The Dawn of the New World

"What are you doing?"

While Hao Xuan was engrossed in his own thoughts, Henrik had walked up behind him.

Hao Xuan opened his eyes and looked back at him, "Nothing, nevermind. What's happening? Any updates?"

"Same as usual," Henrik shrugged, "Nothing you would be interested in. The resistance has ramped up their attacks so the higher-ups had to make a few changes. It wasn't in our plan for them to be this strong and well organized so they want the protectors to keep watch over the fight. That means..."

Instead of finishing the sentence, he peered back towards Hao Xuan who nodded with a sigh, "I know, I'll have to make a move this time," Hao Xuan finished for him.

"When and where?" he asked finally accepting his fate.

If possible Hao Xuan wanted to stay in and better understand the Chaos energies rather than fight but now that it had come to it, he wanted to get it over with quick.

Henrik tapped a few times on his spirit band and a message popped on Hao Xuan's band. It showed a 3D map of a location some 3,000 kilometers away from their current location.

"This is the place selected for the battle. It's apparently one of the danger zones on this planet and they want you to check it out beforehand and see if there is something their scanners missed."

Hao Xuan looked over the data with a skeptical look, "They can't scan it properly? Why do I have to check it in person?"

Henrik took out a paper fan from his back pocket before waving it in front of his face to dry off some of the perspiration.

"I hate the heat I swear," he mumbled while glaring at the sun through the sunglasses, "Of course they can. If they used inspection magic along with the normal scans, they could see all the way to the planet's core but that would disturb the World Spirit. It still hasn't shown itself remember. Plus, there are some....complications...."

Hao Xuan splashed some cold water on his face for the last time and stood up, "Spit it out, what's wrong this time?"

Henrik who was still staring towards the sun seemed hesitant to answer at first but decided to respond anyway,

"Apparently, and this is all hearsay, but apparently one of the insect tribe's galactic hives entered the system not long ago. The bosses above had to move the ship a bit further away in case they attacked."

"WHAT?!"

Hao Xuan knew a little of these insect tribes from Poriverse's information. He had also come into contact with one such creature back on that planet.

If a galactic hive had entered the system then that was a huge problem.

Any normal hive would have up to hundreds of millions of normal creatures and tens of millions of creatures that could rival spirit realm cultivators along with hundreds of thousands of others.

The one thing they weren't short on were numbers as they could reproduce almost endlessly and anywhere.

Henrik adjusted his glasses and turned around before casually waving his hand, "Don't worry about it too much. If worse comes to worst we will be teleported off-planet before being returned back to the beast world. I only told you about them so you understood the whole situation."

"The vessel is actually not in the vicinity of the planet. It's around the edge of the solar system so as to more easily intercept the hive if they attack. Anyways, that's why they are being extra cautious. Just go and give the place a look over, it's nothing too serious."

Hao Xuan rubbed his temples that were starting to ache.

"Fine, whatever. Another problem I can't do anything about. I'll take care of things I can get my hands on first then."

He went back to the portable camp where the usual crowd was waiting for him.

Jin Wang was playing a card game with Salome under the shade while Fortis and Zhurong were nowhere in sight.

"Did you get anything?" Hao Xuan asked as soon as he saw Jin Wang.

"Tsk tsk, wait," Jin Wang hurriedly shook his head, focusing on the three cards in his hand. His gaze shifted between them and Salome who sat opposite to him with a blank look. He also had a few cards in his hand.

"Alright," Jin Wang spoke up after some 30 seconds of pondering. There were beads of sweat dripping down his forehead, "Show on 3! 1, 2, 3!" he yelled before dramatically throwing his cards on the table.

Salome did the same, albeit much more normally.

Jin Wang's pupils contracted to the size of needles upon seeing Salome's hand, "NOO! How?! HOW?!" he started pulling his own hair out.

Salome shook his head, "Stupid. I don't want to play anymore, this is boring."

"No Please! One more!" Jin Wang reached out to grab Salome's hand but before he could do so a heavy hand landed crisply on the back of his head.

"Get your shit together. The hell is wrong with you?" Hao Xuan remarked with a deep frown.

'How bad was he that he kept loosing to Salome of all people?'

"Tell me what you found, is there any new information about her?"