Hidden Check-In Location

"Join forces and slaughter him."

The Marquis of Purple Mountain's uncle bellowed.

Only the old man from Cloud Heaven Palace stayed still. With the situation unclear, he instinctively shielded his two granddaughters.

As for Shi Hao, after glancing at Xiao Tian swiftly killing the powerful invaders outside, he immediately merged with the Ancestral Artifact, the Bian hide. He attacked the members of the great clans who had struck at Xiao Tian. Enmity had already been forged; he could not afford to show mercy.

Especially those from the Purple Mountain Clan, Golden Wolf, Thunder Clan, and Luofu Marsh. They were clearly the invaders, yet their children, youths, and adults alike stared venomously at the people of Stone Village, brimming with murderous intent, as though they were the victims.

Just then!

The Willow Deity finally could not hold back and intervened. There were too many invading enemies, and they had actually attacked the other villagers. To these cultivators from great clans, the other people of Stone Village were mere commoners they could crush at will.

"Pfft, pfft, pfft!"

The lush green willow branch swept like a sword, like an unrivaled immortal blade leaving its sheath. Wherever it passed, the Willow Deity forcibly stripped those experts of all their vital essence. They became decaying, withered corpses, as though eroded by endless ages.

Of those who attacked, one Spirit Transformation Realm cultivator from each clan was spared to escort the remaining terrified children and youths away, fleeing without even choosing their path.

Xiao Feng, Xiao Shan, and Xiao Yuan stared at everything before them, dumbstruck. They had all suffered injuries of varying severity, their robes stained with blood, but seemed utterly unaware of them as they gazed in shock at the charred willow tree at the village entrance, with its single tender branch.

Xiao Tian returned and came up beside the two little girls. He went straight in with his lips-"smack, smack"-fairly planting one kiss on each girl's cheek. The little girls had luminous white skin, ethereal beauty, and large, sparkling eyes. "Yun Lu, Yun Shuang, were you worried about your big brother Tian?"

"Ah, you meanie!

Not at all."

Both girls cried out at once. They had not even seen how Xiao Tian had suddenly appeared before them.

The old man from Cloud Heaven Palace merely smiled. So far, he had found Xiao Tian's talent to be astonishingly good. Making him his grandson-in-law was not out of the question.

Afterward, the people from Cloud Heaven Palace stayed in Stone Village for several more days. Xiao Tian teased the two little girls daily, while also teaching them to cultivate alongside Shi Hao. He even personally prepared Hundred-Beast Milk.

The milk pots he used were the ones he had drunk from since childhood, which had always been kept in his father's Heavenly Grotto.

Now, Xiao Tian gave the milk pots to Shi Hao as a gift and explained to him that there was nothing shameful about drinking beast milk.

Seeing the little fellow sneak beast milk every day with such a bashful expression made Xiao Tian's heart ache.

Xiao Tian also personally demonstrated to the three little ones how to drink beast milk. He taught them eight recipes using different combinations of Savage Beast milk, with wild mountain honey added to make them sweeter and tastier.

On the fourth day, the old man from Cloud Heaven Palace bade farewell and left with the two reluctant little girls.

"Yun Lu, Yun Shuang, my little sisters, remember-you can only marry me."

Watching them fly away on a feather, Xiao Tian called out a reminder.

The two little girls blushed scarlet. Their big brother Xiao Tian was wonderful in every way, except that he loved kissing them. That was just too embarrassing.

Little One, Shi Hao, was adorable too, but he was too young and more interested in drinking beast milk.

"Little One, I'm leaving too. When you grow up, you must come study at the Heaven Mending Pavilion. It's a supreme lineage with a divine inheritance. You can learn many precious Treasure Arts there.

Also, this Treasure Artifact is for you, to protect yourself."

Xiao Tian took out a silver sword, forged from part of the Xiao Clan's Sacrificial Spirit's body.

