Chapter 162: An Old Acquaintance

The Church of Light itself held no fewer than ten million death row inmates whom it planned to execute in secret. Afterwards, the Church of Light spent vast sums of money to purchase slaves, and by expending such large amounts of capital, it managed to acquire tens of millions more "death row inmates." Eventually, some hard-hearted members of the Church of Light even fabricated random pretexts to round up and arrest a batch of ordinary, innocent civilians solely because they did not believe in the God of Light.

Tens of millions here, tens of millions there—death row inmates that other factions would have needed years or even decades to gather were somehow rounded up by the Church of Light in such a short span of time.

No sooner had the headcount been met than George personally led his men to transport them in batches to the capital to fulfill the unfinished transaction with Zhou Tian.

Zhou Tian had severely underestimated the strength of the Church, so when the Church delivered those death row inmates to the capital, Zhou Tian had made zero preparations beforehand.

Because of this reason, Zhou Tian found himself exceptionally busy for a good while.

Leaving aside one hundred million death row inmates, even one hundred million ants, if piled together, would form a massive mass. Zhou Tian had to place a mark on every single one of them before sending them into the Trial Pagoda. Even though this work was not particularly difficult, once the quantity grew so large, Zhou Tian inevitably became extremely busy.

Fortunately, busy as he was, because Zhou Tian could clearly see the benefits awaiting him, he was quite enthusiastic while going through the work. No matter how arduous or exhausting it was, Zhou Tian had no intention of resting; instead, he honestly sent those death row inmates into the Trial Pagoda batch by batch until the very last death row inmate was sent inside, at which point he finally relaxed.

Handing the holy grail desired by the Church of Light over to George to conclude the transaction between the two of them, Zhou Tian sent George and the rest of the Church of Light's members on their way, and then immediately and excitedly savored the benefits brought by this transaction with the Church.

Once one hundred million people entered the Trial Pagoda, even though the Trial Pagoda contained its own independent space, with such a massive crowd flooding in, it still appeared somewhat crowded at that moment. And under such circumstances, with people milling about and having absolute zero understanding of the Trial Pagoda, those death row inmates who entered naturally scattered in all directions at once.

Moving around inside the Trial Pagoda inevitably triggered some of the trial mechanisms within. Relying on the capabilities of the Trial Pagoda, although quite a few of the death row inmates who entered managed to escape the initial mechanism attacks and even gained benefits from them, over half of the people died in the very first wave of attacks the moment they stepped inside.

At least sixty million people died inside the Trial Pagoda shortly after Zhou Tian sent them in. Although the majority of these individuals were merely ordinary civilians used by the Church of Light to pad the numbers, even if each person only gave Zhou Tian a single experience point, that already amounted to sixty million experience points.

When tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of experience points suddenly flooded into Zhou Tian's perception, the sound of 'ding-dong, ding-dong' echoed endlessly in his ears at that moment.

Level up, level up, level up...

Having reaped such a massive amount of experience, Zhou Tian's level naturally skyrocketed immediately. In what felt like mere moments, Zhou Tian's level was forcefully raised all the way to level fifty. After allocating his attribute points, Zhou Tian's status immediately underwent a transformation.

Name: Zhou Tian
Race: Flood Dragon
Level: 50
Strength: 250
Constitution: 200
Agility: 300
Spirit: 100
Fortune: 150
Innate Skills: None
Unallocated Attribute Points: 0
Unallocated Skill Points: 150
Venom (Level 10), Avatar Technique, 《True Dragon Secret Codex》
Equipment: Chaos Bell (Xiantian Supreme Treasure), Fantian Seal (Xiantian Magical Treasure), Binding Immortal Rope (Xiantian Magical Treasure)

Having reached level fifty, Zhou Tian's demonic power had increased significantly. Based on his current level, if he were to make a move, his strength would likely be several times greater than before.

Moreover, this was merely the beginning; people were still dying inside the Trial Pagoda every single moment. Once everyone inside perished completely, Zhou Tian estimated that breaking through to level sixty would pose no problem at all.

A level that had remained stagnant for so long suddenly rising by so much—with gains like these, Zhou Tian was naturally overjoyed.

Following that, a thought stirred in Zhou Tian's mind, and he began plotting other ideas at that moment.

