Chapter 47: Heading to Another World

Another world.

Ancient trees towered into the sky, the vegetation thick and lush.

The air was hot and humid; after only a few steps, moisture gathered at the tip of the nose.

On a tall tree, vines coiled around it like countless giant snakes winding and spiraling, twisting into grotesque shapes.

"Kraa!"

A fire-winged bird burst through the canopy, soaring over the vines.

It descended into the dim forest.

It swiveled its head in confusion, as if searching for something.

Shwa! Shwa! Shwa!

Soon, another ten or so fire-winged birds appeared beside it.

The entire forest was lit up bright red.

Crack!

A flash of silver light streaked past.

Before all the fire-winged birds, a silver disc slowly unfolded.

Silver radiance rippled across its surface like water waves, tiny ripples drifting with the wind.

The first fire-winged bird's eyes lit up; it let out an excited cry and, unable to wait, dove straight in.

The remaining fire-winged birds refused to be outdone, scrambling to squeeze in.

In fact, to compete for the first spots, some of them actually started fighting.

They pecked and bit at each other, claws tearing at their opponents.

They even spewed flames, scorching one another.

Though all were fire-type creatures with maxed-out fire resistance, it didn't really cause any damage.

But it still left row upon row of scorched marks on the forest floor.

If it weren't for the rainforest's humidity, and the fact that the trees, nourished by primal force, were not easily set ablaze—

In a dry forest in a cold region, a major blaze would have been inevitable.

After fighting for a while, the fire-winged birds that were still deadlocked suddenly realized—

The fire-winged birds that hadn't taken part in the brawl had all already slipped inside.

They let out furious hisses.

And lost all interest in fighting.

One after another they stopped, squeezing toward the spatial passage to get in.

……

Blue Star, at the spatial passage.

Fang Shi casually yanked out a fire-winged bird, then, amid its terrified gaze, finished it off with a single sword strike.

The crowd gathered around watching had long since grown numb to it.

At first, when the spatial passage had just appeared,

Fang Shi had stood guard beside it, and whenever a fire-winged bird emerged, he simply lopped its head off with one sword.

Gradually, Fang Shi felt it was too slow.

He simply took matters into his own hands, pulling the fire-winged birds out of the spatial passage himself.

This way was both faster and prevented the fire-winged birds' corpses from falling into the other world.

Truly a solution that satisfied both sides.

"Hm? Why is this one injured?"

Fang Shi looked at the damaged crest feathers on this fire-winged bird and said.

"Forget it, who cares about that."

Crack!

Another sword strike.

Just like that, he killed four more injured fire-winged birds, and then no new ones poked their heads out.

Fang Shi stood beside the spatial passage, thinking for a moment.

"Zhao Wenjun, you lot go hide in the house over there first."

"I'm going to take a look at the other world."

Zhao Wenjun was startled and hurriedly said, "Master, you can't—those monsters can fly."

"If you go over and happen to be in midair, wouldn't that be dangerous?"

Fang Shi smiled faintly. "No need to worry. The spatial passage's position is relative; on Blue Star it's on the surface, so in the other world it must be on the surface too."

Hearing that, Zhao Wenjun said no more.

Fang Shi had always been unfathomably mysterious, knowing far more than ordinary people.

If he said it was safe, then it definitely was.

Fweee!

Fang Shi first thrust his long sword deep into the spatial passage and slashed a few times.

Leaving several ripple-like marks across the silver-disc-shaped spatial passage.

This was the trouble with spatial passages.

Without passing through, you couldn't see the scene on the other side.

Fang Shi was also worried that fire-winged birds might be watching from the other side—better to strike first.

With no obstruction, he stepped inside again.

Humans from before the rebirth,

had naturally explored the spatial passages.

As one of the roots of the apocalypse, humanity certainly had to investigate it.

The result was that on this very trip, they discovered another world.

The other world was a world similar to yet different from Blue Star.

The similarity lay in the fact that a day was still twenty-four hours.

The division of day and night was the same.

There was even no such thing as time zones; in every region the sun rose together and set together.

There was also only one sun and one moon.

Gravity, air, soil, water sources, and so on were also roughly the same as Blue Star's.

If developed well, it would be entirely humanity's second habitable planet.

But unfortunately, this was very hard to achieve.

The other world was brimming with primeval force, allowing supernatural creatures to freely unleash their abilities.

Take the Fire-Wing Bird, for example — it breathed fire in the other world.

It didn't even need to charge up; just open its beak and spew, and flames came rolling in.

This alone greatly boosted the Fire-Wing Bird's strength.

The threat it posed to humanity rose another notch.

Moreover, in the other world, the Fire-Wing Bird barely counted for anything.

That stretch of land was a paradise for monsters.

All manner of powerful creatures dwelled in the other world.

Some powerful beings could slay legends with a wave of their hand.

There were even evil entities capable of clashing with deities.

Naturally, it could nurture powerful otherworldly creatures.

The other world's area was equally vast beyond compare.

Even two spatial passages close to each other on Blue Star—

in the other world might be separated by a hundred and eight thousand li.

A powerful individual once conducted an experiment.

Ten squads entered different spatial passages at the same time and contacted each other through magic.

After trekking a thousand li, only two squads formally met.

The remaining squads never received a signal at all; after scouting the surroundings, they turned back.

During the journey they endured many hardships and dangers, and the ten squads suffered heavy losses.

Precisely because of this, exploring the other world had always been a high-risk operation.

To go, one first had to have the strength to defeat the Gatekeeper monsters.

What are Gatekeeper monsters?

In the Ancheng passage, the Gatekeeper monster was the Fire-Wing Bird.

Only the Fire-Wing Bird could pass through the spatial passage.

The other creatures couldn't even sense the spatial passage.

It was as if nothing existed there at all.

Therefore, creatures like the Fire-Wing Bird were also called Gatekeeper monsters.

If there were no such restriction,

in the early apocalypse, if a legendary monster simply came running over, humanity could have typed out GG.

Therefore, before the apocalypse's second wave arrived, the spatial passages near human settlements—

Ranked creatures could not get through no matter what.

This was also the slim chance of survival the apocalypse granted humanity.

Someone once speculated that the reason the apocalypse had such a mechanism—

and even granted humanity attribute panels—

was all to raise gu, to screen out a supreme powerhouse.

As for why it was so, various speculations had also sprung up.

For instance, the "a master is lonely" theory: an invincible powerhouse was too lonely,

so he wanted to cultivate a supreme powerhouse to fight him.

Or perhaps it was simply a bored little game of a higher civilization.

Just like humans using lab mice for experiments,

a higher civilization used humanity for experiments.

There were also things like the "world invasion awakening" theory, the "primeval force revival" theory, and so on.

As for Fang Shi, he rarely thought about these; with insufficient strength, pondering them was pointless.

What he needed to consider now was the dangers he might encounter upon going to the other world.

Before the rebirth, Fang Shi's strength improved far too slowly.

He was far from humanity's first echelon.

So much so that he couldn't defeat the Gatekeeper monsters, and thus had no chance to go to the other world.

This does not mean the gatekeeper monster actually guards the door; it is merely an indicator of strength.

Just as now, a spatial channel stands before a Level 1 practitioner.

Would a Level 1 practitioner dare to enter?

Although the channel is not guarded by a Fire-Winged Bird now, what about before?

Most likely, one would arrive directly at the Fire-Winged Bird's nest and be utterly annihilated, leaving not even bones behind.

It is only now, with Fang Shi's strength so formidable,

that the Fire-Winged Bird is no longer a concern, allowing him to dare venture into the Otherworld for exploration.

"Otherworld, do not disappoint me."