This was a large rock rampart. It had a metallic sheen to it, which made it look like the canopy of heaven.
“So the top of this place is the Earth’s crust!”
Leylin descended slowly, his expression still revealing his shock, “This is a subterranean world!”
……
On a plain made entirely out of rocks and moss.
Two grey boar-like animals that were a lot smaller used their thick and coarse snouts to dig into the earth, searching for edible food.
*Xiu Xiu!* Two black arrows were suddenly released, and the sharp arrowheads penetrated the back of these two little beasts, pinning them to the ground.
“It’s not a bad harvest today. There are two grey boars! I can change the menu!”
On a hill, not far away, Leylin saw this scene, and joy was present in his smile.
Just ten or so minutes later, he used a wooden frame and made a fire. On top, the grey boars that had been skinned and washed were being roasted, a little grease rolling off the boiling hot skin. There was also an aroma that could make anyone drool mixed with the scent of pine wood, and Leylin’s forefinger couldn’t help but twitch.
“It’s been around a month since I exited from the large rock hill where the teleportation spell formation is.”
After gnawing away at an entire grey boar, Leylin sighed contently and kept the other one for later.
After a month of wandering around, he now had an idea of how barren this subterranean world was.
Here, it was possible to not see any life despite walking for days, and only moss and bugs were tenaciously surviving.
The pig-like creature that Leylin named “grey boar” was the biggest animal he had seen thus far. It was also the tastiest.
At this thought, Leylin couldn’t help but feel a little regretful.
While the precious spatial leather pouch was extremely spacious, there was a limit to how much could be stored within. It was already full of precious items that Leylin had gained through various methods, the value of which was something even rank 3 Magus would be envious of.
Unfortunately, there was no good food or wine at all. Compared to precious materials, their value was much too low and it was not worth being stored within.
Hence, Leylin found himself living the life of a barbarian.
Water was not an issue. He was a Magus, and with a water elemental spell, he could easily produce large amounts of fresh water. If it was food, however, he had little in the way of options.
Because he was a rank 2 Warlock, it was fine if he didn’t eat for ten days or half a month, but if it was a full month, it wasn’t possible for him not to eat at all.
In addition, his living environment in his previous life, and even now, were all not unsatisfactory. He was used to having three meals a day, and even had some stringent requirements regarding the content of his meals.
Currently, after a long search, Leylin could somewhat find a few starchy plants and roots that he could consume. He might also be able to have some birds or berries.
Leylin was beginning to get tired of these meagre meals.
This boar-like creature that he had named “grey boar” was, by far, the tastiest out of everything else that he had seen here up until now.
“Damn it! I hope this isn’t a completely barren land.”
After walking for a full month, besides this desert-area, Leylin had also seen some plains. Leylin began to have some suspicions, as even large animals were rarely seen.
Honestly speaking, as he was accustomed to sunlight, Leylin had never realised how precious it was.
Assistance Required
Leylin had previously seen information regarding the resources of the subterranean world in an ancient book.
Legend has it that the ancient Magus World was only a small part of the surface of the earth, and before the ancient Magi’s focus had switched to the other worlds, their goal had been the subterranean world!
The ancient Magi all wielded formidable power; even the sun and the moon would lose their splendor when put in front of these Magi. Many of the natives of the subterranean world had been subdued by them, and these Magi had then exploited layers and layers of the subterranean world to obtain endless wealth and resources.
It was recorded that the ancient Magi had exploited the 7 layers of the subterranean world!
It was said that the further down the layers one visited, the more powerful the ethnic race of that layer would be, and that at the core of the earth, there was an extremely terrifying female existence.
But these did not stop the ancient Magi from venturing further, and finally, the whole subterranean world had acknowledged them as their conqueror. This was all a part of the golden age of the ancient Magi.
Later, the still-dissatisfied Magi shifted their attention to different worlds, and conquered world after world until they ran into that extremely powerful world!
After what was known as the Final Confrontation, although that opposing world did not end up getting any benefits, neither did the Magus World—they deteriorated instead. Even the passage that led to the subterranean world had been destroyed by this war. Since then, the subterranean world had only appeared in legends.
At the least, within the entirety of the southern coast, Leylin had not seen any of the subterranean world’s life-forms, nor had he heard of any passages to the subterranean world.
“From the previously gathered information and the sights seen, this must be the subterranean world; I just don’t know which layer this is! However, based on the dangerous life-form that approached, it ought to be, at most, the third layer, else I would have ran into many dangerous, high-energy life-forms. Also, the probability of the life-forms I ran into being from the first or second layer is really large…”
Leylin kept on pondering this over.
