Chapter 873: Chapter 873

"Are we going to the space where Jie An is?"

Li Cheng looked up at the vast darkness outside the small boat, with strands of electricity flickering in his eyes.

The ’erosion’ of Angelic Tier Strength over time allowed him to faintly sense the ’bubbles’ existing in the void.

Although he could only feel a vague shadow, he felt that the ’small boat’ they were on was swiftly traversing through this void.

"To be precise, we should have arrived near the space where Jie An is."

He Ao turned his head towards a surging bubble next to him.

This bubble was about the same size as Goya’s and also exuded the unstable aura of a recent creation, but it seemed significantly more ’solid’ structurally than Goya’s.

It was the furthest from the bubble He Ao had been in before and closest to the core area, hiding amidst a cluster of bubbles.

After leaving the bubble space near Li Cheng, He Ao had put a lot of thought into finding this bubble.

However, unlike the bubbles of Goya and Li Cheng before, although this bubble had some marks of tearing indicating a struggle inside, it was now relatively stable and eerily quiet.

"Is Jie An in trouble?"

Li Cheng followed He Ao’s gaze. In his field of view, he could faintly see the shadow of the stable bubble. Sensing the quietness of this bubble, he said with some confusion,

"But with his strength, he shouldn’t be easily defeated in such a short time."

"I’ll go in and take a look."

He Ao opened his hand, and a wisp of ashes floated in the air towards Li Cheng, "This ash can maintain the existence of this small boat. After figuring out the situation, I’ll attack the core of this bubble from the inside. You cooperate and attack from the outside. We must tear this bubble apart as soon as possible."

The current bubble was different from the one that Li Cheng had just torn from the inside; this was a complete bubble. The outer wall of the bubble had a tightly packed Transcendent structure, and they couldn’t directly rush into it with the small boat.

However, based on He Ao’s current understanding of bubble structures and ’help’ from the power of the Eye of Truth, although he couldn’t bring others, he could forcefully ’squeeze’ into the bubble by himself, which he had already tried at Goya’s bubble.

Li Cheng nodded, taking the ashes.

He opened the wooden box and took out the Angelic Tier weapon, Andaville’s Spear.

Sparks of electricity spread instantly across the entire small boat.

Goya glanced at the spear in Li Cheng’s hand and unconsciously frowned slightly, but she still looked in He Ao’s direction and nodded seriously.

He Ao nodded slightly at the two of them, then held the remaining two wisps of ashes in his hand, stepped on the edge of the gunwale, and lightly leaped, jumping directly off the small boat.

In Li Cheng’s view, he saw a slender figure swiftly approaching the large ’bubble’ and then disappearing into it like vanishing into flowing water.

As the figure completely vanished into the bubble, accompanied by a loud trembling sound, the entire bubble began to tremble.

Lin Chichi carefully closed the car door, put away the umbrella, and looked out at the pouring rain through the car window.

The sound of flowing water was like strings being plucked, playing an unsettling melody.

"The rain is really heavy today."

The middle-aged man in the driver’s seat fastened his seatbelt, turned on the windshield wipers, and started the car as he watched the heavy rain outside.

As the car moved slowly and they watched the scenery retreat, Lin Chichi carefully reminded him.

"Hahaha, you make your dad sound like some hot-blooded young man."

The middle-aged man drove the car slowly, merging onto the main road.

Lin Chichi lowered her head, looking at her fingertips.

That was the sound of her heart beating rapidly inside her chest.

Lava, flames, spewing magma.

He Ao stepped on the bare hot rocks, his gaze sweeping across everything around him.

This was the bubble space he had just squeezed into.

In theory, it was the bubble space where Jie An was located.

Thanks to the previous analysis of this kind of bubble space’s outer shell when Li Cheng tore the space, his entry this time took at least two-thirds less time than before.

He looked up at the pure black ’sky’ above, where he could faintly see the dimly lit, deep ’stars’.

He Ao turned back and looked not far behind him.

There was a fiery red cliff there, and a collapsed building was erected along the edge of the cliff and the part of the cliff protruding into the lava. The very front of the building had a stone plaque, now only half remaining, showing blurred text.

