Astral Pet Store (WN)

Chapter 274 The Game Approaches

Su Ping asked Tang Ruyan to take care of the Lightning Rat.

The Lightning Rat showed its teeth, looking fierce. Electric arcs flickered around its body as it was ready to attack.

Tang Ruyan found this interesting.

Having worked there for two days, she had met many violent-natured pets. However, they did behave after their masters comforted them. It was surprising that a Lightning Rat was making chaos there!

“Listen! Be good and do not add trouble to my work!”

Tang Ruyan snorted. She unleashed her seventh-rank energy toward the Lighting Rat.

If it were another pet, even one of the demon family would dread her.

On the contrary, the Lightning Rat seemed to be more worked up.

Good. You’ve found a helper, huh?!

The Lightning Rat used the Thunder Shadow Image at once and several Lightning Rats fled to different directions at the same time.

Tang Ruyan could not believe her eyes. This was an advanced skill of the thunder family!

Su Ping didn’t think that the Lighting Rat would react so strongly. He looked at Su Yanying who was in shock and at a loss about what to do. He had no other option but to tell Joanna to come out of the pet room and fetch the Lighting Rat.

He didn’t want to see this rat jumping up and down in his store, breaking things, and scaring his customers.

Joanna received Su Ping’s instructions. She darted a casual glance at the electric arcs sparkling in the store. All of a sudden, a ray of golden light broke out from her. One of the electric arcs disappeared and Joanna picked up the Lighting Rat.

She picked it up by the neck.

The Lightning Rat: “!” Who is it that grabbed me by the neck!?

“Take it inside,” Su Ping ordered.

Joanna carried the Lighting Rat away.

Astounded, Tang Ruyan looked at how Joanna had subdued the Lightning Rat in an instant.

Su Yanying breathed in relief and apologized at once, “Sir, I am so sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Inwardly, he was thinking that the rat must have lived too comfortably around Su Yanying. It was so bold that it wouldn’t even listen to its master.

To some extent, this was good for Su Yanying because her weak commands would have a less negative impact on the Lighting Rat. Yet, in the longer term, if this went on, it could backfire on her.

Su Ping knew what the Lightning Rat was like. It had followed him and survived mountains and oceans of corpses. The Lightning Rat was vicious and could be as violent as the advanced pets of the demon family.

“I must teach it a lesson. The rat will get out of control at this rate…” Su Ping murmured to himself.

After Joanna took the Lightning Rat away, Su Yanying and Lan Lele also left.

Su Ping then went back to see other customers.

Soon, another returning customer arrived.

“Sir, I’m here again.”

Ye Hao was wearing a famous brand’s leisurewear which added a graceful feeling to him. Su Ping’s eyes glowed in anticipation when this little wealthy man showed up. “Have you gone to the barren area? I had not seen you in a while.”

“Well, sir, have you heard about the Mysterious Realm? I went there.”

Ye Hao kept a casual smile while the pride in his eyes was obvious.

Usually, for students, to be able to visit a barren area after graduation would mean the students were outstanding. But the Mysterious Realm was a different story… Some senior explorers did not even have the right to go to a Mysterious Realm. There, advanced battle pet warriors were everywhere. Even titled battle pet warriors were not a rare presence in a Mysterious Realm.

Su Ping understood it. So, Ye Hao went to the Mysterious Realm.

“How was it?” Su Ping asked.

“It was fine. I was just tagging along to see the world and gain some experience. I also took the chance to check my abilities in the dragon bones.” Ye Hao sounded humble while the pride in his eyes was still visible. “Oh?”

Su Ping was interested to hear the words ‘dragon bones.’ He wondered how things had changed after he left.

If someone had gone to the ninth dragon bone, he would know through the mark in him.

“The dragon bones can test people’s abilities and there are nine in total. Before, no one had ever climbed to the ninth dragon bone. Those who could reach the seventh dragon bone would be considered rare talents.”

With a smile, Ye Hao went on, “I wasn’t prepared and I wasn’t capable, so I barely reached the fourth dragon bone. Sir, if you were there, I suppose you could at least reach the seventh dragon bone.”

Ye Hao had never intended to compete against Su Ping.

Su Ping was a freak. He could use the skills of a titled battle pet warrior at such a young age. Ye Hao had never met someone like him.

Though he could not compare to Su Ping, Ye Hao was better than a lot of his peers. The number of people that could climb to the fourth dragon bone was few and far between. Aside from the well-trained talents in the major families, few others among the young people could have done that.

“The fourth one?”

Su Ping didn’t realize that this was the best Ye Hao could do.

“You must work harder,” Su Ping tried to encourage Ye Hao.

Ye Hao curled his lips as he saw that caring look on Su Ping’s face. He should have known that talking about cultivation with Su Ping would hurt his pride. Ye Hao decided to change the topic.

“I have just come back and got to hear the news. You’re competing against Primo, right? The Liu family is behind this Primo. The Liu family is not that powerful but they can be regarded as half a local tyrant in the Longjiang Base City. You must be careful.”

“I know.”

Su Ping nodded. He would remember Ye Hao’s kindness.

“Can I buy the type of training you used on the Lightning Rat?” Ye Hao shifted to another question.