The primary reason Zhou Tian's level had suddenly increased by so much was because he had sent so many death row inmates into the Trial Pagoda. Since sending death row inmates into the Trial Pagoda was originally just a spur-of-the-moment idea, and he could level up using this method before, Zhou Tian could naturally use the exact same method now to harvest experience.

Zhou Tian could not trust the Church of Light, so only asking them for a batch of death row inmates constituted the completion of his transaction with them. However, it was not as if there were no other factions that Zhou Tian could actually trust; at least Wu Zhao was a suitable candidate.

Once he made up his mind, Zhou Tian immediately penned his request into a letter and sent it to Wu Zhao. Without questioning why Zhou Tian made such a demand, Wu Zhao received the letter and, without a second word, directly transmitted the relevant orders downward.

Given Wu Zhao's current power and influence, when she issued an order stating that all death row inmates in the Yanhuang Empire were to be sent to the Trial Pagoda in the capital for execution, naturally no one would dare to object. However, once such an order was issued, certain aftereffects slowly began to manifest themselves at that time.

Why send death row inmates into the Trial Pagoda?

Just as the Church of Light worried, wasn't the Trial Pagoda meant for trials? Why was Zhou Tian now having death row inmates sent inside? Could it be that the Trial Pagoda had some other purpose? Or perhaps the Trial Pagoda wasn't a good place at all, and Zhou Tian had acquired it specifically to trap people?

Furthermore, executing death row inmates was naturally more convenient to do locally; why on earth would Wu Zhao go to such great lengths to issue a decree like this? Did Zhou Tian give her some benefits? Or was there some unspeakable relationship between the two parties?

Connecting this to the previous incident where Zhou Tian helped Wu Zhao trap Li Jiahao in Xuanwu City for several months, romantic gossip regarding Zhou Tian and Wu Zhao suddenly proliferated among the common folk.

Originally, most of the factions in the capital opposed to Zhou Tian had already been eliminated, and Wu Zhao had basically gained control of the Yanhuang Empire. Coupled with the discovery of this new experience-gathering method, Zhou Tian should have been able to relax.

Yet just when Zhou Tian thought he was about to enjoy a relaxing and leisurely period of time, the Church of Light issued another order to him.

"What? You want me to go to the Elf Empire to negotiate an alliance?" Zhou Tian never imagined that, given his relationship with the Church of Light, they would actually issue such an absurd order to him at this moment.

There were numerous deities on the continent, and correspondingly, with so many deities, churches were naturally ubiquitous.

However, compared to ordinary churches, whichever deities possessed greater strength would naturally wield greater influence across the continent through their respective churches.

Among all the churches, the ones with the largest influence were naturally those established by the Twelve God Kings. Among them, the human Church of Light, the elven Church of Nature, and the beastmen's Beast God Cult were the most prominent exemplars.

With great influence came great strength, and when resisting the demons, these three churches were almost always the absolute main force under normal circumstances.

To resist the demons, occasional contact between churches was naturally unavoidable. For instance, holding some sort of meeting to discuss who would be responsible for what tasks that year, what actions were prepared, and which churches needed to cooperate.

However, under normal circumstances, even if churches were planning to hold a summit meeting, it should at least be led by the Pope, or failing that, led by a Cardinal! Yet this time, who knew what the Holy City was thinking, but they actually arranged for Zhou Tian to lead a delegation to the Elf Empire to meet with several churches. Such a situation caused Zhou Tian a great deal of headache while simultaneously forcing him to accept the arrangement.

Given Zhou Tian's current strength and status, the Church of Light no longer possessed the power to force him into doing anything. However, Zhou Tian genuinely had no way to refuse the Church of Light's arrangement at this point in time.

No matter how poor Zhou Tian's relations with the Church of Light were, such discord could not be revealed to outsiders. Therefore, at least on the surface, Zhou Tian still had to put on a show in front of outsiders, acting as if his relationship with the Church of Light was amicable and that he was a qualified bishop.

Under such circumstances, as long as the orders issued by the Church of Light were not entirely preposterous, Zhou Tian absolutely could not openly oppose them.

However, thinking of the intelligence gathered by his intelligence network, Zhou Tian's expression grew cold at that moment.

"The Underground City?"