He Ao stared at the text, which was clearly evolved from pictographs and was in the language of the First District.

Depending on the mental library of text in his mind, he struggled to discern the meaning of those two words,

It seemed to be some research facility.

Was this a place within the Relic?

In his memory of the Relic records, there was no content about this lava area.

He Ao glanced at the rocks exposed from the magma behind him, leaped, and quickly rushed towards the collapsed building.

His speed was very fast, reaching the rocks in front of the building almost instantly.

Just as he was about to jump into the building, a hand filled with flames and lava suddenly burst out from the scorching magma and slapped towards He Ao.

He Ao twisted his body, flipped into the air, and dodged the splattering lava in mid-space. Raising his hand, the Shadowless Sword slipped out from his grasp.

With the sound of a sharp blade cutting into rock, He Ao’s figure landed on the platform in front of the collapsing building—he steadied himself and looked up.

A lava giant, towering dozens of meters high with a broad frame, climbed out from the magma. His right hand, now severed at the wrist, dropped a heavy palm into the magma, sparking a surge of fiery sparks.

The giant looked at He Ao and let out an angry ’roar’, raising his left hand to strike at him.

He Ao’s gaze fell on the giant’s chest. It seemed the giant had just endured a brutal battle—a certain hard object had pierced through, leaving a vast breach from which flowing lava continuously spilled.

Its right shoulder appeared to have been torn open by some immense force, nearly extending the wound to his right chest, from which lava spurted forth.

He Ao raised his hand and recalled the Shadowless Sword to his hand.

This time, he didn’t engage directly with the lava giant; instead, he placed a mark on the giant and asked, "Where’s the person from just now?"

The lava giant was momentarily startled, his mind a whirl of chaotic thoughts which seemed unable to comprehend He Ao’s words. He raised his fist and smashed towards He Ao’s position.

He Ao leapt up, his form floating as he landed atop a crumbled low wall in front of the rear building. He watched the giant and repeated the question in the language of the Second District.

This time, the lava giant finally responded. He first seemed puzzled, then his mind was flooded with numerous thoughts.

Had he entered the building... and then disappeared?

He Ao rapidly organized the giant’s confused thoughts in his mind. The giant didn’t possess complete rationality; rather, it seemed like some kind of supernatural mechanism endowed with limited thinking ability, hence most of its thoughts were chaotic and cluttered.

After discarding a mass of irrelevant information, He Ao finally discerned the usable thoughts in the giant’s mind.

Was it drawn into the building by some force?

He Ao raised his hand, letting the Shadowless Sword fly from his grip, and turned to look back at the collapsed building.

That silent, deep collapse spot looked like a menacing giant mouth, lying in wait for its prey.

He turned around, jumped down from the low wall, and headed towards the wide-open entrance of the building.

With Super Memory and Eye of Truth enhancing his field of view, it was clear to him that there were no ’souls’ within this research facility.

He quickened his pace, walking deeper into the facility.

The lava giant behind him, seemingly provoked, let out a fierce roar, raised its hand, took a step forward—stepping one foot onto the land and the other into the magma, and reached out again towards He Ao.

In that instant, an invisible blade swept through the air, ringing with a metallic sound.

Like a phantom dancing amidst the fiery red brilliance, it swiftly sliced through the giant’s neck, and that massive head fell from its body.

The boiling lava finally quieted at that moment, as the once-flaming towering giant completely cooled, turning to cold stone, fell backward into the bubbling lava, and flames blazed high.

He Ao’s steps had already moved past the rubble in front of the building, reaching the ’entrance’ that had collapsed halfway.

He Ao had just passed through some ruins, which seemed to be some kind of "derivative construction" in front of the building. Here, however, was the core of the entire complex.

He gazed into the depths of the hall behind the door, his eyes sweeping across the space inside.

The building had long since collapsed, and ruins were everywhere. The only area that could still be used was a barely spacious hall.

However, from the dust-covered exquisite decorations on the remaining fragments of the building, one could vaguely see the splendor of this building in its heyday.

