"Even if it's just dogs fighting, fine," Ke Ran forced a pale smile. "I hid the thing next to the tree roots in residence number 30XX on the Imperial Star."
Ruan Mingchu hummed in agreement: "I will send someone to look for it."
After finding what Ke Ran had mentioned at that location and confirming its authenticity, Ruan Mingchu sent someone to pick up Ke Ran and take her to Satellite No. 10, where she would stay with Liya and the others.
Ke Ran didn't care where he would be sent; he didn't know his destination each time he was transferred, and he had gotten used to it.
He just wanted to find a secluded place to die, so as not to dirty other people's land.
Waking up to find yourself being stared at by seven or eight people is a bit terrifying, especially since several of them are familiar faces.
"Lia?" Ke Ran's voice trembled slightly.
Liya nodded: "Brother Keran, it's Liya. She said that Brother Keran will be living with us from now on. It's really nice here. Although there's an annoying guy, we can't eat as many snacks as we want, and we're forced to brush our teeth and wash our faces, it's still pretty good."
She counted the bad things about the place on her fingers, but she radiated joy and a sense of belonging to the place from the inside out.
For several days in a row, Ke Ran felt like she was dreaming. Could this dream paradise really exist?!
Suddenly a ball hit the nearby water, creating a splash that hit Ke Ran's face.
Ke Ran looked up and saw the colorful creature covered in paint shouting at him, "What are you staring at, Cola Fish? Come play ball with us!"
Ke Ran scooped up the ball and threw it back, laughing and scolding, "I've told you so many times, it's not cola!"
"Hehe, Banlan wants to drink Coke."
People like Gao Bugui usually rely on their power and influence to look down on everyone else, and are incredibly arrogant. But when they fall into the hands of others and their lives are in danger, they immediately become as cowardly as a North American opossum.
Answer whatever is asked, and even proactively talk about things not asked, trying to drag everyone down with you.
Looking at the densely packed names, Ruan Mingchu almost laughed in anger; it seemed there were hardly any clean people left.
Just how corrupt had this vast empire become? Nguyen Minh Thu, who had never dared to think about it before, finally got a vague answer today.
What was his father thinking?
As expected, Nguyen Minh Thu's father refused his request to speak, but gave him a word of advice: don't worry and don't interfere.
What is there to worry about? Ruan Mingchu’s intuition was about this empire.
Although the father and son rarely spent time together, Nguyen Minh Thu trusted his father from the bottom of his heart.
Ruan Minh Thu abandoned his original plan and instead decided to remain inactive, following his father's instructions not to intervene unless absolutely necessary.
Time flew by, and the invisible competition between Ruan Mingchu, Mu Yu, and Galo came to an end, with all the sold mermaids being found.
Fortunately, most of them were not seriously injured. The worst off was the one that was sold to the black research institute, which had a lot of blood drained and many scales scraped off.
They were all in good spirits, gritting their teeth and unwilling to leave, as they hadn't gotten their revenge yet.
Finally, Galo knocked them out one by one, and they behaved themselves.
The four-pointed star stone told Galo that the location was near an asteroid belt in the universe.
On the ninth day, Nguyen Minh Thu and the mermaids arrived nearby and waited, and everyone was on high alert.
The four-pointed star stone suddenly glowed and heated up, flying from Galo's hand into the air. Its light kept getting brighter and brighter, then disappeared in an instant, turning into a vortex-shaped door.
Before this, the mermaid and Ruan Mingchu had tied themselves together with ropes. Now that the vortex gate had appeared, everyone went inside one by one.
After Ruan Mingchu, Galo, and the other mermaids went inside, a small aircraft stumbled and crashed in a moment before the vortex disappeared.
The person inside the aircraft was Mu Yu, along with two other rabbits, Tu Aotian and Men Hao.
Ruan Mingchu refused to let Mu Yu accompany him due to uncertainty. Although Mu Yu was unwilling, he never thought of secretly following behind Ruan Mingchu's back.
