really had tried to have sex, then!
Fang Yi asked, "So what exactly is going on between Zhang Lie and Li Qianlin?"
Li Feng had a sip of alcohol. "How else? Li Qianlin's probably in a hurry."
"A hurry?"
Li Feng explained, "Our captain's right about to ascend, and we all know that he's going to be leaving for the fourth realm sooner or later. Li Qianlin can't keep him here, and she wants him to do something about their relationship. However, our captain won't do that."
Fang Yi wondered, "Is our captain such a trashy man?"
Li Feng rolled his eyes. "Be careful that he doesn't hear that, or you might find yourself doing some special training with him to check up on your progress."
Sun Mengmeng sighed. "It's the opposite. Our captain's a very responsible man, which is preventing him from giving Li Qianlin an answer."
Li Feng added, "From our captain's perspective, he's about to ascend to the fourth realm, and they're about to be split up. Why not enjoy some time together while they can, before forces beyond their control separate them? However, Li Qianlin isn't satisfied with that."
Sun Mengmeng shook her head. "It's not that she isn't satisfied with that, but rather that women think about things differently than do men. Our captain thinks that, because he can't give her the happiness she wants, he shouldn't bother solidifying their relationship at all; on the other hand, even if the relationship ends up falling apart, Qianlin wants to know just how he feels about her."
Sun Xiaowu gaped. "You know a lot about this, Sis!"
Sun Mengmeng sighed. "I'm only thinking about things from her perspective. If I were Qianlin, even if I knew that I wouldn't be able to remain with him for life, I'd want to hear those three words from Zhang Lie. I frequently wish I were Qianlin—after all, our captain dearly loves her."
The woman whom he loved couldn't accompany him; the woman who could accompany him, he didn't love.
Zhang Lie, Li Qianlin, and Sun Mengmeng formed an unhappy trio. Zhang Lie and Li Qianlin loved each other but were unable to be together, whereas Sun Mengmeng had more than sufficient strength to ascend to the fourth realm immediately and remain by his side, but her love would never be reciprocated."
Sun Mengmeng sighed. "Sometimes, I envy Li Qianlin so much that I wish I could exchange her body with mine."
"And yet Qianlin covets your strength, the strength that would allow her to stay by his side forever." Dong Mingxing and Zhou Ying had returned, and Dong Mingxing had been the one to speak.
Sun Mengmeng asked, "How is Qianlin?"
Dong Mingxing replied, "We've brought her to a room to rest for the moment. She had us leave because she wanted to be alone."
Li Feng murmured, "There's nothing we can do about all this, is there? It's a dead knot..."
Zhou Ying wondered, "One of them is the person I respect most, and the other is a good friend. It hurts me to see two such people so upset. Can't our captain ascend to the fourth realm with Qianlin?"
Dong Mingxing seemed rather surprised. "That's true! But is it feasible?"
The hunters were silent.
The members of Team Zenith knew how they might be able to do so—with the disaster-grade dragonwhale soulshard. Zhu, the current ruler of the third realm, hadn't ascended naturally; Zhang Hanxiang had brought her along as a stowaway.
That method could be replicated when ascending from the third to the fourth realm.
Li Feng said, "Our captain's probably thought of that too, hasn't he? He just won't do it."
Sun Mengmeng nodded. "He's a very responsible man, and he knows how dangerous the fourth realm is. He doesn't want Qianlin to be in any danger whatsoever."
Li Feng warned, "We can't speak of this matter in front of our captain and Li Qianlin."
Dong Mingxing seemed confused. "Why not?"
Li Feng sighed. "We all know Li Qianlin isn't that strong. Bringing her to the fourth realm would be a debacle—it would harm her and our captain."
"There's nothing else we can do, I suppose."
The crowd went silent as Li Feng turned and asked, "Sun Mengmeng, won't you go comfort Zhang Lie?"
Sun Mengmeng sighed. "Let him rest."
Li Feng shook his head. "Don't regret this in the future!"
"What's there to regret?"
"Love is war, not a fight or a match. If you're too virtuous and play by the rules, you'll lose out."
Sun Mengmeng blinked.
Li Feng thought that Sun Mengmeng was refusing to take advantage of Zhang Lie while his relationship with Li Qianlin was suffering. In truth, despite Sun Mengmeng's thoughtfulness, she had never been in a relationship. She had spent her youth fighting and training, and she wasn't adept at knowing when to take her chances.
The members of Team Zenith chitchatted with each other idly before they finally departed.
The next day, the day of the draconians' founding ceremony, a five-colored dragon soared through the air. The whole kingdom could see this magnificent sight, and the citizens of the kingdom gasped in awe.
Zhang Lie's lips twitched. The older generation really liked putting on these shows, didn't they?
Unlike Li Zongming, who had tricked his citizens with illusions, the giant five-colored dragon was real. It fell from the sky, smashed into the stage, and transformed back into the draconian sage.
The dragon was the draconian transformation effected by the draconian sage.
After the three thousand worlds were unified, the three remaining superior kings had all received a great deal of strength via the realm's blessing, and the draconian sage had grown significantly younger.
The entire draconian kingdom was in cheers.
There were countless people present at the draconians' founding ceremony, many of whom belonged to races that had decided to join the draconian kingdom, and a large group of races from the Milky Way, humans forefront among them. The draconians themselves, who were supposed to be the star of the show, ended up as one of the smallest groups instead.
The draconian sage said, "Thank you for coming to witness the draconian kingdom's founding ceremony, everyone. I still remember when the draconians were a small race that had managed to acquire their own world through strife and struggle, something that had happened far in the past. When aliens from another realm first appeared, we allied with the humans and developed relations with them.
The draconian kingdom's founding ceremony was very different from the Zongming and Lie kingdoms'. The Zongming kingdom's ceremony was held on Mt. Tian, and only the rich and influential had been invited.
On the other hand, the Lie kingdom's ceremony had been attended by officials and citizens alike, but the attendees were segregated by importance. Only the most important could be within the ceremonial hall; the ordinary officials were forced to remain outside, and the citizens couldn't even enter the palace.
On the other hand, the draconian kingdom, just like the Zenith Alliance, had a ceremony held out in the open, allowing all interested citizens to attend.
This distinction spoke of the differences between the four kingdoms' history, power structure, and governance.
The Zongming kingdom was a monarchy in which those with influence had a say in politics, whereas the Lie kingdom was more of a classic monarchy, with power concentrated on court officials and the royalty.
The Zenith Alliance was a classic democracy, a band of people who formed a loose kingdom, whereas the draconian kingdom was entirely different.
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