The Xuanwu Ruins Realm, suspended in the chaotic heavens and earth, was separated from the Kunlun Realm by a great distance, making it difficult for even Saints to fly across, and could only be reached by travelling through a spatial passage.
“Rumble!”
The formation of the Ruins Realm Ship rotated rapidly, and with the atmosphere of the Xuanwu Ruins Realm, there was a violent friction, forming a crimson fire cloud.
Standing on the ground and looking upwards, one could see that a huge fire cloud had appeared in the originally light blue sky, covering half of the sky, giving off a terrifying atmosphere of the end of the world approaching.
In the midst of a fire cloud, a pitch-black Market Realm Ship flew out and rushed towards the ground.
A moment later, the Market Realm Ship passed through the Xuanwu Market Realm’s atmosphere and appeared over a clear sea. Afterwards, the ship slowly descended and landed on top of a yellowish-brown sea island.
“Boom!”
On the sea island, a thick layer of mud and dust lifted up, and the entire island shook.
The Yellow Imperial Island, three hundred and twenty miles apart from north to south and one hundred and seventy miles apart from east to west, was one of the bases constructed by the Ministry of Military Affairs in the Xuanwu Market Realm.
Around the perimeter of the island, there were seven layers of defence formations arranged.
Inside the island, there were layers of underground palaces and campsites constructed, which could station thirty thousand Market Realm warriors.
When the crowd stepped off the ship and boarded the Yellow Imperial Island, a Market Realm warrior wearing the military armour of the Ministry of War immediately walked up and brought them to the underground camp.
That one Market Realm warrior said, ”Huang Yu Island is located at the edge of the Xixuan Sea, it is one of the Xuanwu Market Realm’s top ten garrison bases, and it is under the control of the Golden Brilliant King’s own father, and the indigenous savage beasts within a thousand mile radius of the sea have all been cleared out. Therefore, everyone can completely rest assured that Yellow Royal Island is very safe.”
He then added, “However, the natives of the Xuanwu Ruins Realm are very clever and often disguise themselves as Ruins Realm warriors and blend into the base to spy on information and cause destruction. So, just in case, please leave an image and a drop of blood on top of the True One Mirror.”
The True One Mirror, a Hundred Marks Sacred Artifact, was researched by the Inscription Guild and could irradiate a person’s own body.
It was because of the special power of the True One Mirror that the First Central Empire purchased large quantities of it from the Inscription Guild and used it extensively in the Market Realm Battlefield, which was used to identify natives who wanted to blend into the base or even sneak into the Kunlun Realm.
The True One Mirror was suspended in mid-air, circular in shape and roughly three metres in diameter, and it was unknown what material it was refined from.
On the surface of the mirror, a layer of faint white light was emitted, quite bright, like a bright moon suspended in the night sky.
Zhang Ruochen took a few quick steps out and took the lead towards the True One Mirror, his shadow, projected on top of the mirror.
He then cut open his finger and squeezed out a drop of blood.
Soon, the mirror absorbed the drop of blood and recorded Zhang Ruochen’s biological information completely.
After doing this, Zhang Ruochen glanced towards Xu Hai and the green-robed Star Envoy at the back, then, he performed his body technique and rushed out of the underground camp.
“Quick, quick, follow them, we can’t let Zhang Ruochen escape.”
Xu Hai immediately rushed up and chased after Zhang Ruochen. However, he had only just rushed out three steps when he was stopped by the Market Realm warrior guarding the True One Mirror.
That one Market Realm warrior held a long spear with a sharp tip, pointing at Xu Hai’s heart, and said in a cold voice, “When you come to Huang Yu Island, you must record your image and blood in the True One Mirror, otherwise, you can only be treated as a Xuanwu Market Realm’s native, and be shot on the spot.”
Xu Hai’s fists were tightly clenched, and inside his eyes, it seemed like flames were about to erupt.
He glanced in the direction Zhang Ruochen had left, but in the end, he restrained his anger and didn’t dare to call out to the Ministry of Military Affairs.
He quickly walked to the bottom of the True One Mirror, and after leaving behind his image and blood, he rushed towards the stone stairs and chased after him.
By the time Xu Hai reached the ground, Zhang Ruochen was already sitting on top of a small thirty-odd metre long ship as he rushed out of the seven-layer Island Protector Formation and disappeared into the sea level.
The other three cultivators of the Xu Sheng Clan’s Fish Dragon Realm also arrived on the ground one after another and walked behind Xu Hai.
“My lord, what should we do now?”One of the Fish Dragon Realm cultivators asked.
Xu Hai’s face was gloomy as he said, “We can’t let Zhang Ruochen escape, immediately chase after him, we must catch up with him.”
“But won’t we wait for the Black Market’s people?”
Xu Hai’s expression was furious as he said, “By the time they come out, Zhang Ruochen would have already fled far away. The Xuanwu Ruins Realm is so vast that trying to find him again would be like finding a needle in a haystack, how easy could it be? Chase! Mustn’t let him escape!”
Afterwards, Xu Hai and the three cultivators from the Xu Sheng Clan’s Fish Dragon Realm formed a ten-member squad with six other Market Realm warriors, boarded a small ship, and chased after the direction of the previous ship.
In the Market Realm Battlefield of the Xuanwu Market Realm, one had to work as a team in order to go out to sea and hunt indigenous creatures.
Ten Ruin Realm warriors were a small team, a hundred Ruin Realm warriors were a squadron, a thousand Ruin Realm warriors were a brigade, and ten thousand Ruin Realm warriors were a legion.