It was comparable to a Spirit Transformation Realm Treasure Artifact. After all, the Xiao Clan's Sacrificial Spirit had undergone many transformations, and the clan had collected what was shed to forge armor and weapons.

Then, beneath the reluctant gazes of the villagers and little Shi Hao, Xiao Tian walked over to the Willow Deity.

"Willow Deity, I'm leaving. Those people definitely won't let this rest. When the time comes, Marquis-Sealing experts will surely come to Stone Village.

Willow Deity, thank you for helping me break through to the Cave Heaven Realm. I know you aren't afraid of those great clans at all. Otherwise, you wouldn't have deliberately let those people go."

Xiao Tian stood beside the Willow Deity for a while before speaking.

"You cannot leave."

The voice appeared in Xiao Tian's mind. He could not tell whether it was male or female, but the Willow Deity had indeed spoken.

"Willow Deity, you mean someone is watching the surroundings?

In that case, I won't leave."

Xiao Tian answered without hesitation.

He actually knew already. However, they had stayed in Stone Village for so long that he did not know whether the Willow Deity was willing to shelter them. He could only test the waters by coming to say goodbye.

Xiao Tian stayed-or rather, he could not leave for the time being.

The very next day, he witnessed the leaders of four top clans, each with populations in the tens of millions, leading their experts and bringing their Sacrificial Spirits and Treasure Artifacts to attack Stone Village.

Yet before the Willow Deity's single willow branch, which resembled Order Divine Chains, they were all nothing but dregs. The Willow Deity casually devoured their vital essence, reducing them to dust.

In the end, the Marquis of Purple Mountain and Golden Wolf escaped. Everyone else at the Spirit Transformation Realm or above was wiped out, including the Flood Dragon Clan's chief and its Sacrificial Spirit, the Gray Flood Dragon, the Wolf Clan's leader, and the Thunder Clan's leader. All became nourishment for the Willow Deity.

Next, the Willow Deity swept back all the mounts those people had ridden. Scale Horses, Unicorns, Moon Rhinoceroses, Feathered Tigers, and other Variant Savage Beasts were all skewered on the willow branch like candied hawthorns on a stick.

Meanwhile, deep within the Primordial Desolate Forest, the battle between the four Fierce Beast remnants grew increasingly fierce.

Blazing vermilion flames, like flames of blood, burned the heavens red. A little red sparrow, only palm-sized, flew among them, battling a pitch-black monster within the dark clouds. The monster stretched across the sky. With its wings spread, black haze shrouded half the heavens. Amid the surging black mist, only a pair of eyes showed, like millstone-sized blood moons, eerily sinister. They could fire two blood spears as thick as mountains at the Little Red Bird.

This was the battle between the Vermilion Bird Descendant and the Heaven-Swallowing Sparrow.

There was also a gigantic Fierce Beast remnant with emerald eyes, standing amid the churning, boundless sea of clouds. Its entire body was dark red, with a tigerlike torso, a broad mouth, and protruding fangs, yet it had two towering bull horns. Ferocious beyond measure, its two bovine feet could race across the heavens and split the earth.

Its opponent was a Zhu Yan taller than a mountain, covered in thick golden fur, with a white head and red feet. It wielded a black iron staff as thick as a mountain ridge, unleashing world-shrouding demonic might with every swing.

Xiao Tian sat on a bluestone in the village, silently watching everything. He knew that this stretch of the Great Wilderness, for a hundred thousand li around, would become a land of death.

The Mountain Treasure had emerged, a supreme treasure, and four Venerable Realm Fierce Beast remnants were fighting over it. Even the Willow Deity could not intervene. Xiao Tian was even more powerless. He could not save those innocent fellow humans in the Great Wilderness.

That Vermilion Bird Descendant was supposed to be the Fire Kingdom's Sacrificial Spirit.

And that Zhu Yan would later narrowly escape death, undergo rebirth, and become the little furball Shi Hao picked up.