He remembered the Lightning Rat very well. He asked Su Yanying about it and found out that the Lightning Rat was a common specimen that only grew to such a scary degree after being trained in Su Ping’s store.

The outcome of such training was unexpected. The thought of using that type of training on his Thunder Basilisk gave him a thrill.

Su Ping nodded. “That is a professional training, which is now open to some people. Since you are one of my old customers, naturally you are eligible to buy this preface. Besides, we still have the Top 10 packages available. Are you interested?”

“Top 10?”

Ye Hao had learned some news about Su ping’s store before he went there. He knew that not only had Su Ping claimed he had the Top 10 package, he also declared that he could guarantee someone could win the championship. It was because of such an announcement that Su Ping had angered many forces.

The Ye family was one of the furious families. Those that were casting covetous eyes on the championship were hopping mad. They all clamored that they would go and smash Su Ping’s store. But they never turned their words into actions because of some concerns.

Ye Hao was “committing a crime” by going to Su Ping’s store at this time.

“Well…” Ye Hao pondered about it. With his great-grandpa supporting him, other family members should not hold him accountable just because he went there. Besides, he was fully aware that his strength was the only thing that mattered. If he missed a chance to make himself stronger just because of concerns about what other people might say, that would be foolish! “Sure, no problem.”

Ye Hao made up his mind.

He didn’t know if he could make it to the Top 10 or not. He had done some research on the Top 10 winners of the past Elite League. Given his current strength, he could make it to the Top 100 but reaching the Top 10 would be a stretch.

Nevertheless, this package was better than the common training.

In Ye Hao’s view, spending more money naturally meant he could enjoy better services. Therefore, he would only choose the pricey one. That was how he spent his money!

“Good!”

Su Ping smiled. “At the moment, professional training in the store is only limited to middle-rank and low-rank pets. It’s not available for advanced pets just yet. You will have to wait if you want to train your Thunder Basilisk.”

Ye Hao didn’t see that coming. He wanted to train the Thunder Basilisk, his major pet.

“Well…”

He was hesitating. But since Su Ping was not going to make an exception, Ye Hao had to agree. “Fine,” he said.

Having settled the deal with Ye Hao, Su Ping received more customers and time flew by during this process.

Soon, there was no more space available at the store.

That day, Su Ping received some of the other old customers that were students of the Phoenix Peak Academy. But they were part of average households and could only purchase the general training services. The Mysterious Realm closed in advance and the Elite League was about to commence. The students that visited the barren area came back one after another. Su Ping would see some familiar faces now and then, including Zhang Baoxing and Lu Pengfei who were always the first in line.

Su Ping did miss those old customers.

Nevertheless, rules were rules. He had to apologize and close the door.

The customers had grown used to the store’s irregular working hours. This was the third time already.

The first two times could be considered a show but the third time meant this was a common occurrence.

That time around, fewer people complained. They just left, feeling sorry for themselves. What could you do when the owner didn’t want to take your money?

There was nothing they could do when the store was so weird; they could only come back earlier next time.

As per usual, after he closed the door, Tang Ruyan went back to the scroll while Su Ping and Joanna went to train the pets.

It was more like Joanna taking care of the pets than him training them. He was bathing in the spring, working on his fist. He asked Joanna to find him some sparring partners to guide him in his cultivation.

With the help of the spring and the guidance from those gods, Su Ping’s understanding of the “Fist of Exorcist” deepened and he moved closer to the first rank of the skill.

Su Ping took the Moonfrost Dragon with him every time he went to train. At the moment, the Moonfrost Dragon’s combat strength had leaped to 8.5.

In that cultivation plane, Su Ping realized that given his current resources, to train a pet to have a combat strength of eight or nine was easy. However, past that point, even an improvement of 0.1 would be hard.

He did some calculations. He still had time before the Elite League. The Moonfrost Dragon was capable of making it to the Top 10 as it was.

Time zipped by.

Soon, the start of the Elite League was just around the corner.

Three days before the day of the game, all the platforms were publishing information about the Elite League, including the site view, some videos, and live streaming.

The qualification trials were much-anticipated. The entire Longjiang Base City would have tens of millions watching the game.

All the TV channels were reporting news on this.

Amid the people’s growing enthusiasm, the games’ kick off was getting near.

During this time, many customers were still visiting Su Ping’s store. The same could be said for Primo. Their competition had died down.

The two stores had to take care of their businesses all day long. It seemed that they were too busy making money to compete. Someone favoring conspiracy worked up the theory that the two stores had ganged up to fake their confrontation to stir up some attention.

Of course, such idiotic words could not stand when someone gave reasonable arguments.

If they had faked the competition, they wouldn’t have to go so far as to use the words Top 10, Top 5, or the championship. After the Elite League ended, they would have to give a satisfactory answer to the public. If they didn’t tread carefully, they could lose business and end up with a tattered reputation. For an old store like Primo, such actions were unnecessary.

As the game approached, the discussion over the two stores faded away a bit. At the moment, more people were focusing on the participants with a higher chance of winning.

Voting activities where people chose who could win the Top 10 places were ongoing across the online platforms. The ones with more votes were usually the past Top 10 participants in the previous Elite Leagues.

Naturally, they no longer considered those who had grown too old or were no longer eligible. Some participants with the right age and rank were at the center of attention.

The participants with more votes had become famous after the media reported their names and information.