Chapter 171: Northern Wasteland Titan Guild

".....the White Knight Guild will always support you."

Inside the endless darkness of the distorted space, Vice Head’s final words continued to echo within the minds of the three of them.

The strange voice seemed to linger far longer than it should have, gradually fading into the surrounding silence until only the darkness remained.

Neither Ethan nor Amelia spoke.

Lukas also remained silent.

However, unlike the other two, his attention wasn’t on Vice Head’s promise.

Instead, he was carefully observing his surroundings.

This teleportation feels slightly different...

He muttered inwardly, his senses spreading as far as they could into the darkness.

His eyes were useless here.

No matter how hard he looked, there was nothing to see.

Not light.

Not shadows.

Not even the vague outlines of his own hands.

It was as though his vision itself had been swallowed by the endless void.

Yet Lukas wasn’t relying solely on his eyesight.

An awakened possessed senses far beyond those of ordinary humans.

Even without sight, they could still perceive the world through countless subtle changes.

The movement of air.

Minute spatial fluctuations.

The flow of star energy.

The instinctive perception cultivated through countless battles.

Lukas instinctively reached out with his senses, trying to grasp the familiar flow of star energy surrounding him.

Normally, no matter where he was, the world was filled with countless tiny particles of star energy drifting through the atmosphere.

Some places had thinner concentrations.

Others possessed incredibly rich densities.

But regardless of the location...

Star energy was always present.

Yet this time...

He found nothing.

Not even the slightest trace.

His brows slowly knitted together.

...What’s going on?

For a brief moment, Lukas thought his perception had made a mistake.

He concentrated once more, extending his senses even further.

Still...

Nothing.

Not a single fluctuation answered him.

A faint ripple of surprise appeared in his heart.

What’s wrong...?

Why can’t I see the star energy...?

Had those words escaped his mouth instead of remaining inside his thoughts, everyone around him would have undoubtedly looked at him as though he had completely lost his mind.

They would probably ask him the same question with utterly bewildered expressions.

Brother... since when could anyone see star energy?

To every awakened in existence, this was basic common sense.

Star energy could be sensed.

It could be absorbed.

It could be manipulated.

But it could never be seen.

No matter how talented an awakened was, they perceived star energy through spiritual awareness rather than physical sight.

That was a fact everyone accepted without question.

It was common knowledge.

Yet now...

Lukas was talking about seeing star energy.

If he weren’t insane...

Then what exactly was he?

Of course, if Lukas knew what they were thinking, he would probably respond with nothing more than a dismissive snort.

A bunch of ignorant dimwits.

His lips almost curled upward.

Not because they were stupid.

But because they simply didn’t know any better.

After all...

The common sense of ordinary awakened no longer applied to him.

Ever since the birth of the cosmos within his body, countless changes had silently taken place.

His bloodline had transformed.

His body had evolved.

Even his perception of the world itself had become fundamentally different.

What everyone else could only vaguely sense...

Lukas could observe directly with his own eyes.

Star energy was no longer an invisible force to him.

Instead, it appeared as countless tiny streams of brilliant light flowing freely through the world, weaving together like an endless ocean of shimmering stars.

Whether it was dense or sparse...

Violent or calm...

He could distinguish every subtle change with a single glance.

Which was precisely why...

The complete absence of star energy here felt so unnatural.

It wasn’t that the surrounding star energy had become thin.

It wasn’t that it had become difficult to sense.

Rather...

There simply wasn’t any.

As though this place existed completely outside the reach of the world’s star energy.

That realization caused Lukas’s expression to gradually turn serious.

If even star energy couldn’t exist here...

Then what exactly was this place?

Just as Lukas was lost in thought, a faint glimmer finally pierced through the endless darkness.

It started as nothing more than a tiny speck of pale light.

Then another.

And another.

Within seconds, the suffocating darkness rapidly receded, revealing the world hidden beneath it.

Lukas instinctively narrowed his eyes.

The first thing that entered his vision wasn’t a magnificent palace or an ancient temple.

Instead...

He found himself standing atop an enormous platform.

A platform made entirely from bones.

Thousands...

No.

Hundreds of thousands of bones were piled together, each one tightly stitched into place by thick, dark-red veins of dried blood that acted as glue, binding the entire structure into one horrifying whole.

The countless skeletons intertwined with one another so perfectly that they formed a smooth surface despite their grotesque appearance.

The skull beneath Lukas’s feet stared upward with hollow eye sockets, while jagged ribs and twisted vertebrae protruded from every corner of the platform like the remains of an ancient battlefield.

A faint metallic smell still lingered in the air.

It wasn’t the fresh scent of blood.

Rather...

It was the stale, suffocating smell left behind after countless years of slaughter.

Lukas slowly crouched down and ran his fingers across one of the exposed bones.

The surface was surprisingly smooth.

His gaze narrowed.

Every single bone carried an astonishingly clean fracture.

There were no cracks.

No shattered edges.

Each cut was perfectly straight, as though every skeleton had been severed by an unimaginably sharp weapon in a single strike.

What in the world is that...?

His gaze slowly lifted.

Stretching out before the platform was a massive bridge that disappeared into the endless sky.

There were no supporting pillars.

No chains.

No visible force holding it in place.

It simply floated through the heavens as though the world itself acknowledged its existence.

Just like the platform beneath his feet...

