Beastmaster of the Ages

Hearing this, Mu Qingqing suddenly laughed.

“What are you laughing at?” Tianming asked.

“I’m laughing because next time someone asks me what the world was like before the universe was born, I can finally answer that it was actually just the endpoint of our future. By the same logic, if someone asks me what lies outside the Realms of Order and Chaos, I can also answer. Outside, there may be worlds stacked upward one after another, and in the end, the greatest world is hidden within a flower in the mortal realm. Jump out of that flower, and one has grasped the cycle of rebirth,” Mu Qingqing said.

The fact that she could grasp this proved she was indeed intelligent.

“Well, none of that matters now. Maybe one day, when I jump out of this universe, or go see where these grapes grow, I’ll have the answer,” Tianming said cheerfully.

At the moment, there were two things that puzzled him: one was the Chaos Skyjail, and the other was the gate of blood lightning left by Xiaoxiao at the Archaionfiends’ lair. The two seemed to be hinting at some sort of greater cycle in play.

“The ultimate fate of the universe might be an endless cycle. No one can escape this circle,” Tianming said.

“Are you done sighing?” Ji Ji appeared on his shoulder, glaring at him.

“I’m done! Give it a try,” Tianming said, embarrassed.

Right now, the nova source in Ji Ji’s body was entirely chaos-type. Tianming wanted it to try and see if it could take all these middlekin stars in one go.

Thus, a gigantic pink celestial body emerged from the lifebound space.

“Come!” As soon as Ji Ji shouted, the middlekin stars flew towards it, sticking to its surface and forming layers.

“Mining and transporting middlekin stars is supposed to be a major challenge, yet it can accomplish this so easily.” Mu Qingqing asked in surprise.

“Did that ‘him’ from ten thousand years ago not have this ability?” Tianming asked casually.

“When you were with me, you only hatched up to your sixth lifebound beast. After that, you became strange. You should have had new ones hatch, but you never showed them to us. We could only see traces in the painting,” Mu Qingqing said. And Ji Ji was the seventh Primordial Chaos Beast.

“So something happened when it got to Sixth again?” Tianming muttered helplessly. He had come to the Realm of Chaos in such a rush that he hadn’t handled Sixth’s vita yet.

Very soon, all the middlekin stars in the upper section of the divine channel were taken by Ji Ji. There were hundreds of thousands of them in all sizes, and Ji Ji had turned into a giant black sphere with a pink core.

“I feel fat now!” Ji Ji complained. “Are we done yet?”

Tianming had already gone downward. He could see that further down, space had become twisted and chaotic. It formed spatial channels that could easily drag someone in and fling them to god knows where.

The middlekin stars had been ejected from those twisted space channels.

These channels were terrifying, but their tolerance was limited. If Tianming attacked them, he could tear them apart. But that would cut off the “feeding,” which would obviously be idiotic.

That Chaos Star Ruin in the Dongshen Domain had been wrecked before, and they still didn’t know who did it.

“Anyway, those middlekin stars we would normally need thousands of years to mine and transport were cleaned up in one go,” Mu Qingqing said in shocked delight.

Middlekin stars in the Realm of Order had formations and were fairly stable, making transportation convenient.

But this was the Inverse Battlefield. Physically dragging spherical vortices across it was indeed inconvenient. Many middlekin stars dispersed mid-transport and needed extra care. If not for these transportation difficulties, there would’ve been no need to build war fortresses and slowly mine over time.

“There really is some crimson light!” After taking away those middlekin stars, Tianming went toward a corner. Amidst swirling mist, several crimson-glowing objects really appeared!

There were nine in total, each roughly between the size of the one Li Tianzi had given and the one Tianming had seized.

They were neither large nor small, but there were quite a few of them.

“We struck it rich.” With his face glowing red with excitement, Tianming headed that way.

“Wait!” Mu Qingqing quickly grabbed him and asked, “Didn’t you notice something strange about these dazzling radiances?”

“Strange?” Tianming took a closer look and spotted it. These dazzling radiances were rather pinkish and looked immature. It was clear that the order within them was unstable, making their forms flicker and change at times.

“How could this be?” Tianming asked.

“I heard your elder brother say before, these seem to be dazzling radiances in their maturation stage. You can think of them as unripe fruits. If you absorb them, not only will they fail to promote growth, they’ll destabilize your order and cause harmful consequences,” Mu Qingqing said.

“In short, unripe fruit is poisonous, huh?” Tianming said helplessly.

“Yep! So don’t eat them yet,” Mu Qingqing said.

Tianming looked at those red spheres of order, then at the black middlekin stars, and asked curiously, “These two things—one black, one red, one power, one order—don’t they seem like fruits from the same grapevine? Complementary in nature?”

“They do look a bit like that!” Mu Qingqing nodded. “It’s said the dazzling radiances are all ejected from Chaos Star Ruins, so since ancient times, Chaos denizens have always located Chaos Star Ruins by tracking the appearance of dazzling radiances...”

Before she finished, Mu Qingqing’s expression changed. She said to Tianming, “There’s some trouble. These ‘red grapes’ seem about to ripen. When they ripen, they usually emit strong crimson light that can be seen outside. After glowing for a while, they’ll shoot out like seeds, and you won’t be able to catch them.”

“What do you mean?” Tianming was speechless. Were these supposed to be dandelions now, with seeds that flew off on their own?

“It means that after they ripen, you have to seize them quickly. But that ripening process might draw enemies here...” Mu Qingqing said anxiously.

“Unbelievable. This grapevine just has to make things difficult and won’t let people peacefully enjoy the fruit.” Tianming was annoyed.

“How about this? You take the ‘black grapes’ back first. I’ll stay here and guard them. That way, even if someone shows up, at least the middlekin stars are already taken away...” Mu Qingqing said.