After an unknown period, Qianye woke up from his deep sleep and gradually retracted his cultivation art. There was now a shade of scarlet gold roaming about in the new origin vortex. Although the glow was negligibly faint, almost like a thin layer of liquid in a big tub, it would take only a couple of months to fill it to the brim.

The Song Clan Ancient Scroll had been operating at greater speeds since entering the Great Maelstrom, facilitating Qianye’s cultivation on more than one occasion. It almost felt as though the entire world was revolving slowly around him. Drawing power from the heaven and earth made it easier to channel the Glory and Mystery Chapters. As Qianye himself also became familiar with the process, he realized that he might be able to borrow even more power from the world around him.

But it wasn’t time to continue cultivating. Qianye checked the time and found that it was almost midnight—it was time to help the two ladies. Although they had the white fruits, it was barely enough to get them through the night. They would require help in order to save energy.

At this moment, Ji Tianqing and Li Kuanglan were in quiet meditation. Qianye scanned them quickly and felt relieved to find that their vitalities were still quite exuberant.

Midnight was drawing close, and for the last two days, Li Kuanglan would require Qianye’s help by this point. Today, however, she was able to last especially long. Ji Tianqing possessed countless secret arts, so much so that she was fine even after drinking the white-fruit wine. Qianye was never able to see through that monster, so he simply let her be.

Qianye waited patiently for a good quarter of an hour before the girls woke up from their cultivation session. After exchanging glances, Ji Tianqing said, “As expected, several cultivation arts seem to work faster in the Great Maelstrom. It’s like the original bottlenecks never existed. It feels like our talents are one level higher here.”

Li Kuanglan replied, “The arts we cultivate are of the same type, it would seem our families have been preparing for this day.”

Ji Tianqing pondered for a while. “But according to what I remember, the cultivation boost inside the Great Maelstrom was never obvious. Could it be that the deeper parts have greater effects?”

“Might be. I remember now, there were records in the imperial clan about the frigid night. But the stagnation effects described there are nowhere near as strong. That means we’re not that far from the center of the Great Maelstrom.”

The two girls discussed for a while longer before taking a white fruit each. Then, under the protection of Qianye’s blood core, they got through the frigid night without any incident.

Qianye packed up the camp at dawn and brought the girls away from this camp. The group entered the vast forest and began speeding toward the native area where Qianye had obtained the fruits. Back then, Qianye only had time to s.n.a.t.c.h a number of white fruits before he was hunted down all the way back to camp. However, Qianye had already killed the fiercest four-armed people, leaving only a large number of weaker ones. The difficulty in attacking their stone keep would be drastically reduced.

Several figures appeared in the vicinity half a day after the trio’s departure. Led by a four-armed woman, several two-armed people were carefully approaching the camp.

The four-armed woman raised her head and sniffed hard. She became excited all of a sudden and began shouting aloud while pointing at the summit. The two-armed people charged up to find a camp hidden behind a natural stone wall.

The four-armed woman circled around before picking up a piece of broken pottery and started licking it with great ardor. This was a broken piece from the jar containing white-fruit wine, still stained with a small amount of the spirit. After licking the pieces clean, the four-armed woman’s breathing became heavy. She pushed one of the two-armed men to the ground and started mating with him.

…

A ball of black radiance appeared silently in the darkened sky. Amidst a clap of thunder, a person shot out of the ball of light and dropped straight down. Surrounded by arcs of sanguine lightning, he looked as though he would soon smash into the ground. Just before striking the soil, however, numerous wisps of black energy shot out and nailed him to several places in the air. The energy pulled on the man like ribbons, breaking the momentum of his fall. He flipped around and positioned his feet in a tiptoe, hoping to land in a confident manner.

However, the dark ball of light trembled again and fired a second, smaller figure which smashed into his body, sending the both of them cras.h.i.+ng into the rock-hard ground.

That small silhouette stretched itself to reveal Bai Kongzhao. The thick armor on her was in tatters, leaving only a few of the armor-pieces hanging on her body. Despite that, there were only a couple of tears on her white dress.

The girl clambered up, moved her body, and jumped about. She then broke into a frown, apparently unaccustomed to the weight of her body. She was just about to try jumping again when Anwen’s voice burst out from beneath, “You’re stomping me to death!”

Shocked, Bai Kongzhao moved to the side. Only then did she see Anwen under her feet. “Are you okay?”

The latter finally crawled up, his handsome face somewhat bruised and swollen. “I was smashed into and then almost stomped to death. How can I be fine?”