Although he was uneasy that this place was a barren region, Leylin continued travelling. The recent appearance of the grey boar supplied him with huge confidence to proceed on his journey.
While walking the whole journey, Leylin also made a record of his surroundings.
At the location of the ancient magic spell, which Leylin had named “Giant Stone Hills,” the signs of life were so weak that, at most, one could see only moss and some insects, and nothing else.
As Leylin went about his journey, the signs of life gradually increased, and later, he saw something like bat-like birds.
He would occasionally see the grey boars and as he travelled further, the rate of encountering them grew higher.
Thus, Leylin was certain. He had already walked away from the life-restricting region and come to the outside world.
[Beep! Discovered energy waves! The estimate is that these waves are the aftermath of level zero magic. Direction: 15 degrees east, at 3,123 meters.]
Now, the A.I. Chip had issued a message.
“Huh?!” Leylin’s thoughts shook: “Finally, there are some traces of an organism with energy!”
He quickly packed up and soon went in the direction from which the energy waves were emitted.
There was still a grave injury upon his body, not to mention that due to his sea of consciousness solidifying large amounts of spiritual force, he could only display the approximate might of a level 1 Magus right now. However, he did not pay any attention to this trivial matter, and rushed to the scene of those energy waves.
What appeared in Leylin’s sight was the scene of three males and two females confronting a high-energy organism.
These five people seemed to be a standard small squadron. Two males dressed in leather, who were at the very front, served as human shields, constantly swinging their huge iron swords. They, at the very least, had the power of a Grand Knight.
The other three wore gray robes that looked like what the magician apprentices of the southern coast wore, but the style of these robes was very old-fashioned; they were simple and unadorned.
“There are humans here! And they are acolytes!” Leylin inward
ly felt elated at this prospect.
What the five acolytes were confronting was an organism that was similar to the huge grey boar, but with a physique that was almost a dozen times bigger, and 3 pairs of huge, crescent-moon-shaped teeth beneath its snout. Hard fur grew all over its body, and it was entirely covered in pine resin, mud, and other forms of muck. It formed thick lumps that, like a battle tank that had donned armor on. The level 0 magic spell that had been previously used by those apprentices seemed to have only left burn marks in the region; it had been incapable of breaking through even the outermost defences.
“Hoo hoo…” Two puffs of white gas were emitted from the nose of this organism that looked like a suckling pig. After pawing the ground, it suddenly charged, and its whole body was like a derailed train as it ran towards those two Grand Knights.
“Ah!”
The floor shook, causing one of those Grand Knights to lose his footing. Soon after, he slipped and was sent flying by this huge boar-like beast. Upon having been gored upon his waist and back by the organism’s huge tusks, blood poured out from his wounds like spring water.
Seeing this scene, the other Grand Knight let out a loud shout and immediately retreated, thus exposing those three apprentices.
With the Grand Knight no longer impeding it, the boar fiercely bared its teeth at those apprentices with a blood-thirsty glint in its eyes.
The two female apprentices were scared and kept retreating backwards. *Thud! Thud!* The two of them tripped on something and fell down, expressions of despair coloring their faces.
The remaining male apprentice displayed a gentlemanly bravery, quickly appearing in front of these women with an expression of firm resolve. Still shouting something, he lifted his hand, from which small fireballs were emitted and aimed at the middle of the nose of that big-headed boar.
*Pat! Pat* The big boar’s nose was blackened, but that did not slow down its assault speed by even a bit. On the contrary, the boar seemed to have been infuriated by that male apprentice, and its charging speed even seemed to have increased a little.
That male apprentice smiled helplessly, and then turned his head toward the two female disciples behind him and muttered something; his demeanor gave one the feeling that this youth was not afraid of dying.
*Hoo hoo!* The wild boar got closer and closer, and the three apprentices could now see clearly the blood vessels in the big boar’s eyes and the thick pores below its fur.
Of course, what they would find very hard to forget was the cold radiance of the three pairs of snow-white, fierce, crescent-moon-shaped teeth of the boar.
“Shadow Binding!”
At that moment, Leylin suddenly made his appearance, and several tentacles made of shadow extended outwards from below the belly of the wild boar, and transformed into several hands that firmly dragged the boar by its front hooves.
*Peng!* As if a magnitude 9 earthquake had suddenly occurred, that boar, which was charging at a high speed, suddenly fell down while making a huge noise; even the sounds of bones breaking could be heard from its body.
Soon after, the three apprentices saw a youth in leather armor walking out from behind the fallen boar.
