Chapter 365: Beasts, dangerous traps, and humans.
Sigma Sigma
"My name is LaoLi."
"I am LaoLun."
The two guys with blonde hair, blue eyes, and sturdy bodies looked at ShiYan, sneered, and introduced themselves.
"ShiYan."
"Nice to meet you ShiYan. I hope that we will get along well during the journey ahead."
After talking, the two guys beamed a smile, walked shoulder to shoulder to another place, about a few hundred meters away from AiYa and CaiYi, and then sat down.
One of them took out a Demon Crystal and meditated to restore his strength. The other stood to the side, staring at the void like he was in a trance.
ShiYan remained calm and secretly observed the brothers LaoLun and LaoLi. Then, he looked toward CaiYi and Borg and said to himself that this group seemed to have constraints among them.
While CaiYi was restoring her Profound Qi, Borg was guarding for her. LaoLi and LaoLun were also on alert.
It turned out that this group of five was not in solidarity. They were taking precautions against each other.
CaiYi and Borg were on one side, the two brothers LaoLun and LaoLi were on another side, and AiYa was alone. Although the three parties were traveling together, they didn鈥檛 trust each other and were always on alert. They were very cautious even when they were restoring their strength. It was easy to see that these five people didn鈥檛 get along well as he had originally thought.
After observing these people secretly for a while, ShiYan realized their strange relationships, and he thus didn鈥檛 dare to let down his guard and was even more cautious.
After the two brothers Lao had introduced themselves, AiYa arched her eyebrows and walked over to ShiYan. She stopped ten meters away from him and coldly said, "I am a little bit curious about the Endless Sea. Can you tell me about the place?" The girl in a silk gown with a jade belt wrapped around her small, appealing waist asked. She had beautiful, straight legs; her thighs were vaguely exposed through the thin silk, which was mesmerizing.
She was standing alone. Her eyelashes were very long, and her lucid eyes were as clear as water. Sometimes they flashed up with beams of light as if they wanted to pull men鈥檚 souls into their pupils.
Before, as ShiYan had stood quite far away and been on the alert when he had first met her, he hadn鈥檛 carefully observed her.
As she was approaching, ShiYan goggled watching her and couldn鈥檛 help but praise her as he had never thought this girl was this heart-stirring. Her beauty could be compared with Xia Xinyan and Cao ZhiLan, which was the root of all troubles.
"The Endless Sea was in the west of the Dark Magnetic Noxious Mist. There are only five sections where warriors gather, including the Kyara Sea, the Hengluo Sea..."
ShiYan said with a low voice and a calm face. He told her about the situation of the Endless Sea but didn鈥檛 mention the forces there, the invasion of the Fourth Demon Area and the Sevenfold Underworld, nor about his origin or his situation in the Endless Sea.
"Such an interesting place," AiYa鈥檚 long eyelashes slightly shivered while she whispered and revealed a thoughtful look.
After a long while, she suddenly looked toward him and curiously asked, "Why do you come to this Dark Magnetic Noxious Mist? Did you come here to get to the Grace Mainland?"
"I come here to temper myself," ShiYan said indifferently. "I have encountered a bottleneck during my cultivation. I have heard that there are many mysteries in the Dark Magnetic Noxious Mist, so I came here to try my luck, to see if I can find something here to have a breakthrough."
AiYa鈥檚 eyes brightened up while she nodded, "It seems that the Endless Sea has good warriors."
ShiYan sneered but didn鈥檛 say anything.
"The Dark Magnetic Noxious Mist has three fatal dangers; beasts, dangerous traps, and humans.
AiYa hesitated a little bit and then said gently, "Beasts are the easiest to deal with. Dangerous traps are the second. Humans are unpredictable and the most terrible ones. You should be careful when you are here."
"Humans?" ShiYan鈥檚 face darkened.
"That鈥檚 right, the same kind as ours." AiYa nodded earnestly, glanced at the other groups of CaiYi and LaoLi, and then said to ShiYan, "You have to be careful with the people next to you. In this place, companions are nothing. In crucial moments, not only are they not trustworthy but they can be a fatal threat."
After mentioning this, AiYa seemingly wanted to continue but then stopped, pondered for a few second, displayed a complicated look, then threw a glance at ShiYan and said, "Being alone is sometimes safer. You are alone, so you should take good care of yourself."
When her plump thighs under the thin silk moved slightly, AiYa had already flown hundreds of meters away and quickly disappeared into thin air.
Borg and LaoLun who were taking guard seemed to let out a sigh of relief when they saw AiYa fly away. Their vigilance was slightly relaxed as they felt more assured and sat down.
ShiYan shuddered within his heart.
Through this small detail, he immediately realized that AiYa was probably the most dangerous in this group.
Among these five warriors, AiYa and CaiYi had the Sky Realm cultivation base while the other men had the Third Sky of Nirvana Realm. ShiYan recognized that no one in this group had good intentions or was trustworthy or easy to deal with.
