Consuming Earths, Devouring Skies

Chapter 331 Tracked

A bolt of black lightning traveled within the dark air southward. This black bolt emanated a deep, calamitous sensation of endless death causing all to avoid it, including low-rank Yaoguai, like a plague.

This bolt was Yan Zaizen, traveling freely without hindrance. "Will I be able to locate it in time without spatial shifting?" Asking himself, Yan Zaizen was somewhat doubtful. Despite lightning being unaffected by the Dusk Zone and death laws being amplified, the speed he traveled wasn’t enough to cover the southern Dusk Zone, let alone the entire south part of the Twilight Region.

If space was unaffected by the strange rules of the Dusk Zone, he could shorten the time by thousands of times or more, making it overly frustrating. He even contemplated using the Twelve Regalia Spatial Array. However, after some consideration, he didn’t do so.

The array was powerful, but it was taxing on the spirit. He didn’t want to be in a vulnerable position because of that. Not to mention, even if he did, with the suppressed spatial laws in this zone, it’ll be too stressful on the regalias themselves, who knows what might happen.

"If it’s not in the Dusk Zone...If I can enter the Dawn Zone, and its there, it’ll be easier than a thought to find." While the Dusk Zone suppresses life, space, and other laws like light, the Dawn Zone was the exact opposite. It promoted those and denounced the ones the Dusk Zone beloved.

As for the Flux Zone...he just hoped it wasn’t there.

"Faster." The black lightning around his body expanded and formed a small storm, even clouds suffused of deathly aura shrouded his body as it sped forward.

-----

In the black skyship with silver skulls on its hull, Yi Seo-Jun and his crew finally arrived at a particular spot. If Yan Zaizen were here, he would be surprised! This was his cultivation cave!

Park Ji-Hu exited the skyship with a group of similarly dressed subordinates. When they saw Yan Zaizen’s cultivation cave, all of their eyes flickered with a strange light. This light contained an unfathomable essence of time.

After a short period, they all wore solemn expressions, especially Park Ji-Hu.

"..." Atop the skyship peering over, an ice-cold beauty remained silent, but her eyes revealed a hint of impatience. Every so often, she’d glance over to Yi Seo-Jun, who had a calm expression as if this was an average stop on an average day.

Park Ji-Hu finally returned after a while. His face was dark and even more devilish looking than before. "It seems Hahm Eun-Jun was correct." Those words felt like they were hurtful to say, almost to the point where one could feel as if Park Ji-Hu was on the verge of throwing up his insides.

However, he still relayed the information. Shockingly, Hahm Eun-Jun, this beauty, was unconcerned with that tone as if it was normal. Her eyes did hold a tinge of internal pride. If one looked even closer, they would see her chest ger slightly more pronounced as it was puffed out.

"Oh?" Yi Seo-Jun only replied with that.

"The temporal signature in this area has been tampered with deeply. Likely some type of reversion, it’s somewhat consistent with a known anomaly. My subordinates are currently settling the temporal disturbance and find evidence of what happened." As experts of time laws, the Oneuli Empire’s men were most suitable to handle this.

Yi Seo-Jun briefly nodded.

A few minutes later, the group of men returned. They donned respectful expressions as they bowed towards Yi Seo-Jun. A single man stepped out, "the anomaly was human-made, probably in an attempt to hide itself or its tracks. We’ve tracked its signature. It went south from this location." After saying this, he withdrew back into the crowd.

Park Ji-Hu proudly nodded. He clearly wanted to showcase his men’s ability without him, and it was a success. Even Yi Seo-Jun smiled, "then, south we go." He offered some praise as well, causing the men to be content while Park Ji-Hu held a soft, prideful smile throughout.

They immediately set off south, tracking the signaturem while unbeknownst to them that they were tracking someone, who was tracking someone, who was tracking something.

-----

The gray-robed figure stopped several hundred thousand kilometers away from the Yi Seo-Jun’s location at Yan Zaizen’s cultivation cave. The figure looked backed. "Someone’s locked onto my time signature?" The figure seemed somewhat shocked but coldly snorted. It was as if it was being challenged.