These Bubble Spaces were copies of the past that people entering the space most feared, which meant, in reality, there was such a ruin somewhere, and Jie An had been there before?

He Ao pondered, shifting his gaze forward.

He was now in the place where the residual strength was deepest.

He looked down at his feet.

The floor of the entire hall was covered in thick dust, and it seemed that the crumbling bricks around had also remained untouched, as the dust on them was still preserved.

This proved that either Jie An had not entered this hall, or after he entered, he hadn’t touched the ground and had directly "disappeared".

He Ao slightly crouched, focusing on the ashes around him.

According to the memories of the Giant, Jie An had been pulled into this building by some force while he was fiercely battling the Giant and was not at a disadvantage.

This proved that Jie An did not subjectively want to hide in the building for "self-preservation" and was most likely forcefully pulled into the "building".

However, He Ao saw no trace of any human activity in this building.

Had Jie An been taken away from this space by some force?

He Ao thought and stood up.

But why was it Jie An?

Among the four, Li Cheng, who held an Angelic Tier weapon, appeared the strongest and was not easily "disappeared", perhaps the reason why he was not "chosen".

But ’Hao Yi’s clone, holding only a B-level weapon as a C-level, was theoretically the weakest and should have been the easiest to be "taken", yet he wasn’t taken.

Similarly, Goya, whose actual combat ability was weaker than Jie An’s, also was not taken.

Therefore, strength might be a factor, but it likely wasn’t the only one.

What could the other factor be?

At that moment, He Ao remembered the ’Relic of the Bygone Days’ he had seen through the Echo of the Bygone Days.

That seemed to be the ’entity’ of the transparent sphere.

’Hao Yi’s clone’s Bubble Space copied the ’Main World’, unrelated to the relics.

Goya, although her space copied the relics, the site in her memory was too high-level to be recreated.

In terms of Mysticism, the more one understands and interacts, the more entangled one becomes; ordinary people who have encountered Extraordinary events are more likely to encounter them again.

For Higher Beings, this is even more apparent.

He Ao lifted his head, looking at the building in front of him.

Did this building ruin possess some kind of ’secrecy’, yet its Positional Grade was not strong enough; being a copied relic, had it formed some high-level ’entanglement’ with that Relic of the Bygone Days, thus becoming a ’channel’ through which the behind-the-scenes existence could transmit its strength?

Among the four people, the hidden being found it easiest to transfer power to Jie An, so he "took" Jie An away?

However, the process of taking Jie An away seemed somewhat ’hasty’, even the molten giants originally used to deal with Jie An looked utterly confused.

Does this mean that this was not the hidden being’s initial plan but some kind of ’emergency measure’ taken after the Angel figure appeared?

He Ao looked ahead into the deep darkness. In that endless dark, a vaguely shaped figure seemed to sit in front of him, dropping a chess piece in front of him.

It seemed that this time the enemy was trickier than before.

However, if it truly was the adversary’s countermeasure, then Jie An should still have some value for use, meaning he was most likely still alive.

Those who could rise to B-level in the Main World and establish a faction were no fools.

As long as the adversary gave Jie An a chance, he should be able to save himself.

While pondering, He Ao lifted his gaze, trying his best to invoke the spreading power of the Eye of Truth inside him and closely examined his surroundings.

As he observed meticulously, some extremely fine, black ’lines’ started appearing in his field of view.

These lines were similar to the Extraordinary Power that constructed this hall, blending into it; they were utterly indiscernible without close inspection.

But unlike the stable energies that constructed the space, these black lines were already extremely dim, having nearly dissipated.

This must have been the ’trace’ left by the hidden being’s power after passing through this space.

He Ao’s gaze locked onto these black lines and gradually found other black lines, following one all the way forward.

He quickly arrived at the center of the hall.

Here, the black lines disappeared.

He Ao glanced around, seeing no other traces, then lifted his head thoughtfully and looked upward.

The top of the building had long been blocked by fallen walls, and looking up from below, there was only darkness and the inclined walls that sealed the top.

