Zhang Dong opened up his eyes and could see a uniform ceiling made from steel. There were various small gem light orbs embedded in it that shone in a dim yellow light. He rolled over to the side, what he witnessed was the sleeping face of his lovely wife right next to him.
He just remained there, not moving while staring at the mother of his children. She still placed importance on her face, the makeup that she wore only got more intricate with the years. He had tried to tell her that it was fine to go with a more ‘natural’ look. Whenever he mentioned that he could feel the daggers stabbing into him from her menacing stare.
He moved his hand over to her cheek, with the back of his hand he caressed it. He could feel Liena’s breath on his skin and she started to wiggle around. Before he could wake her up, he heard someone call out from the side.
“Patriarch, we will be arriving at our destination within an hour’s time.”
The voice was a bit choppy, it was coming from a console from the side that was connected to the Argonauts control room. He recognized the voice, it was the ship’s captain doing his report. This abrupt call out also caused his wife to finally wake up.
“Is that so, I’ll be with you in a moment.”
Zhang Dong called out to the disembodied voice of the ship’s captain while sitting up. He was still in bed, the only thing covering his naked body the silky bed sheets.
“We should get ready and prepare for battle.”
Liena rubbed her sleepy eyes for a moment, she could see Zhang Dong standing up and grabbing his robe that was on the side. The two started to redress themselves while looking at the mirror at the side.
Zhang Dong checked if he had all of his spatial rings present along with the weapons that he usually used. While doing this Zhang Liena moved over and straightened up his robe along with his disheveled hair.
“Give me a moment, I need to freshen up.”
“You look fine…Uh… nevermind.”
She gave him that face again so he decided to just let her redo her makeup. Something like that could take from a couple of minutes to even an hour. After leaving the room he headed to the ship’s operating room where all the important people should be gathered.
“Greetings Patriarch!”
“Welcome Master.”
His two disciples were here as well but they were missing a certain Huo Qiang.
‘He never liked this type of gathering, he is probably on the bridge getting prepared for the coming battle.’
He nodded at the people that were greeting him while moving further inside. He remembered everyone in this room all thanks to his almost perfect memory. Being a cultivator at his level brought some perks with them. Knowing their faces was the only thing that he did, what their private lives looked like was something he wasn’t interested in. There was a certain barrier that wouldn’t be crossed.
He was the Patriarch and they were under him, having a personal relationship with them would be quite hard. The people here treated him like some kind of king, some even close to a divine being. They would perform any task he would give them. What they wanted in return was prestige and a chance for improving their cultivation. Everyone was aiming for the very top here, they all wished to ascend to immortality in one way or another.
“How does it look, Captain? Are there any dangers ahead of us?”
Zhang Dong asked while sitting down, he had a special seat prepared for just his use. All the other people were standing up straight not daring to do anything out of place in front of the sect leader.
“Reporting to the Patriarch! The trip has been smooth, the monsters that lurk in the fog are unable to pierce through our barrier. There were fewer of them left than we expected. We believe that most of the monsters from these lands were slain during the defense of the Divine Fist Sect.”
Zhang Dong rubbed his chin while listening. Apparently, the monster’s numbers weren’t unlimited. There were swarms of them back there, it was possible that the army was now thinned out.
“Mmm, prepare for battle either way. Even though the monsters aren’t appearing now, they could be lurking at the ruins to defend their master.”
It would be a good idea for the beast to pull back its armies to its lair. He wasn’t sure if the monster had a direct connection with its minions. After most of them were killed by him and his elders it would be smart for the demonic being to bunker up. They would probably experience heavy resistance at these ruins when they arrived.
“Is the radar picking them up?”
“This mist is blocking our devices, we can’t pierce through them beyond a kilometer. I’m afraid we will only know if the beasts are waiting for us after we arrive at our destination, my lord.”
He nodded while looking at the screen. There were a few red dots here and there which represented some flying monsters. There weren’t that many around, whenever they flew by the monsters would try to attack them. But they would disintegrate into particles whenever they slammed themselves into the Argonauts shield. There were two large green dots in front of his ship which represented the two ships from the Divine Fist Sect. They had guided them towards this area, even in the mist, their navigators were able to traverse their land without a hitch. They weren’t going that fast but within a day they were not close to the previously found ruins.
Zhang Dong found it a bit strange that these ruins were only found recently. They weren’t that far away from the main sect city. They also weren’t in a particularly dangerous area from what he had heard.
