Exploration Team X Vast Grassland

In the wilderness.

The two were traveling alone.

But then a small mishap seemed to have occurred to them.

"Get out of here!"

Buhaci cursed loudly.

Pushing your arms forward forcefully, you can see the fat and flab on your arms solidify in an instant, transforming into a muscle-like structure.

The force of the thrusting palms suddenly increased dramatically.

The charging beast was hit directly, flying backward through the air and crashing into the herd that had been hunting with it, instantly uprooting a large group.

What followed was a series of pitiful screams.

The sudden action startled the hunting creatures, who scattered in all directions and fled in panic.

Only after he finished did Buhaci stop.

He nodded in satisfaction as he watched the fleeing beasts.

"These wild beasts are really annoying."

Men Qi said helplessly from the side, and casually put the knife she had taken out back.

Then she raised her arm, and a Chimera Ant was crawling on it.

"We've resolved this on our end, let's move on."

The message was relayed by Chimera Ant.

Melusina, who also had a Chimera Ant crawling on her other arm, nodded.

We will continue onward.

Pairo nodded.

The Exploration Team now consists of six people, divided into three groups, spreading out in a triangular formation as they explore forward.

They are relatively far apart, but if they encounter any danger, they can support each other very quickly, thus expanding the scope of exploration.

There's a monster hunting at the three o'clock position.

Pairo reminded him.

The two of them circled around a little.

At night.

The three teams reunited, dug a small cave on the spot, and rested inside after providing some simple shelter.

Rukira took out a notebook.

I started writing and drawing on it, and every now and then I'd turn to ask other people for help.

After comparing the records, he continued to make changes to the entries in the notebook.

"I didn't know you could do cartography."

Morel leaned against his Pipe, looked at Rukira, and said with some emotion.

Rukira, head down, sketched in his Notebook as he said, "Knowing I had to come here to learn on the spot, becoming like this has many advantages."

For example, if they are willing, their learning ability will be very strong.

Keep in mind that Rukira Division Leader; in addition to his immense strength, his learning ability far surpasses that of ordinary people.

"The surrounding landscape has begun to change. We might cross this area tomorrow, but we don't know if we'll still be in the Giant Beast Kingdom."

Men Qi spoke, she prepared dinner nearby.

"It's hard to say, since the area of the Giant Beast Kingdom is very large. But even if we didn't cross the entire Giant Beast Kingdom, we should have arrived in another region."

"Different environments lead to different organisms, so we need to be more careful."

Pairo sat by the fire, looking at the flames, and suddenly said something.

"It would be great if the New Continent Chronicle were more detailed."

These words left everyone speechless.

The New Continent Chronicle is a guide to the Dark Continent, and a very thick one at that.

It contains a lot of information.

Even so, such a thick travel guide is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the entire Dark Continent.

Its author, Don Fuglits, published it three hundred years ago.

Moreover, this is the East Coast, which is the entire eastern coastline divided by the north and south.

It's a coastline, not a continent.

The entire Dark Continent is extremely, extremely, extremely large, beyond imagination.

It's important to know that the sea areas that humans cannot cross on their own are lakes in the middle of continents.

The human world is an archipelago in the center.

In this comparison, the entire coastline is actually ridiculously large, far exceeding the size of human society.

How could the writer possibly record everything in such detail on such a large area?

Therefore, the book's narrative actually runs from south to north, not in a straight line, but rather around the entire east coast.

An upward-drawn arc.

In this way, you can determine what happened and the approximate location of the recorded objects based on the contents.

The locations of some important supplies were recorded in more detail, which allowed for the deduction of the landing site and the direction of advance.

This is the hope chosen by the Five Great Powers.

Are these the only five kinds of hope in the entire book? The answer is no; the book contains far more than just these five kinds of hope.

It contains records of hundreds of strange and unusual things.

Useful, useless, strange, vicious.

They have all types.

The Five Great Powers simply chose these five hopes based on their own needs, and their preliminary explorations yielded useful data, making these five the most detailed of all the hopes.

Because, apart from the order in which the records were made, the writing style of the entire travelogue is also vague.

The first step is to identify a prominent landmark, and then use that landmark to draw out a point of interest.

This point of interest could be something like hope, an interesting creature, or simply the landmark itself.

But most of them are written in this way.

Then comes the introduction to this existence.

Presented from the recorder's own subjective perspective.

Then the problem arises: he didn't mention a word about what was around him or what dangers he might encounter.

This is why every exploration always ends in failure.

It is also a trial deliberately left behind by the recorder.

After all, the recorder is also human, and the meaning is: if I can obtain it alone, you, as human beings, can too.

If you can't even do this, then don't even dream of exploring this dark continent.

"Isn't our Giant Beast Kingdom mentioned in the book? I think it's very necessary to include it."

Men Qi asked from the side.

Although she had read The New Continent Chronicle several times, she still couldn't remember every single line.

Sometimes many things are glossed over with a single stroke, but the information contained in that brief sentence is actually quite profound.

Pairo shook his head.

"No, and it's understandable. According to the book, the entire Dark Continent is enormous, a behemoth-like entity that exists in almost every direction."

"Based on the exploration data we previously obtained from Jin, we also know that behemoths are arguably the most common creatures on the Dark Continent."

The so-called enormous size of living beings is merely the most basic element of the Dark Continent.

Upon hearing this, Men Qi nodded in agreement. It seemed to be true. In that case, the Giant Beast Kingdom was nothing special; it was just a normal area where giant beasts fought over territory.

"After all, the plant resources here are very abundant, supporting a large number of herbivores. If it can support so many herbivores, it can naturally support a large number of carnivores."

