Speedrunning

"Are you really sure that you don't want us to come with you?"

Holding his hand with a deeply worried look on her adorably gorgeous face, Xie Mei pleaded with him once more. Yet, even though this was the second time, the answer still stayed the same.

"I am. Vigi will be enough to support me. As for the two of you, just cultivate well, alright? Ying'er also needs someone to protect her in case something happens."

Noticing his gaze, Li Shuying hastily nodded, blinking at Xie Mei with the best pleading puppy-dog eyes which she could muster. At the side, despite how concerned she was as well, Han Junqiao couldn't help but giggle to herself when she saw this play out.

"... fine! But promise me you'll stay safe!"

Caught between a rock and a hard place, Xie Mei eventually relented, pouting unhappily and staring intently deep into Theodore's eyes.

"Alright, I promise. I'll see you two later!"

Giving both Xie Mei and Han Junqiao an affectionate, temporary farewell, he double-checked what he would be bringing with him one more time, then he nodded at Vigdis and teleported them away. Immediately after, they arrived at the vicinity of Lushui City, the capital of the homonymous prefecture.

As they had already discussed what to do prior to this, there was no need for words before they sprang into action. Vigdis had primarily come with him to handle all Storage Ring-related matters, but she would also be involved in speeding up the creation of the Arrays which he would make use of.

Teleporting multiple times to different spots in the city, always utilizing their perception to figure out the ideal places that would keep them from being discovered, Theodore analysed the city as thoroughly as possible with the greatest speed which he could muster.

Not hesitating in the slightest, he had Vigdis hand him a couple of Array materials and got to work, transporting the two of them to the exact spots where they needed to lay them out. Contrary to their operation in Jingshan City, that had been very thoroughly planned and carefully done, this time, they didn't have to uphold any kind of public identity. As long as they kept out of sight and were quick about it all, it would go smoothly.

Within less than an hour, multiple city-spanning Arrays had already been set up. This time, he had also made a few improvements in regards to the Illusion Array. It would allow him to instantly recognize who to eliminate, based upon the reactions which the ones under its influence would outwardly display. He had also modified it so that the slaves exposed to it would be confronted with the choice between freedom and death within the illusion. That way, he wouldn't need to separately ask them once they woke up.

He still mourned all those Attribute Points and Talents which he had missed out on last time, because he had approached it too casually. Had he done this from the start, then he wouldn't have to think back upon yesterday's incident with slight regret.

Activating the Arrays without hesitation, the entirety of Lushui City rapidly fell under his control. This time, there were only a handful of presences which could resist for a moment, and they were significantly weaker than those of the Mo branch had been. It looked like on this occasion, there wouldn't be any particular surprises–and that was exactly why this city had been chosen!

The 'cleansing' here would serve as a proof of concept, upon which he would further improve in the days to come. His goal was to routinize and streamline the process as much as possible, to the point that any potential dangers would be more easily spotted and all cities without them could be 'freed' of the Hans and their lackeys at record speed.

Not one to shy away from bloodshed, Theodore commenced the slaughter as soon as he was certain that everyone had been restrained by his Arrays. Using his superhuman perception, he teleported right next to every single one of his prey, cutting down on the travel time between his targets.

In this manner, it only took him another hour to eliminate all those who needed to be got rid of. During this time, Vigdis had taken it upon herself to proactively collect any and all materials and items which they might need. Sometimes, Theodore threw some to her that she hadn't recognized, but she refrained from asking any questions for now and stashed them away obediently.

Lushui City's Soul Sculpting Stage elders didn't pose any danger whatsoever, especially because she herself had also reached this stage. In case another one of them managed to awaken and activate a distress signal–which should be impossible now that Theodore had improved his Arrays–she would intervene and snuff out the soul in question. This was another one of the reasons as to why she had to come along, to serve as additional insurance.

Once all of the targets had been eradicated, it was finally time for that which Vigdis was looking forward to the most: The collection of the Energy Veins! Yesterday, she didn't have a chance to witness how her Leader would do this, so she was a bit excited now that she would have the opportunity to behold it at last.

Instead of digging his way towards the Energy Veins, this time, Theodore teleported the two of them further underground, right above them. He disregarded the ground all around which was threatening to crush and suffocate them, as it could pose no danger to them whatsoever. With their pure physical prowess alone, they created a large cavern for them to make use of.

Pulling out a few Array components, he made a new control nucleus for the city-wide Arrays above and refashioned them to serve his purpose. All the while, despite his rapid movements, he patiently explained the process to Vigdis, who paid full attention to his each and every word.

