Douluo Continent.
The core region of the Star Dou Great Forest, beside the Lake of Life.
Di Tian stood quietly by the water, his draconic eyes likewise fixed intently on the Heavenly Screen's livestream in midair.
An intractable confusion lay between his brows.
Behind him, Bi Ji, the Myriad Demon King, Xiong Jun, and the other Ferocious Beasts had all gathered, each wearing the same puzzled expression.
"This..."
Bi Ji's delicate brows furrowed slightly, her stunning face filled with confusion. "What happened to the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land's power to strip away time? Why is it gone? Or does it have no effect on that little girl?"
"Could we really have been wrong all along?"
The Myriad Demon King's deep voice rang out, his face of countless vines twitching slightly. "Is this Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land actually not that dangerous?"
Xiong Jun shook his head.
"But when the Heavenly Screen first played, that fellow named Long Aotian really did turn to drifting ash within just a few steps!"
"I could feel the terrifying presence of time rushing past even through the Heavenly Screen!"
"But how do you explain what's happening now?"
The Scarlet King's three heads turned toward Xiong Jun at once, all six eyes full of questions. "No matter how you look at her, that Xiao Nannan is just an ordinary human cub."
"No Soul Power fluctuations, no traces of cultivation. I could blow a whole swath of her kind to death in a single breath."
"Yet she walked out of the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land without encountering any danger whatsoever."
After a long silence, Di Tian slowly spoke. "Perhaps we really were wrong. The Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land isn't dangerous. What's dangerous is actually the humans of that world."
"For instance, that old man in the Bitter Sea Realm earlier. That speed, that strength..."
"They were simply terrifying beyond belief!"
"So last time, Long Aotian was most likely stripped of his time by a powerful expert from the Shrouding the Heavens World using a spell. It wasn't that the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land was dangerous."
Hearing Di Tian's words, the Ferocious Beasts nodded instinctively. After all, this was the most reasonable explanation.
But soon...
"If that kind of spell isn't inherent to the forbidden land itself, but is cast by someone..."
"Stripping away time!"
Bi Ji murmured softly, a rare flicker of alarm crossing her emerald eyes.
"That is absolutely not a domain Soul Skills can reach. It even... surpasses the scope of Soul Skills as we understand them. Stripping away the years, turning hair white with a snap of the fingers..."
"This is practically like... like touching the fundamental rules of the world."
Di Tian stood with his hands behind his back, his black robe utterly still amid the mist rising from the Lake of Life. His thoughts went further and deeper.
Not just time spells, but also the other scenes the Heavenly Screen had previously shown in fleeting glimpses...
"The humans of that world... walk a completely different path from ours."
"Their strength seems to lie not merely in accumulating energy, but even more in controlling and plundering laws, the Dao, and certain fundamental powers."
"Time... may only be one of them."
Di Tian's voice was low and slow, carrying an unprecedented gravity. At the same time, his gaze involuntarily turned toward the Heavenly Screen, as though seeking to pierce space and time and see that name, that figure...
Heavenly Emperor Hao, Lin Hao!
That heavenly waterfall of Sword Qi outside White Emperor City!
Although Di Tian was not proficient in swordsmanship, his strength still allowed him to see... that heavenly waterfall was anything but simple!
"God King..."
Di Tian slowly uttered those words, words that symbolized absolute supremacy on the Douluo Continent.
Yet his eyes were filled with uncertain hesitation and profound wariness.
"My lord, the Silver Dragon King, is the sovereign of all Soul Beasts, one half of the divided Dragon God, possessing the highest God King-level standing and power. If she could recover her full strength..."
He fell silent for a moment, his draconic eyes fixed on the Heavenly Screen, as though comparing and weighing it against that streak of Sword Qi in his memories that had pierced heaven and earth.
After a long while, Di Tian let out a deep sigh.
Within that sigh lay a trace of helplessness that even he had not noticed.
"Even with my lord at her peak, against that heavenly waterfall of Sword Qi unleashed by Lin Hao... victory or defeat would likely remain in the realm of the unknown."
"The humans of that world... are truly far too terrifying!"
Beside him stood Bi Ji, the Myriad Demon King, Xiong Jun, and the many other mighty beings who could make the entire Douluo Continent tremble three times with a stamp of their feet.
Yet at this moment, all of them felt supreme awe toward another being!
"If we go to the Shrouding the Heavens World in the future, we absolutely must not offend the Heavenly Court!"
And while Di Tian and the others marveled.
The image on the Heavenly Screen suddenly split in two.
On the left was still the scene of Xiao Nannan holding the Three-Eyed Golden Lion's hand, skipping toward the edge of the forest in the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land.
Nothing unexpected happened at all. The human and beast were perfectly safe.
On the right, however, an entirely different scene appeared...
It was a world of dazzling lights and revelry!
[Third-person view: Sun Moon Empire commoner, Li Dan (Level 0)]
At that moment, on Blue Star.
Towering buildings stood in dense rows, their glass curtain walls reflecting the last rays of the setting sun.
With a flash of golden light, Li Dan, a commoner from the Sun Moon Empire on the Douluo Continent, abruptly appeared in the middle of a road...
"This..."
He stared, dumbstruck, at the bustling traffic on the street, all sorts of strangely shaped "iron shells" roaring past.
Overhead, occasional "iron birds" streaked across the sky, trailing long white lines.
On the sidewalks, pedestrians came and went, dressed in all kinds of clothing that looked extremely "revealing" or "bizarre" to the people of the Douluo Continent.
Many held small glowing rectangles in their hands, looking down at them as they walked.
"Wh... where is this?"
Li Dan stood blankly at the intersection, looking around at everything with bewildered eyes, his mouth slightly open, his worldview visibly shaken.
"Didn't I transmigrate to the Shrouding the Heavens World? But this... this is completely different from the Shrouding the Heavens World I saw on the Heavenly Screen earlier!"
Li Dan stiffly turned his neck, watching a bus drive past him, his eyes widening into circles. "What are those iron shells running along the ground? There are no Soul Power fluctuations, and no livestock pulling them. How can they move on their own?"
"And those iron birds flying up there! They're so big! How do they not fall?!"
"These buildings... aren't they way too tall?! How were they built?! Aren't they afraid they'll collapse?!"
Like a country bumpkin entering the city, he was astonished by every new thing he saw.
And at that moment.
Across the Douluo Continent, the people watching the Heavenly Screen also erupted into an uproar.
Shrek Academy.
"This..."
Yu Xiaogang stood in Shrek Academy's square, his brows tightly furrowed, his usually stern face now filled with confusion.
Behind him, Tang San, Ma Hongjun, Oscar, and the rest of the Shrek Five Monsters all looked up at the Heavenly Screen, bewilderment flickering in every pair of eyes.
"Teacher, is this also the Shrouding the Heavens World?"
Tang San could not help asking, his gaze moving back and forth between the two images.
On the left, Xiao Nannan skipped through the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land, the years peaceful and serene; on the right was an utterly unfamiliar forest of steel, bustling with traffic and flashing neon lights.
"They're completely different."
Yu Xiaogang slowly shook his head. Always so "confident," he now spoke with unprecedented uncertainty:
"The Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land clearly has the scenery of a primeval forest, with mountains, water, plants, birds, and beasts. And the Shrouding the Heavens World we saw earlier also mostly had low wooden houses."
"But here on the right..."