Among them, the guy Borg, who was impatient and easily irritated, was the easiest one to deal with.
The remaining four people were all calm and discreet; he especially could not see through CaiYi and AiYa. However, he felt that these two girls were always against each other. They seemed to be harmonious, but it was not their true mind.
The five of them had divided into three teams, scattering in three directions. They took turns to absorb the Demon Crystals to restore their Profound Qi. They didn鈥檛 talk to each other, which gave others the feeling that they were getting along well, but they were actually guarding against one another.
After carefully observing for a while, ShiYan regained the calmness in his heart.
He quietly backed off and stopped when he was eight hundred meters away from LaoLun and Lao Li, who were nearest to him.
Looking around, he noticed that behind him and to his sides were rocky mountains and thus the predictable danger could only come from the front. He sat down, took one-third of the Demon Crystal out and started to absorb the power inside it.
Different from other Demon Crystals, this Demon Crystal had been taken out from the beast鈥檚 body in the Dark Magnetic Noxious Mist, and thus it could adapt to a particular environment, not able to be dissipated.
Demon Crystals were indeed nutrient supplements for the power鈥檚 restoration.
Golden Eye Snow Dragon was a sixth level beast, which was equivalent to a human Nirvana Realm warrior. The power of this piece of Demon Crystal was not vigorous anyway.
Demon Crystals, after all, were not pure Qi. The loss of the crystal鈥檚 power was inevitable after it was converted into available Profound Qi for warriors to use. After the power of this one-third Demon Crystal piece was converted, ShiYan could only absorb half of it, which was equivalent to one-tenth of his Profound Qi.
Before that, when he had cast out the Life Seal, he hadn鈥檛 consumed much of his Profound Qi. This small piece of Demon Crystal helped him not only restore the amount of the consumed Profound Qi when he had used the Life Seal earlier but also reinstate a part of the amount of the depleted Profound Qi from the past few days.
While meditating and waiting for the Demon Crystal piece in his hand to become a useless stone, he felt the Profound Qi in his body about to reach its peak, around nine out of ten parts.
Although he didn鈥檛 reach the peak yet, he was already satisfied. He squinted as he looked ahead and saw LaoLi and CaiYi had completed their power restoration and were keeping watch for Borg and LaoLi to meditate.
No one knew where AiYa had gone. As she was alone and didn鈥檛 trust anyone, she obviously had to choose a remote corner to ensure that there would be no unexpected events taking place during her meditation.
ShiYan carefully observed everything and continued to maintain his meditating posture.
After a long while, Borg and LaoLun completed their power restoration. The four of them then gathered in one place and waved at ShiYan.
ShiYan stood up and walked toward them while still staying alert. When he was around ten meters away from them, he stopped and comfortably asked, "Should we continue on our way?"
He quietly observed them and found out that Borg鈥檚 hostility had weakened compared to earlier. Although he still wore a cold face, his eyes no longer had any sign of hatred. This gave him some doubts as he didn鈥檛 know what CaiYi said to Borg for his attitude to change that much.
"AiYa hasn鈥檛 returned yet. Wait for her for a while." CaiYi stated pretentiously, revealing a sweet smile as she boringly played with a bracelet on her snow-white arm. "AiYa doesn鈥檛 trust anyone. She doesn鈥檛 allow anyone to come close when she meditates. Early on, we had another companion; as she was meditating for quite long and hadn鈥檛 come back, that person was worried and went over to call her. That person didn鈥檛 come back afterward. Nobody knows what happened."
A strange light flashed up in ShiYan鈥檚 eyes.
CaiYi coldly smiled in her heart. As she had got what she wanted, she didn鈥檛 say anything further, just sneered and looked toward the direction AiYa headed earlier.
The five people suddenly quieted down, and no one spoke. Thus, the atmosphere was quite strange.
Not long after that, AiYa quietly appeared from a distance and gently stepped forward, moving effortlessly.
"We can go now," AiYa said, her face looking indifferent. "Now that we have one more member, we should reallocate the Pathfinder job. What do you think?"
"Let the newcomer do it then. He has to do it at least one or two times." CaiYi slightly chuckled as he threw a glance at ShiYan and said, "Pathfinder is the easiest job. As soon as he discovers a danger, he immediately retreats. This kind of job is a test for the newcomer鈥檚 reaction and observance. What do you say?" CaiYi looked at LaoLi, LaoLun, and Borg.
Unsurprisingly, the three of them nodded, seeming to have reached an unspoken understanding.
AiYa nodded as she saw the majority of the crew agreed, and then said, "I don鈥檛 know much about this place. You go first to find a way. If you encounter beasts, you should call us. If you see dangerous traps, you have to retreat. If you meet humans, you have to observe their cultivation base and the number of people."
ShiYan said to himself that it was not going well for him. After linking thoughts in his mind, he finally beamed a smile, nodded in agreement to take the task, and said, "Not a problem."