"A relatively complete ecosystem can naturally emerge here, and it will naturally attract other creatures, like the Resentful Eater Snake."

Buhaci added from the side.

Therefore, in order to come to the Dark Continent, everyone must have at least some knowledge of biology.

Melusina, who hadn't said much until now, couldn't help but nod.

"I agree. You see, in the area above and to the side of the Giant Beast Kingdom, there's a Black Tower, which is undoubtedly a structure built by Sapient Life."

They also gave Kevin the Chip to explore.

The Chip also stores information.

So, the fact that this Black Tower is located here clearly indicates its intention to gather more biological information from this area where creatures congregate.

Listening to everyone's conversation, Rukira turned to another page and began drawing several large circles.

Morel, who was sitting next to him, peeked over.

Are you drawing a diagram?

Rukira nodded.

"Drawing a picture can give us a general understanding of the resources that might exist around us, and these are mostly our goals."

"No need to guess, Kevin's target is definitely these resources that are clearly documented in the book."

Melusina made her conclusion immediately.

Men Qi also leaned over, curiously looking at the pattern that Rukira had drawn.

First, let's look at their location.

Then, to the northwest of their location, Unmanned Stone was marked.

This thing is located in a desolate mountain range.

In the northeastern part of the Unmanned Stone, close to the area, a huge tree was drawn.

This is a giant landmark that is highlighted in the book.

World Tree.

Kim had always been extremely interested in this place, which was one of the reasons why he was willing to come with Kevin and the others.

If we're being precise, this is in the direction Kevin and the others are in, just not the closest distance. But at least it's not an insurmountable distance.

Then there's the southeastern part of their area, where there's an Inner Sea the coast.

One very important reason for marking this place is that there are records of an extremely large sea monster existing in the Inner Sea.

That appears to be their lair.

One important reason why sea creatures are recorded is that they are harmless and do not attack proactively.

Because anything dangerous is deliberately blurred out in books.

For example, the Resentful Eater Snake.

Then, directly to the west of where they are now, there is a huge, bottomless pit.

It's located in the area below the Unmanned Stone Range.

If they were to explore the Unmanned Stone Range, they should be able to see that enormous crater. According to the records, this crater is large enough to contain the entire Unmanned Stone Range.

And to their north.

There exists a high-end, man-made architectural complex.

One of the High Tower is particularly eye-catching.

Kevin had previously suspected that the Kōtan they encountered might be one of the structures in this man-made high-end building complex.

The area where Kevin and his group were first thrown was between the Kōtan and the Giant Beast Kingdom.

"Judging from the direction we're exploring now, we should be heading towards the area where the Giant Ox Herd is located, right?"

Men Qi pointed to the northeastern area in the book and said.

Melusina nodded.

"The book records that Giant Ox Herd produce a type of Milk that is extremely nutritious, with an astonishingly high Milk value and composition."

If you were to put it another way, this could actually be considered a kind of patriarchal desire.

If this kind of grandfatherly wishful thinking could give birth to a creature.

Clearly, no country in human society believes it can bring such Giant Ox Herd into human society for domestication.

Its value is significantly lower compared to other places, so naturally no one wants to come here.

All I can say is that if you come here, you can try to steal some things.

And that is their current goal.

"Shouldn't such Giant Ox Herd be dangerous in itself?"

Men Qi couldn't help but complain from the side.

Sahara shrugged and said, "Whether it's dangerous or not, we have no way of knowing. We always gloss over anything that's dangerous."

"What a wicked guy."

There's nothing we can do about this.

The next day.

The group set off once again.

Thus, from the start of the journey, the next day passed.

They seemed to have finally escaped the Giant Beast Kingdom.

Ahead lay a vast expanse of lush green grassland, stretching as far as the eye could see.

"We've arrived at the grassland."

Squatting on a large tree, Morel held up binoculars and spoke to the Chimera Ant on his hand.

The others, still recovering from the devastation, immediately rushed over to gather.

They were all awestruck by the exaggerated beauty of the grassland.

Looking out, the sky and earth seem to merge into one.

The sky was crystal clear, a flawless azure, and the sun shone down without reservation.

The flat grassland stretches out endlessly, a lush green expanse like a giant velvet carpet. Every blade of grass is yellowish-brown, floating gently in the breeze, creating ripples and whispering softly.

"This scenery is so beautiful."

Men Qi muttered to herself.

This is a sight that can never be seen in human society.

"Wash it repeatedly!"

Strange cries came from afar.

Then the ground began to tremble violently, and the group quickly ducked and hid.

Looking out over the grassland.

The sound of galloping horses and strange neighing and shouting filled the air; a group of horse-like creatures were rushing towards them.

They have a physique almost identical to that of a horse, except that they are significantly larger than normal horses.

Each horse was the size of a mobile house, and its length was estimated to be at least four meters.

Their strong muscles are clearly visible. The horses are mainly Crimson-Bane White-Kōtan with white hooves, and on their heads, you can also see two horns that curve backward.

On the neck, limbs, and tail, fine scales can be seen reflecting light in the sunlight.

The tail is not a mane, but rather a cow's tail shaped like a long whip.

These herds of horses galloped across the grassland like moving houses, crashing wildly together.

Its main feature is its extremely high speed.

Pairo observed carefully and couldn't help but mutter, "With such a huge size, judging from the speed measurements we're seeing now, even their current running speed is already 300km/h."

No sooner had they finished speaking than the horses began to accelerate again, splitting into two groups and galloping off in different directions.

It's windy.

"Wind?"

Then they saw it.

Something invisible was blowing, and the lush green grass looked as if it had been neatly cut by something. A yellowish breeze swept across the sky.

The horses are fleeing.

"Climb the tree!"