“We will approach slowly, it would be unwise to rush in without any information. Make sure that everyone is ready for combat!”
He gave his orders while observing the indication on the big screen. He spread his senses outside and kept a close eye on everything. There were approaching the supposed lair of the monster, the first thing he noticed was the noise. The closer they got the fewer sounds he could hear.
During their approach just a few minutes ago he could hear the wails of strange monstrosities in the distance. There were even sounds of them slamming into their protective barrier but now, there was nothing. It was as if there was nothing here, the wind had even stopped howling.
‘Something isn’t right….’
“The wind… something is affecting it.”
He looked to the side, Zhang Liena was standing there back in her attire. She was the person most versed in the Dao of the wind so she noticed that something wasn’t right. Their eyes met for a moment and he nodded, it was time to go outside.
“Captain, remain vigilant. I and grand elder Liena will depart for the ship deck to examine the situation.”
It was time to leave and go outside. The two removed themselves from the room, Liu and Xue moved behind them while Nuana also approached from the side. The kids had joined them on this expedition but they were here more as observers. With the nascent soul masters around the core formation cultivators would only get in the way.
These youths at the core formation level could still aid the Argonaut with their cultivation. They could and would be stationed by the ship’s side cannons. There were many of those and they were constructed in a way that a cultivator could boost the cannon’s power with their own cultivation base.
“Finally you are out, the fun is about to start!”
Huo Qiang was sitting right at the tip of the ship’s deck. He was looking out into the cloudy void that was this mist. The two smaller ships in front of them were giving out light of their own. They were still hard to spot with the naked eye as the ships kept a large distance from each other.
“Fun huh? I hope that fun won’t be very deadly.”
Zhang Dong replied with a shrug while moving towards Huo Qiang and the tip of the ship. He tried to spread out his senses beyond this fog but it was quite good at blocking his internal sonar. He decided to use his system’s map function afterward but as before it was getting jammed.
He didn’t like where this was going, whenever his system was affected by anything it didn’t bode anything good. He was going to face off against a monster that he believed was brought with him to this world along with his system. By who and why was still unknown to him.
Zhang Dong hopped that he could shed some light on this mystery by taking the beast out. He had yet to encounter any more of those strange cube treasures that he had absorbed on two occasions. The person that appeared that one time was also suspicious. Was that person an ally or an enemy? It could just be a ploy of the being that brought him here.
He was scared that he was now some kind of plaything of a god-like existence. It could be a person at the immortal level of strength or even far beyond that. From what he knew there were no immortals left in this world at least none that were active. One could be hiding somewhere but not like anyone at the nascent soul level would be able to sense a cultivator of that prestige.
The silence continued for a few moments, the only thing that could be heard was the humming sound of the Argonaut’s engines. The silence was brought to an abrupt stop as one of the Divine Fist Sect’s ships went up in flames.
It was the one that was the furthest away from them. Zhang Dong could faintly see something large and slimy piercing this flying vessel from below. It looked like a giant trunk of a tree with many branches that were strangely moving around.
“Enemy Attack!”
The alarm sounded on the ship, the thumping steps of many cultivators were heard in the surroundings as everyone took off running. The side cannons sprung into action as everyone that was in one tried to focus on the enemy.
The two grand elders including the Patriarch from the United Element Sect reacted as well. They all focused their energies on the exploding ship, they weren’t attacking the strange ‘tree’ but trying to pluck the Divine Fist Sect cultivators that were falling down after the explosion.
Elder Heng who was responsible for their safety was also there. With the four powerful cultivators working together most of the ship’s crew was safely evacuated to the other two ships. “Finally I was tired of waiting, it’s our turn now!”
Huo Qiang shouted out while pointing out with his finger towards the strange tree that was hard to see due to the mist.
The tip of Qiang’s finger started glowing in a deep crimson. Particles of red light converged onto the tip before a red beam of plasma shot forward. In a fraction of a second, it connected with the thing that pierced the ship.
“GUOHHH.”
A monstrous wail of pain was heard by everyone present after the attack connected. The mist was forcefully parted by Qiang’s attack to reveal the enemy’s true form. Instead of a large tree what they saw was a mass of flesh. The branches were just smaller squiggly tentacle appendages, on each of them a toothy mouth which was now screeching in pain after a large hole was blown open in the thick tentacle trunk.
“Everyone, Attack!”
The order was given, the large ship composed of spirit metal lit up brightly as its cannons started firing, the battle had finally started.