Both of us kept following them, and as we kept following the beasts they all fell down into a deep hole, a trap set by a plant?, the vines started moving on their own, the plants around there seemed to be alive..
"Quick! Give me your sword!" I stretched my hand toward her.
"What are you going to do?! Are you going to try and save them? That would be suicide!" Xia Xue yelled at me.
"We don't have a choice! If they die, we won't have a other way to get out of this place!" I told her with a panicked expression.
"Can't we find another way!? What if you die?! Then what!?" She kept yelling at me. Trying to stop me from acting recklessly..
"What if there is no other way? ..." A sudden pause with silence but it was soon interrupted by me again. "Just trust me okay? I'll be fine, I promise"
She was indecisive but she nodded and handed me her sword. I quickly grabbed it "thanks".. I turned around and rushed over to the beasts to help.
As soon as I arrived I cut down the vines releasing them, but as I looked around, I couldn't find their leader, I went deeper into the hole as the vines started attacking me, I cut through them using Xue's sword and went in deeper and deeper, until I got to a dead end, a small cave like place made of vines and the leader of the beasts entangled between the vines and a small baby beast that's trapped, it seemed that the leader of the herd was trying to save the little one.
As soon as I saw the scene, I sprinted towards them releasing them both cutting down the vines, and as we turned around the way I came in was gone, the vines started getting tighter and tighter, the space slowly getting smaller, surprisingly the beasts I saved didn't attack me, it looked like they had some intelligence. Meaning there is a possibility that there are more friendly species out there, but I snapped back to the moment we were in now, I looked around to find a way to escape, a way to survive, and as the space we were in started pushing us against each other, I started cutting down the vines, I kept cutting the vines but it seemed to endless, the vines I had cut down has already regenerated like it was never cut down before. As more and more time passed, I kept cutting down the veins, my stamina started running low because the oxygen was getting lowed... Some sweat beads ran down my cheek and went to my chin, my vision was starting to get blurry.
I promised Xue to go back to her... I tighten my grip on the sword handle. I won't die here!
Suddenly a wave of energy entered my body.. I looked behind me, where the flush of energy came from, and I saw the leader of the beasts herd, it was glowing, and it was transferring its own energy to me..
..? I look puzzled. Why is it helping me now? ... Does it trust me now? ... A sigh of relief came from my mouth. I turned my head and started slicing the veins once more, I knew that there was no point in me keep cutting it as it's regenative speed was extremely high...
Suddenly, as I kept cutting the vines, it attacked me, knocking me back, with both of the beasts behind me.
What?! It's attacking now!? This is bad!!
Without another moment to react I got hit again making me fly against the wall and making a hole back to the surface, with a explosion of the terrain I was back in the surface, but not where I entered from, I saw the leader of the herd protecting the small beast, the leader was a bit wounded but the baby seemed to be alright.
I then looked back at the situation we were in, I could sense the monster that was following us back from the cave from before, but this time, it was different?
What is this feeling... I feel like I'm being pressured on by something... I looked down at my arm, two of my fingers were broken and I had many flesh wounds, there was a sudden sound inside my head.
*Hey you human! Help me protect this baby! And I'll owe you my life!*
Huh?! What!? Telepathy?! I looked at the beast as I thought to myself..
Isn't that something only a really high cultivator can do!? Even I can't do it yet! This beast doesn't seem to be normal, but it's still on my side as of now, so I don't have to be that worried...
I turned my head towards the beast and nodded..
Suddenly the ground under me crumbled
Sneak attack!? I quickly tried to dodge but a vine coming from the ground came at high-speed and it sent me up into the air leaving me opened for another attack, I gripped the handle of the sword tighter, as another vine attacked me, I used the sword to parry the attack, but the force sent me back to the ground hitting my back against the hard terrain, i landed right next to the two beasts.
"Can you help me a little!?, I can't keep up with the speed of those veins!!"
The beast suddenly sent me a wave of energy, my flesh wounds had already covered up, and my cultivatuon base had suddenly risen temporarily, I'm on par with a stage 5 silver core formation!
