"Did you find anything? Any clues?"
An angry-looking Zhang Liena was tapping her foot on the ground. There were some people standing around her, they were looking at that tapping foot. The more it moved the more the ground shook around her.
These people were members of the Argonaut 1 ship crew. The flying vessel had been put out of commission after overloading the main cannon. While repairs were underway the people that were free started searching the area where Zhang Dong had vanished in. It looked as if a chunk of earth was evaporating out of existence. The hole was perfectly circular and over a kilometer in diameter.
A day had already passed since the fight with the gigantic monster and its two companions. The moment the monster vanished along with the sect Patriarch the other two went up in smoke. There was nothing left to tell the tale, the only thing there was the giant hole in the middle of those old ruins that didn't exist anymore.
"We have examined the explosion site… after a day of searching we couldn't find any rem…"
The person that was answering was one of the elders that came along on this expedition. The moment he tried to mention Zhang Dong as the 'remains' he felt a chill run down his spine. Zhang Liena looked at him with rage-filled eyes and while exuding some killing intent.
"I mean… we couldn't find any sign of the Patriarch being there. There are also no monster remains, it's as if they evaporated along with this fog."
The old man sweated while shifting the conversation in a different direction. After the cannon was fired and both the monster and the Patriarch were gone, the mist cleared up.
"We have contacted our sect members that remained at the Divine Fist Sect. It seems that the fog is now gone from these lands. Even the creatures that were inhabiting the infected people seemed to have vanished, as if they were never there, to begin with…"
"Is that so… you may leave…but keep looking!"
Liena waved with her fan and the old man quickly bowed and removed himself from this location. This was just in time for Huo Qiang to appear out of the distance, he emerged from the bottom of the hole that Liena was also in close proximity. He landed next to the Matriarch, a big frown on his face along with furrowed brows could be spotted.
"This is bizarre, there are no traces left of him or the monster. It's as if the battle never took place."
He stood next to Liena with his arms crossed over one another while both of them looked to the large perfect sphere hole down below. There were many lights and people moving down there as everyone was ordered to search.
"He lives, I know it… A master of his caliber would leave a trace behind, something… it's as if.."
"He was teleported away?"
Liena nodded at Qiang's question. The two were thinking of the same thing, it looked like everything in this hole was just wished out of existence. A regular explosion would have left traces of spiritual energy behind. There would be faint signs of the creature's and Zhang Dong's nascent souls, those were much harder to erase. For these two people here it looked as if the whole spot that this detonation occurred was removed from this place.
"My thought exactly… the other possibility would be…"
The two looked down with their faces grim as they didn't want the other option to be true. This being that Zhang Dong was truly dead either by this explosion or by total eradication of his very being.
"Yes… what will you do? One of us must return back to the sect, I'm sure the Divine Fist Sect will aid us in the search now but we need to keep the news from spreading…"
Huo Qiang asked while moving away, the news of their Patriarch perishing or vanishing in strange circumstances would bring them harm. They were already on a brink of war against the Limitless Sword Society. There was also the Yggdrasil Sect working in the shadows which was another problem they might have to contend with.
"I'll remain here with some of our sect members, the ship needs to be repaired, I'll protect it."
"I'll return to the sect and bring the news, we will wait for Senior Brother's return…"
Huo Qiang nodded while moving away, before leaving he was sure to give Liena a small pat on the shoulder. She didn't react much besides giving him a nod, without Zhang Dong around they would need to keep everything in check.
The biggest problem was the other sects that might try to use Zhang Dong's absence to their advantage. The next one was the inner members of their own sect, with the most powerful member now gone the power dynamic would be shifting in another direction. Even though these two didn't want it, their camps were at odds with each other. Zhang Dong was a large sturdy wall between the two which kept anything from escalating but now he was gone.
Liena didn't look back at Qiang as he floated away. She looked down at her golden ring that she was gifted by her husband. It was one of the most treasured gifts that she received as it was the item that was proof of their betrothal. She was unsure of what had happened to her husband but she dreaded the thought of this ring becoming just a momento.
She took up flight and closed her eyes, her spiritual sense examining everything once more. Liana wasn't willing to just give up yet, if Zhang Dong was only teleported away then he might be alive, he might also still be battling this evil creature in another part of this world. If she could just get a hint as to where he went, then maybe the masters at the sect would be able to pinpoint his location. For now, she could only continue searching and she would search for as long as she had to….
"Dong'er… where are you…"
........................
'Some time earlier.'