According to intelligence gathered by Zhou Tian's subordinates, the Underground City was once again making suspicious moves. Analyzing all the intelligence, the target the Underground City intended to deal with this time appeared to be none other than the high-ranking figures attending the church summit.

To be honest, the Underground City rarely missed a chance to carry out such operations. After all, the demons' opponents were the gods, and as the gods' enforcers, the churches were naturally the demons' old adversaries. During a church summit, while their collective strength was certainly formidable, compared to the fortified main cities of the various churches, the defensive strength at such a summit appeared considerably weaker.

Moreover, because the attendees of the summit all held lofty statuses, if the Underground City could truly eliminate all those church members in attendance, it would deal a heavy blow to both the strength and prestige of the churches.

Therefore, the Underground City frequently attempted such operations. Although ninety-nine percent of these operations failed, there were always a few occasions where they succeeded.

Although Zhou Tian could not understand why the Church of Light wanted him to lead the delegation this time, regardless of what was going on, this request did not look like a difficult task on the surface. On the contrary, as one of the representatives qualified to attend this meeting, it was an affirmation of Zhou Tian's status. Regardless of what kind of scheme the Church of Light was plotting behind this, unless he no longer cared about his reputation, not only could he not resist the Church of Light's arrangement now, but he also had to put on an expression of deep gratitude.

This feeling made Zhou Tian extremely displeased.

Ginger gets hotter the older it is; Zhou Tian had just taken a small advantage from the Church of Light, and they immediately returned the favor with a counterattack. Although this counterattack amounted to nothing to Zhou Tian, the feeling of knowing the other party harbored malicious intentions yet being unable to retaliate while forced to express gratitude made Zhou Tian somewhat uncomfortable.

Regardless, agreeing to participate in the meeting for the Church of Light this time would still boost Zhou Tian's personal fame to a certain extent. Thus, although Zhou Tian felt somewhat displeased in his heart, he ultimately did not refuse the Church of Light's arrangement. With an unsightly expression, he nodded, thereby agreeing to lead the delegation to the meeting.

Except...

"Are you kidding me? You don't have to be this ruthless!" Although the Church of Light had used some underhanded methods against Zhou Tian from the beginning, Zhou Tian truly did not expect them to take things to such extremes. Letting him lead the delegation to the inter-church meeting was one thing, but once Zhou Tian agreed to the arrangement, the Holy City actually used the excuse of insufficient manpower to make Zhou Tian bring his own people to the meeting.

When things reached this point, the problem naturally became significant.

With an ordinary bishop like Zhou Tian leading the delegation, in terms of status, Zhou Tian would undoubtedly be the lowest among all the church representatives. Coupled with the fact that the people Zhou Tian brought were entirely his own subordinates, once he arrived in the Elf Empire, he would likely become part of the most insignificant group there, even if they nominally represented the Church of Light.

Of course, even so, this was merely a matter of saving face. Given Zhou Tian's current status and prestige, no matter how much those churches looked down on him, they probably wouldn't dare to openly disrespect him to his face.

The real problem now was that this meeting was clearly going to be targeted by the Underground City against the various church representatives. When attending such meetings normally, which church didn't bring a full complement of personnel? To say nothing of having seventeen or eighteen god-level powerhouses, at the very least, several demigod-level professionals were never absent.

Under such circumstances, Zhou Tian was leading a group whose strongest members were merely at the Saint Realm to attend the meeting. No matter how famous Zhou Tian was, people would inevitably look down upon him. If the Underground City really made a move, Zhou Tian would undoubtedly become their prime target. Understanding all of this, Zhou Tian was naturally dissatisfied with the Church's arrangement.

Of course, dissatisfaction aside, Zhou Tian wasn't particularly concerned about the threat from the Underground City.

If he were still on the Black Blood Plateau, facing a behemoth like the Underground City would indeed require Zhou Tian to exercise some caution. But now that Zhou Tian was in the outside world, even if the Underground City truly wanted to deal with him, they couldn't make any massive moves.

As long as the Underground City couldn't deploy its full might, then given Zhou Tian's current strength, he had zero fear of any assassinations by the Underground City.

After grumbling and cursing the high-ranking figures of the Church of Light under his breath for a while, Zhou Tian, despite his reluctance, honestly boarded the teleportation array and teleported toward the Elf Empire.

Thinking of the Elf Empire while on the road, Zhou Tian couldn't help but recall some of the past events he had experienced there.

