It's Here

Hong Yan noticed the condition of the two knights in the nick of time and barked, "Wake up!" Her raspy, smoky voice took on a surprisingly rich, resonant timbre. Even though she had focused her breath into directed sound, waves of acoustic force still rippled outward. Fortunately, the Guizu domain was currently undergoing widespread abnormal turbulence, so even the nearest Guizu-transformed tiger-head hornets were not disturbed in the slightest. The two knights shuddered, and clarity instantly returned to their eyes. In the next moment, an imposing voice rolled across the distance, reaching far and wide: "Grand knights of all factions, join the Hall of Esoteric Masters to slay the greater Guizu!" Immediately afterward, several beams of light ignited, striking straight toward that massive fluctuation in the northwest. The beams moved faster than lightning, varied in color, and differed in thickness. The nine of them were too far away to make a precise assessment, but they could still roughly gauge it. The thickest was probably over a meter across, while the thinnest was at least as thick as a man's calf. Remarkably, through the haze and fog blanketing the sky, the lights could be seen from such a great distance. Wu Youren watched with wide eyes and a dropped jaw. Did Liang actually possess laser weaponry? Still, it probably wasn't a laser, right? Misty, rainy weather like this was the worst condition for laser performance. Yet judging by the speed of the beams, it certainly gave that impression. "The Hall of Esoteric Masters!" The female archer looked toward Instructor Hong, her eyes wide with poorly concealed excitement. "They're rallying—" "What does that have to do with us?" Hong Yan snorted coldly, her face impassive. "Whoever wants to go can go on their own." At those words, dead silence fell over the campsite. Several knights turned their heads, staring at the grand instructor in astonishment. *That's the Hall of Esoteric Masters! What kind of reaction is this?* Yet no one dared ask aloud. Everyone merely stole a glance before quickly pulling their gaze back. Wu Youren did not even turn his head. Standing motionless, he closely observed the effect of the beams' attack. Seven or eight beams struck that massive swirl of twisting fluctuations in near-simultaneous succession. The enormous, blurry fluctuation had already begun to take shape; vaguely, it truly resembled an eyeball. As several beams struck the distortion, the colossal eyeball shuddered violently, shaking with immense ferocity. It was not pierced in an instant; it merely shuddered violently, followed immediately by an even more frantic warping and surging. It was as though space itself had begun to twist. The beams did not last long, but just as they began to fade, several more beams converged from afar and struck in an instant. The eyeball trembled ever more violently, expanding amidst the twisting, looking somewhat poised to dissipate. And then... there was no "then"! Violent spatial fluctuations caused the fog and haze to thicken drastically, severely obscuring their vision. The angle of observation from their camp was not good either. "Tsk," Namuzha finally spoke up, breaking the silence. "Young Wu, can you still sense it?" Ever since Instructor Hong had signaled her complete lack of interest in cooperating with the Hall of Esoteric Masters, no one had dared utter a word. Now that he spoke, the youth remained standing motionless, as if he hadn't heard. "Don't disturb him," the raspy, smoky voice sounded again. "Pack up all valuables and prepare to evacuate at a moment's notice." "Those tiger-head hornets have all flown off," Daiqisi, the specialist in mechanisms, spoke up. "There are no Guizu-transformed creatures nearby outside." "Quiet." Instructor Hong waved a hand, her expression somber as still water. After pausing for twenty to thirty seconds, she spoke again. "Did you hear that?" No one answered her. After a while, Namuzha broke the silence: "No. What sound?" Grand Instructor Hong furrowed her brows slightly, keeping silent for several breaths before speaking slowly, "It's hard... to describe. Faint and fleeting." Hearing this, everyone could not help glancing at the motionless youth, but still no one dared speak. Wu Youren remained dazed for over a minute before finally snapping out of it. He glanced at Instructor Hong, his clear eyes still carrying a hint of bewilderment. "What sound?" Hong Yan parted her lips as if to speak, but her brow immediately twitched. "Watch out!" A strange fluctuation rolled past, silent and formless, sweeping through the camp and penetrating even the interior. Every single person present felt their hearts clench in sudden dread. Daiqisi frowned. "A spatial tremor?" "We can't stay here," Instructor Hong said, unable to resist another glance at the youth before speaking decisively. "We need to leave as soon as possible." "I feel... it's not the right time," Wu Youren said hesitantly, clarity fully restored to his eyes. "How about we wait a bit longer?" "Why?" Instructor Hong asked bluntly. It was intuition—Wu Youren was certain of it—but he couldn't say that. Otherwise, once they escaped with their lives, such an inexplicable, uncanny knack would bring endless trouble. He said in a deep voice, "The attacks probably aren't over yet. I feel that running right now might not be safe!" Facing the grand instructor, he had phrased it as tactfully as possible. With the two differing in opinion, the other seven were as quiet as cicadas in winter; none dared chime in. Instructor Hong pondered for two or three seconds and gave a brisk nod. At critical junctures, she never dithered. Even the worst decision was better than indecision. "All right. Going out now also makes it easy for others to spot us." She didn't specify, but it was obvious she meant the people from the Hall of Esoteric Masters. Over these past ten or so days, as they hunted Guizu-transformed creatures