Western wilderness, inside the inner layer.
The group was running as fast as they could, unaware that nothing was following them. However, they had heard the final words of that monster, so they dared not take chances and kept running.
A few hours of running and hundreds of miles later, they finally stopped. Night had fallen, and they were deeper within the continental forest, with no idea where they had run off to.
The thick herbs, plants, and trees, along with the darkness of night, made it difficult to get much light from the three moons that shone in the sky.
"Haah...haa. That was very close, too close," Thorin panted as he placed Tang Hao on the ground.
"Hehe… sorry, guys," the latter said, wiping some dust away from his shoulder and apologizing. Now that they were a distance away from that monster, he had regained his ability to move.
"Why are you apologizing? The monster did not seem very reasonable. Thank god we managed to run," Raizel said, looking at Tang Hao with a hint of suspicion.
Silence reigned, everyone catching their breath and thanking the gods for their safety.
Then, amidst everyone's eyes, Kaeln walked toward Tang Hao with heavy steps. He did not have a very good look on his face.
Tang Hao froze, this time for a different reason. Watching Kaeln approach, he awkwardly turned his gaze away and acted oblivious.
Finally, Kaeln was only a step away from him. He lifted his arm slowly, making Tang Hao's heart beat at sonic speeds.
"Shit! He's going to whoop my ass… mommy. I shouldn't have touched those last few stalks." He once again regretted his greed.
"Well, it's my fault this time—I should take responsibility." He willed himself to endure the oncoming punch and closed his eyes.
One, two, three seconds passed. Then ten seconds. Not feeling any pain, Tang Hao opened one of his eyes to peek at Kaeln, only to see a hand extended to his chest, seemingly waiting for something.
"Eh!? Oh right!" A bit confused at first, but quickly realizing what was expected, Tang Hao took the extra stalks he had harvested. His arms were suddenly full of earth fire ginseng, which he then gave to Kaeln with an apologetic expression.
"I'm really sorry, man. I should have listened and not been too greedy." He gave everything to Kaeln and bowed slightly.
He then turned to everyone and said, "I promise that won't happen again, everyone!", since his actions put everyone in danger, he felt he owed them all an apology- including Xue Qing.
Kaeln did not speak and maintained a neutral expression. He received the plants and handed them back to Tang Hao, confusing the latter.
Finally, he said, "Tang Hao, you must not be greedy on the road of martial arts. Although heaven and earth treasures are good, they're external objects that can only help so much. If you're going to be my friend, I need you to be more confident in your ability. As for those, you can keep them. When I told you not to take them, I didn't expect that monster to appear at all. If I did, I would've been firmer in my stance." He exhaled lightly, paused and continued. "It's not bad to leave some for the next person who comes; if every time you find a treasure trove, you empty it of its treasures, you will not accumulate good karma." That said, Kaeln tapped Tang Hao's shoulder before stepping back.
Tang Hao stood there, stumped. He quickly regained his countenance and shouted, "I understand."
Kaeln smiled in approval and turned.
Everyone else was watching out of the corners of their eyes, trying not to be too obvious, including Su Yao and Xue Qing. The first was curious about how Kaeln would handle the conflict, while Xue Qing took pleasure in her cousin's greed-induced misfortune.
With that settled, the group sat on the ground around a bonfire they quickly built.
"All right, it's time to review our traveling plans now that we have the main treasure we were looking for. We've already been in this massive forest for two months, and these past weeks we have ventured into the inner layers. Although we are still within the outskirts, this is where things start to get very dangerous. Since we originally planned four months of travel, I don't think we should head back just yet, but I think we should look for a safe place for a few weeks to increase our strength so we can go deeper. What do you guys think?" Kaeln said.
He looked at everyone, awaiting their answers.
"I think that's for the best, I have something to show you that will hepl with the next step," Su Yao spoke. She took a huge scroll from her spatial ring, which she unrolled to show to everyone.
The scroll seemed very old, but there was no damage to the paper or its content.
It was completely yellow with countless drawings of mountains, lands, and rivers. It appeared to be a very detailed map of the entire Southern Desert Lands and the Western Wilderness.
The map was very odd as the inscriptions actually hovered above the yellow ancient paper and formed a three-dimensional image. Borderlines appeared that separated the two continents into smaller territories. It was a very odd tool. The entire continent was shown on this map, showcasing how big it was. The Western Wilderness was separated into two different zones: one endless patch of forests and Heavenly Demon Territory. Both areas were bigger than the entire Southern Desolation Continent, which was massive in its own right. The area where Su Yao pointed, their location, was barely considered the inner part of the Lower Wilderness. In fact, the last two months of traveling, the group had covered about ten thousand miles, which was not a small distance. However, that wasn't even five percent of the entire territory.
