"You mean what drove away the High-Rank Magic Beasts was that the aura down there had been exposed?"
"Most likely."
Ye Chuqi murmured, "But why wouldn't even the Small Magic Beasts dare go near it?"
An ancient city had lain buried underground for who knew how many years. No one knew what was inside. It would have been normal for an overwhelming pressure to drive the beasts away, but Ye Chuqi had felt no such pressure.
They had marked the spot, so finding it again would not be difficult. Besides, the Teleportation Array here had originally been part of the city. The moment they entered this area, they had entered the city's bounds.
"San San, can you scan underground now?"
San San had tried to "look" underground before, but whether because it lacked the strength or faced some other restriction, it had noticed nothing amiss. This time, beyond making sure their surroundings were safe, its main task was to "see clearly" what lay beneath them.
Just as Ye Chuqi asked, San San touched a strange boundary. A shock unlike anything it had ever sensed struck it, and it nearly screamed.
Bound to San San, Ye Chuqi instantly felt the shock it sent her. An ancient, weighty aura carried a strange sense of movement held back, as though each slow pulse came with a labored breath. Her own breathing grew heavy, each breath tugging at her heartbeat until it beat slowly and with effort.
What was this?
San San's voice came trembling. "It's... its heartbeat..."
By "it," San San meant the Lost Domain sleeping beneath this land: a vast, lost city. That ancient, weighty aura was its heartbeat.
It was alive.
And San San's probing had disturbed its sleep.
A faint tremor had begun beneath their feet, growing steadily stronger.
Yan