Novel Full Chapter 366: Five days
Chapter 366: Five days
Five days passed quickly since Kyrian had fallen asleep inside the small hidden cave in the intermediate area of the Great Volcano.
Outside, the world continued exactly as always. Violent. Hot. Hostile.
The distant sound of lava flowing through the volcanic mountains constantly echoed throughout the region like the breathing of a sleeping giant, mixing with the occasional roars of fire beasts hunting one another across the volcano’s black slopes.
Sporadic tremors shook the ground, constant reminders that the mountain was alive, pulsing with power.
Ash continued to fall slowly from the reddish sky, accumulating in thin layers over every exposed surface. The air remained heavy and suffocating.
Inside the cave, however, there was only silence.
Kyrian had not moved during all that time.
His body remained leaning against the rocky wall, eyes closed, breathing slow and steady. With each passing day, the ice around him diminished slightly while his body slowly recovered from the marks left by the battle against the Five-Horned Lava Lizard.
...
During the first two days after the battle between Kyrian and the draconic beast, the groups sent by the great powers of Red Smoke City completely finished exploring the entire Outer Area of the Great Volcano.
Every mountain. Every cave. Every volcanic valley.
Nothing was left behind.
The disciples searched every crevice, every suspicious rock formation, and every area where Qi behaved differently.
Some elders used perception techniques to scan underground in search of hidden chambers or ancient formations.
But they found absolutely no clues related to Ming Hai’s tomb.
No mechanisms. No formations. No ruins.
Nothing.
Frustration grew among the groups. Some began murmuring that the inheritance might only be a rumor, an old legend with no real foundation. Others insisted they were searching in the wrong places.
The truth, however, was that everyone had already expected this. The outer area was the safest zone of the volcano and also the most likely to have been explored by others in previous centuries. If Ming Hai’s tomb were that exposed, someone would have found it long ago.
Then, inevitably, all the groups began advancing toward the Intermediate Area.
Even though it was far more dangerous.
Even knowing that beasts in the Core Formation Realm inhabited that region.
Even aware that they might never return.
The greed for Ming Hai’s inheritance was simply too great. Centuries of waiting, of stories told and retold, of promises of power and wealth, all of it weighed upon the minds of cultivators like an anchor of ambition.
And so, the exploration began again.
...
Another three days passed quickly.
Half of the Intermediate Area was explored by the ordinary groups led by the elders of the four great powers. Each group received a zone of responsibility, a specific area of the mountain to search. The disciples walked in tight formations, their weapons always ready, their defenses always active.
There were encounters with fire beasts. There were injuries. There were deaths.
Several cultivators from different groups fell into a lava fissure and were carbonized before anyone could help them. Another was dragged underground by an Armored Magma Mole before his companions could react.
The intermediate area did not forgive the careless.
The other half of the Intermediate Area, however, was personally explored by the four leaders of the great powers.
Cultivators of the Spiritual Awakening Realm.
Existences far above everyone else present.
While the ordinary elders and disciples advanced cautiously, fighting every beast that appeared in their path, the four leaders simply... walked. Their presences were so overwhelming that most beasts fled before even approaching. Those that did not flee were eliminated with a single strike.
Their spiritual senses could cover enormous distances. Places that would take ordinary cultivators days to analyze could be examined within a few hours by them. With a spiritual sweep, vast stretches of terrain were mapped instantly.
Because of that, working together, the four leaders quickly explored a large part of the immense volcanic mountain. They split apart, each covering a different quadrant, and periodically regrouped to share information.
But even so...
Nothing.
No clue about the tomb.
No sign of Ming Hai.
As though the inheritance simply did not exist.
...
After another entire day without progress, the four leaders finally decided to gather all the groups together.
A luminous signal was launched into the skies of the Intermediate Area.
It was a mark formed from fire and spiritual Qi, a pillar of yellow light rising toward the heavens, visible from dozens of kilometers away. The flame danced in the air, pulsing at regular intervals, transmitting a simple message to everyone who saw it.
It was a gathering.
All the elders immediately understood its meaning.
It was a summons.
The leaders wanted everyone assembled. Probably to plan the next steps, or perhaps to decide whether the search would continue.
Thus, the groups slowly began gathering at the meeting point.
The group led by Pan Zheng’s elder naturally also headed in that direction.
...
Since the attack of the Five-Horned Lava Lizard, the atmosphere within the group had remained heavy.
Most of them were still frightened.
Even after five days, some disciples still remembered the monstrous roars of the beast and the crushing terror of that draconic pressure.
They relived the moment in their dreams, the ground shaking, the heat rising, the creature’s shadow emerging from underground.
They knew they had escaped death through pure luck.
Or rather...
Because someone stayed behind.
The elder did not comment on the matter. Whenever the conversation approached what had happened, he changed the subject or simply silenced the disciples with a stern glance.
Pan Zheng walked in silence among the group.
His face looked far more exhausted than before, dark circles beneath his eyes, expression heavy.
His eyes carried guilt.
During the past few days, he had thought countless times about the final scene.
Kyrian is staying behind, alone.
That young figure faced a monstrous beast while everyone else fled desperately.
Pan Zheng was not stupid.
He knew perfectly well what that meant. At least, that was what he believed. To him, Kyrian had stayed behind to delay the lizard.
He knew the beast would kill him, yet he chose to stay anyway. To buy time for the others.
Kyrian stayed because... because?
Pan Zheng did not know the answer. And probably never would.
To him, Kyrian had most likely died because of it.