Abyssal Blood Hawks

Several years later, in a gloomy, sunless land shrouded in darkness, lay one of the Six Domains, the renowned Abyss Domain. Its gray-brown earth stretched into the distance, riddled with ravines and crowded with canyons.

Though the Abyss Domain's environment was harsh, its ecosystem was still remarkably rich. On the dim, finely cracked rocky ground, dust swirled in the Yin Wind, and all manner of native insects scurried over the strange, intricate terrain, hunting or becoming prey.

Each of those bizarre insects looked ferocious and had its own peculiar tricks, putting on vivid displays of the primitive law of the jungle. In the Abyss Domain, where that law prevailed from the lowest level to the highest, there were no weaklings. Even a humble, inconspicuous bug that anyone could casually crush underfoot might be venomous. One careless sting could leave even a high-ranked cultivator in serious trouble.

Bitter, soul-piercing Killing Intent swept along the ravines, canyons, and abysses, howling past with shrieks like ghosts wailing and wolves howling. No one could say what dangers lurked in those dark, bottomless chasms.

Beneath that seemingly peaceful atmosphere, an ambush could break out at any moment.

Just then, a dusky-gray giant scorpion, seven or eight zhang long, crept carefully along a steep, damp, chilly cliff face. Its pincers clung to the rock as it moved with a nimbleness utterly at odds with its massive frame. Its target was a nest on a misty precipice, where several hungry chicks waited to be fed.

Those chicks were clearly no ordinary creatures. Even with their wings still growing, they spanned a zhang when they flapped them. Iron-hard talons grew from their fuzzy feet, and their young eyes gleamed with a ferocity and cunning rarely seen in other species. Their bodies were a dusty gray, blending into the