A thin layer of fine dust had settled on these walls; not thick, but nearly covering the entire wall.

He Ao pondered, a flurry of thoughts crossing his mind.

The molten giant that once terrified Jie An had been killed, according to the usual pattern, the ’underlying monster’ of this space was about to emerge, and he didn’t have much time left to think.

After seeing the dust on the ground again, He Ao paused, then turned around to face the main entrance, half-kneeling down, mimicking the posture of sitting and dozing off.

This was Jie An’s favorite pose for dozing off.

He opened his eyes, slightly adjusted his posture, bringing his head closer to where Jie An would have been in this pose.

Following this posture, his gaze precisely fell on an inclined wall section.

That wall piece was about ten meters above the ground, still covered with fine dust. However, above that dust, someone had left twisted traces with a thin force that combined to form a symbol in Central Earth script.

The symbol was incomplete, the final stroke only half-done, clearly indicating the person writing it had not had much time.

The stroke’s curvature was too smooth, wobbly—typical of Tia Empire citizens who hadn’t practiced Central Earth script.

Clearly, this hint was meant for those from the Main World who understood Central Earth script.

It seemed that this was a ’clue’ left by Jie An, possibly related to this building within the ruins.

The one most familiar with this building was the one who had visited and left with fear of it.

’Star,’ what did it represent? Starscape? Starlight? Starry night?

He Ao lifted his gaze, slowly walked back to the entrance, and looked up at the sky. In the deep darkness of the sky, a faint starlight reflected completely unlike the normal stars.

Could there be a similar area where Jie An was ’taken away’?

As He Ao stared at this starscape, the magma in front of him suddenly began boiling furiously.

Countless molten creatures, each about two to three meters tall, emerged from this fiery lake and charged towards He Ao without hesitation.

He Ao glanced at these creatures, raising the Shadowless Sword in his hand.

The invisible sword light swept across the sky, cutting through these continuous molten creatures like mowing grass.

As these molten creatures fell, thick limbs extended from the lava.

The scalding magma vibrated intensely, as did the rocks floating in it.

The boiling magma flowed like water to the sides, revealing the monstrous form beneath.

It was a creature the size of a louse but hundreds of meters long, covered in magma, with hundreds of human legs.

The creature lowered its body, gazing at He Ao, its fiery red and slender eyes flickered, and it suddenly spewed out scorching red brilliance.

This brilliance struck the building ruins, piercing through the entire structure in an instant, leaving behind a molten hole.

Then the creature shifted its head, sweeping the brilliance down towards He Ao.

He Ao looked up at the creature, raising the Shadowless Sword in his hand, not retreating but advancing like a streak of light.

His figure grazed just beneath the lava’s brilliance, his sword piercing into the creature’s head.

Then he raised the tip of his sword, instantly slicing open the creature’s right eye.

The dual red brilliance was reduced to one.

The creature immediately halted its surging brilliance, its remaining eye looking towards He Ao as scorching lava flowed from the gaps in its armor, covering its head, flowing towards the spot where He Ao stood.

He Ao flipped up, landing like a swallow on a rock on the creature’s back.

Then he raised the Shadowless Sword, the flowing sword light instantly merging into the creature’s tough shell, slashing open its back as He Ao moved backwards.

The surging lava erupted violently, creating a spectacular scene.

The entire world flickered at that moment, endless power began pouring into the creature’s body.

The monster roared violently, shaking its body as if trying to shake He Ao off.

He Ao seized the momentum and thrust the Shadowless Sword fiercely, the hilt flying out of his hand, instantly slicing horizontally through the monster’s carapace.

At that moment, half of the hundreds of legs that were originally inserted into the magma suddenly flipped over, aimed at He Ao, and gushed out intense flames.

He Ao lowered his body and leaped out, brushing past the edge of the flame, reaching the innermost side of the horizontal wound left by the Shadowless Sword, then fiercely raised his sword and struck diagonally forward again.

Immediately following, he leaped up, passing through the gaps between the flames, and jumped toward the sky.

Those molten legs that spewed flames suddenly flipped back, spraying flames diagonally toward the sky.

