Chapter 568 The Final Three Factions

"Crackle."

Sparks flew.

A massive, short-beaked eagle perched high in the treetops just like always, faint flashes of lightning visible as its feathers rubbed together.

Its sharp eyes, gleaming with the intelligence of a sapient creature, scanned the surroundings for potential prey while tracking the positions of adventurers through its Perception.

Not far behind it, the pale red boundary of the secret realm was closing inward at a visible rate.

Though he didn't know exactly what had happened, ever since the boundary's contraction accelerated a few days ago, he had gained the ability to sense the locations of other adventurers.

Having already killed other adventurers to absorb their life energy, he was nearing the Second Evolution. He knew perfectly well that the ritual had likely reached its final stage.

His identity as a bird of prey capable of flight made him feel like a fish in water in this environment. Fully utilizing his speed and aerial advantage, he had been massacring the adventurers in the surrounding area.

Just this morning, he had swooped down from the sky and crushed a gopher adventurer who had cautiously peeked out of its burrow. Thanks to the unusually large amount of lingering life energy he absorbed from the kill, he had finally reached the Third Evolution stage.

He could roughly guess that "Algae Scale" Dodd was plotting something by holding this ritual. But he was just an ordinary adventurer who had brought his squad to Stodd Island to attend the Lunar Tide Banquet. He might have a bit of a reputation in the Southern Archipelagos, but he had little to do with that great pirate.

Still, since they had dragged him into this mess, he was going to cause them some trouble no matter what.

Pondering his next move, the lightning eagle adventurer searched for his next target through his Perception.

Suddenly, a speck of light quietly entered his sensing range.

'Pretty close. Should be just a short distance away to the southwest.'

'I can fly over and take a look first. If it's too tough to deal with, I'll just find another.'

His style of doing things was fairly cautious, and he made full use of his flight advantage.

Before attacking, he would always carefully observe his chosen target. If they had also reached the Third Evolution or looked too troublesome, he would temporarily retreat and choose another.

"Awooo—"

A long, fierce wolf howl suddenly rang out from the southwest, echoing leisurely over the plains.

It drew the lightning eagle adventurer's attention, snapping him back to reality.

His sharp eagle eyes subconsciously looked toward the source of the howl. In the distance across the plains, he could faintly make out a blurry black shadow moving at high speed.

To be clearly visible to the naked eye from such a great distance meant its speed was incredible.

But since they were so far apart and the other party was restricted to running on the ground, while he could take flight at a moment's notice with a flap of his wings, he assumed it was just an ordinary monster in the secret realm and didn't pay it much mind.

He focused his attention again, sensing the locations of the surrounding adventurers.

'Huh?'

He suddenly froze.

He realized that the speck of light he had chosen as his target had vanished from its spot in the brief moment he was distracted.

In its place was a different speck of light, much closer to him now, flickering as it seemingly moved in his direction.

Realizing something, the lightning eagle adventurer snapped his head back, his gaze shooting toward the direction of that black shadow.

In just a few short seconds, the creature had crossed the vast distance between them at an absurd speed and was now relatively close.

It was close enough that he could see the pitch-black Wolf Head condensed from mist swirling around its body, as well as the surrounding air distorting from its high-speed movement.

He had never seen a wolf-like creature with such an appearance and method of movement.

Before he had time to think, a sense of extreme danger exploded in his heart.

He instinctively tried to flap his wings and take off, but the moment the thought of escape surfaced in his mind, the wolf howl still echoing in his ears seemed to sense his weakness and instantly seized the opening.

Boundless fear spread through his mind, freezing his movements.

Even his thoughts seemed to grind to a halt.

By the time he reacted, his vision was spinning, and he caught sight of his own body sliced into two bloody halves.

In this final stage of the ritual, adhering to the principle of prioritizing efficiency, Xia Nan didn't waste a single second.

He absorbed and digested the glowing blue life energy floating above the corpse, simultaneously searching for his next target among the few adventurers left in his Perception.

Deep in the forest, located at the very center of the secret realm's current map.