I could now sense the monster clearly, it was a high rank tier 4 monster, but it could be on par with a tier 5 monster, the monster that was following me and Xia Xue from before had fused with the forest because of the spiritual energy density here. But because of the energy the beast gave me my strength wasn't any less than the monster. I sensed out where the monster was and used a sword slash in it's direction, using the wind pressure to create a wind slash, as the wind slash hit a tree in that direction it created a small explosion but more importantly the tree was cut down, the monster managed to dodge it but I saw its movement, without leaving any time for it to escape, i charged at it to attack, a vine from the side tried to get me from the side but the speed of it was too slow and i managed to cut it. The monster who was made of vines didn't have anywhere to run, so it blocked my attack head on, I poured a immense amount of Qi into the sword to end it with a one move, the energy it used to block it and my energy clashed as soon as it made contact, making another explosion, the monsters strength had went down by a lot, but same for me, because of using that much energy, I came back to my original strength, my left hand was broken, blood dripping from the shoulder, my clothes were tattered with blood, but I gripped my sword once more.
Just a little more... I can do it... If I beat it... Who knows what benefits I'll gain from it thanks to the endless void... Pants. More importantly... I gained the trust of those beasts... If I win now, we can get out of here... Pants
My stamina was very low too... But I went towards the monster again, it was already injured a lot, and it's regeneration factor was damaged making it impossible for it regenerate for now. "This is my chance!"
I swung the sword at it again, with all my might, it couldn't block nor dodge because how weakened it was... And finally, it died, my endless void absorbed the core, my energy suddenly boosted, and I broke through 4 realms, I was in the 5th stage of foundation establishment, and my strength was on par with a 8th stage core formation because of the endless void. I also gained it's regeneration ability. My wounds slowly started healing on its own, the speed of the regeneration was much slower than the monster's but it was still great, I healed everything in just 40 minutes, while I was tending to the beasts, the leader of the beasts didn't seem that well, it had spent too much energy on me when it was wounded so it was dying.
The voice from before was in my head again.
*Thank you, please, take my baby back to the double winged warmblood herd... Others will take care of him until he grows to be a fine leader... This is my final request, I'll leave you this as a final gift*
Suddenly the leader of the herd started slowly crumbling into blue glowing particles and slowly vanish, some of the particles entered my body, and formed a white coloured wings similar to what they have, behind my back. As it was about to completely disappear, I nodded.
"I will... Don't worry..." And it was gone, the small double winged warmblood was sleeping admist of all of the chaos that was going on, I slowly picked it up without waking it up, and started flying upwards to spot where the herd was, without any effort I spotted them and flew down towards them, all of them gathered around me as soon as they sensed the small double winged warmblood... I slowly put it down and went away...
I went to find where I left Xia Xue, as soon as she heard me she jumped up, with relief all over her face and yelled "You're alright!" And ran towards me to hug me, she didn't even notice the wings I had... I patted her head.
"See, I told you I'd be fine" I gave her sword back... "Here... And we can get out of here now..." I smiled... As soon as she looked up towards me, she realized I had wings, she jolted backwards.
"Wha- how... How did you get wings!?" She yelped
"It's a long story... But let's just say the leader of the herd gave them to me..."
It's better not to tell her everything that happened yet...
She stared into me, it's absurd but she didn't have any other choice but to believe me, and then she grabbed me by the shoulders.
"Okay fine! But I could've sworn that you were only at the first stage of foundation establishment! How did you get to the 5th stage of foundation establishment this quickly! The aura around you is leaking like a lake!"
"That..." I was caught in a difficult position. I can't tell her my secret trump card, even if she was the person I trusted the most..
She sighed and looked at me as my expression changed, "fine... I won't pressure you into giving me an answer... Everybody has secrets after all..."
I smiled... "Thank you..." After a little pause. "Should we get out of here now?"..
She quickly nodded yes. "Yes! Let's go!"
I picked her up into my arms and started flying. She hid her face as she started a blushing a bit. I kept flying upwards, where the crack was and the sunlight was coming from, luckily we haven't been in there for more than a day. As soon as we got out of there, we were on top of a mountain, we could see the whole of Xiangchen, but not the whole Tianshang empire to the end of it because how big it was.
"Hey... Ace... Thank you..." She was looking away from me as she said it.
I scoffed with a small smile "for what?... We're friends... There's no thanking between us okay?"
She sighed.. "okay okay... Fine... You win..." She turned around with a smile so beautiful, my heart felt like it was about to burst open.
Hmm...