"You there!" Yang Kai turned his head and called out with a grin. "You answered one of my questions, so I'll give you a piece of advice!"
The man bellowed, "If you've got something to say, then say it!"
"Stay away from me, or you probably won't make it into the Blood Demon Cave Heaven!"
The man froze for a moment, then flew into a rage. "You little punk—you dare try to snatch my entrance? I'll twist your head off and use it as a chamber pot!"
"That's all I have to say!" Yang Kai shut his eyes the moment he finished speaking, his spiritual sense flaring outward to blanket the surroundings.
The man glared at Yang Kai, itching to hurl a few more threats, but seeing that Yang Kai was no longer paying him any attention, he could only seethe in frustration. Still, he widened his eyes and kept scanning the void around him, on guard for the Blood Demon Cave Heaven's entrance to appear at any moment.
Time trickled by, and a subtle tension gradually permeated the silent void. Even warriors from the same faction occasionally sparked off one another when their gazes met. Every single person here had fought through rounds of selection within their respective sects just to earn the right to stand in this place—but even after making it this far, no one could guarantee they would actually enter the Blood Demon Cave Heaven. It all came down to the question of seizing an entrance. Only those who claimed one could truly get inside.
As such, everyone around was a rival competing for the same prize. How could anyone afford to let their guard down?
Yang Kai kept his eyes shut the entire time, motionless, as though he had fallen into a deep sleep. The Xuanyuan Cave Heaven disciple stationed only a dozen li away, however, was a bundle of nerves. He had been straining his eyes to search for half the day without any sign of an entrance appearing, and his eyes were beginning to ache.
He glanced sideways at Yang Kai and snorted coldly. "Playing the mystic, are we?"
He reached up to rub his sore eyes, but after just a couple of strokes, something caught his peripheral vision. He whipped his head around to see a speck of crimson light suddenly materialize at a certain point in the void nearby. At first the glow was faint, but in an instant it spread outward like a drop of ink falling into clear water.
In the span of just three breaths, the crimson light had transformed into a rotating vortex of blood. It was not large—barely wide enough for a single person to pass through.
The aura of a Qiankun World billowed out from within the vortex.
The entrance to the Blood Demon Cave Heaven had appeared!
In that instant, the eyes of every mid-stage Open Heaven Realm cultivator from both Xuanyuan Cave Heaven and the First Inn locked onto the blood-red vortex.
The man had no more thought for rubbing his eyes. He threw back his head and laughed. "Heaven itself is helping me!" His figure blurred as he shot toward the vortex.
He hadn't expected the very first entrance to open right beside him—his luck was absolutely absurd. Throughout the wait, he had been wracked with anxiety, terrified that no entrance would appear within the several-hundred-li radius he occupied. If that had been the case, then no matter how strong he was, he would never set foot inside the Blood Demon Cave Heaven.
Who would have thought his fortune would be this good? All his earlier worries evaporated in an instant, and he couldn't help laughing toward the heavens.
He would become the first person to enter the Blood Demon Cave Heaven! Granted, the interior was fraught with peril, but who had come here without some preparation? Compared to the dangers, the opportunities and treasures to be found inside were plentiful as grass. If he could gain something inside the Blood Demon Cave Heaven, it was entirely possible for him to soar to new heights—and if he could advance to the Open Heaven Realm within, that would be even better.
Heart surging with excitement, face flushed with emotion, the man rocketed toward the entrance, as though he could already see a glorious future waving at him.
The next instant, his smile froze on his face. His eyes went wide as he stared at the space before the vortex, and he cried out involuntarily, "How is this possible?!"
In that fleeting instant, a figure had materialized right in front of the vortex—someone who should have been over a dozen li behind him.
The man thought his eyes were deceiving him and couldn't help glancing back, but the spot where Yang Kai had been standing was completely empty. That annoying kid had vanished at some point and, somehow, had overtaken him to appear directly before the entrance.
On the Five Elements Peak, the three mid-stage Open Heaven cultivators from Xuanyuan Cave Heaven all wore very different expressions.
Senior Brother Guo was stunned beyond words. "This…"
Elder Chu's jaw tightened as he hissed, "A spatial divine ability!"
The beautiful woman, meanwhile, showed a look of sudden realization, murmuring, "So that's how it is."
Back when Yang Kai had agreed to Senior Brother Guo's suggestion without a moment's hesitation, she had found it rather puzzling. After all, that arrangement was extremely disadvantageous for the First Inn. But now it was clear—this junior called Yang Kai had been relying on his mastery of the Dao of Space. With a spatial divine ability, he could disregard the constraints of distance and teleport instantly between two points in space.
With an ability like that at his disposal, was there any chance he would fail to seize an entrance?
The beautiful woman shook her head with a rueful smile. He really was still just a child at heart—losing out a little and immediately needing to get even. A touch childish, to say the truth.
But it was only one entrance. So what if that Xuanyuan Cave Heaven disciple failed to claim it? They had never expected everyone to make it inside. If fifty out of these two hundred could enter, that would be the best possible outcome. Losing a single entrance would make no difference to the bigger picture.
No matter how impressive this kid's spatial divine ability was, he was still only one person…
That thought had barely formed when the group suddenly saw Yang Kai reach out and grasp at the void. An instant later, a portly, broad-shouldered man was pulled out of thin air before him…