Reilo and An Liya had been talking in secret on the Gobi for about an hourglass.
By now, the sun was setting.
Sand blew across the desolate land, and the blood-red sunset framed the ominous crescent moon on the horizon. Amid the wasteland, mournful grass grew stubbornly. Qiu Dao, Tianci, Bailan, and Anxi, the Alchemy Master known as Furnace Power, finally saw two figures walking slowly toward them side by side. They hurried to meet them.
Bailan and Tianci were at the front. Without a word, they each took their place beside the Shadow Paper Figure, beaming with genuine delight.
Qiu Dao and Anxi were more composed. They walked over to the pair at an unhurried pace.
But the burly, square-jawed man was clearly growing restless.
After all, they had been waiting here for so long, and the extraordinary magic power emanating from that staff was impossible to miss. How could it not stir the heart of an Alchemy Master like him?
He had been a renowned Alchemy Master for many years, and the realm of Alchemy Grandmaster, the dream of every alchemist, was not far beyond his reach. Though the difference between an Alchemy Master and an Alchemy Grandmaster was only one word, the gap between them was as vast as heaven and earth.
"Dean."
Once Qiu Dao and Anxi had reached Reilo and An Liya, Qiu Dao spoke first.
He hesitated briefly, then asked cautiously, "How is it?"
"It's truly extraordinary."
Reilo chose his words carefully. "Its scale exceeds anything the Academic World has ever imagined about life. Even I know very little about it, since I've had so little contact with Level Five lifeforms. So I can't accurately define what it is. But the strange thing is, something so immense lies dormant as a fragment of genetic