Life Drain System

Chapter 179 - Something Strange / Something New

    This figure having finished another page, picks it up and moves to one of their walls to pin it on the wall. However the moment they pin it, the page disappears as if it never existed causing the person to smile before going back to their bed while thinking. '... There are so many better places, and even if he wants this planet why not just order us to take out those living here?'

    'Honestly, it is a pity the last raid has not worked out as planned. All because the princess had to show up as well as those soldiers. *Sigh. At least the next invasion should work properly, the only problem now is the timing. Hopefully everything can be ready by then.' The shadowy figure thinks to themselves as they get ready to go to sleep in their comfortable bed.

    Regardless as the time passes the hours flow by until it is once again morning, where everyone is up and out working on the project they have been assigned by Yueliang. Some high orcs heating up and melting sand before shaping the molten liquid in order to make glass. Where as some of the others including the goblins are mining one of the nearby mountains in the room for metal and not really caring what type as they could just strengthen them as alloys or otherwise if need be. Then some of the others are working on digging the massive hole that needs to be made for this project.

    Everyone having their own respective jobs to do, keeps the area very busy in this room, while in another Shen Hu and Huoli are taking good care of their little ones, and teaching them to hunt already. Yin is working on more advanced alchemical formulae and alchemical techniques with his master Bing Wen.

    Then there is Ai Lan who is laying on the ground right where emperor Rin left her last night, still not having moved except to breath and opening her eyes to look up at the sky. Still surrounded by her pets she stares up at the sky, her eyes filled with a mix of melancholy and despair. Feeling that without Yue around life is draining and debilitating just to think about not to mention actually getting up and living her life.

    However she just tries to focus on and think of her memories with him to get herself up. It is painful and tiring, but she knows that if she cannot live without him nearby, she will likely just die. That being sooner rather than later, thus she tries to adapt to her current situation.

    Meanwhile, Yueliang having tried to sleep to the best of his abilities, was in excruciating pain all through the night as his bones were realigning themselves. And while he far from being completely healed, his bones should be strong enough now to at least stand up. Although not wanting to make things worse than they already are, Yue lets go of the wall, and gently pushes himself off before using the void steps to climb up and out of the underground aquifer conduit.

    Taking one step at a time, he can feel the creaking and pain in his bones as if they are about to snap at any moment. Walking up each step, he nearly cried out, tears forming in his eyes, but he holds them back because of feeling that it is unbecoming of a man to cry especially when in front of others. (Which he is not near anybody at the moment.)

    As he makes his way up, Yueliang notices the water flow has increased and now he will have to hold his breath and either swim or find some way to get through the very high powered water flow. The water pressure being so strong at the moment that one might think the river is an oversized firehose. (A slight exaggeration, but pretty close)

    Seeing this he thinks to himself. 'No rope of any sort to pull myself through, therefore that is clearly out, cannot climb on the sides pulling myself because even if there were grooves to grab onto my body is not in good enough shape. Then again, how am I to get through this? I clearly cannot swim through it, and using the void steps would not work unless I folded space. However I have yet to even figure that out for myself. ...'

    'Wait, the crystals. There was one thing different when I succeeded that one time in doing it by accident. Plus I noticed that the ones nearest to me had changed color, yet none of the others. So unless I am wrong, the most likely thing is the crystals. Although seeing as I cannot get to them, maybe there are more beneath me if I follow the aqueduct conduit? Ugh... This is going to hurt...'

    Having finished his thoughts, he starts walking downward practically walking in place but still descending but staying close enough to the one wall he was on earlier that he does not get hit by the water at the moment. As he descends he feels chi, very dense chi the lower he gets. But not letting himself get distracted he continues down.

    Getting closer and closer to the bottom of the way down, he notices it is glowing very brightly below him. Looking closer while walking down, he sees glowing mushrooms, ferns, flowers, and various other plants. Even a few glowing rocks, however when he gets down to the bottom, which takes a bit longer since the cavern below is about 3 stories tall. 

    When he finally gets to the bottom and moves over to the dry land part and not the river, he notices a pillar in the middle of the cave, that is glowing purple and is the same as the crystals he saw up above. Although the thing that really catches his interest is when he looks down just a little bit and sees the river flowing towards it, but a few centimeters before touching it, the water disappears.

    Seeing this, he wonders if he is seeing things, or if the water is going underneath the ground, or what could be happening. With such thoughts he follows the river all the way over to the large purple crystal.

    While Yueliang walks towards the pillar he sees a few small fish that have translucent (semi transparent) fish swimming in the water, as well as a kangaroo rat with large ears coming near the water right in front of him as if there was nothing to be worried about. So letting the strange little creature get its drink of water, Yue just stands there and watches the kind of cute little creature drinking up. 

    One of the translucent fish turns toward the little large eared kangaroo rat, and as if breathing in, the fish creates a wind tunnel through the water, and sucks in the little critter into its stomach. The creature now gone and never to be seen again, the tunnel disappears, and the fish continues breathing through its gills as if nothing ever happened. 

    This display shocks Yue, but a few minutes later, he starts thinking. 'This seems strange, so are all the being in here capable of manipulating space to their will? But the pillar has not changed color even after having its energy absorbed. Is my theory wrong or am I missing something? Never the less, clearly I should not touch anything in here.'

    With these thoughts, he raises his altitude by two meters, just to be safe, regardless of the glowing plants that reach the roof of this cave.

    *Fwoosh *Leaves Rustling

    Feeling a light breeze, Yueliang looks around out of curiosity for the source. Not seeing anything that might have caused it he keeps moving, but then something clicks, and looking around, he notices everything is rearranged except for the river below him, the pillar, and the walls.

    Seeing this he picks up his pace, and while not quite scared he starts thinking. 'Clearly once I am done here, there will be no time to waste before leaving this cave, or I might be eaten or something as well.'

    Once over near the pillar, he looks down and sees what he saw as a few centimeters from way back at where he entered, was actually a whole 2 meters. Moving closer to the pillar he even watches the water coming towards him disappear, but without wasting any more time, he sits down a few centimeters from the pillar and closes his eyes to rest.

    Since he has not yet relearned how to cultivate, Yue closes his eyes to let himself rest, let his body absorb the energy around him as it has before, and anything else that may happen here. Then while that is happening, he tries to think on the nature of the way things work around here. Trying to think on the nature of how the nature is down here, he inevitably falls asleep. While he may not have done much today, healing takes a lot out of people sometimes.