"Rustle..."

A sudden vibration came from beneath the slightly rolling ground.

Dirt and mud splattered outward.

A giant burrowing worm, covered entirely in a metallic carapace and possessing a hideous, spiral-shaped maw, slowly poked its head out of the soil and carefully observed its surroundings.

Seeing nothing but trees and an empty, clear sky, a very human-like look of confusion appeared in its massive, insectoid compound eyes.

As an adventurer who had also completed the Third Evolution, he had sensed the changes in the secret realm and switched from passive to active, using his perception to hunt down the other adventurers in the ritual.

To be safe, he instinctively avoided the small groups that appeared to be working together, exclusively picking off solitary individuals as his targets.

Things had gone fairly smoothly overall. Though he was still a long way from the Fourth Evolution, he had taken advantage of the secret realm's final stage over the past two days to absorb and stockpile a significant amount of life energy.

Right now, just like before, he was searching for a target.

But oddly enough, his Perception clearly showed that the two specks of light symbolizing adventurers had overlapped, yet despite circling the area over and over, he couldn't find the other adventurer.

'Could they be in the sky? Or maybe they have some sort of invisibility? Or...'

As if realizing something, the burrowing worm looked down at the dirt beneath its body.

Perhaps the other party also possessed the ability to move underground, and had been hiding deep below the surface this whole time?

If that were the case, it would explain why he couldn't find them despite the overlapping light specks.

Having wasted so much precious hunting time, the burrowing worm adventurer felt rather angry. He subconsciously let out a ferocious hiss like a wild beast.

Its sharp maw drilled downward, churning the surrounding soil. The long, worm-like body wriggled and disappeared deep underground, leaving only a pitch-black hole in its wake.

Three minutes later.

"Roarrr—"

A flash of blistering, orange-red firelight flickered and died deep within the dark tunnel left by the burrowing worm. Faintly, the high-pitched, distinctive roar of a giant dragon could be heard echoing from far beneath the earth.

In his Perception, one of the two previously overlapping specks of light quietly snuffed out.

Only one remained—the one that had landed here at the very beginning and stayed perfectly still no matter how the secret realm changed.

It sat there exactly as before: isolated, motionless, and completely harmless.

The duration of the secret realm, relative to the number of adventurers pulled into it, wasn't actually that long.

This was especially true after the series of events that had occurred: the life energy airdrops, the appearance of elite monsters, and the sharing of locations.

The ritual's progress had been vastly accelerated.

The ones who reaped the greatest rewards were, apart from a certain black wolf madly hunting to strengthen himself and a dragon whelp developing safely by its guardian's side, naturally the architect of the ritual: "Algae Scale" Dodd.

"Shkk! Shkk!"

Sharp, hard stone spikes jutted up from the ground in a crisscross pattern, completely impaling the massive, mountain-like bovine monster in the clearing ahead. Blood and organs spilled all over the ground.

It died on the spot. Glowing blue life energy floated upward and was absorbed by the crystalline horned lizard beside it, which was now even more massive than it had been a few days ago.

A hint of slight disappointment flashed across Dodd's face, though it was quickly replaced by satisfaction and the thrilling anticipation of his impending promotion to the Transcendent Tier.

As time went on, he grew more and more thankful and amazed at his own wisdom.

Activating the final authority was undoubtedly the most correct decision he had made since entering the secret realm!

The life energy he had missed out on from skipping the airdrops earlier had practically all been made up for in one fell swoop over these past few days.

With an already outstanding racial starting point, after reaching the Fourth Evolution, he could crush the remaining adventurers in the secret realm—who were only at the Second or Third Evolution—like crushing dry weeds and rotting wood.

It had only taken a few days of day-and-night hunting.

By now, there were hardly any adventurers left in the entire secret realm.

After absorbing the life energy from the bovine monster before him, he was now just a hair's breadth away from the final Fifth Evolution.

He just needed a little more life energy. Even the most ordinary beast that hadn't reached the First Evolution would be enough to push him to the peak.

