A few miles away from the City, Xuefeng and Tianshi finally stopped running away, slowing their pace. They had to be more economical than usual with how they used almost one-third of their total Fate Qi reserves already. His Time Manipulation ability was second after the Judgment Vine when it came to the Fate Qi consumption.
Although Judgment Vine didn't require Fate Qi, he had to fill the lack of Qi using Fate Qi because he didn't have enough Earth Qi in his Soul. He would need first to expand his Soul to the limits to use the Judgment Vine without wasting any Fate Qi.
Just as they stopped, Xuefeng released Tianshi from his arms, and they pulled out a pair of black cloaks to hide their identity. Before he covered his face completely though, Tianshi suddenly leaned over and kissed him deeply while embracing his face under the cover of their hoods.
Xuefeng got confused at the suddenness of her kiss, but he would never reject such an act. They were in the middle of nowhere anyway, so they could afford to spend a few seconds on mutual pleasure.
"Thank you," Tianshi muttered as her lips hovered above his own, grazing against them just enough for them to taste each other's warm breaths.
"What did I do?" Xuefeng asked curiously, rubbing their noses together. He didn't think he did anything special, but then Tianshi enlightened him.
"Even though I didn't do anything, you still put my name out there, involving me in the whole process… I know you did it naturally, which makes me love you even more…"
She kissed him once again as the reward, their tongues entering into their special connection before Xuefeng teased, "I thought our love already filled the whole heavens and all universes. Do we even have a space for more?"
"There is always space for more love. If there is none left, we can grow it stronger instead," Tianshi replied. "You didn't have to mention me, and I would still love you, so thank you. It made me happy inside."
Xuefeng already hugged her tightly, but he still pulled her even closer after her words. "Of course I would include you. Aren't you, my wife? I want you to be part of my life forever. Your glory is my glory."
"Can I never leave your side and always support you?"
Xuefeng smiled at that silly question.
"Did I ever say you can leave me?"
He pulled away after kissing the tip of her nose and grabbed her hand, flying forward in the direction of Water Land Capital.
"Let's go beautiful."
With such a sweet invite, Tianshi couldn't reject him and flew closely next to him.
'You two are just as special to me,' Xuefeng called out in his mind, making sure his other two wives don't feel excluded.
He felt fortunate to have them all, but Ming crushed his moment of happiness with the step into reality. 'We know that, but you should think more about how to gather more Fate Qi instead. Unless you want us to disappear, we need Fate Qi to live.'
'Oof, is it that bad already?' Xuefeng asked in wonder. They gathered many Fate Stones before Ascending, which was their primary source of Fate Qi, aside from killing other Fate Holders. To think it wasn't enough to last them for a while.
'Yes. If we use Fate Qi so freely, we will drop below the minimum threshold in less than a month. We can also only use the Judgment Vine two more times before running out, so it's not good,' Ming explained worriedly. 'Let's not waste any more Fate Qi. You can use your Sword Arts for now till we find another source of Fate Stones.'
'Where can we find them? Are there any known places?' Xuefeng questioned, not knowing Heaven Realm as Ming did.
'There are no I know of that you can access right now. Unless you randomly find a mine somewhere in the Heaven Realm, you can only visit Metal Land. It is filled with various Ores and you can find Fate Stones naturally growing there. Too bad, not only it's too far away from the Water Land, directly on the other side of Heaven Realm, but also dangerous, with many high ranked beasts owning the land,' Ming replied.
'Once he masters all seven sword moves, he should be fine dealing with most cultivators,' Ling interjected. 'I can take that task while you focus on solving the ID Card issue.'
'Sounds great to me. I'm sure we can meet some Fate Holders as we travel and kill them as well,' Xuefeng added. Fate Holders were like fire and water, all ready to kill each other to consume the other's vital Fate Qi. Without Fate Qi, they wouldn't be able to survive otherwise.
Ming thought for a moment before agreeing, 'Fine, let's focus on the current problems. I should be done with the ID Card before we reach the Water Land Capital. We are still a few days away from it anyway. We are lucky we Ascended not far from it, else it would take us weeks to get there.'
Flying ahead with their plan set up, Xuefeng couldn't help but feel the lack of the dummy Drakos. Even though he was mischievous, he was good at solving problems.
'Sigh, if only Drakos was here. He definitely knows multiple places where we could get Fate Stones.'
———
Yawn.
"Are we there yet?"
A sweet but tired voice reached Drakos' ears as he flew under the cover of the clouds. His dark blue Dragon body already grew big enough to carry a few humans on his back, but this time it was only one, the most annoying one from them all.
Bella.
She was a Phoenix who turned into her humanoid form after reaching the Celestial Stage. Her flaming hair spread between Drakos' scales as she laid down on his back with a relaxed expression on her face. Her long, smooth legs moved left and right from boredom, as she yawned from time to time, already tired from seeing the same scenery this whole time.
She was relatively new to being a lady, so her legs spread wide, and her skirt rolled on her belly yet she didn't seem to care much. Bella played with a small flame on top of her palm, but there was only so much fun from looking at the dancing flame.
"If you fly next to me, you won't be as bored," Drakos replied, already tired from hearing the same sentence over and over again.
"Meh, it's troublesome to change my form," Bella replied lazily, used to being carried by Drakos. "Just tell me how long till we arrive."
"Actually, if I'm correct, we should see our destination from a distance," Drakos replied, putting Bella into excitement. "Really? Show, show!"
She sat up like a little girl who just got her present and swiftly crawled up on Drakos' head.
He could only comply and dive through the clouds to reveal the land underneath. Bella's eyes immediately widened at the view.
Whoa…