To be honest, after Zhou Tian left the Beastman Empire and entered human territory, he genuinely never thought he would ever set foot in elven territory again. Although elves were extremely alluring in appearance, due to past events, Zhou Tian had lost quite a bit of his goodwill toward them. Arriving in the Elf Empire once more, Zhou Tian inevitably felt a sense of emotional complexity.

"You must be Bishop Zhou Tian, the representative of the Church of Light, right? We have already received word from the Holy City. Please follow me; we have already arranged a resting place for you." Just as he stepped out of the teleportation array, an elf immediately stepped forward, bowed to him, and then led him away.

Zhou Tian made no superfluous movements. This meeting was hosted by the Church of Nature, and on these elves' turf, Zhou Tian didn't want to make any special scenes. He would simply follow whatever arrangements they made for him. Besides, in this meeting, Zhou Tian was merely playing a minor supporting role; compared to the meeting itself, Zhou Tian was actually much more interested in the potential assassination attempts the Underground City might launch next.

His mind drifting elsewhere, Zhou Tian pondered matters concerning the Underground City while lying back in the wooden hut prepared for him by the elves, falling into a daze.

Right at that moment, an unexpected visitor pushed open the door to Zhou Tian's room.

"Squeak~"

Knowing that the Underground City would target these church representatives, and finding himself with enough self-preservation power but lacking the ability to protect others, Zhou Tian naturally hadn't brought his subordinates along. Aside from the little divine tiger, Zhou Tian brought no one else; just like that, it was a single man and beast who arrived in the Elf Empire.

Because Zhou Tian had come entirely alone, naturally no one should have come to disturb him at this hour. Hearing the sudden sound of the door opening, Zhou Tian felt a start, and his body immediately reacted...

"Who is it?" Uttering those words by reflex, Zhou Tian had already lunged toward the silhouette pushing open the door even as he spoke.

"Awooo~" Before Zhou Tian could make his move, the little divine tiger accompanying him acted a step faster. Before Zhou Tian could reach the spot, it pounced forward and instantly pinned the figure to the ground.

"Don't kill her!"

Though anyone breaking into his room at this hour hardly looked like a good person, no matter how one appraised that dark silhouette, there were two main considerations. First, Zhou Tian was currently inside the Elf Empire; random slaughter might bring unnecessary trouble upon himself. Second, and most importantly, Zhou Tian had a lingering sense of familiarity regarding that silhouette. Although he couldn't immediately guess the person's identity, since there was a possibility it was an acquaintance, Zhou Tian naturally couldn't let the little divine tiger harm them.

"Let her go!" Confident that the dark silhouette couldn't harm him, Zhou Tian walked over and instructed the little divine tiger to release the 'person' pinned beneath its paws.

Having spent a long time together, while they hadn't quite reached the point of master and servant, the little divine tiger was very close to Zhou Tian. One could say that calling Zhou Tian and the little divine tiger friends or family nowadays was no exaggeration. Though it somewhat disagreed with Zhou Tian's command, after letting out a low growl, the little divine tiger ultimately obeyed Zhou Tian's intent and lifted its paws from the 'person'.

Once the little divine tiger released its claws, the dark silhouette scrambled straight back up.

Unexpectedly, under normal circumstances, that dark silhouette should have fled. In reality, however, when Zhou Tian had the little divine tiger release her, she showed no intention of running away. Instead, after standing up, she revealed her face.

"Long time no see."

"You are..."

Zhou Tian never expected that dark silhouette to actually be an elf. Realizing the little divine tiger had almost killed an elf inside the Elf Empire, Zhou Tian felt a wave of secret relief while immediately beginning to size up the female elf.

Her being an elf undoubtedly proved one thing: she and Zhou Tian were acquainted, and at the very least, they had interacted before.

Heaven and earth be the witness—while Zhou Tian felt she looked somewhat familiar, he genuinely couldn't recall who she was. Even among humans, the aesthetic standards of Easterners and Westerners had certain differences, let alone the aesthetic gaps between sentient beings of entirely different races.

Although elves appeared quite beautiful to human eyes, in reality, to humans, elves looked almost like cartoon characters. While they looked stunning, telling one elf apart from another was fundamentally impossible unless one had lived with them for quite some time.

