The seven Ice Pavilion Sect disciples seemed to be leading Nie Tian around the flat-topped mountain peak.

Soon, Nie Tian discovered that, due to the long distance, his connection with the Heaven Eye he had left with Dong Li started to grow weak and flickering.

At first, he was somewhat worried to leave Dong Li with Qian Xin and the others, and thus kept a close watch on her through that Heaven Eye as he went farther and farther.

Soon, he found that after he left, those from the Realm of a Hundred Battles stayed by Dong Li’s side and took on the responsibility of protecting her, just as they had promised.

Furthermore, as the Ice Pavilion Sect disciples had said, no one else came after the eighth grade black phoenix’s corpse again.

Meanwhile, he was able to vaguely sense Dong Li’s direction through his Sound Stone.

Thus, he supposed that, after Dong Li had finished her breakthrough into the late Greater Heaven stage, he would probably be able to stay in touch with her via his Sound Stone.

Gradually, he put his heart at ease.

As they marched at a fast pace, Zhao Le and the other Ice Pavilion Sect disciples constantly talked to him in a respectful and obsequious way.

The broken mountain peak took up a very vast area. It took them nearly four hours to circle around it.

After arriving behind the mountain peak, from within his ring of holding,

Xuan 

Ke summoned an fascinating air-transportation spiritual tool that seemed to be made of nothing but ice.

Sparkling and crystal-clear, the air-transportation spiritual tool was wreathed in a frosty aura. However, as

Xuan 

Ke jumped on board and cast spells to activate it, it seemed to be affected by some sort of magnetic field, and wouldn’t activate.

Eyebrows furrowed,

Xuan 

Ke said, “There’s something strange about this place. I still can’t seem to activate my air-transportation spiritual tool.”

From the look of it, this wasn’t the first time he had made an attempt to travel in his air-transportation spiritual tool, and all of his previous attempts seemed to have failed as well.

Since they couldn’t use their air-transportation spiritual tool, the speed at which they traveled would be rather limited.

Xuan 

Ke put his frosty air-transportation spiritual tool away, looked over his shoulder at Nie Tian, and said, “The veins I told you about are ahead of us, where those colossal rocks are. They belonged to the upper half of the severed mountain peak. Apparently, when the mountain peak was severed by some extremely powerful tool, the upper half exploded, revealing the part near the top where there were veins of spiritual materials.”

Then, he pointed at the barren land before them. “See all these large rocks? They probably all used to be part of the mountain peak. There’s a colossal and oddly-shaped rock ahead of us. I detected very intense spiritual energy fluctuations from with it.”

Nie Tian nodded slowly, but didn’t say anything. Instead, he secretly controlled his Heaven Eyes to fly towards the location

Xuan 

Ke had just pointed out.

With the help of his Heaven Eyes, he saw countless rocks of different sizes scattered on the dead, silent ground. Most of them were grayish-brown, and seemed ordinary.

This area was much colder and more barren than the area on the other side of the mountain peak, where Dong Li and the others were.

Then, as Nie Tian spread out his Heaven Eyes to cover a larger area, he failed to detect any signs of life or locate the special rock

Xuan 

Ke had referred to.

He realized that it might be in a location farther ahead of them.

They might still have to travel ahead for some time before that special rock would enter the detection range of his Heaven Eyes.

“How long has it been since you set foot on this continent, Nie Tian?”

Xuan 

Ke asked suddenly.

Caught by surprise, Nie Tian pondered a moment before answering, “Not very long.” 

“We’ve been here for about two months already. Our people were scattered in different locations at first, so we know this continent... fairly well.”

Xuan 

Ke seemed cautious with the words he used, his expression serious. “According to what we’ve learned, this continent, where us Greater Heaven stage cultivators have been led to, is a vast continent that’s surrounded by a sea.”

Nie Tian was taken aback. “Surrounded by a sea?!” 

Xuan 

Ke nodded. “A few of our people have reached places where the land ends, and black sea water filled their view. It seems that we’re on a giant island. From one of the Thunder Mountain Sect disciples I killed, we learned that there another island that’s not very far from ours, since he said he was able to see it standing on the coast.

“If we go straight ahead, we’ll reach the coast. Perhaps from there, we’ll be able to see that vast island.

“It’s just that, since we can’t use our air-transportation spiritual tool, we won’t be able to cross the sea, no matter how narrow it might be. Plus, no one knows what lies beyond the sea, on those neighboring islands.

“Perhaps we’ll find Worldly realm or Profound realm experts there if we go there.

“If that’s the case, it may not be a bad thing that we can’t use our air-transportation spiritual tools.”