However, the Willow Deity had also narrowly escaped death and undergone rebirth. Perhaps many memories had yet to return. The Willow Deity's current strength was only at the King-Sealing level, insufficient to oppose Venerable Realm Fierce Beast remnants.

That day, Human Race Villages were reduced to ruins, one after another. The Sacrificial Spirits they worshipped were utterly powerless to stop such a calamity. This included Little Solitary Mountain Town, countless towns and tribes farther afield, and even the surrounding great clans with populations exceeding ten million.

Power. Never before had Xiao Tian yearned so desperately to become stronger.

Xiao Tian left.

Just minutes before the Willow Deity condensed order runes and departed with Stone Village, Xiao Tian used the Sixth Calabash Brother's divine ability to leave the village and enter the Great Wilderness. To grow stronger, he needed precious flesh-and-blood medicines.

He possessed the invisible calabash child's innate talent. Even the four battling Venerable-level Fierce Beast remnants could not sense his presence. He would witness this great calamity and survive it, then settle every account when the time came.

The Willow Deity knew Xiao Tian had left. However, his innate divine ability was formidable, so there should have been hope of him surviving.

He was a child, after all. Human strength had its limits; some things lay beyond its reach.

The price of growing up was losing the person one had once been.

Growing up was a realization that pierced the heart. Though painful, one accepted it willingly. The innocence of the past vanished without a trace, and the people and things one had once cared about all became a single grain in the vast sea.

A mayfly lodged between heaven and earth, a tiny grain in the boundless sea.

"Ding-dong!"

[Congratulations, host, on triggering a hidden check-in location: the hundred thousand li of land about to turn to ashes in the calamity.]

[Check-in requirement: survive on this land for one hour.]

Xiao Tian had never expected his unwitting decision to reveal a hidden function of the system. Check-ins were not limited to locations designated by the system; there were hidden locations where he could check in as well.

At the same time!

Xiao Tian heard several monsters conversing. They had actually noticed Stone Village escaping and even said that it had originally been the place where a divine being had fallen.

Qiongqi, the Heaven-Swallowing Sparrow, the Vermilion Bird Descendant, and Zhu Yan were fighting over the Mountain Treasure. They also intended to slaughter witnesses and prevent word from spreading. Qiongqi and the Heaven-Swallowing Sparrow, in particular, personally attacked the great clans.

Xiao Tian could hear their thunderous conversation. Zhu Yan and the Vermilion Bird were trying to stop them, believing the other two were violating the harmony of heaven.

Xiao Tian resolutely rushed into the depths of the Primordial Savage Forest. Now, all the powerful Fierce Birds, savage beasts, and Primordial Remnants within this forest had been enslaved by the Heaven-Swallowing Sparrow and Qiongqi, driven to attack every nearby Human Race settlement.

His individual strength was limited. All he could do was avenge them in the future.

Right now, he needed to grow stronger. He needed cultivation resources.

Over these past days, Xiao Tian had gone out to train with Shi Hao and the others. From the village's young hunters, he had learned where powerful savage beast variants held territory. Such beasts generally possessed strength at the Cave Heaven Realm or higher.

Soon, he found a marsh. A Green Flood Dragon had once lived here, most likely a powerful savage beast variant at the Spirit Transformation Realm. Even from afar, he could feel waves of baleful energy rolling toward him. He found many enormous scales amid the marsh, each as large as a palm.

Xiao Tian shrank to the size of an ant and hopped across the marsh without sinking.

At last, in the very center of the marsh, a small tree three meters tall came into view. Compared with the towering trees in the primeval forest, which easily reached dozens of meters, it looked like a mere sapling.

Five-hundred-year-old Flood Dragon Blood Fruit!

It was a treasure that the marsh's Green Flood Dragon had cultivated using its own blood and the area's special conditions, probably to consume when advancing to the next realm. The golden fruit, the size of a longan, gleamed brilliantly.

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(End of chapter)