Seized by the System

Fang Ning had complete confidence in the System’s vision. Ever since they ate the gallbladder of that king cobra, they could even clearly read the lips of someone speaking over 10 thousand meters away.

What boosted Fang Ning’s confidence even more was the detailed reports of the appearances of the Whitestone people that they had obtained.

They were white, extremely so, and square, extremely so as well. Anyone would be able to tell a Whitestone person from afar; among the countless races of the previous realm, not one had the same appearances as the Whitestone people, so mistaking another race for them was impossible.

When Fang Ning had first read the reports of their appearances, the first thing he thought of was the initial protagonist in “Minecraft”, one of the games he used to play, Steve.

The longer his thoughts lingered on it, the more sense it made. They were birthed from actual Stone Demons, which meant they were definitely related to stones. If these stones wanted to take on a humanoid form, the simplest way would be using stone squares.

In its desperation, that Demon of Unrequited Love must not have taken into account aesthetic value and had directly used the simplest way to go about creating the race.

As to why they were white in color, the reports had no information. Maybe the favorite color of his unrequited love interest of ten lifetimes was white…

…

Five days after the Dragon Carp had briefed the both of them on their missions, Fang Ning was busy cultivating when the System reminded him of his missions.

“Rich-man Host, I’ve discovered the Whitestone people, and I don’t think I’m mistaken. Do you want to confirm things?”

Fang Ning immediately stopped his cultivation and engaged the System View. All he could below him was a tropical beach which featured rows of palm trees swaying in the breeze. The beach seemed to stretch on for miles, and an ancient beacon tower could be seen faintly in the distance.

With the unique characteristics of the race, it was no wonder the System said it was not mistaken; it was not possible for there to be another race that shared the characteristics.

He then asked, “What is this place below us? It seems slightly familiar, which is weird, since I’ve never been here before.”

The System answered, “Mr. Rich Boss, of course it would seem familiar to you. We are directly above Qiongzhou Island, Fuluo County… ¹ ”

Fang Ning was speechless at the revelation, “I see, no wonder I felt a sense of familiarity to this place, so many protagonists of time-travel novels have spent time here. How many Whitestone people are below us right now?”

“Exactly 250.”

Fang Ning was shocked. He suddenly felt uneasiness settle in his stomach, before he said, “That is too much of a coincidence, something fishy is definitely going on. Sir System, what do you think?”

The System deadpanned, “Didn’t understand what you said. You could just descend to ask them yourself.”

Fang Ning immediately stopped the System, “Wait a minute, seeing is believing. Silently make a landing and hide somewhere nearby so that you’ll be able to unleash that amazing eavesdropping skill of yours. I want to continue observing this group of Whitestone people.”

The System retorted, “I can eavesdrop for you, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be able to translate…”

Fang Ning was speechless, “Nonsense, I’m not hoping you’ll translate. If you give me something like ‘blah, blah, blah’ again, my brain will explode. I’ll have Anderson record everything, and we can show that carp when we get back, I’m sure he would know.”

Vigilante A slowly descended his flying sword into a coconut grove a few hundred meters away from the group of Whitestone people. He landed atop one of the trees, and by using the thick leaves, he hid himself completely.

Using the System’s powerful hearing and vision, Fang Ning was able to observe the guests from the previous realm carefully.

As he watched them, he realized the reports that Zheng Dao had compiled really were accurate. Just as it was described in the reports, they were square from head to toe and looked extremely similar to the robots in old cartoons. They were the very picture of shoddy work…

Their skin had the texture of stones, add that to the fact that they were all square, it was no wonder they would be mistaken as stone people from afar.

However, Fang Ning had discovered a problem. These Whitestone people did not actually look very squarish after all.

Some of them had slightly softer edges to their limbs, face shapes, and bodies, and looked closer to normal human beings. For example, the tallest Whitestone person amongst them all.

A few moments later, he watched as the Whitestone people gathered into a group before sitting down. They appeared to be in the midst of a discussion, and the language they were using was in fact fluent Chinese…

Something strange was definitely going on.

The System said, “Huh, I can understand them completely. Big Billionaire Host, I’ll definitely translate accurately this time…”

Fang Ning was speechless, “Why would you still need to translate? I understand better than you do.”

The Whitestone people in the distance had loud voices, so their voices traveled far. Fang Ning could hear them very clearly.

“Those Heliotropes that had descended first finally opened the advent channel to us, we might finally be safe. The vitality food and Vitality Pills we have in storage will not last a year.”

“Those b*stards have never shrunk from any crimes and looked at humans as nothing more than food. Yet they’re doing something good this time? Could it be just like what they had said; are they still concerned about the kindness our ancestor showed them that year?”

“It could be true. After all, when our ancestor had wreaked havoc in the previous realm, only the True Dragon could subdue him. The entire Stone Demon clan had used his reputation to rise up from a low-level demon clan into a middle-level demon clan.”

“Yeah, these Heliotropes aren’t all bad, you know. They even told us that Chinese is popular in this realm, so that we would learn it before arriving. How convenient, since using spiritual sense to pass messages does consume magical energy.”

“Unfortunately, this language isn’t easy to pick up. Some of the people in our clan are finding it difficult to learn it, so only the few hundred of us that managed to pick it up first could descend first. However, I wonder why they only allowed 250 of us to descend?”

As their discussion picked up, the tallest and most human-looking Whitestone person, who seemed to be the leader of this group of Whitestone people, stopped their discussion from straying off topic by giving an order.

“Stop discussing unimportant things. Whether or not the Heliotropes were telling the truth, due to the damage to my magical energy, I can’t tell at all, so I suggest none of you believe them first. We should start working; although the vitality in this realm is thinner, it is still way better than the place we came from. The density is increasing too. Quickly get to working planting some vitality crops so that we can properly welcome the rest of our people.”