Bai Kongzhao shook her head. “Your body is so strong, there’s no way I can stomp you to death. Even if I cut you up with my cleaver, I’ll need to try several times at full force. For instance…”

Anwen felt uneasy. “Stop! Do you really plan to kill me?”

Bai Kongzhao was puzzled. “Didn’t you say I was about to stomp you to death? That’s not possible even if the gravity is ten times higher. Yes, if I really want to stomp you to death…”

“Stop! I don’t want to die so early.” Anwen stopped the young girl and only heaved a sigh of relief when she stopped thinking. “The world is so magnificent. I can’t die without living a few thousand years. You can stop thinking about these things in the future.”

Bai Kongzhao explained, “I didn’t want to, but you asked me so I had to reply. Yes, if I really wanted to stomp you to death, it would require four hundred and twenty times the gravity, and even then, I would need to hit your vitals. I’m too light, after all. If I was a bit fatter…”

Anwen started sweating profusely. “Enough! I think you’re good as you are, no need to get fatter!”

“Really?” Bai Kongzhao still looked rather confused.

“Of course! You’re perfect right now, you won’t look good even if you’re just a little bit fatter. As a future peerless expert, you must make sure you look good. Just look at those ugly demonkin women, they’re all so fat. The human ladies don’t look half as good as you, either.” Anwen was spouting so much nonsense that he started feeling embarra.s.sed.

Bai Kongzhao was even more confused. “Looking good is also a part of fighting power?”

“Of course!” Anwen was fairly decisive.

Bai Kongzhao finally nodded, much to Anwen’s relief.

“What are they doing?” Bai Kongzhao pointed at the natives rolling on the ground.

“That…” Anwen didn’t know how to explain. For some reason, he really didn’t want the girl to know too much. He would rather she remain as innocent as a blank sheet of paper.

Despite being one of the most learned of their race, so much so that he was considered to be following in his ancestors’ footsteps, Anwen had to spend great effort to think of an explanation. “They’re… fighting!”

“Fighting?” The girl was even more muddled now. Not many people could claim they understood combat more than she did, and these people didn’t look like they were in a deathmatch.

“Yes, a flesh battle,” Anwen said calmly. The first lie was usually the most difficult; everything else just followed smoothly.

“Fighting isn’t always about life and death. These… natives are actually only half-intelligent. They fight frequently to produce newer generations.” Anwen became fairly fluent with his story.

The young girl listened seriously with widened eyes.

“This is a strange race where only the winners can have progeny. The one pressed underneath no longer has the power to resist. After he loses completely, the right to produce offspring will be transferred to the victor.”

The girl seemed to only half-understand. “You really know a lot.”

For a moment, Anwen wanted to scream at the sky. The people around him had always treated him with the utmost respect, either because of his bloodline or his position. Seriously speaking, few ever acknowledged him personally. Actually, the demonkin was quite proud of his scholarly knowledge and his deep accomplishments in the history of Evernight.

This was the first time someone had praised him for knowing a lot. Although the reason itself was quite ridiculous, Anwen didn’t feel that way. It wasn’t easy to produce so many lies in such a short time.

It wouldn’t be good to let the girl keep watching the reproductive scene. Anwen said with an awkward cough, “The greatest enemy we have inside the Great Maelstrom are the natives. We cannot let them live no matter what. They’re busy with their infighting, so it’s the best opportunity for us to attack.”

With that, Anwen swung his hand ever so slightly, and the dark mist surrounding the two immediately faded away. This black mist was the demonkin’s concealment ability. Anwen was so powerful that he could completely hide both their traces with that seemingly spa.r.s.e black cloud. The natives couldn’t see them at all despite being so close.

All the natives turned around at the same time, proving how sharp their senses were.

Anwen was calm and collected—an intricate origin gun appeared in his hand, from which he fired several streams of black energy. The black radiance shot through the natives without any obstruction and completely immobilized them. The victims had no injuries on the surface and looked as though they had fallen into a deep sleep, but in fact, they had turned into corpses.

Anwen seemed tired after firing several rounds and was already panting after he had tossed the native corpses over the stone wall. Only at this point did he have the time to scan the camp. He was startled and became cautious all of a sudden.

“What’s wrong?” the girl asked.

“Someone was living here before, and judging from the traces, they’re probably from the Empire. We need to be careful now.”

“But I don’t sense any danger in the vicinity.”

Anwen’s expression relaxed. “Oh, I forgot. Who can ambush us with you around?”

He crouched down to draw an origin array, speaking as he worked, “Let me see who camped here before us. This array can perfectly restore the void origin power fluctuations that have taken place recently...”

Anwen hadn’t even finished speaking when a tornado of origin power erupted from the array and surged into the sky.

The newly-formed array immediately crumbled apart.