When that time came, having climbed to the highest point of life hierarchy in the ritual and standing as the last survivor in the secret realm, he would take on the class of [Scale Shifter] in its most perfect form and ascend to the "Transcendent Tier."

He had waited far, far too long for this moment.

So much so that right now, with the ritual nearing completion, his body couldn't stop trembling just thinking about the glorious future that awaited him.

"Huu... Huu..."

Sprawling his six short, thick legs on the ground, he took a few deep breaths, practically forcing himself to calm down.

Only then did he refocus his consciousness, using his Perception to observe the situation in the secret realm.

Currently, counting himself, there were only four factions left in the entire secret realm.

Two of them were grouped-up teams. One was an Adventurer Squad he had already observed, consisting of a full four adventurers.

The other was a relatively smaller two-person team. They...

Focusing his attention, Dodd suddenly froze.

In just the few short seconds he spent observing the battlefield, he watched the two adventurer teams—a total of six specks of light—collide and overlap.

Then, the two specks that had actively charged forward abruptly blinked out, leaving only the four-person squad.

Seeing this, Dodd's expression darkened.

It seemed... the combat strength of this four-person squad was a bit stronger than he'd imagined?

After all, anyone able to survive in the secret realm to its final stage was generally no pushover, unless they were incredibly lucky or had an exceptionally hidden spot.

And according to his observations over this period, these two teams rarely stayed in one place, making it obvious they had engaged in battles with other adventurers.

Based on that premise, their combat capabilities certainly weren't weak.

Under these circumstances, for the two to clash and one side to get completely wiped out at such a speed was proof enough of the other side's strength.

However... to be honest, with Dodd's current Fourth Evolution life level nearing completion, he didn't need to worry too much.

Even if their strength exceeded his expectations, once he reached the Fifth Evolution and descended upon them, it wouldn't matter how many of them there were. In the face of their vast disparity in strength, they would have no choice but to obediently become stepping stones for his ascension to the Transcendent Tier.

And the reason Dodd was so confident he could elevate his evolution stage to the fifth before clashing with this Adventurer Squad...

...lay entirely with the final faction currently in the secret realm.

Like him, this one was a lone wolf.

Moreover, they were relatively close, located right in the center of the secret realm's current map.

Honestly, Dodd had been keeping an eye on them for a while now.

After all, the ritual itself was highly randomized. Even though his status as the architect gave him massive conveniences, he couldn't rule out the chance that other adventurers might perform exceptionally well for various reasons, perhaps even catching up to his progress.

Given that, he naturally took note of this oddly behaving solo player.

Over the past two days, Dodd had frequently seen other adventurers overlap with this person.

But weirdly enough, only a small handful of them were killed and dissipated.

The vast majority of those who collided with them simply stopped in place for a brief moment, circled around the speck of light a few times, and then slinked away dejectedly.

At first, Dodd found it bizarre and couldn't understand why.

But after thinking on it for a moment, he realized the truth.

Clearly, when faced with the secret realm's final stage, this solo player—unlike his own plan of actively hunting prey to strengthen himself...

...had chosen to stay put, utilizing the traits of the monster they possessed to hide in a spot that was incredibly concealed yet not entirely impossible to reach.

That was what caused the other lured-in adventurers to experience what he had sensed.

This meant that even though this person had survived until now as a lone wolf just like him, there was a high probability their actual evolution stage wasn't very high.

They might not even have reached the Third Evolution!

Their strength was extremely limited. They had only managed to hang on until now entirely through the convenience of their location and their hiding abilities.

Under these circumstances, as long as he could find them, he could easily turn them into harvestable life energy and push himself into the Fifth Evolution stage.

When that happened, the remaining four-person squad would be nothing to worry about.

Formulating his plan of action, he noticed the squad in his Perception getting restless, seemingly showing signs of moving in his direction.

To play it safe, even though Dodd was confident they were no match for him despite their numbers advantage, he didn't actively charge to meet them.

Instead, he changed course and scurried his six short legs toward the lone wolf who had remained in place this whole time, rushing over as fast as he could.