Lantern Sister is still very capable.

Chapter 68 Channels

With his identity pretty much guessed, Chu Deng decided not to play the sheep any longer. He took the wooden tag his father had given him, added a communication number, and contacted the clock.

Shi Zhong asked Chu Deng why he had come. He wanted to know if Chi Yu would sell the gold-type crystal core. He had sold the wood-type crystal core to his father, who was a poor bachelor. His father had tried to evade the question and hadn't given him a high price. Since they were old acquaintances, Shi Qingyu was giving him face and wanted to add some of his own savings to exchange for the gold-type crystal core so that he could find someone to trade it for a space-type one.

Level 4 crystal cores have always been rare and expensive. Even if someone gets one, they won't easily sell it for money. If the attributes match, they'll use it themselves; if the attributes don't match, they'll barter with other items.

Chu Deng was certainly not stupid. Jin Xiaoyue had not yet awakened. If she happened to be of the metal element, this crystal core could be left for his friend to use.

But Shi Zhong, being a seasoned veteran, wouldn't act without seeing the benefits. Chu Deng was poor and a student about to take the college entrance exam, with neither money nor power, only his level four fire-type ability to trade.

[I'll be offering an invitation to the AA Forum this time, valid only in Shanghai and for three months.]

Seeing the text transmitted through the personal terminal, Shi Qingyu became excited. Although the conditions were harsh, he had made a profit by exchanging a level 4 fire elemental for an invitation.

[Transaction completed.] After sending the message, Shi Qingyu immediately forwarded a link to Chu Deng, fearing that Chi Yu might change his mind. Based on Chi Yu's performance in the rescue near the port, he believed that Chi Yu's character was not bad.

If Chiyu really didn't want to expose himself, he could have simply stopped shielding Qingtian and the others from the oppressive aura, and he wouldn't have needed to set fire to protect the residential building.

Afterwards, Shi Qingyu, who had been questioning Qingtian carefully, also scanned Chiyu's route through the surveillance footage. Unfortunately, only Chiyu's shadow was captured, with no real person in the frame, making it difficult to analyze Chiyu's identity. However, Chiyu is definitely a genius and is no more than thirty years old.

Of course, if Shi Qingyu were to guess, Chi Yu must be an adult, probably around twenty-four or twenty-five. Thinking of his father still giving people milk, Shi Qingyu wanted to laugh. Anyway, he absolutely did not believe that Chi Yu was already at level four before he was twenty. Seeing Chi Yu effortlessly defeat that level four metal-type foreigner, he was definitely a seasoned expert who had seen a lot of blood. How could he still be in school?

After all, even He Feiquan, who became a Level 5 cultivator before the age of 30, only reached Level 4 at the age of 22 with the support of the state. Later, he abandoned everything to focus on cultivation, which led to his current achievements.

Wild superhumans mostly live in corners unseen by the authorities, missing out on many resources and facing numerous difficulties in upgrading, always lagging behind others.

That's why the Old Man's Teahouse has attracted so many people. With the help of their organization, the strength of unofficial, unregistered superhumans has been slowly increasing in recent years.

There's no other way. Exotic plants and beasts are all developing, and if humans just sit idly by and wait to die, they might fall from the top of the food chain in the future.

After receiving the invitation, Chu Deng quickly created an account for herself. After filling in some information, she was able to enter the forum to view the information she wanted to know after the review and verification were approved.

Chu Deng read through the first hundred articles in the "Interesting Facts" section. Then she opened the "Celebrities" section of the forum, wanting to learn about the strongest superhumans of the present era, so she could deal with them if she encountered one in the future. After all, the crystal cores of high-level superhumans were easier to obtain than exotic plants and beasts, and if her level four fire-type ability was exposed, she would also be targeted.

Unlocking the information of each superhuman among the celebrities requires spending gold coins.

Chu Deng learned about the gold coin rules. Initially, he only received five points, and he could earn gold coins by posting, replying, gambling, trading, completing tasks, and selling information.

Chu Deng looked at his gold coins and found that he had zero!

But weren't you supposed to start with five gold coins?

Chu Deng checked her gold coin spending and found that browsing 20 interesting stories would automatically deduct one gold coin. She had just viewed 100 stories, which automatically deducted five gold coins.

Chu Deng, who is penniless both in real life and online: ...

"...Huff, huff..." Jin Xiaoyue, who is usually an early riser, could no longer stay awake during the night tour and fell into a sweet sleep leaning on Chu Deng's shoulder.

Seeing that there was still plenty of time, with half an hour left on the hourly machine, Chu Deng decided to start her journey of earning gold coins.

She first posted a few anecdotes, but since she was at school all day, she didn't have any interesting stories to share besides what had happened in the last few days. So she changed the description and described the battle between the Fire Butterfly and the level 5 wind element. She also broke down her experiences at the port into countless anecdotes and posted them. When she posted the tenth one, a message popped up reminding her that she had reached the posting limit for the day.

Chu Deng, who had just earned ten gold coins, fell silent when he saw that even the cheapest profile among the celebrities required 99 gold coins to unlock.

With no other option, Chu Deng changed her approach and started selling information. At present, she could only sell cultivation methods and experience in fighting against various elements. Information needed to be reviewed and priced by the forum administrator. Chu Deng first posted her combat experience, thinking it should be worth at least ten gold coins. While waiting, she browsed the trading and bounty sections. Trading was mainly about buying and selling, while bounty was about setting up rewards and completing tasks.

To unlock the trading section, Chu Deng needs to spend 500 gold coins. Accepting bounty missions does not cost gold coins, but a 20% commission will be deducted after completing the mission.

"Shady businessmen." Chu Deng muttered, his vision blurring as he looked around. This forum, though seemingly glamorous, reeked of unscrupulous merchants.

Even individual merchants in the apocalypse aren't as good at making money as the creator of this forum.

The forum may seem to be free, but it's full of people with special abilities who can't be attracted by money.

Superpowered individuals, attracted by intelligence and resources, can only accept missions on the forum in order to earn the forum's unique gold coins. Since those who post missions have superpowered individuals to choose from, they will naturally spend more money on this forum, and the connections they slowly build up cannot be bought with money.

Gold coins can be exchanged for intelligence, resources, and connections. The person behind this AA forum has managed to gather a large number of superhumans without even showing their face.

However, Chu Deng noticed that there were relatively few Chinese superhumans active on the forum.

She noticed that in those provocative and derogatory posts from people who were clearly from South Korea and Japan, there was a significant difference compared to the Chinese people who could fight back against South Koreans and Japanese online for three days and three nights, resulting in rivers of blood. In fact, very few of them retaliated.

Moreover, many of them seemed somewhat lacking in confidence.

However, there is another point: the attitude of Europe and America towards Chinese people with superpowers is somewhat ambiguous, seemingly positive but not quite positive.

Something's strange, Chu Deng thought to herself.

In fact, it's clear from the fact that the first five anecdotes are all related to China that the Alien Alliance forum pays close attention to the Chinese supernatural community. However, it seems that for some special reason, Chinese supernatural beings are not active in the Alien Alliance, so much information is somewhat vague.

The more ambiguous something is, the more it will provoke debate among people in the forum, which is why this situation exists.

However, this implicit information was not presented in detail, so she didn't waste time looking for it. She figured she would naturally find out as she spent more time on the forum.

Chu Deng has always been very patient.