It was all because Rabbit Aotian, upon hearing that Ruan Mingchu was going to travel to other worlds, immediately objected and insisted on going with him.
As his good friend, Mu Yu couldn't bear to refuse such an adorable rabbit, so he reluctantly followed along.
Actually, he was still somewhat hesitant, unsure how to explain things to Ruan Mingchu once they got there. Tu Aotian, thinking he had changed his mind, directly tried to seize control of the aircraft, and before he knew it, he had plunged into the vortex.
Galo and the other mermaids only knew that this wormhole could connect two worlds. Even with that thing, they could only determine the location of the wormhole and the world it appeared in. As for where they would land in the other world, that was uncertain. They couldn't even be sure if they would land together.
Fortunately, none of the mermaids were lost after they landed safely.
The place was very open, and Galo quickly circled around to determine their location.
"We are in the Blacktail Empire, the northernmost part of the Mermaid Continent."
There happened to be a black-tailed mermaid among the group. Hearing Galo's words, he became excited: "Then let's all rest at my house first. There's a bus station near my house, so it will be convenient."
Only the white-tailed mermaid refused his invitation, choosing to leave alone.
The black-tailed mermaid didn't try to stop her, and seemed relieved that the white-tailed mermaid had left on her own initiative.
Ruan Mingchu seemed to be deep in thought. Could it be that mermaids would be hostile to each other because of the different colors of their tails?
Galo quickly gave Ruan Mingchu's answer: "The other colors are fine, but there has always been a deep gap between the black tail and the white tail."
Ruan Minh Thu nodded to indicate that he understood and expressed his gratitude for Galo's explanation.
Watching the white-tailed mermaid disappear into the distance, the black-tailed mermaid gave everyone a hearty smile: "Let's go, we can get to my house before dark."
Judging from the sun's position, it should be around four or five in the afternoon. We won't arrive until dark, so the distance is probably quite far.
The black-tailed mermaid led the way, his friends surrounded him, the other mermaids lagged a few steps behind, Ruan Mingchu walked at the very back, while Meng Shuo stayed by his side the whole time.
Ruan Mingchu looked at Meng Shuo suspiciously, not expecting his plan.
Mengshuo: You think I want to follow you?!
Suddenly, a huge thing crashed into the open ground not far in front of them, creating a large crater and kicking up a cloud of dust.
Galo reacted the fastest, appearing next to the aircraft in the blink of an eye.
Looking at the familiar aircraft, Ruan Mingchu was momentarily unsure whether he should step over it.
Of course, he only hesitated for two seconds before running over quickly, passing the mermaids, and becoming the second person to reach the side of the aircraft.
"Cough cough, Mu Yu, I'm breaking up with you! It's all your fault for fighting me for the control panel, otherwise we definitely wouldn't have crashed." Tu Aotian roared angrily, executing the villain-first-accuse-herself accusation perfectly.
Mu Yu spat out the dust in his mouth twice, not giving an inch, "You absolutely won't crash if you don't fight me for it. Aircraft are for people to fly, not rabbits!"
Then Rabbit Aotian started swearing and cursing again.
Galo recognized Ruan Mingchu as an acquaintance and stepped aside. Ruan Mingchu listened to their argument for two minutes, but couldn't take it anymore, so he pounded on the rickety door of the aircraft.
The room fell silent instantly, and then Mu Yu walked out with his head down, looking guilty.
Ruan Mingchu didn't ask him why he had followed, because the answer was obvious.
Since we're already here, we might as well make the best of it; we can't just send them back.
So the first question Nguyen Minh Thu asked was, "Is the aircraft still usable?"
Mu Yu raised his head and blinked his round eyes, seemingly pondering whether there were any unspoken meanings in Ruan Mingchu's words.
The bewildered look in Mu Yu's eyes amused Ruan Mingchu, who tapped Mu Yu's forehead and chuckled, "What are you thinking about all day long!"
Ruan Mingchu used his mental power to roughly scan the aircraft and found that it could still be used after some repairs.
"Can the three of you fix the aircraft?"