Several black, shadowy ropes trussed up that fallen boar, not even leaving the smallest of weaknesses in the bindings.
“Are you alright?” asked Leylin, with a gentle smile on his face.
Those three apprentices saw Leylin, their expressions those of shock, and they opened their mouths to say, “gnkmfsk……”
The smile on Leylin’s face drooped, and then he sighed. “This is really not the common language of the continent!”
What Leylin had just spoken in was the common language of the southern coast magicians, but what these 3 apprentices had spoken was not a language that Leylin recognised.
“This language’s endings sound a bit familiar to the Metiya language, but the syllables in between resemble the language of the highlands…”
Leylin did not feel surprised in the least about the differences in the language. After all, after the ancient era, the subterranean world had been isolated from the earth’s surface. It would be strange if the language was still similar.
“Hello! I am a nomad. Can you tell me what is this place?”
Leylin immediately switched to another language—this time it was the ancient Byron language!
The ancient Byron language brought with a strange power; it held power over rules and regulations. It could draw upon the power of the energy particles within the atmosphere and was the foundation of all magic spells.
Thus, the ancient Byron language was also a language that all magicians were required to learn.
Whether it was the surface world or the subterranean world, the ancient Byron language was passed down from the ancient Magi, and there would not be even the tiniest bit of disparity in its usage.
Sure enough, upon hearing Leylin asking in the ancient Byron language, those 3 apprentices immediately reacted, and finally, that male apprentice took the lead to reply, “Respected Sir! Hello! This here is the Woody Wastelands of the Eastern Twilight Zone.”
He gave a respectful salute. Although Leylin’s actions were suspicious and the language that he initially used to speak was very different from their own language, from the way Leylin had easily subdued this huge, 6-toothed boar that had almost caused a complete wipe for their team, it was obvious that the other party’s strength was superior to theirs.
This was the wilderness, where the strong preyed on the weak. If they got on bad terms with Leylin, then they would be killed, and no one would come to know of it. Thus, this male apprentice’s mannerisms were very deferential.
“Eastern Twilight Zone?” Leylin frowned, and the A.I. Chip quickly searched through the storage database but did not find any details related to this.
“You might need this!” Leylin pointed at the Grand Knight who had been sent flying, and threw a blood clotting medicine towards them.
“Thank you!” Those two fallen female apprentices also stood up, and one of them immediately clutched the medicine and smeared it on that Grand Knight’s injury. After hesitating for while, she bowed to Leylin.
*Hiss! Hiss!*
At that time, a snake formed entirely of black gas slithered forward and spat out an armoured Grand Knight who had lost consciousness from within its mouth.
“This one is also your partner, right? I had also conveniently picked him up.”
Leylin pointed at the Grand Knight who had just been spat out, and those three apprentices, who had been scared by the sudden appearance of that huge black snake, retreated many steps.
“This coward!” Leylin heard that female apprentice mutter, but he only smiled indifferently.
After that, he asked, “Oh, by the way, do you know which towns are close to here and where the Magi’s Bazaar is?”
These 3 apprentices looked each other in the eyes, and then that male apprentice, seeing Leylin’s agreeable demeanor and speech, gathered his courage and stepped forward as he said, “The closest town from here is Potter Town in the west, and its distance is one and a half days from here. About the Magi’s’ bazaar… the official Magi’s meeting point is located only in the capital city of the Twilight Zone….”
Treasure
As if baffled by the kind smile on Leylin’s face, this acolyte mustered up his courage and asked, “My lord! Are you… perhaps, not from here? May this humble servant know what your name is? I… I am Aaron!”
“Me? I’m obviously not from around here!” Leylin laughed as he looked at these 3 acolytes.
“Though there are still a lot of things I’d like to ask you, I suddenly realised that it would be much faster if I were to see it for myself…”
Due to the look that Leylin was giving them, the 3 acolytes began to tremble, as if they were being stared at by some predator.
“Let’s go!” Aaron yelled, getting in front of the two female acolytes and chanting incantations.
“What
a joke! You’re too slow!” Leylin shook his head, and three black streams of air shot out and entered the foreheads of the three acolytes.
They turned dizzy, and without being able to even make a sound, they fainted.
Leylin approached the male acolyte called Aaron, his right hand directly pressing on the top of his head. The acolyte’s eyes turned jet black, and even his pupils vanished.
Large amounts of images and voices were like a video, replaying in front of Leylin’s eyes. The A.I. Chip worked at full speed, gathering all the information it thought to be important and organised them.
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