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🕑 Added 2022-11-29 15:27:52 +0000 UTCTitle: A Trip Through Time and Beyond (4)
Ja Sun followed the steps of a spirit beast once the fragment of the drop of golden-black blood was sucked into the real world. It's no longer the same as skipping time as he felt when he washed over on the River of Time. This realm is obviously the planet that contained the Douluo Continent and many things become clear to Ja Sun quickly enough.
'The 'world' I was in was actually a higher realm... I got confused back then and misunderstood. I thought that the world was one but the moment the Supreme Dragon God came into existence, he had his own world and brought in many species and planets under his control. Essentially, humans rebelled against the Dragons with the added sprinkle of forcing the Otherworldly Warlocks out of this existence.
What feels like a realm divided is, in reality, a realm layered.'
Still 'within' the Lightning Panther, Ja Sun begins to feel frustrated. This may as well be his longest dry spell ever. For him, years have gone by. Years. He did not age physically. It could be argued that he did not age mentally either since to age and experience interactions, he needs to actively intercept such situations but until now he has acted as a spectator to the story of this fragment of Gold-Black drop of blood.
'I wonder if Ah Yin already gave birth to our kid...' He wondered for a moment. Now that he has left the river of time, he stands to experience everything in real-time which is dangerous to his mindset. It's after all, easy to lose the sense of one's origins. Spirit Beasts are well and dandy after 100000 years because, to them, their past feels like a dream. That's all.
But what about this core? Would following the memories of this core actually lead him to something useful? It's only a bet at this point. Ja Sun understood well he would need to 'sleep' and wake up every ten or even a hundred years.
Yet the question is should he choose to follow this and risk nothing or pull back and hope to be there on time for Ah Yin's delivery?
He would like the know more about the origin of the evil core formed by a mere fragment of a droplet of the blood of an offspring of the Evil Sage and Supreme God. But he also wants to be in the origin of his own offspring. It's important to him.
Ja Sun was never about power entirely. Else... what's the difference between him and his previous master?
Control of Self in face of ultimate, corruptive strength... that's what he aspired for.
This dilemma is truly a hard one..m if Ja Sun didn't go through that trip in the River of Time itself!
'I have traveled the River of Time for many years. I'm almost a master. Instead of fearing if I would find any value in the creation of this core, I need to bet on the fact that I will soon become a master in the aspect of the temporal element. With that, hopefully, I would be able to at least discern the difference in time between my consciousness traveling this memory lane and my real body on that ship.'
Ja Sun decided at once. If becoming a master would not allow him to discern this difference in time, he would call it quits and return. At best, his gain would be becoming a master in the temporal element.
Instead of being anxious, calmly reasoning things did allow him to quickly come to this point and then Ja Sun got to work. If by this time, he does miss out on Yin's delivery then that's that. This memory trip really had been a surprise, after all.
Meanwhile, the Lightning Panther prowls around with his pack and would hunt other beasts. Its strength would increase at a steady pace every day but in reality... a beast's life is boring as hell.
Ja Sun focuses on his situation entirely. From observing the cycle of day and night to trying to feel the river of time flowing through this leopard, he did it all. And consequentially, his own understanding of temporal law grew by a small margin but at a steady pace.
---
With Ja Sun's skills in the array being second only to the Lady of Lake possibly, it was not an easy feat for Violet and Ja Yin to try and use the array on the ship to hide their presence from Qian Xunji. But their thought process is simple.
That's what matters the most for an array— Thought Process. An array is formed to perform a function and the more simple and concrete the idea is, the better.
Ja Yin's and Violet's idea was to use the array already constructed by Ja Sun to use it as a central system and then form a trap so that even the enemy's god does not see this coming— literally. But it could not be formed on the sea. No, they needed to lure this group into one of the many dimensional items Ja Sun created. One of the artifacts that Ja Sun used to trap the Devilgod Tiger in the first place.
But the risk of alerting Qian Xunji, as Ah Yin said, must never be ignored. While Ja Sun could surprise an actual god, it did not mean the rest could, too.
Still, there is some distance between the two ships. They have few days at best to think about various possibilities and the solutions to many problems that are very easy to solve with pure strength... but the reality is that even if Ja Sun happened to be here, at best, the two factions are equally matched. Either Ja Sun has to become an actual god or raise a god from his group. The same is the case for Qian Xunji.
As for the balance of the realm?
The distribution of strength?
Risks of angering other gods—
The two did not care one bit. Or rather...
They looked forward to the challenge!
But now that they are aware of the impending conflict, Ah Yin instantly demanded all five schools of aquatic spirit beasts to scout as much as they can about the enemy approaching them.