"This Compound Array consists of a modified Energy Gathering Array, a Compression Array, a Sealing Array, a modified Barrier-breaking Array, as well as of auxiliary Alarm, Illusion and Isolation Arrays. I'll admit, it does appear quite complicated when you look at it as a whole, but if you approach it step by step, you should be able to learn how to set it up yourself relatively quickly."

As the Energy Veins which had been supporting this city until today came to rest in his hand, resembling a few dozen strands of hair, he gave Vigdis an encouraging smile. In response, the young woman could only inwardly roll her eyes at him.

'You make it look so easy! Even combining two Arrays is already a challenging endeavour. But to you, doing the same with seven of them is nothing major.'

"It'll take me some time, but I'm confident in eventually being able to replicate this feat. Still, don't expect it to happen in the near future."

Giving him the response that he had been hoping for, she recalled every single one of his actions and the specific ways in which he had laid out all of today's Arrays. She could vaguely see how they interacted with each other, but wrapping her mind around it all gave her a bit of a headache. It felt humbling to recognize that she couldn't even remotely detect all of his advance preparations for the Compound Array despite having followed next to him all this while.

"Good. Even after I've collected enough Energy Veins for my own needs, we'll still have to gather countless more of them in the future, so it will be fantastic to have another pair of hands around which can help out with this task and lighten my burden."

Giving her an appreciative smile, he pondered over his actions this time and found a few places where he could still optimize his approach a little. With those in mind, he nodded at Vigdis and brought them to another settlement, Shuihu City. This one was just as affluent as the previous prefectural capitals which they had 'cleansed', but it was merely a regular city under the control of a provincial capital.

Repeating what he had done before, he shaved off a minute or two from the overall time and fine-tuned his Arrays even further, this time finishing the entire process, including the Energy Vein harvesting, in just under two hours!

Upon further reflection, he then moved on towards the third city of the day, once more drowning himself in a flood of Heavenly Dao notifications. After this last one, however, he and Vigdis returned to their new base in the subterranean city. He still needed to tally his gains and convert them into new power, as well as cultivate, so he couldn't spend all day on eradicating the Hans and their minions!

It took almost an hour to sift through the more than one and a half million pop-ups, and by the time when he was done, he was left with a handful of previously not yet obtained, unremarkable Talents, as well as 66,221,981 Attribute Points. Adding them all to his Endurance once again, it rose from 24,458,329 to 90,690,310!

Because it 'only' a bit more than tripled, the sensation which overcame him this time wasn't all that special, somewhat reminiscent of a regular breakthrough. Still, he couldn't help but show a satisfied smile. He would only become increasingly faster in the future, so while 400 billion seemed very far away, he was getting closer to it one step at a time.

'I should keep an eye out for materials that I could fashion an Array Disk out of. If I create one as well as a few more components, I could set up all of the Arrays I need in a tiny fraction of the time, almost irrespective of the local conditions. But alas, I just haven't found any yet...'

It was likely that only provincial capitals would have a tiny chance of having the items which he needed. But at least for now, going there would be a bad idea. Peak Soul Sculpting Stage experts could be found aplenty, even a handful or two Initial Ascension Stage elders might be around. Unless Vigdis reached this level as well, it would be foolish of him to go there, as he simply couldn't get rid of the souls of these people. Only yesterday had he learned about the distress signals which some of them could send in this state, so he wouldn't risk such an occurrence a second time.

'Of course, once Vigdis has become strong enough to get rid of that peak Initial Ascension Stage enemy, this will change. Provincial capitals will then be ripe for the picking!'

Slightly smirking to himself, he ate lunch with the rest of the group, then he began the day's cultivation session. Another ten hours flew by ever so quickly, his full focus on improving himself all this while.

'The 39,208th realm is where I'll stop for today. Overall, I'm not doing too badly. My pure Standard Attributes are about as high as that of a regular person who has just broken through to the Soul Sculpting Stage.'

Naturally, when compared to a Named Family member, he barely surpassed those at the Core Formation Stage's Unification Realm. In other words, everyone else had left him behind in terms of Standard Attributes. Thankfully, he still had plenty of Talents to work with, amongst which Intraworld Teleportation especially stood out. Coupled with his extremely potent Endurance, that could now allow him to resist even some weaker Initial Ascension Stage experts' blows, his transformation into the new God Emperor of Cockroaches was coming along nicely.

A delicious dinner later, he once more updated the Qinglong State map which he had created, then he picked out another three cities from amongst the thousands of potential targets.

Tonight's activities of carnal nature didn't last for too long, because they would all have to wake up early. This didn't diminish the enthusiasm of Xie Mei and Han Junqiao, though. The less time they had together, the more they needed to cherish it!