Su Yao used her slender finger to roughly pinpoint their current location in the wilderness area of the map. When her finger pointed at the map, ancient characters appeared where her finger landed.
They read—"Horned Crocodile Monster King's territory."
With the help of Su Yao's map, the group could more easily distinguish specific areas within this seemingly endless wilderness.
According to what was shown, the squad had entered the territory of a Monster King; a title given to strong experts of the beast races above the sixth rank—equivalent to human Dao-finding experts, but only in cultivation; monsters and demonic beasts are much stronger at the same level than average experts, monster Kings even more so.
"I didn't know there was such a delineation of the western territory. It's good to know whose backyard we are playing in," Kaeln scrutinized the mysterious map in detail.
While the map showed both southern and western lands, he only focused on the latter, after all, that's what was relevant at the moment.
"The western continent seems smaller when seen this way," Raizel couldn't help but comment.
"Yes. The pie looks much smaller after it has been cut into equal pieces and divided," Thorin added.
Su Yao moved her finger from their position and played around with the map. The illustrations on the map rotated about until only the Western Wilderness was visible. Then, the gigantic land was separated in two. On the right was the Heavenly Demon Territory; on the left was the Endless Forest.
With a movement of her hand, the right part disappeared, showing only the Endless Forest. It was then split into six huge regions, ancient characters floating above each region, naming them.
Next to each name, a beast insignia appeared. First, Su Yao pointed to the northernmost region. On the map, that area became enlarged; the beast insignia for this place was a blood-red Qilin.
"The total number of factions is roughly equal to the Southern Lands. Separated into six directions; in the north is where lives the Blood-Scaled Sacred Qilin Clan, the most powerful beast clan in the entire western lands. It is said that their full power is only equal to, if not greater than, even the strongest clans of the Middle-Heaven Continent. They're one of the few pure-blooded clans of the entire Great World and rulers of the Lower Western Wilderness. They occupy the northernmost part of the Endless Forest and control the other clans from above."
As she showed the ins and outs of the northern region, Su Yao narrated the power on top.
"Next is the Three-Legged Heavenly Flame Crow, a variant monstrous beast of the Three-Legged Golden Crow Saint beast and ruler of the south of the Endless Forest; it is said they're not much weaker than the Sacred Qilin Clan and hold the second place among the monster races. Following is the Golden-Winged Peng Clan, sovereign of the eastern region of the wilderness, descendants of the extinct Golden-Winged Great Peng Saint beast. It is unknown how pure their bloodline is, but to occupy the third place naturally proves their strength."
She swiftly moved the map, going through each region, one after the other, which wasn't so easy to navigate, but she was very proficient, most likely from continuous usage.
"The fourth-ranked clan is the Lightning-Clawed Desolate Dragon Clan. In terms of physical strength, they rank just below the Sacred Qilin Clan, but it is said they don't have as many peak demon emperors. They control the western area of the Western Wilderness. Finally, the weakest, yet not to be underestimated, Purple-Eyed Demonic Lion. On top of their tyrannical strength, their demonic pupils are extremely terrifying to deal with. They control the centermost region." In one breath, Su Yao went through the five main powers of the Endless Forest of the Western Wilderness.
"Wait, how come there are still many smaller regions that don't fall within the rule of those clans?" noticing something unusual, Xue Qing pointed towards a few unmarked territories.
Her question was shared by the others, who nodded in confusion.
In fact, the place they were at was also one of those unmarked territories, which the group naturally saw.
"The unmarked territories are areas that were claimed by powerful monster kings or emperors. The five clans control roughly sixty percent of the entire Lower Wilderness, the Blood-Scaled Qilin Clan ruling over twenty percent, and the rest shared control over an equal ten percent…" Su Yao answered while playing around with the map.
Her fingers moved through it, showing different areas that did not fall within the monster clans' jurisdiction.
"Hm… there's a big piece of land there that seems to be under none of the monster clan's control. Which power rules that area?" Kaeln analyzed the map thoroughly and noticed that another faction had control over roughly eight percent of the territory, but it didn't seem to be a monster clan.
Hearing him, Su Yao moved her finger towards the said region, enlarging it for everyone to see.
"Woah!"
"Holy!"
Surprised gasps from Thorin and Raizel ensued. The region on display this time was quite different from the others. For one, you could actually see deep within for some reason, which was not the case for the others, even with the map, you could only get rough images of the areas. There were basically no trees around this region, only gigantic silver palaces in the shape of swords, with many smaller sword-shaped mansions around it. The entire region was surrounded by the Endless Forest but seemed to exist in a different place once you looked inside.
"Heh? That seems to be… the Sword Palace?" Tang Hao, who had a bit of knowledge, recognized the place.