While leading the way,

Xuan 

Ke explained their discoveries of the continent they were on to Nie Tian. As he did, the other Ice Pavilion Sect disciples occasionally chimed in, gradually lifting the veil and giving Nie Tian a fairly comprehensive understanding of the continent.

He learned that they were on a vast island surrounded by a black sea, along with other Greater Heaven stage Qi warriors.

Since not a single Worldly realm or Profound realm expert was on this island, they might be on that nearby island, or some others in this boundless black sea.

“A vast island...?” Eyebrows knitted, Nie Tian muttered as he followed

Xuan 

Ke and the others forward.

As he did, his Heaven Eyes, which he had scattered in the sky around him, pressed forward.

After an unknown period of time, through the Heaven Eye that was at the forefront, he finally caught sight of the colossal rock

Xuan 

Ke had told him about.

More than half of it seemed to be buried underground, with only a small portion showing above the ground.

Under the gray sky, the pale-gray rock seemed to be emanating faint, white light, along with noticeable spiritual power fluctuations.

A handful of dead Qi warriors were lying disorderly in the rubble around the very large, pale-gray rock.

From the way they were dressed, they seemed to be from the Poison Sect, the Heaven Expanse Sect, and the Thunder Mountain Sect. They had probably died during a fierce fight over the rock.

At this moment, nine Qi warriors were standing by the pale-gray rock, all of whom were wearing garments that had the Yin Sect’s and Yang Sect’s sigils on them.

Apparently, they were from the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect from the Realm of a Thousand Devastations.

After seeing that the final winners of the fight over that rock were actually people from the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect, Nie Tian’s face gradually fell.

Before he had entered this dimension via the spatial rift occupied by the Tool Sect, he had learned that many sects, including the Thunder Mountain Sect, the Heaven Expanse Sect, the Yin Sect, and the Yang Sect, had been fighting over the one last unclaimed spatial rift.

Earlier, when he had encountered people from the Thunder Mountain Sect and Heaven Expanse Sect, he had thought that the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect had lost the battle over the last spatial rift.

Thus, he had never expected to see them there.

He had very positive feelings towards the sects in the Realm of a Thousand Devastations. After he had sealed the spatial rift in the Realm of a Thousand Devastations, the Heaven Palace Sect had demanded that he return to the Heaven Palace Sect, but the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect together had helped him through the crisis.

Xing Huanyue from the Yin Sect and Li Muyang from the Yang Sect had both treated him well.

Had

Xuan 

Ke asked him to join them because they wanted him to help them deal with the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect?

With this question in mind, he suddenly came to a stop. Eyebrows furrowed, he asked

Xuan 

Ke, “Don’t you know about my relationship with the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect?”

Xuan 

Ke and the other Ice Pavilion Sect disciples also stopped. Frowning,

Xuan 

Ke said, “Umm, yeah, a bit.”

“If you know, then why did you ask me to come to help you?” Nie Tian asked.

A confused expression stretched across

Xuan 

Ke’s face. “What are you talking about?” 

“Disciples of the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect are now gathered by the rock you told me about.” Nie Tian was very displeased.

Xuan 

Ke went blank for a while before snapping out of his bewilderment and saying, “We didn’t see any Yin Sect or Yang Sect disciples last time we were there, only a handful of Heaven Expanse Sect, Thunder Mountain Sect, and Poison Sect disciples.”

“Those people you saw have already been killed by people from the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect.” Nie Tian said, his face cold.

Xuan 

Ke looked deeply at him before his eyes suddenly shone with frosty light. “Wait! Can you see the situation over there?!”

Upon hearing his words, the eyes of all the other Ice Pavilion Sect disciples suddenly lit up.

They had been close to the rock before, and thus knew that they were still a significant distance from it. Nie Tian had been marching with them, yet he was able to tell that members of the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect were gathered by the rock, and that they had already killed the people they had previously seen roaming that area.

Nie Tian was clearly only at the middle Greater Heaven stage.

Even Worldly realm experts might not be able to learn the situation by reflecting a detailed scene of everything in their minds from such a great distance. How was he able to do it?

All of a sudden, their respect for Nie Tian was raised to whole new level.

Also at this moment, while members of the Yin Sect and the Yang Sect cut the large, pale-gray rock with sharp spiritual tools, some mechanism seemed to be triggered, and the rock suddenly started to shine with blindingly bright light, and thrum with peculiar energy fluctuations.

In the next moment, intense life force burst forth from within the pale-gray rock.

Nie Tian’s expression flickered as he exclaimed, “We need to get there as quickly as possible! I think you were wrong about what’s in that rock!”

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