Fang Yi felt exactly the same way. His new obsidian spear would be as powerful an augmentation as Sun Mengmeng's sunbird bow.

Instead of flattering Zhang Lie as he was wont to do, however, Fang Yi simply looked Zhang Lie deeply in the eyes. Sometimes, that was all the communication that was needed.

After handing Fang Yi and Sun Mengmeng each a superior-grade soulshard, Zhang Lie kept the remaining three. He was intending on keeping the soulshard with the potent regenerative ability for himself and handing the other two soulshards out, but now wasn't the right time: the other hunters would first need to develop skills of their own, and handing them such a strong weapon now would affect their growth negatively.

He wasn't even sure he had made the right decision with regard to Fang Yi and Sun Mengmeng.

He couldn't help reminding them, "You should all know where I got these soulshards from, and you'd better be wary of activating in public. You understand what I mean, don't you?"

Fang Yi and Sun Mengmeng nodded earnestly.

They were well aware of the trouble that could result if anyone saw them using those soulshards, and they immediately affirmed that they would avoid using them in sight of other hunters if at all possible.

Zhang Lie relaxed, then turned to the other hunters.

"Don't get too jealous. As long as you all follow me loyally, I won't be stingy with you. I promise that, before you all take part in the Void Cup, you'll each have at least one superior-grade soulshard of your own."

The other hunters whooped and proclaimed their loyalty, pledging that they would follow him come hell or high water.

In truth, who wouldn't want a captain like Zhang Lie? He was strong, practical, intelligent, resourceful, and, most importantly, generous.

After handing out the soulshards, Zhang Lie once again sent them on their way, indicating that they should start surveying the superior-grade lifeforms from the booklet he had given them. 

As for himself, he was preparing to cook the prey he had hunted that day: the superior-grade blood ant.

Since he was going to consume it, he would have to remove its exoskeleton, which would serve as excellent raw material for forging. 

Zhang Lie was very careful to preserve as much of the chitin as he could. He was planning to use the superior-grade blood ant's chitin, along with the venombane scorpion's carapace, to construct superior-grade armor for himself.

In that case, he would possess both a superior-grade weapon and superior-grade armor.

After deftly removing large pieces of chitin and storing them in his pouch, Zhang Lie finally began to prepare the ant flesh.

The superior-grade blood ant's flesh was white, and looked no different from crab meat. It wasn't as fresh as seafood, but its superior-grade nature gave it a surprisingly delectable texture, much like that of marbled beef.

There were many ways of preparing ant meat, steaming and frying being the most common among them. Zhang Lie chose the technique he was most familiar with: frying.

He dipped strips of marinated ant meat in a boiling-hot pot of oil, turning the white meat an appealing golden-orange. A mouthwatering scent filled the entire room.

Zhang Lie let the strips cool down for a moment, and then ate them piping-hot. As he consumed the veritable mountain of meat, the will of the world announced in his mind:

[For consuming the flesh of a superior-grade blood ant, you received one superior gene fragment. Current total: 26]

[For consuming the flesh of a superior-grade blood ant, you received one superior gene fragment. Current total: 27]

[...one superior gene fragment. Current total: 33]

He spent two whole days solely eating and cultivating, and finally finished the last piece of meat on the afternoon of the second day. All in all, he had gained eight superior gene fragments, and was now at a grand total of 33.

This alone would put him within the top twenty hunters of the Blacksteel settlement.

It was relatively easy to hunt regular- and mutated-grade lifeforms, but far more difficult to hunt superior-grade ones. Not only were they difficult to track down, they were also difficult to kill. A regular team of hunters, all of whom had maxed out their mutated gene capacity, would need ten or more members in order to kill even the weakest superior-grade lifeform.

The additional superior gene fragments that Zhang Lie gained strengthened his body and constitution. Over the last two days, as he digested the nutrients from the superior-grade meat, his [Ninecarp Transformation] reached the peak of the first form, and he felt as though he would be able to advance to the second form after consuming the flesh of one or two more superior-grade creatures.

Zhang Lie was a little curious as to just how strong his evolving framework would become then. His current stats were already extremely impressive, so what would further evolution bring?

Zhang Lie: a mortal lifeform

Framework: Foundation, Lv. MAX, Ninecarp Transformation, First Form: Carp

Techniques: Rippling Walk (advanced), Three-Wave Crescendo (advanced), Calm Waters (advanced), Fists of the Silent Sea (novice), The Boundless Blade (novice)

Genes: Basic, 160; Mutated, 100; Superior, 33

Soulshards: White Grub (superior), Galewolf (mutated), Blood Ant (superior), Potbellied Toad (mutated), Venombane Scorpion (superior), Eternalspring Cocoon (superior)

He had reached and long since exceeded the regular gene capacity, reached the mutated gene capacity, obtained 33 superior gene fragments, and had broken through with his foundational framework.

His three high-grade techniques, [Rippling Walk], [Three-Wave Crescendo], and [Calm Waters] had all reached advanced-level, and the pinnacle-grade [Fists of the Silent Sea] and the mythic-grade [The Boundless Blade] were all at novice-level.

As for his soulshards, he had the utilitarian transformation-type white-grub soulshard, the armament-type venombane-scorpion soulshard, which endowed him with powerful stealth and poison capabilities, the augmentation-type blood-ant soulshard, which granted him an extremely powerful boost, and the particularly rare augmentation-type eternalspring-cocoon soulshard, which boasted supreme regenerative abilities.

And all four were superior-grade soulshards.

Zhang Lie was certainly as strong as the top ten hunters on the gene leaderboard at present, and once he concocted Potion #2 and broke through the mutated gene capacity, he would easily be able to take on the top ten hunters on the gene leaderboard even if they came at him together.

He would soon be past the most difficult stage of his reincarnation, in which he was still weak and had to use all sorts of tricks to shore up his strength, and would quickly advance to the second stage of his plan: leading mankind to salvation.

Speaking of Potion #2, it had been over a week since he had requested that the auction house acquire the ingredients he needed, so he opened the trading post interface to contact his representative there.