The spirit beasts did have a lot of lower leveled fodder. They used these beasts as a way to slowly unravel the strength of the voyagers from the Spirit Empire.
Spirit Beasts have always been competitive. There is barely any love between their own species and the specimens like Heavenly Snow Woman that Snow rules over are an obvious exception. Since Qian Xunji did not leave any good impression on the sea and even forced a few of these beasts to relocate, they were eager to cause some damage to the Spirit Empire, too.
Truthfully, this is the second-best option. The beasts are intelligent and realize that the best would be to not engage in the conflict between Beast God and Blood God...
But they did not have the option to retreat. Not with Zi Ji and Bi Ji here. Just these two— a drake berserker and the best healer in the continent and the seas beyond— could level with five of the 100,000-year-old beasts. That's how potent Bi Ji's healing is.
And as such, to make sure that their contributions are noted well for this task, they did not mind expending lower leveled spirit beasts. It's the beasts above 20000 years of strength that they truly valued the most.
---
"Explain what is going on!" Yu Xiaogang demands solemnly as one of the scouting spirit masters quivers in his boots. The deck of their ship is littered with fishy guts and the stench of blood made them feel as if they had returned to the Blood Sea once again! Weaker spirit masters cleaned the ship with gloomy expressions, recalling the sudden but ferocious tides of aquatic creatures.
Although the recognized talents filled the ship's ranks, it did not mean they had a limitless source of strength, and not once did anyone get any support from the real powerhouse retreated within the confines of their rooms.
The spirit master caught by Yu Xiaogang stutters, "These spirit beasts, t-they seemed too united. Flood Pythons are overbearing beasts but they attacked alongside elephant koi which is unheard of. And all these beasts dove too deep under the sea for our measures to detect them until they directly surrounded us."
Yu Xiaogang scoffs and shoves away the spirit master, "Tell me something I didn't see. Why are they targeting us?"
"I- I don't know," The spirit master shifts uncomfortably as Yu Xiaogang stares at him once more.
While dissatisfaction and fear for the unknown brewed within everyone on the deck now that they have tasted the ferociousness of aquatic beasts that Land Beasts simply could not contend against, the Titled Douluos held their own discussions.
"That attack almost got out of hand. We lost tens of spirit sages and two Spirit douluos. Our numbers have dwindled to less than 100... do you think it's a Sentient Beast?"
"Not 'A' Sentient beast," Golden Crocodile explains, "I have explored the sea quite a bit over the years. The majority of the attack comprised of specific beasts that already have an overlord of their own... but their territories once resided in the current Blood Sea. These beasts barely have any proper strength in their schools since Blood God's ascension killed many aquatic beasts and those that remain are probably recently conquered beasts. What we are facing... most likely is a group of enraged spirit 100,000-year-old beasts."
This instantly alarms some Titled Douluos. A single 100,000-year-old beast needs at least two average Titled Douluos to tackle them evenly and a group of such beasts instantly made these few Titled Douluos pale, at least, those who had lower strength at this level.
"What should we do? If they attack us all at once, we may not be able to protect the ship."
"Maybe we should set out and actively tackle these enemies before they find the right moment to lay a trap of some kind. The intelligence of these beasts must not be underestimated."
"How many can we even hope to defeat? The aquatic beasts are different. Beasts of the continent cannot hope to make use of their surroundings as deviously as the ones in the sea and the fact that such a group exists means that there is no shortage of 100,000-year-old beasts here. We cannot be rash!"
"Enough," Golden Crocodile frowns, "The fact that these beasts only sent fodder means that they are finally afraid of humanity's retaliation. Their intelligence will not allow them to rashly incite Blood God's anger. We stay focused on our objective and let the disciples of the Empire deal with the rest...
As you all understand, the beasts on the continent have a mutual understanding with the Blood God and have accepted his divine grace. This means that those beasts are our allies...
But the beasts in the sea are not. Each 100,000-year-old beast means an equivalent spirit bone. And we Titled Douluos rarely collect in such numbers. Once the objective is complete, we shall scout the region and try to fill the gaps in our strength collectively."
Golden Crocodile's words instantly use Qian Xunji's name to lower the pedestal on which the Titled Douluos had placed the beasts and simultaneously motivated them to hunt the beasts with all they had since it meant another level of strength!
After all, even Golden Crocodile did not have a full set of Spirit Bones and the spirit bones that he did have were of far inferior quality when compared to a single bone from a 100,000-year-old spirit beast!
***
Alternate Title: Beasts Die for Food and Humans for Greed!
