Chapter 54: The Federation's Kneeling Aristocracy

Faced with Cao Yu’s inquiry, Song Qiao relayed all the intelligence she knew at top speed.

Whether last night or tonight, the monsters appearing in the Talent Residential Area were both of the spiritual type, meaning physical attacks would pass straight through them.

Fortunately, among their three-person team, there were two Immortal-class players. Although E-rank Immortal players lacked the ability to proactively launch soul attacks, once the "Manifestation of the Seven Souls" was permanently anchored to their physical bodies, every move they made carried the passive characteristic of inflicting mental damage.

This characteristic was extremely weak, but after multiplying the number of attacks, the accumulated damage was still enough to kill low-level spiritual monsters.

"Spiritual, huh..."

Cao Yu noted this down, unconcerned about whether acquiring intelligence in advance would affect his run in the副本 (instance dungeon).

The Evolution Game could detect players’ thoughts and behaviors, and the various punishments it doled out were clearly aimed at "conscious and proactive cheating."

This was probably the reason why a small number of players, who accidentally entered instances with a wealth of intelligence, never encountered any accidents.

What kind of intelligence was it just to understand the monsters beforehand?

At most, he could deduce...

*'It seems the entity invading this place is most likely a supernatural-type instance.'*

Cao Yu’s gaze fell upon the long-haired man he had just slapped away.

The long-haired man had already climbed up from the ground, muttering the words "Barbaric Bloodline." His petite body began to swell, and massive muscles bulged, stretching the highly elastic Special Operations Bureau uniform until his height directly broke the two-meter mark.

He glared angrily at Cao Yu: "You..."

"Enough, cut the crap," Cao Yu said with a hint of impatience. "Drop your props and come over to apologize to me, and we'll consider this matter settled."

The long-haired man: "?"

Such a dismissive attitude instantly ignited his fury.

He immediately growled, "You're looking for—"

"You deaf piece of trash!" Cao Yu narrowed his eyes slightly.

*Swoosh—* Following two subtle sounds, the long-haired man’s two ears suddenly snapped off cleanly, dropping to the ground.

Blood stained the side of the long-haired man’s face, and the sudden, searing pain made him howl.

Triggered by the animalistic instincts brought forth by the prop "Barbaric Creature," he suddenly felt a chill run down his spine, and he abruptly realized—the man before him could easily crush him to death... Wait, why does he look a bit familiar!?

Taking advantage of the light spilling from the guard booth, the long-haired man carefully scrutinized Cao Yu’s face... He remembered who this person was!

At noon today, Captain Ding Ge had sent a personal profile complete with a photograph to their small group chat, severely warning all members that a vicious, arrogant, and capricious fiend with extremely brutal methods had arrived in the East District. Under no circumstances should he be offended, or else they would end up with broken hands and feet at their own peril.

The long-haired man was one of the group members.

At that moment, the long-haired man felt as though Cao Yu’s gaze had already landed on his hands and feet... *Thud!* His legs went weak, and he dropped heavily to his knees.

Then, completely devoid of dignity, he begged for mercy:

"Brother Cao, my attitude earlier was a bit arrogant; it was my fault. I’m kneeling for you!"

Cao Yu: "..."

After a few seconds of silence, Cao Yu asked, "You recognize me?"

"I saw your photo earlier," the long-haired man replied truthfully.

"Little Ding moves pretty fast," Cao Yu mused, then asked, "Do you aristocratic scions all undergo training in kowtowing?"

First there was Ding Nuo, and now this long-haired man. Both dropped to their knees so fast, and even their lines were practically identical.

What nobility?

Was this just a full kneeling exhibition?

Federal kneeling aristocracy?

"Brother Cao, you jest," the long-haired man laughed awkwardly.

*So someone has already knelt before me...* he guessed inwardly.

"Will you still engage in workplace harassment in the future?" Cao Yu continued.

"I won't... I wouldn't dare! Never again." The long-haired man deactivated his prop's transformation, but remained kneeling on the ground without getting up. "Brother Cao, do you think... can I get lost now?"

Cao Yu sighed softly in his heart; this East District branch office was truly a cesspool. He hadn't even been on the job for a day, yet he had already encountered workplace bullying and workplace harassment in succession... Oh well, once this current incident was dealt with, he would have to go back and establish some proper rules.

"Get lost," Cao Yu said.

"You got it!"

The long-haired man stood up and made to leave.

"Hold on," Zhou Fan stepped forward at that moment and said, "Clean the floor before you leave. Don't soil Brother Cao's eyes."

He pointed at the two ears lying on the ground and said:

"Pick up your ears! Pick your ears up!"

"Yes..."

...