The sea around Yellow Imperial Island had long been swept by the Market Realm Legion, and the powerful indigenous savage beasts had almost all been killed, leaving only a handful of low-grade indigenous savage beasts still surviving here in this part of the world.
The low-grade indigenous savage beasts had low intelligence and limited attack power, thus, they were not the target of the Market Realm warriors’ hunt.
The imperial court was trying to rule the Xuanwu Market Realm, not to kill all the living beings in the Xuanwu Market Realm.
Normally, when they went out to sea, most of them went in small teams of ten to accumulate military merit values, and only when they found powerful indigenous creatures would they send out squadrons and brigades.
Zhang Ruochen was the one who had temporarily joined a ten-member squad, which was why he was able to immediately go out to sea.
The members of this squad were all sergeants from the Ministry of Military Affairs, and the captain with the strongest cultivation was only at the middle extreme level of the Heavenly Extreme Realm. Those other members of the squad were almost all at the early and mid Heavenly Extremity Realm.
The captain of the squad, named Nie Nanfei, looked to be in his thirties and appeared to be a bit vicissitudes, his hands and face were full of scars, obviously having experienced many battles.
Zhang Ruochen exchanged words with him for a while before he learnt that his true age, which was sixty-eight years old, was twenty-one years old, having fought in the Xuanwu Ruins Realm for twenty-one years, and had accumulated enough military merit value to allow him to exchange for a title of an inferior county king in the First Central Empire.
“Your age, it should be less than thirty! First time coming to the Xuanwu Market Realm?”Nie Nanfei asked.
Zhang Ruochen nodded and smiled, “It is indeed the first time.”
Nie Nanfei sighed, “To reach the Heavenly Extremity Realm at such a young age, you should be a genius who wants to impact the Heavenly Ranking. However, I must tell you honestly, the Xuanwu Ruins Realm is a top tier medium Ruins Realm, which is almost close to the superior Ruins Realm, and is quite dangerous, not to mention Heavenly Extremity Realm martial practitioners, even Fish Dragon Realm martial practitioners may die here if they are a little bit inadvertent. Therefore, if you want to accumulate military merit value and impact the Heavenly Ranking, it’s better to go to the Lower Ruins Realm, where the level of danger is also lower.”
Zhang Ruochen knew that the other party was kindly reminding him, but since he had already come, how could he leave so easily?
Zhang Ruochen humbly said, “Brother Nie, you’ve been in the Xuanwu Market Realm for more than twenty years, so you should already be quite familiar with the Xuanwu Market Realm, right? Why don’t you tell me a bit about it?”
Nie Nanfei knew that he couldn’t persuade Zhang Ruochen, he had seen too many young and arrogant pride of heaven like Zhang Ruochen, however, there were not many of them who were able to survive.
However, he had already spoken kindly and was considered to have done his duty as a veteran, so he did not continue to advise.
Nie Nanfei explained to Zhang Ruochen, “Just how vast the Xuanwu Market Realm is, it is estimated that even the Half-Saints in the military are not clear. According to the maps released by the Ministry of Military Affairs at this stage, it has been explored that there are two continents in the Xuanwu Ruins Realm, named Xuan’s Continent and Wu’s Continent respectively.”
“The two continents, only occupy a very small map plate, in fact, more than ninety per cent of the Xuanwu Ruins Realm is covered by the sea.”
“The indigenous humans are almost entirely spread out over the two continents, with some large islands. In the sea area, there are mostly highly intelligent indigenous savage beasts, some of which are even smarter than humans.”
“Huang Yu Island is located at the edge of the Xixuan Sea of the Eight Seas, and within a radius of 1,000 miles, the barbarian beasts above the fourth rank have almost all been cleared. Therefore, if we want to accumulate military merit value, we must travel to the more distant seas.”
“Of course, Market Realm warriors whose cultivation hasn’t reached the Fish Dragon Realm would be better off not travelling too far into the sea, and pretty much operating within a range of three thousand miles from Huang Yu Island would be less dangerous. Once it exceeds three thousand miles, it’s easy to encounter a powerful Fifth Order Savage Beast, and even if we just encounter one, it would be doomed for a small group like ours.”
Zhang Ruochen listened attentively and also memorised every word Nie Nanfei said.
Between the words, the ship had travelled a thousand miles away from the Yellow Imperial Island, entering the danger zone, and the speed of the voyage, too, had clearly begun to slow down.
Suddenly, Zhang Ruochen’s gaze, glancing in the direction behind him, saw a small black dot on the sea level, rapidly approaching.
It was a small ship.
Using his Heavenly Eyes, Zhang Ruochen looked over and clearly saw Xu Hai standing at the bow of the ship, and besides him, there were three other Fish Dragon Realm cultivators from the Xu Sheng Sect Clan.
“Catching up so quickly?”
Zhang Ruochen smiled, stood up, leapt up, flew out of the ship’s protective formation, and landed in the water ten feet away.
A stream of true qi surged out from his feet, holding his body in place.
Nie Nanfei was slightly surprised and said, “Brother Zhang, what are you doing?”
Zhang Ruochen stepped on the water waves as if he were walking on a flat surface, and said to Nie Nanfei on the ship, “Brother Nie, you guys go first! I have some personal matters that need to be resolved, so I hope that we will have the opportunity to meet again in the future.”
Nie Nanfei glanced towards the ship behind him, revealing a thoughtful expression, nodded, and said, “Alright! You take care of yourself.”
After saying this, Nie Nanfei and the rest of the team, harnessed the ship and accelerated out, moving away from this area of the sea.
A few moments later, the ship harnessed by Xu Hai and the three Fish Dragon Realm cultivators of the Xu Sheng Sect Valve came riding the wind and waves, stopping three miles away.
