Beastmaster of the Ages

Sun Xiaoyue had been in a laughing mood moments before, but now he held his head low and clenched his fists tight. He whispered to Jiang Xiu’er, ”That bastard is amazing at running away. He even shamelessly targeted you as the weakest link of our chain. I’m worried that he’ll kill you for real. But don’t worry, we’ll have a chance, okay?”

”I can’t wait!” she angrily snapped.

”Listen to me. Safety comes first. We will talk about the rest later,” Cang Jue said.

”Fine, Brother Cang Jue!” Only then did she begrudgingly stop.

Sun Xiaoyue felt embarrassed that his girlfriend would listen to another man instead of him, when they were saying the same thing. He wasn’t inferior to Cang Jue in the least, just slightly younger.

Tianming, seeing them calm down and shut up, couldn’t be bothered to waste any more time with them. ”I guess giving you guys a beating was enough to teach you to behave after all.” He smirked and turned to look at the Darkfiend Den before charging straight into it without the others. He was far more interested in the darkfiends than his party members.

The other four watched as he left from under their noses like that, completely unabated. All they could do was seethe and swallow their rage. Jiang Xiu’er was in so much pain that tears flowed from her eyes nonstop. She kept bringing up a breakup, causing Sun Xiaoyue much frustration.

”Li Tianming, I still say the same thing! If I don’t kill you, I’m not a human!” What Sun Xiaoyue didn’t understand was the fact that Tianming had spared the life of his girlfriend.

.......

Tianming noticed somebody following him soon after he left. Turning back, he saw Jian Qinghe, who seemed to have barely any presence. During the conflict earlier, she had stood to the side, facing Bluemaple without paying attention to the fight at all. She was quiet to the point that one doubted she really existed.

”Why’re you following me?” Tianming asked.

”The mission is supposed to be carried out in a party. We have to move in groups of two or more. If you’re too far away, the myriadpath ring will warn us,” Jian Qinghe said. Her voice was really soft and pleasant to the ear.

Tianming had met far too many arrogant and delusional people in Myriadpath Valley, but Jian Qinghe gave him a good impression. She didn’t seem like the kind of person who liked to make commotions or fight with others. ”Fine, you better keep up.”

On the mission sheet, Jian Qinghe was said to have eight cosmic charts, but Tianming felt that her aura was a bit odd. After all, she was someone who wore a formation-locked veil over her face. That old man seemed to be imprisoned just like this girl. She did mention the cuffs when she was talking to her chaperone that day, so she definitely knows about the old cleaner. My interest in the cuffs managed to draw their attention.

Myriadpath Valley’s undercurrents are far too deep. I shouldn’t show too much interest in the cuffs or veil or I might lose my life before getting my hands on the Myriadpath Sourcespring. He made a proper effort to not look too closely at the veil.

”Did she come to monitor and learn more about you?” Ying Huo asked.

”That’s what I initially figured. The problem is, she joined the mission before I did. I was the last to sign up. So I think it was a coincidence that we ended up in the same party. She did talk about coming out on a trip to forget her troubles with the other man, too,” Tianming telepathically said. It was because of that that he didn’t hold any hostility toward her. Otherwise, he would be warily keeping his eyes on her the whole time.

The two of them continued advancing. Once they were slightly farther away from the beautiful star, they got a good look at the Darkfiend Den. It was a place that had plagued the star for thousands of years.

Tianming saw a gigantic astral abyss of sorts in the space ahead of him. It was as if the astralscape itself had fractured into billions of spatial tears. A cavern that looked like an insect hive seemed to grow out of those spatial tears, complete with winding paths and structures that didn’t seem to make any logical sense. A thick, bloody smog filled the den, accompanied by low, fearsome growls. Tentacular appendages also seemed to extend from the den. It looked as if the gate to hell had opened up right next to a beautiful gem.

”The Darkfiend Den seems to have formed out of nothing. It looks like it’s stretching out from a completely different world into the astralscape of order. I wonder what kind of world that is....” The closer Tianming approached it, the more sinister things appeared. ”This is primeval source!”

Primeval source was actually pouring out of the Darkfiend Den! That energy was native to the Ancestral World. ”In other words, the Darkfiend Den is rooted in the Ancestral World and stretched into the astralscape of order through spatial tears. Doesn’t that mean I’ll be able to reach the Ancestral World from here?”

Even though the tears had been filled up by the part of the Darkfiend Den that poked out, Tianming figured that he should be able to go through them by entering the den and making an opening from within to reach the Ancestral World.

Though he had many questions, he had nobody around him to ask. Li Fan could have been of help for this matter. But right now he had no better option, so he turned to Jian Qinghe and asked, ”Is the Darkfiend Den stretching out from the Ancestral World?”

She nodded. It was good news; at least she seemed willing to communicate.

”Has anyone ever gone to the Ancestral World proper through the Darkfiend Den?” As far as Tianming was aware, the Ancestral World was the most mysterious among the three worlds, the other two being the normal one they were in and the Xenoworld. The Kunlan Realm and Huang Qi’s beehive were only parts of the ancestral world.

”Yes, but there’s nothing there,” she said.

”What do you mean?”

”The Ancestral World isn’t a contiguous whole, but rather separated into smaller, discrete areas that aren’t interconnected. The part of the Ancestral World you can access through the Darkfiend Den is limited. Apart from primeval source, there isn’t much else there,” she explained.

It clicked in Tianming’s head. The astralscape of order was completely contiguous, whereas distance was a concept that didn’t make sense within the Xenoworld. The Ancestral World, on the other hand, seemed like it was made of distinct places that were completely separated from each other, such as the Kunlan Realm, the beehive, and the Darkfiend Den. Only primeval source was able to permeate the entirety of the Ancestral World.

”Is there really nothing else?” Tianming asked.

”A few generations of valley lords have entered to take a look. There really isn’t anything there,” Jian Qinghe said.

”Wow, valley lords have come... so why didn’t they completely wipe out the darkfiends to give Bluemaple true peace?”

Jian Qinghe looked down without saying a word.