I didn't know anything else about it, not for sure, but as usual, no one contested my choosing that target. However, reaching the lair proper was an uphill battle, almost literally. The nest, I quickly realized, was at the very top of a particularly large tree, and of course there were a great many bird-type magical beasts near it. In this case, there was basically no possibility that I'd reduce their numbers enough to clear a path to the "boss." The flying enemies could come at me from all over, so unless I exterminated just about all of them, I'd never see the end of it.
Instead, I'd have to rely on my speed and agility to avoid them until I got close enough to the nest. I was reasonably sure that once I entered the boss "territory", they'd leave off. Though Ascended Beasts were less affected by the terrible hunger of ordinary magical beasts, and less inclined to prey on small fries of any kind unless they invaded their territory in force, they were still affected by its spiritual pressure.
It was a little strange. Magical Beasts gathered around Ascended Beasts for a number of reasons. For starters, the most common way for an Ascended Beast to come to be was for a normal Magical Beast to consume enough to satisfy its hunger, after which it would enter a period of hibernation during which it would "ascend". When it woke up, its hunger wouldn't be as maddening, it'd be a lot more powerful, and it would be smart enough to recognize its former species. In almost all cases, it would have made some of its fellows its minions before, so as an Ascended, it simply continued to take on minions.
Second, Magical Beasts had a pretty good ability to recognize like types. Such like types wouldn't cannibalize each other unless their hunger got truly desperate, though what constituted truly desperate when the default state inhibited higher functions and promoted bloodlust, I had no idea and no desire to know. The monkey creatures were stronger individually, but the Ascended's presence gave them a way to have a territory the monkeys couldn't invade, and could sometimes strike out at them from. Such territorial disputes were common in truly wild areas, but some magic or formation or other or whatever prevented them from killing each other en masse here.
Of course, with such a target rich environment, I took down plenty before I decided to go for the Gust Falcon. The whole idea from the start had been for each of us to use a different Ascended Beast's territory to grind to the 9th Stage then push to break through to the next realm as best we could. I'd been tempted earlier by the notion of using cores to jump from 8th to 9th stage, but with so many swarming birds, it hadn't been needed. Instead I'd need every core I could get to reach the 7th Realm.
The others progressed alongside me, Jue Zhu taking it upon himself to keep everyone updated on each other. By the time I was ready to make the push to the Nest proper, he himself had of course already entered the 7th Realm a week ago, and was basically relaxing and enjoying nature near the volcano while waiting for us to show up. Jong was on the way to him, having defeated his Ascended Beast the day before yesterday. The others would need a bit more grinding to reach the 9th Stage.
When at last I reached a high enough point that the normal monsters stopped coming for me, I didn't have long to catch my breath before it became clear that the Gust Falcon was much better named than the Lightning Marmosets. A powerful whirlwind began to stir, immediately threatening to throw me right off the high branch. At the last second, I grabbed hold, and just as I was clawing my body back to solid ground, the gale ceased. I kept making my way up, wary of it beginning again. Sure enough, it did, and I managed to handle it a bit better this time.
After a few more repetitions of this, I realized that the gale was actually starting and stopping at regular intervals, the gale itself lasting a bit over twice as long as the calm periods. Now that I'd noticed the pattern, I was able to make my way up much more quickly until I broke through the treetops.
The death glare the Gust Falcon gave me as I did almost put me off as much as its spiritual pressure. From the strength of the gale, I thought it would be as large as a roc, but it wasn't nearly that big. It was plenty large enough for someone to ride, though, not that I was going to try to tame it. In the time it took for that thought to flash through my brain, it was already taking to the skies and angling itself to beat its wings directly at me.
The gale this time was more concentrated and a lot more forceful. This time as I held on, it really was for dear life. Once again, though, it couldn't keep it up indefinitely. However, the moment the gale stopped, it started gaining altitude fast.
It was going to dive at me, and I was sure its talons and beak would hurt way worse than any Sabrefang Leopard's fangs or Speartail Wolf's tail. Still, I wasn't confident in dodging it, so I lined up a shot instead. I barely got it off before it reached me, so I ended up striking its belly instead of wounding a wing. It kept its momentum, though I was successfully able to avoid its talons with the hit throwing it off. Still, having a bird the size of a griffin crash into you at high speed could definitely at least knock the breath out of a cultivator at my strength. All the same, I wasn't hurt, so I quickly switched to my sword, an action my personal Inner Court combat trainer had spent a lot of effort to drill into me, and cut furiously at its exposed belly. It screeched and took to the air again, readying another gale.