Therefore, no matter how familiar the elf looked to Zhou Tian, trying to recognize her identity purely from her appearance was something destined to be impossible from the very start.

Seeing Zhou Tian's reaction, the elf princess's gaze dimmed slightly before she quickly whispered a reminder to him: "Don't you remember? We were once together in the Beastman Empire..."

Before the elf princess could finish her sentence, Zhou Tian had already reacted.

The elves Zhou Tian had seen were few, and the only ones he had truly interacted with were that single squad of elves who had fought alongside him for a time in the Beastman Empire. Given the outcome negotiated with the beastmen back then, among those elves, the only one who still had the face to see him now was presumably her.

"The Seventh Princess!" Recalling the girl's performance back then, Zhou Tian felt a warmth stir within him, and his attitude toward the elf before him immediately improved significantly.

Seeing that Zhou Tian had finally remembered who she was, the Elven Seventh Princess broke into a wide smile. Nodding heavily at Zhou Tian to confirm she was indeed the elf he had named, she seemed to recall the past events. With a look of shame on her face, she glanced at Zhou Tian and apologized, "I'm really sorry about what happened last time. We actually ended up leaving you behind all by yourself, I..."

Prompted by the Elven Seventh Princess, Zhou Tian's previously pleasant mood soured again. Waving his hand to interrupt the rest of her sentence, Zhou Tian changed the subject: "The fault of what happened back then didn't lie with you. Given your status, what the Silver Moon Arrow Saint did wasn't wrong. I can only blame my own strength for being too weak back then. If I had the strength I possess now, that squad of beastmen wouldn't have posed any threat to me at all, and none of the subsequent events would have happened." Even so, a trace of resentment still inevitably leaked into Zhou Tian's tone.

That was entirely normal. After all, Zhou Tian had been treated as an expendable pawn back then. No matter how broad-minded Zhou Tian was or how much he understood the other party's actions, having experienced such an incident, it was impossible for him to harbor zero resentment in his heart.

However, the slight trace of resentment in Zhou Tian's tone was naturally imperceptible to the relatively inexperienced Elven Seventh Princess. Hearing his words, she instantly broke into a smile, grabbed Zhou Tian's arm, and asked eagerly, "What did you experience after we left? I asked around, and that beastman squad didn't capture you. How did you escape? And how did you become a bishop of the Church of Light? I heard humans are exceptionally xenophobic; since you're a magical beast, how did the Church of Light ever accept you?"

"Accept my foot." Hearing the Elven Seventh Princess's words and recalling the unfair treatment he had suffered within the Church of Light, Zhou Tian naturally felt a deep sense of dissatisfaction. Still, such matters weren't suitable to air in front of the Elven Seventh Princess. For one, airing such laundry wasn't pleasant; for another, in front of the Elven Seventh Princess, Zhou Tian still cared about his dignity.

Instead of answering, Zhou Tian began to boast about his experiences in response to the Elven Seventh Princess's inquiries.

Since bragging cost nothing, Zhou Tian certainly didn't mind showing off a bit in front of an old acquaintance like the Elven Seventh Princess.

"Speaking of how things were back then, it really wasn't ordinary dangerous. After you guys left..." At the very beginning of his tale, Zhou Tian only altered a tiny fraction of the details. But as he went on, the things Zhou Tian said became increasingly preposterous.

A tiny merit became an earth-shattering achievement in Zhou Tian's mouth, and what was already a considerable contribution was amplified by him to the point where it sounded as though he had single-handedly saved the entire Church of Light. Although it made the Church of Light sound utterly useless, it successfully portrayed Zhou Tian himself as extraordinarily formidable.

Zhou Tian was naturally a master storyteller; back in the day, he had managed to turn the entire Journey to the West into a personal obsession for the white tigers of the White Tiger tribe. Now that his audience was the Elven Seventh Princess, he could easily bamboozle her just as well. Her eyes shone as she stared at Zhou Tian, looking as though she truly believed he was some incredible, towering figure.

Not until Zhou Tian finished recounting his 'experiences' did the Elven Seventh Princess look at him with deep admiration and say, "Zhou Tian, you're amazing! You actually managed to weave an ordinary experience into such a wonderful story. As expected of a bard capable of writing stories like Journey to the West—you really are extraordinary."