After the long-haired man left, Song Qiao sent a file to the phones of both Cao Yu and Zhou Fan, completing the handover.

After taking some time to read through it, Cao Yu nodded at Song Qiao and the muscular man, saying, "You two can leave."

"......Understood."

The muscular man replied very cautiously, completely devoid of the confrontational, hair-trigger excitement he had shown earlier.

Built like a brick wall as he was, he was actually quite delicate in his thoughts... To put it simply, he was somewhat afraid of Cao Yu.

Song Qiao, however, did not leave immediately. She spoke up to remind him:

"That long-haired guy from just now is called Zhou Yi, and he belongs to the local Zhou family of Meishan..."

"I'm not interested in such matters," Cao Yu interrupted Song Qiao in a nonchalant tone, then glanced at Zhou Fan and said, "Let's go."

With that, the two of them walked deeper into the Talent Residential Area.

Song Qiao watched their retreating figures for a few seconds before suddenly turning her head to the muscular man and saying, "Let's follow them."

"Huh?" The muscular man was stunned. "Sis, our mission is over..."

"Stop talking nonsense!" Song Qiao gave him a kick and said, "Keep up."

The muscular man had no choice but to obey.

The brother and sister quickly caught up to Cao Yu and Zhou Fan.

Noticing the commotion behind them, Zhou Fan turned back to look and asked with genuine surprise, "What are you two doing?"

"This invading instance is likely a supernatural-type instance,"

Song Qiao said rapidly:

"My brother and I are both Immortal-class players. My evolution level has reached 11%, and my brother's is at 10%. The Seven Souls have all manifested, granting us a certain degree of spiritual-damage capability. The four of us teaming up to resolve this incident will make it much less dangerous."

Hearing this, Zhou Fan was somewhat undecided.

He turned his head to look at Cao Yu and asked, "Brother Cao, what do you think?"

"I appreciate people with courage." Cao Yu came to a halt, looked at the Song siblings, and smiled with a chuckle. "After my official onboarding, I’ll be taking up the post of team leader. You two can temporarily join my squad; it saves me the trouble of picking people myself."

"Join the team... Are you also an operations officer of the East District?" Song Qiao asked. "I've never seen you before... Are you newly hired?"

Newly hired, about to take up the post of team leader, outrageously capable, and aristocratic scions kneeling at the sight of him... She instantly realized that the person before her was a member of the Zhao siblings' faction.

Judging by his performance, he was likely not an ordinary member, but a key focus of cultivation... Her guess was right!

Having survived and struggled in the workplace for half a year, Song Qiao had long since recognized the importance of having a powerful backer, as well as the importance of having a reliable supervisor.

This was also the reason why she had followed them.

She wanted to pledge her loyalty to a powerful figure!

"Mm, just started today," Cao Yu said.

"My name is Song Qiao," Song Qiao stated her name, then pointed at the muscular man beside her. "He's my younger brother, Song He. Both of us are graduates of the Fourth Academy and joined about half a year ago."

"Graduates from half a year ago? An 11% evolution level?" Cao Yu said with mild surprise.

Song Qiao: "..."

Was she... being underestimated?

Under normal circumstances, an ordinary Immortal-class player without any family backing would basically need to clear around 10 instances just to scrape together enough points to raise their evolution level from zero to the E-rank limit.

Unless they dared to risk their lives and gamble for high instance ratings.

She had managed to reach 11% in just half a year across only 6 instances... Wasn't that proof of outstanding capability?

Sensing Song Qiao's subtle reaction, Cao Yu smoothly changed the subject:

"An evolution level of 11% is already enough to match D-rank instances and progress further. Why didn't you choose to advance to a D-rank player? What's the point of staying at E-rank just to take shit from people?"

"I'm waiting for my brother to reach 11% as well. Besides..."

Song Qiao hesitated for a moment before continuing:

"Once you reach D-rank, you can only enter D-rank instances, and both the difficulty and danger level will increase significantly.

Actually... quite a few E-rank players within the Federation who reach 11% evolution choose not to rashly advance to D-rank. 11% sits right at the starting line of the D-rank evolution bracket, and lingering here to run E-rank instances is much less dangerous. As long as you don't take reckless risks, you can basically handle everything.

The only downside is that your instance ratings will be capped, and you won't be able to get high ratings anymore. But... for players who choose not to advance, that doesn't really count as a downside anyway."

After all, having already chosen to slack off, they had naturally long since abandoned any pursuit of high ratings.

"I see. I had no idea there were so many hidden tricks to this,"

Cao Yu said with some emotion.

From Song Qiao's words, he caught a glimpse of the survival philosophy of ordinary players.

His own goal was to climb step by step to the very top, so lingering at a capped evolution level was a domain he had never encountered before.