Death... and me

When Rean's group began to get closer to the valley again, they stopped so Rean could change their appearances. Soon, the fake red meridians appeared on everyone's bodies. Not long after, they made sure that they ran Spiritual Energy inside them. Of course, as Rean did in the past, he could also change how they looked like. So not only did they have the red meridians, but their faces and builds were very different as well.

There was only one thing that Rean couldn't do anything about, the fact that his ability changed the color of everyone's hair to snow-white. Well, that wasn't really an issue. They had a lot of material to use on Calina. After all, she always showed black hair to everyone while she was, in fact, blond. 

Roan, of course, took over the tasks and made sure that everyone's hair looked very different from what the Lakure Race members knew. Still, there was one thing that Wano couldn't understand.

'Just where the hell did they get these things? Did they go to the abandoned cities while I wasn't looking and took these things? But... How come I didn't notice them carrying it up to this point?'

Naturally, these materials were inside the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm.

Roan quickly finished dying their hairs and changing their styles. Sure enough, it became as believable as what he did with Calina back then. 

"Well, let's first try it out."

Instead of heading straight to the valley, Rean's group decided to approach one of the outside groups patrolling the region. As one could expect, Rean didn't use his Spiritual Sense and Light bending skill this time. When the enemy's Core and Soul Fusion noticed five cultivators in his Spiritual Sense, the entire group became ready to battle.

However, all he saw was five members of his own race approaching.

"Hmm? What are you doing here? This region was supposed to be ours to check, you know?"

Although their appearances were different, their cultivations were still the same. That being said, Wano was seen as the leader of Rean's group. Well, Wano had never felt like he had a low position to start with.

"Sorry, sorry. We just came out of the valley for the first time, so we got a little lost. It's not like other teams didn't have this problem before."

The leader on the other side nodded.

"I see. You guys have just arrived from the teleport formation, right? You're quite lucky, then. There are way more of our race members down there in the underground world than here on the surface. Because of the seal on the underground world, we can only bring a few of them every day."

Wano smiled before sighing.

"I know, right? It was quite hard to wait until my time came. Anyway, we're heading back to the valley. Sorry for disturbing you."

The man didn't suspect Rean's group identity even for a second. That's because they had never heard about anyone posing as a Lakure Race member. Obviously, that's because one shouldn't be able to fake their special meridians. When he saw that Spiritual Energy was running through the 'meridians' on Rean's group, he already determined that they were the real deal.

Well, he couldn't be blamed. After all, who can do something like what Rean did to their bodies? It's not like no one can do that with their bodies. However, what are the chances of finding a group of five, all disguising themselves with fake meridians? That seemed ridiculous. 

Of course, Rean's group wasn't overconfident. Roan made sure that they tested it a few more times with other groups. However, none of them seemed to be able to recognize them as fake. Only then did he agree to have all of them entering the valley.

However, just as they were about to enter the valley, they saw a commotion ahead. Suddenly, there were multiple Lakure Race cultivators running in their direction at full speed.

'Shit!'

Their group turned around to flee straight away. However, Rean and Roan suddenly noticed that something was off.

'Wait! There's no killing intent directed at us.'

Immediately, they noticed that something wasn't right and sent Malaka, Calina, and Wano a Spiritual Sense message.

'Don't run. Wait and see what's happening.'

Malaka and Calina nodded in response. However, Wano couldn't help but feel a little nervous. After all, he didn't have the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm like Rean and Roan, nor did he know it existed. He would have to rely on himself to run away. If he really waited, it would make things more difficult for him later. However, the twins had been right all this time, so he decided to give it a shot and didn't run.

Sure enough, the Lakure Race members passed by them, running by them as if they didn't even exist. It looked like that their target was something completely different.

Rean's group mentally sighed in relief and waited for everyone to pass while showing a puzzled expression. In any case, they didn't care about that. They only wanted to enter the valley to look for Masput Rocks.

However, they were not given a chance to do so. A man suddenly stopped midair as he looked at Rean's group in the middle of the pack.

"You five, come with us as well. The humans' cultivators appeared again. Be ready to fight at any moment."

The mouths of Rean's group twitched in response. Of course, they knew very well that the other powers had entered the natural formation. However, they had never met each other all this time. After all, they stayed close to the valley while the others stayed far away from it. However, just when they finally decided to enter the valley, those guys decided to come out as well. What kind of luck was that?

Unfortunately, they couldn't refuse the order. After all, it was obvious that the guy in front of them was in the Nascent Soul Realm. Not only that, but quite a few more Lakure Race cultivators passed flying above him while not bothering to hide their cultivation at all. Rean's group could tell that not only were there Nascent Soul Realm cultivators between them, but there were also Soul Forging Realm cultivators. If there was anything good in this development, it was the fact that no one seemed to find anything different in Rean's group.

Still, Wano decided to give it a try.

"Senior. We just came back from the underground world and finished our patrolling. Do we really need to go as well?"

However, that only made the man in front of them show a dark expression.

"Are you telling that you're afraid of fighting the humans? You? A Lakure Race member? How the hell did you obtain the chance to come out of the underground world?"

Wano bitterly smiled when he heard that. It seemed like he stepped on a mine.

However, Rean quickly came to his rescue.

"That's definitely not it, senior. It's just that the poison in our brother's body began to act recently, so he can't display his full power. He doesn't want to drag the rest of the race down because of his poison."

Finally, the Nascent Soul expert relaxed his expression. The poison acting up was something that every Lakure Race member was used to. Rean found about it while healing the Lakure Race members in the past two years. Unfortunately, it couldn't be avoided and happened every now and then. During that time, their combat ability would indeed drop a little due to the poison's pain. Obviously, the man in front of Rean's group was no exception.

"I understand. However, we need as many members as possible. Just grit your teeth and follow us. We are planning to wipe them out in a single go now that they finally got close to the valley."

Without any other choice, Rean's group nodded and immediately turned around. They could only follow the other members and see what would happen. Of course, Rean's group also thought that they might find a chance to escape this problem.

On their way back, Rean took the chance to send a Spiritual Sense message to one of the Lakure people running with them.

'Brother, what do you know about this group of humans? We just came out of the underground world, so we're oblivious to the situation. Are we going into an all-out war against the humans?'

The guy didn't find it strange. Every day, a new batch of their race would come out of the teleport formation, after all.

'The situation is not like what you probably think. I was here ever since we decided to show our presence. At first, that's what everyone thought. We even wiped out the cities that were caught in the natural formation. However, there has been a recent rumor that our ancestor is planning to negotiate.'

Rean's eyes lit up.

'Oh! And why is that?'

The guy shook his head.

'There are a lot of things going on, so I'm not entirely sure. I'll tell you what I've heard. For example, there was an order that Nascent Soul Realm and above warriors of our race can't attack those at the Core and Soul Fusion Realm and below. The ancestor wanted the things inside here to be fairer to both sides. I don't know why, though. There is also the Fat Bird Group's appearance, which is healing everyone's poisons after beating them up. Last but not least, there's even a rumor that what we think happened in the past is different from the truth. That humans were not really completely at fault about the sealing.'

Rean and the guy then conversed through Spiritual Sense for half a minute. After all, Spiritual Sense messages were instantaneous, so it only took this long.

Still, Rean was surprised to hear about everything that was happening. He didn't expect that his poison healing plan would work that well either. The question was what they should do with that information.