Zhou Tian felt a wave of awkwardness.

"I got played." Only at that moment did Zhou Tian realize that the Elven Seventh Princess was no innocent, worldly-inexperienced little girl; she wasn't foolish in the slightest. She had likely known about seventy or eighty percent of his actual experiences long ago. Listening to him ramble on just now was merely treating his experiences as a story. In short, Zhou Tian had been completely fooled by the Elven Seventh Princess's innocent appearance and played for a fool.

Yet, despite clearly being played by the Elven Seventh Princess, Zhou Tian couldn't even get angry. Who told him to make up those lies in the first place? He couldn't possibly throw a tantrum just because someone called out his tall tales! Doing so would make him look petty.

A few years' time wasn't particularly long for an elf, and Zhou Tian never expected the Elven Seventh Princess's personality to have changed so drastically. Sighing inwardly, Zhou Tian could only shrug helplessly and concede defeat: "Alright, I admit that some parts of what I just said were fabricated, and I apologize for lying to you. But you must have another reason for coming to find me, right? Even though we haven't seen each other in a long time, I shouldn't have enough charm to make you run all the way here just to see me!"

"Oh, right!" Reminded by Zhou Tian, the Elven Seventh Princess finally recalled the purpose of her visit. Giving her tongue a playful poke, she quickly looked at Zhou Tian and said, "I came here this time to give you a warning. The Underground City is making big moves this time. According to intelligence gathered by our Church of Nature, the Underground City has even dispatched a demon god to ambush you. Be careful on your way back. If possible, it's best if you travel with the envoys of the other churches. Otherwise, if you're all by yourself..." Though the Elven Seventh Princess spared Zhou Tian's pride by leaving the rest unsaid, her meaning was unmistakable. In her eyes, Zhou Tian possessed zero capability to withstand a demon god's attack. If he didn't want to die, the best course of action was to seek protection under the envoys of other churches; otherwise, traveling alone with just that tiger, there was no telling where he might meet his end on the journey back.

Zhou Tian desperately wanted to tell the Elven Seventh Princess just how formidable his current strength was. If the Underground City didn't bother him, fine, but if they came after him, he could single-handedly thrash any demon god they dispatched.

However, some things were better kept as inner thoughts; if Zhou Tian actually said such things to the Elven Seventh Princess, it would sound a bit too much like showing off.

Nodding casually as if acknowledging the Elven Seventh Princess's warning, Zhou Tian assured her that he would be extra, extra careful on his way back and would never let the Underground City's demon gods catch him. However, whether the Elven Seventh Princess noticed or not, Zhou Tian's guarantee completely omitted any mention of traveling alongside the envoys of any other church.

Naturally, the Elven Seventh Princess had no inkling of Zhou Tian's inner thoughts. Seeing that Zhou Tian had heeded her warning and assuming he would act accordingly when the time came, she felt relieved and promptly took her leave of Zhou Tian's room. After all, Zhou Tian was a male while she was a female, and given their special statuses, who knew how many eyes were watching them in the dark. She had only come to visit Zhou Tian because she felt compelled to warn him; she genuinely dared not stay too long inside Zhou Tian's room. If outsiders were to see this and spread gossip, it would damage both her reputation and Zhou Tian's.

Zhou Tian had no ulterior motives either. Since the Elven Seventh Princess wished to leave, he saw no reason to force her to stay. The moment she expressed her intent to depart, Zhou Tian agreed without a second word and personally escorted her back.

However, the moment Zhou Tian sent the Elven Seventh Princess off, he completely failed to notice that his actions had caught the attention of quite a few church envoys. As those 'people' shot him meaningful, profound glances before looking away, Zhou Tian suddenly felt a strange chill run through his entire body.

Time flew by quickly. The day after the Elven Seventh Princess's visit, the so-called inter-church summit officially commenced.

To express the importance attached to this meeting, the Saintess of the Church of Nature directly arranged for the envoys of all the churches to hold the meeting at the headquarters of the Church of Nature—right beneath the World Tree, one of the most vital treasures of the elven race.

According to legend, the elven race had been created by the Goddess of Nature through the World Tree, making the tree the most crucial treasure to them. The elves often referred to the World Tree simply as the Mother Tree, demonstrating the immense weight they placed upon it.