here, three different squads had taken notice of them. However, Hong Da had revealed her identity and driven them all away, claiming that Red Pine was observing the changes in the Guizu aura pillar here to respond to anomalies at any time. Such was the deterrent of a high-ranking martial artist. Even if she was their only grand knight, having one versus having none made all the difference in the world. Other squads had wanted to team up, but she had rejected them without hesitation, caring nothing for whatever names they dropped. Yet now she was worried about being discovered—there was no need to overthink the subtext behind that. The female archer hesitated before speaking up. "Hong Da, once it completely erupts and chaos engulfs the Guizu domain, won't that increase our danger?" She wasn't questioning the decision, but rather reminding her to take this into account. "Total chaos actually brings opportunity," Namuzha spoke up, signaling that he had seen this play out before. "Once the Guizu fall into chaos, they won't necessarily have the mind to attack humans... When we detonated the ghost-destroying mine at night, it produced a similar result." The newly joined knights had all heard about that crazy, desperate dash of theirs. "I support waiting," Daiqisi voiced her agreement. "If the attacks trigger severe consequences, this place at least offers some shelter." Skilled in mechanism engineering, she could easily follow that train of logic. Instructor Hong nodded. "Prepare to move at any m—hmm?" Another strange wave of fluctuations swept past, noticeably stronger than the last, making the ground beneath their feet tremble slightly. A thought popped into everyone's mind simultaneously: *Are these spatial tremors ever going to end?* Namuzha spoke up once more. "Don't panic. We're... pretty far from that place." "It really is something to be thankful for," someone finally dared to join in. "Even if we wanted to participate, we couldn't make it in time." In truth, everyone had so many questions they wanted to ask—for example, what was wrong with the Hall of Esoteric Masters? Yet if Hong Da didn't say, who dared ask? Besides, now was hardly the time for curiosity; they had to survive this hurdle first. Before long, another wave of fluctuations rolled in. This time, everyone had already taken their stances and released their battle qi for protection... Following that, the fluctuations grew increasingly frequent and more violent in magnitude. More than an hour later, after withstanding over thirty waves of tremors, a faint, shrill shrieking finally echoed in the distance. It did not come from human or Guizu, but from the air itself—or perhaps... space itself! "It's here!" Instructor Hong called out, speaking just two short words. In the next instant, the ground beneath their feet violently shuddered. A tempestuous shockwave swept past, bringing a cacophony of noise. There was the howl of raging wind, the snapping of branches, the pelting clatter of gravel and stone, and even faint, agonized wails... The camp was a cave-type shelter, essentially subterranean, but as the powerful shockwave swept past, the outer defenses were blown straight away. Like peeling bamboo shoots, wave after wave rushed past in quick succession, stripping away the camp's structures layer by layer. By the time twenty-odd minutes had passed and the incoming fluctuations stopped intensifying, more than half of the spacious camp was gone. All that remained were the stone hollows they had chiseled directly out of the mountain rock—a project completed gradually in the later days. Even the massive bedrock had several faint fissures shaken into it by the quaking earth. "Even the door is gone," the female archer couldn't help muttering, referring to the large stone slab used to seal the cave entrance. "Should we observe a bit longer?" the discipline inspector asked Instructor Hong cautiously. "Could there be aftershocks?" Hong Yan had just pulled her gaze back from the Jin hostage. Hearing the question, she shook her head. "Await my command, prepare to move... Young Wu!" Seeing that the youth showed no disagreement, she knew what had to be done. Wu Youren wiped the blood from his nose and mouth. "All right. Everyone, stay close." The continuous tremors had taken a heavy toll on him, mainly because... he didn't dare release his internal breath for protection! In reality, though, he wasn't quite as bad off as he looked. It was just a little blood. As a male martial artist, didn't he have a few days like this every month... getting into brawls? Watching him dash out without hesitation, the corner of the discipline inspector's mouth twitched imperceptibly. *Did I unknowingly mess with a ruthless bastard?* "Keep up, hurry," Hong Da shoved Daiqisi—who was actually still staring at the Guizu aura pillar. "Namuzha, bring up the rear!" "Run faster, all of you!" Namuzha declared decisively. "No picking up Guizu relics if you come across any, or I won't wait for you!" "Don't be stingy with your ghost-dispelling powder and things!" the female archer yelled after him. "Otherwise, all the Guizu relics we hunted these past days will be for nothing!" Right now, they didn't need to worry about Guizu aura at all. With the earth shaking and the mountains trembling, how could the Guizu possibly spare any attention for them? For the entire Mount Xuanling Guizu domain, the official data compiled by Great Liang listed its area at over a thousand square kilometers. However, mountain terrain couldn't be calculated that way; running up and down mountain trails, no one measured travel as the crow flies. Furthermore, the Liang authorities agreed that once a Guizu domain formed, it became an independent pocket of space, diverging drastically from external estimates. To human martial artists, the domain felt perceptually closer to twenty or thirty thousand square kilometers. To run out as quickly as possible was truly no small feat!