The bridge was also constructed entirely from bones.

Countless white skeletons formed its foundation, stretching endlessly toward a destination hidden beyond the clouds.

The sheer scale of it made Lukas feel unbelievably small.

Then...

As though some invisible seal had suddenly shattered...

The absolute silence disappeared.

A deafening wave of voices instantly flooded his ears.

"Damn it, Father... if you’re watching from the heavens... do you see this?"

"I finally made it to the Demigod Realm!"

The young man’s voice trembled with excitement.

His knees crashed heavily against the bone platform as he pointed a trembling fist toward the endless sky.

His face had already turned completely red.

Tears streamed uncontrollably down his cheeks, yet he made no effort to wipe them away.

Instead, he laughed.

A loud, emotional laugh filled with years of suppressed frustration and longing.

"Just wait..."

"Your son will claim the Demigod Legacy!"

"I’ll rewrite our family’s history forever!"

His voice echoed throughout the platform.

The young man looked no older than eighteen or nineteen.

His clothes were ordinary.

His cultivation wasn’t particularly outstanding.

Yet at this moment, none of that mattered.

There was only overwhelming excitement.

It wasn’t just him.

Several other young awakeners wore similarly emotional expressions.

Some clenched their fists so tightly that veins bulged across the backs of their hands.

Others quietly wiped away tears before anyone noticed.

For countless awakeners...

Simply stepping into the inheritance space of a demigod was already something they had dreamed about their entire lives.

However...

Not everyone shared that enthusiasm.

Several older-looking awakeners merely glanced toward the emotional youths before shaking their heads with amused expressions.

One middle-aged man folded his arms and let out a faint snort.

"Claim the Demigod Legacy?"

"My foot."

His tone was filled with obvious ridicule.

"For countless years, heaven-defying geniuses from every major guild have entered this place."

"Each one believed they would become the chosen successor."

"And every single one returned empty-handed."

He glanced toward the kneeling young man before adding with a smirk,

"This brat is still wet behind the ears, yet he believes he’ll accomplish what generations of monsters couldn’t."

Standing nearby, a beautiful young woman quietly watched the exchange.

She possessed a graceful oval-shaped face framed by silky black hair.

Her pair of chrysanthemum-like eyes curved into gentle crescents as she smiled, not mockingly, but with the helpless expression of someone who had witnessed this same scene countless times before.

After allowing the young man’s excitement to settle slightly, she softly sighed.

"Sigh..."

"You must be new."

Her voice wasn’t loud.

Yet it easily reached everyone nearby.

"You don’t know much about the Vengeful Berserker Demigod."

"It’s normal to think this way."

"When I first arrived here, I also believed someone would eventually inherit the legacy."

A trace of nostalgia flashed across her eyes before disappearing.

"But after spending enough time here..."

"You’ll understand."

Her smile gradually turned bitter.

"If you’re observant, you’ve probably already noticed something."

She slowly spread her arms toward the endless surroundings.

"There isn’t a single trace of star energy in this realm."

"Not in the air."

"Not underground."

"Nowhere."

"No matter what cultivation technique you practice, you won’t be able to absorb even a single strand from your surroundings."

"The only way to replenish your star energy..."

She raised her hand and pointed toward the endless bridge stretching across the heavens.

"...is to cross that bridge."

"And reach the next platform."

Hearing those words, Lukas silently withdrew his senses.

So this is the inheritance space of the Vengeful Berserker...

Unlike everyone else, he wasn’t particularly interested in their conversations.

Most of it was nothing more than emotional shouting or empty speculation.

However, mixed within all that useless chatter were pieces of information worth remembering.

For example...

There was no star energy here.

And the only method of replenishing it was progressing through the inheritance itself.

That alone was valuable information.

Then another thought quietly surfaced in his mind.

Demigod...

God...

Lukas narrowed his eyes slightly.

What exactly separated the two?

Was it merely a higher realm of strength?

Or was there some fundamental difference between them?

After all, the inheritance outside had been called the Demigod Realm, yet the Sword God and Death God legacies clearly belonged to true gods.

What qualified someone to become a god?

What prevented a demigod from taking that final step?

The question lingered in his mind for several seconds.

Unfortunately...

There wasn’t enough information to reach any meaningful conclusion.

Lukas quietly pushed those thoughts aside.

There would be plenty of opportunities to uncover the answer later.

For now, gathering information about the inheritance itself was far more important.

Turning around, his gaze naturally shifted toward his own group.

Both Jasmine and Jack had also begun observing their surroundings.

The two occasionally exchanged a few words while silently sizing up the people gathered on the platform.

Jasmine’s pair of narrow, serpent-like eyes slowly swept across the various groups.

Most people wore different uniforms or insignias embroidered onto their robes, making their affiliations immediately obvious.

His gaze suddenly stopped.

"Northern Wasteland Titan Guild..."

A faint light flickered within Jasmine’s eyes.

Earth wasn’t ruled by any single nation anymore.

Instead, true authority rested in the hands of several colossal guilds that stood above every country.

Among them...

The Northern Wasteland Titan Guild was undoubtedly one of the most famous.

Not only because of its overwhelming military strength...

But because it was one of the very few guilds in human history that had successfully advanced beyond the five-kilometer mark within the Star Dimensions. That achievement alone had cemented its status as one of humanity’s greatest powers, earning the respect and fear of awakeners across the entire world.