Mu Yukuang nodded, while Tu Aotian looked disdainful and wanted to retort, but Mu Yukuang stopped him before he could say anything.
Since Mu Yu had come along, Ruan Mingchu decided not to go with them to the black-tailed mermaid's house.
He had secretly probed a few mermaids and found that while mixed-race individuals were barely accepted in the mermaid world, pure humans were like ants to humans—not so much discriminatory, but rather contemptuous.
The black-tailed mermaid looked at Ruan Mingchu's face and expressed regret, but still didn't say anything to stop her. He was a very traditional mermaid; he could barely accept Ruan Mingchu, but he really couldn't accept Mu Yu.
The mermaids said goodbye to Ruan Mingchu and left, but Meng Shuo and Jialuo remained.
Galo said to Ruan Mingchu, "The temple is in the very center of the continent, but it's not a place you can just walk into."
As for why he wasn't casual, Fagalo didn't elaborate. After saying that, he left, seemingly not with the group of mermaids ahead.
Ruan Mingchu thought Meng Shuo also wanted to say goodbye to him alone, so he waited for him to speak.
The two stared at each other for two or three minutes, but they simply couldn't continue.
Ruan Mingchu said, "Don't hold back on what you want to say."
Meng Shuo held his breath, feeling sullen and unhappy.
Pointing at Mu Yu, he said, "After eating so much of his food, now that we're on my turf, I'll be your tour guide for free as a way of giving back."
Ruan Mingchu looked Meng Shuo up and down suspiciously. No matter how she looked at him, this mermaid didn't seem like the kind of person who would repay kindness, especially now that he had such a long face, he looked like a respectable man who had been forced into prostitution.
This distrustful look made Meng Shuo's face flush red with anger. If it weren't for that damn bloodstained spirit pearl, he wouldn't want to stay by Ruan Mingchu's side for even half a second!
After assessing their own fighting strength, Ruan Mingchu figured that defeating fifty Meng Shuo was no problem, so he didn't press the matter further and agreed to let Meng Shuo stay and serve as their guide.
Mengshuo: I'm so angry!
Arriving in an unfamiliar place without a map is absolutely impossible, so Ruan Mingchu planned to get a map from a populated area first before doing anything else.
It just so happened that Meng Shuo insisted on going with them, so a blue-tailed mermaid was probably the most cost-effective errand boy.
After the aircraft was repaired, the group boarded it and randomly chose a direction that did not overlap with the group of mermaids they had just encountered.
It took Meng Shuo a long time to calm herself down.
He told Ruan Mingchu, "You'd better not let Mu Yu enter the town. If you absolutely have to, you must leave your scent on him."
Ruan Mingchu: Bewildered.
Mu Yu: Suddenly excited.
Ruan Mingchu: "What do you mean?"
Meng Shuo took a while to organize her thoughts before speaking: "On the Mermaid Continent, pure humans who are not marked by their masters are considered unclaimed property, and anyone who wants them is entitled to them."
Look at these words, "master" and "ownerless"—you can get how lowly humans are in this world without much description.
Meng Shuo continued, "The mark that is recognized by all mermaids is the pheromone. Only if you leave your scent on Mu Yu will he not be harassed by other mermaids."
As he spoke, he quickly glanced at Mu Yu's face. His cute baby face really appealed to the fetishes and collecting tendencies of many mermaids.
When Meng Shuo mentioned pheromones, both Ruan Mingchu and Mu Yu recalled the pheromone incident. Of course, their focus was different. Ruan Mingchu's mind flashed to the alluring sight of Mu Yu's nape—an Alpha whose glands were even more tempting than an Omega's!
Mu Yu was thinking about what his uncle Mu Nianyi had said: Omegas could also mark Alphas. He was happy to be bitten by Ruan Mingchu, but the thought of their pheromones intertwining and exchanging made his heart pound uncontrollably.
They may even develop a strong attachment to the mark.
Ruan Mingchu shook his head slightly, throwing away the yellow waste. "He's an Alpha, your brother, your friend, your junior. Who are you being fair to by letting your mind wander like this!"