Zhang Dong opened his eyes, he wasn't sure where he was but he was in a heap of trouble. The last thing he remembered doing was positioning the corrupt cube in the line of the spiritual cannon beam. He was sure it was a direct hit but what came next was a blur.
He didn't feel any pain or that he suffered an injury. When he opened up his eyes he found himself back at his regular size. His avatar form was canceled out but he was alive.
The odd thing was his surroundings consisted of chaotic energy. He found himself floating through some kind of tunnel, the walls of it were composed of strange Qi. He could feel that he was spinning out of control at an immense speed, where he was going and what this strange space was he had no idea.
'Did that Cthulhu die?'
'How long have I been in here?'
'What is this place? How can I get back?'
He started asking himself questions, it was very hard for him to concentrate around here. He tried gathering his spiritual energy to make himself stop from spinning but to no avail. He was like a rock hurled into outer space, his destination unknown.
Zhang Dong could see strange energy torrents, lightning-like energy, and flickering of lights everywhere. This looked like one of those bad drug trips that some people had when overdosing.
The whole experience was making him sick, he was disoriented and had no idea what to do. The more he tried to activate his cultivation to free himself from this place the more his head hurt. It was as if this place wasn't letting him use his powers at all.
He tried feeling out the Dao around this strange space but the feeling was totally different than to what he was used to. He felt like he was running on an unsupported operating system, any attempts to gather his qi were getting shut down. The only thing he could rely on now was his system, the moment he brought up the screen he saw red.
There were 'Danger' and 'Error' signs plastered all over this display. It was already hard to tell anything while spinning around but this just made things less bearable. With time and some squinting, he was finally able to see something.
'Lost world tether? What is that anyway?'
The system was giving him some strange prompts, there were a lot of corrupt text and warning signals littering his display. Finally, he was greeted with a button that he could press, without any other options he begrudgingly pressed it. This prompted the system to give him more corrupt text but some of it was readable.
'Missing world tether…'
'Trying to establish a new connection… please wait…'
'Searching...error… error…'
'Error… missing tether…'
'Overwriting commands… looking for a new link… please wait…'
'Trying to establish a new world tether to user number 80082… error … subject deceased…'
'... found a new world tether from sector 41067 setting up a new link…'
The error signals and prompts continued to appear for a while. With time something like a new world tether was found. His body started glowing immensely during this process and somehow the spinning motion started to lessen. He found himself stopping in his tracks together with a dinging sound that his system gave him.
'… new tether added… transferring user to the new sector now...'
The moment that message appeared he felt his whole body jerking toward the energy tube wall. He was now traveling at neck-breaking speeds towards something that looked like pure energy, energy that was far above his cultivation realm. Before he could be fried by it an opening appeared. It was composed of white light and large enough for his body to go through.
The inside of this white light was another energy corridor. This one was much smaller and he couldn't actually move at all. It felt like he was going down a constrained tube of energy what was on the other side would remain to be seen.
"GAHHHHHHhhhhhh"
With a plop he was finally out, he hit something hard and tumbled forward. The momentum carried him further and further until he hit something hard. His face hit the ground and he sprawled out like a starfish. He couldn't hear anything or anyone as he just remained face planted on the ground.
"Ow… my head…"
He had a splitting headache, he tried activating his holy energies and they worked. A golden light surrounded his body while healing it. The wounds that he had sustained were slowly vanishing and he also felt like his energy reserves were larger than before.
'Where am I?... did I absorb some of that cubes power, I think my cultivation is higher…'
He stood up to see where he was, what he saw was not something that he expected.
'Huh? What is this place?'
There was nothing here besides a small wide pillar that he had hit while tumbling. The rest of this space was filled with nothing but the void. This void wasn't pitch black, there was a stary sky above him that faintly lit everything up.
He looked around but besides the wide pillar that reached up to his belly button, there was nothing there. Before he could examine this whole place further he felt a jolt of energy. He quickly glanced to the source which was right in the middle of that pillar.
To his surprise, he saw someone appearing out of thin air right in the middle. It looked to be a person but compared to him, the person was quite tiny. It looked to be a young girl in her teens, she was so small that he would be able to squish her with one finger.
The girl looked a bit confused while looking around, with time she looked up and noticed Zhang Dong staring down at her. After opening up her mouth wide along with her eyes she dropped down to her knees and started bowing. Then she finally spoke up.
"Honorable heroic spirit, I Beatrice Hohenberg beseech thee to grand me a contract!"
Zhang Dong just blinked repeatedly while staring down, soon a sound escaped from his mouth.
"Ehhhhh???"