Chapter 090: The Sixth-Order Light Sword Fish Was Exposed

"How strange. Gaining a little flesh is nothing unusual, but why have you grown taller too?" Qing Jin said in astonishment.

Qing Hu immediately beamed with pride. "Big Brother really does have sharp eyes."

"You've not only grown taller, you've broken through in cultivation as well?" Ning Qi, who was snacking on roasted peanuts nearby, chimed in.

"Of course. I'm at the fifth level of Energy Refinement now." Qing Hu put her hands on her hips and laughed triumphantly at the sky.

"What's so great about the fifth level? Look at your Fourth Brother. He's already reached the seventh." Qing Zhen sauntered in with a rolling duck-like gait. Qing Quan and Jiu Quan followed behind him, both looking lively and spirited.

"The Fourth Young Master finished all ten jin of spirit liquid last night as soon as he got back," Jiu Quan reported directly to his master. "The effects were obvious. The Fourth Young Master had already accumulated enough, and he broke through to the seventh level of Energy Refinement in one go."

At hearing this, Qing Zhen lifted his chin with self-satisfied delight. Hmm, just as expected.

"Fourth Brother, you drank it all up? I still have a little left." Qing Hu said with haughty pride.

Qing Zhen sat down right next to Qing Jin, then flopped sideways against his own big brother with a hooligan's air. "Yes, yes, you're the best, all right? But have you thought about it? You're going from the fourth level to the fifth, while I'm going from the sixth to the seventh. How could that be the same?"

From the fourth level onward in the Energy Refinement realm, each breakthrough became harder than the last. Did she think he didn't know that?

"I knew it. You just can't stand the idea of me being better than you. Shen Qing Zhen, get up. I'm going to duel you." Qing Hu said angrily as she reached for her Fourth Brother.

"Not getting up, not getting up. I refuse to duel you. Last time we fought, I clearly won by half a move, and in the end I still had to treat you to a feast. That wiped out two months' worth of the pocket money I'd been secretly saving." Qing Zhen sprawled there as if to say, Brother won't stoop to your level. Go ahead and pull; no matter how hard you tug, I still won't get up.

Furious, Qing Hu resolved to use her claws. If she couldn't pull him, she could scratch him.

Qing Zhen saw the situation turn bad and hurriedly sprang to his feet, dodging and fleeing.

"Ow, help! Qing Xiao Hu, when was the last time you clipped your nails? Ow, ow, your little hand is sharper than a cat's paw now? Ow, ow, ow..."

Seeing the siblings at each other's throats again, Qing Jin simply took his book and sidestepped to the cabin's large window. Before long, Ning Qi came over too, carrying a plate of peanuts.

"Do those two always roughhouse like this?" Ning Qi asked, munching on peanuts with a resigned expression.

"Since they were little," Qing Jin said weakly.

One has a sharp tongue, and the other goes physical at the slightest provocation. What was he supposed to do?

"Being the big brother is hard on you," Ning Qi said with great sympathy.

"It's fine. At home, my mother is there. As long as she grabs a broom handle and starts laying into them, those two immediately stop fighting and look out for themselves. They run faster than rabbits." Qing Jin said enviously.

"Then why don't you go break them up? Should I find you a broom handle too?" Ning Qi asked with great interest.

"No way. How could my flawless image be ruined by a broom handle?" Qing Jin said with an air of righteous dignity.

Ning Qi: "..."

A fraud.

"I've always thought of myself as a very down-to-earth hero. How did I end up friends with someone as pretentious as you?" Ning Qi complained in bewilderment.

"If it weren't for me, do you think you'd have gotten onto the Chu family merchant ship?" Qing Jin said coolly.

Ning Qi: "..."

A pretty face did still have some value after all.

"By the way, this Chu family merchant ship sits pretty deep in the water. They must have loaded it with a lot of cargo." Ning Qi gave Qing Jin a sidelong look.

"Don't be nosy. We just need to get safely to Destined City." Qing Jin lowered his eyes again, preparing to wage a life-and-death struggle with the scroll. But Ning Qi had no intention of letting him read in peace.

"Huh? Why do I keep seeing a kind of fish that keeps leaping out of the water in groups of three or five, as if it wants to look at me?"

At that, Qing Jin finally tore his attention away from the scroll and carefully looked out through the wooden window.

Indeed, there was a fish he found somewhat familiar. Its small body was silver-white, spindle-shaped, and streamlined. In twos and threes, it would gather together for no reason, then suddenly spring high out of the water, flying so high it almost came level with the window. Then its fish eyes would roll as it swept its gaze around.

"I think you're overthinking it. Those are Qing Hu's eighth-grade White Sword Fish. They're looking for their master, not staring at you."

"This is Qing Hu's eighth-grade White Sword Fish?" It was the first time Ning Qi had seen the full bodies of the little fish Qing Hu raised with his own eyes. Before, he'd only heard about them, or caught a glimpse of their backs beneath the water, or seen a few fish heads breaking the surface with their mouths wide open.

But after observing them a few more times, his expression stiffened as he looked at Qing Jin. "Just how many of those fish outside has Qing Xiao Hu raised?"

"Probably just over ten thousand." Qing Jin thought back and answered. That was the number Qing Hu had told him the last time he asked.

Ning Qi suddenly lunged at Qing Jin, grabbed his lapels, and began shaking him desperately. "Is your family insane? Aren't you afraid of getting eaten? You actually dare raise sixth-grade Light Sword Fish!

"Sixth grade, do you understand? Sixth grade! Every single one of them could grow into a great terror of the Eastern Wastelands, or even a king of fiends.

"Doesn't your Shen family fear extermination?"

"Wait, what sixth-grade Light Sword Fish? Aren't those eighth-grade White Sword Fish? You didn't recognize them, did you? I've heard they look pretty similar when they're young." Qing Jin asked cautiously.

"Similar my foot. Even if they look similar, could I still not tell the difference between sixth-grade Light Sword Fish and eighth-grade White Sword Fish? White Sword Fish are just white. But Light Sword Fish are different. From a young age, they possess a natural talent that lets them use every kind of light in the water to conceal themselves and move at high speed, as if they know a secret art of light escape.

"Your family actually has just over ten thousand of these fiends. What on earth are you trying to do?"

After hearing Ning Qi's words, Qing Jin immediately shoved him off himself and walked to the wooden window to look carefully at the little fish dancing and swimming around the great ship.

With close observation, Qing Jin instantly discovered something unusual: the fish's speed was far too great.

They darted through the water like streaks of flowing light. In particular, the dense silver-white scales on their bodies kept refracting, reflecting, and absorbing the light without cease. The radiance that enveloped them seemed to blur their true forms entirely.

If they had not deliberately restrained their light and leaped from the water on their own, he was afraid it would have been hard to glimpse their full appearance at all.

The great ship glided silently across the water. In the blink of an eye, beneath the surface there seemed to be several monstrous forms, tightly encircled by dense schools of glittering fish. They trembled from time to time, yet not even their death cries could break through the water's surface.

If they really were eighth-grade White Sword Fish, they indeed would not possess such a fearsome ability to remain unmoved and reveal nothing.

But sixth grade... sixth-grade Light Sword Fish...

Qing Jin's mind went humming blank, swelling completely out of shape.