Everybody settled down immediately. It was obvious this tall Whitestone person was revered as a leader.

He immediately pointed at the fattest and widest Whitestone person and said, “Shi Da, go see if there are any locals nearby, we seem to be on owned land. Ask if they could rent this place to us. If they don’t allow it, we’ll switch places.”

Right after he finished speaking, he shook his head and then said, “Forget it, the people on the outside aren’t as honest as we are, they always lie. If you find any locals, tell me where they are and I’ll go over personally to speak with them.”

The fat Whitestone person lifted his head upon hearing his order. He then scanned the surrounding beach before he located footprints, to which he then proceeded to run off into the directions the footprints led off to.

After watching Shi Da’s disappearing silhouette for a long while, the Whitestone leader then pointed at the thinnest Whitestone person.

“Shi Er, catalog each person’s remaining magical energy and body condition, then differentiate them into ranks. That would make distributing jobs later easier.”

Fang Ning nodded his head as he watched the scene unfold before him. He has not seen everything yet.

From the exchange between them, it was more than enough proof that this group of Whitestone people had to fend for themselves. They had to rent land for farming, which was the most basic way of life for farmers.

He continued his observation as time flowed pass him like a river.

…

About half an hour later, Shi Da returned with two blonde youngsters. They had ripped jeans on and were dressed like delinquents.

Their faces betrayed the fear they were feeling, yet their eyes glinted with a sliver with greed as they secretly sized up these weirdly-shaped Descended Ones.

Shi Da excitedly exclaimed, “Leader, I have found locals, and they’re both earnest Samaritans. They had offered to follow me. They said that this beach and the mountainous area behind it belongs to their family. We only need to pay them $10 million and they’ll let us plant anything we want to without interference.”

Seeing this, the leader patted Shi Da’s shoulder in encouragement before he turned to speak to the thin Whitestone person, “Shi Dao, you did well. Shi Er, do give him five points later.”

He then turned to face the youngsters before he said, “I am Shi Gan, the clan leader of the Whitestone people. How may I address the both of you?”

The delinquents shared glances before glee overtook their features.

The taller delinquent immediately said, ” I’m Chow Yun Fa, he is Lau Tak Hua.² Once you all pay up, then you can plant whatever you want here.”

Hearing this, Shi Gan’s face glazed over with an unreadable expression.

He shook his head before he ordered his people, “Shi San, Shi Si, please escort this pair of locals away, they aren’t the owners of this land.”

The taller delinquent hurriedly tried to salvage the situation. “Why aren’t we? We come here every day. See for yourself, the footsteps all along the beach definitely belong to us.”

Shi Da scratched his head and said apologetically, “I forgot to tell you both that our clan leader is able to sense whether or not a person is lying. The both of you are normal humans, you have no magical energy, so there is no possible way for you to block out our clan leader’s induction. You both are probably lying, so we cannot do business with you.”

The taller delinquent immediately offered an explanation, “Lying is normal. After all, you lot look much too different from us, so we should take our precautions right? There’s no way we’ll immediately be honest, but this land really does belong to us, we can even return to get you proof.”

Shi Gan growled, “You both are lying about the fact that you own this land, and when you said you wanted to return to get proof, you merely wanted to make a counterfeit one. How can we pay you? Leave now, don’t waste our time. Shi Da, go look for other people.”

The taller delinquent was at a loss for words.

The shorter delinquent grumbled, “See, I told you we should have reported to the local Special Affairs Department. We could have received a reward of a few thousand. All because you said this big lump of rocks seemed to be naïve and foolish, and you wanted to earn some money.

“Just our luck, we’ve been exposed by them. I think someone must have come over to tell them while we were running here. Not only did you lose the chicken, you didn’t even manage to get a single feather…”

The taller delinquent stomped the ground in fury, yet he remained silent. He had no choice, there were hundreds of them while he had only his friend, how could he make a fuss?

Hearing this, Fang Ning nodded his head. It made sense of course, otherwise how would a bunch of honest folks survive a realm like the previous one without a unique ability?

Shi Gan’s ability to tell lies from the truth was what helped them survive so long.

Fang Ning then said, “Since that’s the case, I can rest assured since I know they won’t cause any trouble because they were lied to.”

The System replied, “I’ll leave then, I don’t want to waste time watching a bunch of rocks go about their day. They’re yellow with a hint of white, so there’s no point in farming them.”

Fang Ning rolled his eyes, “All you know is farming, what else can you do?”

The System deadpanned, “I also know practicing my martial arts and subduing monsters…”

Fang Ning sighed, “Yes, yes. Sir System is the best, Sir System is the smartest. Let’s go now. I’m slightly dizzy, the sun is blazing and they’re all made of stones, so the gleam is crazy.”

Vigilante A left silently.

The pair of delinquents walked away with their heads bowed. Even if they wanted to use other ways to bluff the Whitestone people, they were afraid of the sheer amount of people the Whitestone people had. They could only leave for now, but it was obvious they would not be giving up so easily.

The leader of the Whitestone people paid the delinquents no heed, yet he lifted his head to look towards the coconut grove where Vigilante A was heading in, his eyebrows furrowed as he did so.

“The True Dragon’s presence had appeared, and it seemed to be watching us too. Was it worried that our ancestor would appear again and wreak havoc upon the land? But there was good reason behind that matter, and there were no casualties. With their haughty tempers, why would they personally come to observe us?”

Shi Gan just could not wrap his head around it, so he let the matter go for the time being. He then started to order his people to practice cultivation to restore their bodies while they all waited for the local Special Affairs Department to make contact.