As one of the primary intelligent races, how could the attendees be ignorant of the elven race's situation? Precisely because they understood the significance of the World Tree to the elves, even though the meeting was held outdoors, the various church representatives felt thoroughly satisfied with the arrangement made by the elven race.

Knowing that attending this diplomatic mission to the Elf Empire might entail danger, how could the envoys sent by the various churches be weaklings? A gathering of such powerhouses wouldn't care about the environmental setup of a meeting; what they cared about was the elven race's attitude toward them. Knowing that the elves held them in high regard was enough. With such a result, the envoys were exceedingly content.

With smiles on their faces, under the guidance of the elves, they took their respective designated seats, cast casual glances at their surroundings, and calmly awaited the opening of the meeting.

Yet, wherever there were people, there was pugnacity. Although the various churches were nominally allies, internal struggles within this alliance were naturally inevitable. Under normal circumstances, based on their respective reputations and displayed strengths, the various churches maintained a certain balance. While minor conflicts were unavoidable, large-scale confrontations were relatively rare.

This time, however, Zhou Tian was the sole exception. Because his status as a representative was somewhat special, it was predestined that Zhou Tian would inevitably encounter some trouble during this meeting.

As one of the three major churches of the Demon Moon Continent—arguably even the head of the continental churches—the Church of Light naturally drew the envy and dissatisfaction of many. However, due to the Church of Light's soaring reputation of late and the formidable strength they displayed, other churches mostly chose to endure in silence whenever they faced them, no matter how much they disliked the Church of Light.

This summit in the Elf Empire, however, provided them with a glimmer of hope.

Didn't they recognize Zhou Tian?

Of course they did. Zhou Tian's reputation on the Demon Moon Continent was resounding; none of the church envoys failed to recognize him. But Zhou Tian was famous for his alchemy. In terms of martial prowess, while his reputation wasn't small either, true powerhouses among the continent's professionals had never truly placed Zhou Tian in their eyes.

If Zhou Tian had brought out all the divine statues of the Twelve Capital Heavenly Gods Fiend Formation today, the other church envoys probably wouldn't dare to provoke him. But now, Zhou Tian had run over to attend a meeting bringing only a single divine beast, naturally drawing the dissatisfaction of the other churches.

Although people spoke of the "Three Giants" among the churches, nominally, all churches were of equal status. If the Church of Light had brought commensurate strength, the other envoys wouldn't have said a word even if Zhou Tian sat in one of the primary seats.

Yet right now, the Church of Light represented by Zhou Tian consisted solely of one man and one beast. While it did include a divine-realm powerhouse, given the intelligence concerning the Underground City, which church's delegation lacked divine-realm powerhouses? In terms of surface strength, Zhou Tian's delegation ranked dead last among all the churches.

Ranking last in strength yet sitting in a position of high honor—those with good tempers or those wishing to avoid bad blood with Zhou Tian had no objections to the elven race's arrangement. But certain church envoys thought differently. In their view, since Zhou Tian lacked corresponding strength, he had no business occupying that seat. And since Zhou Tian dared to sit in that seat, he naturally ought to display strength that could convince them otherwise.

"The Church of Light, what a grand reputation! A wet-nosed brat and a tiger cub that's barely been weaned want to sit in that seat? Does your Church of Light truly think you've risen above all other churches?" Before Zhou Tian could even warm his seat, a sarcastic, mocking voice rang out right beside him.

Hearing those words, Zhou Tian furrowed his brow.

Regardless of how poor his relationship with the Saint City might be, Zhou Tian was, at this moment, an emissary of the Church of Light. The other party's words not only targeted the Church of Light but simultaneously launched a pointed attack at Zhou Tian himself.

Zhou Tian didn't care much about those words in his heart. Compared to the envoys of the other churches, Zhou Tian's age really only qualified him as a kid; while the speaker's words were rude, they weren't entirely wrong.

However, since the other party had deliberately singled him out with those remarks, Zhou Tian could not afford to remain entirely unresponsive.

Whether Zhou Tian cared about the comment was one thing, but in the face of such provocation, if Zhou Tian showed no reaction at all, he would instantly be looked down upon by the other churches. There was no telling what kind of continuous schemes those church envoys would unleash against him next. If he didn't want to keep retreating until he had nowhere left to run, Zhou Tian had to launch a counterattack right here and now.