After Qing Yanjing left, Xiao Yan set off alone toward the Heavenly Tomb. He knew that the next time she appeared before him, she would surely be confident of defeating him. But he did not particularly care. Their last battle had been fierce, yet he had not used his full strength. Even if she broke through to heavenly sovereign, he was confident he could defeat her again, so her departure gave him no cause for concern.
Several days later, Xiao Yan finally reached the location marked on the map. The journey should actually have taken less than half a day, but he had been unlucky enough to encounter several natural disasters along the way, delaying him considerably. Fortunately, nothing seriously untoward had happened.
Just as the map indicated, the region where the Heavenly Tomb lay was utterly desolate. Before Xiao Yan stretched a black expanse of land, with cold, sinister mist lingering in the air above it. From a distance, he could make out what seemed to be dead trees hidden within the fog. The atmosphere was especially eerie.
Xiao Yan did not pause because of that eerie atmosphere, but continued deeper into the mist. Just as Qing Yanjing had said, this place, also called the Heavenly Tomb, had already been explored. Anyone capable of entering the Ancient Sacred Abyss possessed, at minimum, the strength of an Earth Supreme. Naturally, they had no interest in things at the supreme realm level, but Xiao Yan was different.
As he walked, Xiao Yan saw all manner of skeletal remains lying silently on the ground. Their surfaces were covered in cracks, and most could no longer be pieced together into complete skeletons. Many had been reduced to scattered fragments of shattered bone. These were only the people whose bodies had survived at all.