At this moment, the monster’s head also elongated from its shell, turned around, looked toward the sky, and intense light burst forth once again from the monster’s remaining sole eye.

And at this moment, accompanied by a loud booming sound, grand thunder instantly filled the sky.

Dense electric light, like a giant net covering heaven and earth, enveloped the entire sky.

He Ao raised his hand, and the Shadowless Sword appeared in his grasp.

At this point, the marks left by his three attacks had connected together, forming a triangular wound.

The molten lava gushing inside the monster surged out, directly pushing off the triangular carapace that had been cut away, revealing the glowing red interior beneath.

The gigantic monster seemed to sense a certain danger.

The light that was initially budding in its eye gradually receded, while the brilliance on the separated wound became increasingly dense, like an energy-storing plasma cannon, accumulating fierce flames.

Above, He Ao watched all this with a calm expression as the thunderous brilliance converged above his head.

With a fierce effort, he thrust the Shadowless Sword downward.

Scattered thunder followed the sword light, bursting forth simultaneously.

At the same time, the monster roared, and a vast red brilliance surged from the triangular wound, colliding head-on with the sword light and thunder falling from the sky.

The three lights collided, bursting forth a surging, trembling airflow.

The howling wind swept He Ao’s hem as he still ascended through the sky, the intense brilliance reflected in his deep, dark pupils.

The sharp sword light, like slicing through grass, cut through the red light, carrying the surging electric light downward, and in an instant, penetrated the giant beast’s body.

Accompanied by a loud explosion, the giant monster’s body suddenly shattered, filling the entire world with countless cracks instantaneously.

Terrifying thunder burst forth with even more powerful momentum, tearing apart this space.

At that moment, He Ao’s upward momentum finally stopped, and he hovered at the highest point in the void, standing amidst the destructive thunder, looking up at the flickering stars above.

Then he reached out, grasping the starlight before him.

The entire world shattered thunderously, and black ash condensed in the palm of his hand.

An invisible boat emerged from the void, He Ao glanced at the broken, vanishing space, and stepped into the boat.

Li Cheng raised his head, released his hand, and handed the ash in his hand to He Ao.

"Jie An is not in there, he might have been taken deeper into the world by some behind-the-scenes being."

He Ao caught the ash.

He then briefly recounted the situation in space and his own speculations.

"That guy is cunning and lucky; he should be fine," Li Cheng sighed slightly.

Among the group, he and Jie An interacted the most, although the time as enemies far exceeded as friends.

Beside him, Goya nodded gently.

Then Li Cheng looked up at ’Hao Yi’, "But how did you think of Jie An leaving a ’hint’ through the perspective of dozing off?"

Goya also looked up, her silver pupils expectantly watching ’Hao Yi’.

She was also curious why ’Hao Yi’ thought of this.

He Ao replied softly, "There were no footprints on the floor of the hall, which proves Jie An was dragged away while suspended; hence, he didn’t necessarily have to be standing. If his posture was adjustable, I guessed he would choose the most distinctive one,

"And his sitting-lying posture was the one most frequently displayed before us, which could serve as one of the ’conditions’ for verifying his identity,

"In fact, he took many such small precautions to verify his identity, like deliberately using Central Earth characters, but the strokes were written in the style of the Tia Empire."

Jie An was clearly a person rough on the outside but meticulous inside.

At the end, He Ao saw the ’how did you guess that?’ expressions on their faces, paused,

"But if I guessed wrong, I could only quickly exhaust every possibility one by one."

Take it as the truth.

She lowered her head to look at the black ash in ’Hao Yi’s palm and asked, "This, how much more does it lack?"

He Ao looked down at his palm, "Almost there, but ordinary bubbles probably don’t have this much. Finding one near the core area should be enough."

"But it seems we don’t know the location of the core area,"

Li Cheng looked up at the surrounding illusory shadows, "The distribution of these bubbles around us seems completely random; we don’t have a fix."

He Ao raised his gaze toward the front, the shaking boat still steadily moving forward, "We have been heading toward the core area; we’ll be there soon."