“Not entirely? What do you mean? Is Lu Ran not just a probationary member of the Heavenly Alliance, but also a probationary member of other guilds?”
Cong Shuang asked with a frown.
But the moment the words left her mouth, she paused, caught off guard by her own question.
That possibility wasn’t out of the question!
It’s just that she instinctively assumed that few guilds would be willing to share a probationary member with others.
After all, probationary members would still have to formally join a guild once their novice period ended.
Besides.
Lu Ran was already a probationary member of the Heavenly Alliance.
Would he even care about other guilds?
Or rather, how could the Heavenly Alliance possibly allow such a thing to happen!
Although the rules didn’t technically restrict anyone from joining more than one guild.
For almost every guild, however, allowing their members to join other guilds at the same time was absolutely out of the question.
So.
The unwritten rule now was that each person could only join one guild.
This wasn’t a restriction enforced by the system’s rules, but rather a convention that all the major guilds adhered to!
Before her.
The servant pondered for a moment, then said, “That’s right. I haven’t been able to dig up the specifics yet, but here are the findings. You can take a look.”
With that, he handed over a document.
Cong Shuang reached out and took it.
It was only a single page—likely because the investigation had been too short to uncover anything detailed.
So the information on the sheet was quite sparse.
But just one glance was enough to leave Cong Shuang utterly dumbfounded.
The document showed that Lu Ran was currently a probationary member of four guilds!
Those four were: the Heavenly Alliance, the War Banner National Guard, the Red Garment Chamber, and Mirror Flower Water Moon!
All four of Longxia’s major guilds, right there in one list!
This had never happened before among any member of the Heavenly Alliance!
Not even geniuses, not even those with terrifyingly unique class traits, not even those who had already received the Heavenly Alliance’s full support and endorsement—
None of them had ever managed to join multiple guilds simultaneously!
But Lu Ran had pulled it off!
“How is this possible!” Cong Shuang was stunned.
She had only ordered the investigation because she saw Su Ting by Lu Ran’s side and found it a bit odd. And now, the result she got back was indeed bizarre!
If anything, it was almost downright strange!
He was just a Necromancer, for crying out loud!
What gave him the right?
“I don’t know the details either. When I looked into Lu Ran’s background, the information was very limited. You can keep reading further down,” the servant said.
Cong Shuang forced herself to continue reading.
Lu Ran came from the slums of Blackfire City.
He’d worked odd jobs to get by.
After awakening as a Necromancer, his girlfriend broke up with him.
Of course.
As for his romantic relationships—Cong Shuang couldn’t care less about that.
Then, starting from the very next day, Lu Ran dominated the top spot on Blackfire Academy’s freshman level ranking board with an absolute lead in level!
He never fell from that position!
And the level gap between him and the other students only grew wider and wider—no one could ever catch up to him.
“Oh, by the way, a few other things happened in between, but they haven’t been compiled into the report yet,” the servant said, as if suddenly remembering something.
“Go on,” Cong Shuang said, turning her gaze to him.
“During Lu Ran’s leveling process, he had a run-in with a young master named Liang Shaoyu from the Liang family, a prominent household in Blackfire City. Liang Shaoyu targeted Lu Ran several times,” the servant said.
“And then?” Cong Shuang asked.
“After that, the entire Liang family vanished. All of its main members died and disappeared without a trace. The ones who carried out the purge were most likely the Heavenly Alliance,” the servant analyzed.
Cong Shuang stared at him in disbelief.
This Lu Ran… had that much power behind him?
“Also, there’s no trace of Lu Ran’s usual daily movements. The only place we found he visited a few times was Tianyuan Tower—a restaurant where meals are notoriously expensive, which doesn’t match his background from the slums. And Tianyuan Tower is owned by the Red Leaf Merchant Guild, which is backed by the Red Garment Chamber,” the servant continued.
Ye Hongyi!
Cong Shuang’s brow furrowed slightly. Something’s wrong. This Lu Ran is far too unusual!
“Anything else? Keep going,” Cong Shuang urged.
“Nothing else for now. We’ll need more time,” the servant said thoughtfully.
“I’m being impatient. In such a short span of time, this is indeed quite a lot. Keep investigating, and let me know the moment you find anything,” Cong Shuang said with a nod.
This was already impressive enough.
In such a short time, they’d managed to uncover this much about Lu Ran.
While none of it was exactly top secret, it still spoke volumes about the Cong family’s efficiency.
After the servant left.
Cong Shuang remained in the backstage area, no longer even paying attention to the matches happening out on the main floor.
She just stared at the document in her hands, her eyes narrowing slightly.
A sense of crisis!
She felt an overwhelming sense of crisis!
And this crisis was coming from a Necromancer she had never once taken seriously!
“First there’s that mysterious senior Necromancer, and now a rookie Necromancer pops up out of nowhere. What in the world is going on with this class? Isn’t it just a standard, run-of-the-mill profession?” Cong Shuang racked her brain, but couldn’t come up with an answer.
Suddenly.
She recalled what she’d heard during the live commentary of the arena matches.
Almost as soon as the match started, Lu Ran had taken down his opponent.
The time it took was practically a one-shot elimination.
Unfortunately, Cong Shuang had no idea what exactly Lu Ran had done during that fight. If she did, she might have been able to pick up on some clues.
“Probationary member of the four major guilds—comes to the capital, stays at the Heavenly Alliance headquarters, and even the four guild leaders who never showed up at the Hundred Cities League are all here, seemingly just for this Lu Ran…” Cong Shuang murmured under her breath.
That sense of crisis only grew heavier.
After a long while.
Cong Shuang finally shook her head and let out a deep breath.
She muttered to herself, “I’m overthinking this. No matter how special he is, he’s still just a Necromancer. I can’t let him cloud my judgment or my focus. The championship—will be mine!”
Up on the main stage.
The four guild leaders sat there looking absolutely relaxed and content.
Beaming with satisfaction, they watched the other competitors’ matches. To be honest, there wasn’t much to see—their minds were still stuck on that fight where Lu Ran had instantly taken down Wang Yan.
“That match on Arena 37 over there is pretty decent—clean combat skills.”
“Still not as explosive as Lu Ran’s burst power, though.”
“Explosive? Are you kidding? I’d be just as weak if I went up there!”
“Not much to watch, really. It’s way more interesting when Lu Ran’s up there.”
…
Meanwhile.
Backstage.
Lu Ran, on the other hand, was the calmest of them all. He returned to his small room and waited for the matches to finish.
Su Ting stayed by his side, almost as if she’d lost her soul, sneaking glances at him every now and then.
Finally.
She couldn’t hold it in any longer and asked, “Lu Ran, just now… how exactly did you do that?”
Hm?
Lu Ran glanced at Su Ting and chuckled. “Do what? Are you talking about how I took down my opponent in the arena?”
“Yeah,” Su Ting nodded eagerly.
“Nothing special—just Blood Lance,” Lu Ran said matter-of-factly.
Su Ting stared at him, dumbfounded.
No kidding.
She knew it was Blood Lance too.
But your Blood Lance… is a little bit unconventional!
Your opponent was a Mystic Armor Berserker—the natural counter to magic-based classes!
And you’re telling me one Blood Lance and the guy just dropped?