Suddenly, its figure split into thousands of temporal distortions which all vanished as if they hadn’t existed a moment ago. "Let’s see you follow this." After another snort, the figure faded out of time once more.

-----

Yan Zaizen was unknown to all these matters, but currently, he had stopped his movements. He looked down, his eyes bright, and his body was nearly trembling in shock. "Is this even possible?!"

Below him was a few figures, they looked like cultivators that were traveling. Their skyship was anchored with various defensive formations on it, concealing it and preventing any form of sense from entering. However, Yan Zaizen recognized this skyship. It was a skyship he had even traveled on!

Esi’s Skyship!!!

He blinked. Inspecting the skyship once more, he was confident that this was the ship that he had boarded with the treacherous duo. While ships can look differently, there were minute differences between them, such as additions of symbols, the number of weapons, the size of the flag above it, etcetera. This ship was entirely consistent with all the identifying markers.

However, to be sure, he waved his hand. A blue, translucent figure appeared. This figure was Eshe’s soul form. After destroying her physical body, Yan Zaizen had kept her soul restrained within the Meteor Ring until his cultivation base reached a point where he could safely search her soul flame. However, even though he formed his own Dao Heart, his soul was still at the Perfect Nascent Soul Realm.

Eshe’s soul, however, was at a realm he couldn’t deduce. It seemed she had taken another soul path, something Yan Zaizen hadn’t figured out. However, he concluded it was roughly as strong as the Astral Soul Realm.

When the soul appeared, it looked weak, but there was a calmness in its eyes that revealed a sea of hatred. It was eerie, and anyone who’d see those soul eyes of hers would find themselves shivering.

"Found her," Yan Zaizen coldly spoke. His voice was suffused with a triumphant tone as he forced the soul to look downwards. When it did, it shook slightly. However, this shaking became even more tremendous after a short period. Eshe’s soul transmitted a message, pleading Yan Zaizen to spare her sister, and a willingness to do anything he asked. Yan Zaizen’s eyes narrowed, his brows furrowed, and his hands gripped the soul harder.

"So...this isn’t hers?" Yan Zaizen’s voice was like thunderbolts to Eshe. As if her entirety had been seen through, she no longer kept the mask and glared ferociously with the intent to eat his flesh and devour his soul.

Laughing coldly, Yan Zaizen placed her back in the Meteor Ring.

"This skyship is like a mirror image, but Eshe wasn’t desolate as I expected. Instead, she was pleading..." He was far more cautious and suspicious than before, often thinking deeply on any matter before acting. This was why he hadn’t attacked the skyship immediately but instead wanted to see how Eshe would react.

He didn’t feel any instinctual warning towards this skyship, but he was still cautious. After some thought, he shook his head and continued south.

Within the skyship, an old man was looking up at Yan Zaizen. This old man had white hair, an old white mustache, and a brawny body. He looked like a bodybuilder! However, his aura didn’t reveal a vast physical presence, but instead a light and fleeting feeling, like the wind itself. His brows were somewhat furrowed, unsure of what to think.

"Who was that?" The old man murmured to himself.

A member of the crew on this skyship immediately arrived, he gave a respectful salute, and said, "Captain, we’ve finished repairs." After saying this, he awaited orders. However, the old man who had been dubbed Captain was preoccupied with his own thoughts.

If Yan Zaizen were to see this old man, he would’ve been shocked! His aura may be light and fleeting, but it contained an unfathomably powerful feeling. This old man was a Heavenly Monarch! Not only that...

After some time, "Ready the ship and....follow that man." As he said this, the member of the crew was somewhat shocked, but he nodded immediately, turning towards where Yan Zaizen had taken off. He couldn’t help but feel pity for that poor sap. He left.

"The soul he brought out...I don’t recognize it, but there may be more to this." He thought further on the event and couldn’t help but be even more suspicious. In a few minutes, the ship had powered up and followed Yan Zaizen’s trail.