In the boundless void of the Blood Demon Domain, portal after portal appeared in rapid succession, each one snatched by the cultivators waiting nearby. The entire Blood Demon Domain was now crawling with people. In most cases, from the moment a portal materialized to the moment someone rushed through it, no more than ten breaths passed. Some portals were seized before they had even fully formed, claimed by whoever happened to be closest.
Every portal represented an opportunity. Seizing one depended half on skill and half on luck. To fight over a particular portal, senior and junior brothers from the same faction would sometimes clash with each other—and this was permitted, so long as no one crossed the line and took a life. The sect elders overseeing the expedition turned a blind eye.
The victorious cultivator vanished through the portal; the ones who failed could only curse their misfortune and search elsewhere.
Within the territory held by the First Inn and Xuanyuan Cave Heaven, Yang Kai's figure flickered and darted through the void, his Space Laws pushed nearly to their limit. As Senior Brother Guo had mentioned before, the portals into the Blood Demon Cave Heaven formed where the Blood Demon Cave Heaven merged with the Blood Demon Domain. Before each portal fully materialized, the faintest tremor of spatial fluctuation leaked out. Others might not perceive anything at all, but for Yang Kai, who commanded the Space Laws, such tremors were impossibly conspicuous.
He exploited this to seize the initiative every single time. Even alone, he was utterly unstoppable. A portal would appear and he would already be there, casually pulling someone out of his Small Universe and tossing them through, then turning to leave. Behind him, the elite Disciples of Xuanyuan Cave Heaven could only stare in dumbstruck fury.
The portals appeared without any pattern—sometimes not one for ages, then suddenly several at once. So despite his enormous advantage, he could not claim them all.
Even so, of every portal that had appeared so far, he had captured roughly seventy percent. Xuanyuan Cave Heaven, for all its numbers, had managed only thirty. Up on the Five Elements Palace, Elder Chu's gaze practically shot flames, killing intent roiling behind his eyes, as though he wished nothing more than to leap down and flatten Yang Kai with a single palm strike.
Had Yang Kai not been racing around snatching portals left and right, Xuanyuan Cave Heaven would have secured at least fifteen, nearly twenty portals by now. Instead, only five or six of their Disciples had made it inside.
Every portal was a chance, a fortune—such losses were enough to make his heart bleed. Swallowing his rage, he shifted his gaze in another direction.
There, his personal senior disciple, Yin Xinzhao, hovered in the void, looking left and right, his expression tight with anxiety.
His luck had been poor. Nearly an incense stick's worth of time had passed since the portals first began appearing, yet not a single one had opened anywhere near his position. Despite his considerable strength, he had no way to enter the Blood Demon Cave Heaven.
Sensing Elder Chu's gaze, Yin Xinzhao turned his head, then drew a deep breath, suppressing his anxiety, and waited patiently.
Persistence paid off. Half a cup of tea later, a faint crimson glow suddenly materialized forty li away. Yin Xinzhao sensed it instantly, launched himself toward it, his face brightening with renewed vigor.
He was, after all, at the peak of the Emperor Realm—forty li was practically within arm's reach. He arrived in the blink of an eye.
Up on the Five Elements Palace, Elder Chu let out a sigh of relief. It would have been one thing if the other Disciples had failed to get in, but if even his personal senior disciple were left outside, that would be a devastating loss. His expectations for this eldest disciple were exceedingly high.
Then, thinking of Yang Kai, he immediately cast a wary glance toward the distant battlefield—and found that Yang Kai, after all that frantic scrambling, was now tens of thousands of li away. He breathed easier.
At such a distance, even with the Space Laws at his command, Yang Kai could not possibly return in an instant.
That thought had barely formed when Elder Chu's eyelids twitched violently. Right before his eyes, Yang Kai—tens of thousands of li away—vanished without warning, only to reappear mere paces from Yin Xinzhao.
Elder Chu's face drained of color. He could hardly believe what he was seeing.
How was this possible? A mere Emperor Realm cultivator, however skilled in the Space Laws—how could he bridge tens of thousands of li in a single instant?
What infuriated Elder Chu even more was that there had been a portal right near Yang Kai's original position, yet Yang Kai had ignored it entirely. Instead, he had come directly to Yin Xinzhao's location—a clear act of deliberate targeting. He meant to compete with Yin Xinzhao for this portal. Elder Chu's heart climbed into his throat, and he watched the scene without so much as blinking.
Over on the other side, the Landlady and her group had been watching Yang Kai all along and naturally noticed his sudden movement first. Old Bai whistled lightheartedly, a grin plastered across his face as he settled in to enjoy the show.
The Landlady, however, looked pensive. Sharing Elder Chu's confusion, she murmured, "How can he teleport that far? That distance should already exceed his limits."
She had once chased Yang Kai through the void herself, and she had a rough sense of what his maximum range was.
Yue He said softly, "It's the Void Spirit Pearl—a spatial Artifact the young master forged himself. One is anchored in place, and he carries the other with him. As long as the separation isn't too extreme, they can resonate across distance and link two locations."
The Landlady's eyes widened in understanding. "You're saying he left a Void Spirit Pearl nearby beforehand?" She suddenly recalled that before the portals into the Blood Demon Cave Heaven had opened, Yang Kai had wandered around the area with his hands clasped behind his back.
In hindsight, what had looked like idle strolling was actually a calculated preparation—and he had certainly left more than one Void Spirit Pearl behind.
"Cunning brat!" the Landlady scoffed lightly. It was becoming clear that he had been planning this from the moment he agreed to Xuanyuan Cave Heaven's unreasonable demands.
Yin Xinzhao was Elder Chu's personal senior disciple, and he had previously exchanged barbs with Yang Kai. Being targeted was practically inevitable. The instant a portal appeared nearby, Yang Kai had returned from tens of thousands of li away without a second thought—even abandoning a portal right beside him.
At this very moment, Yin Xinzhao looked as though he had seen a ghost. He turned his head to stare at Yang Kai, who was now hurtling through the void alongside him, his face frozen in horror.
Yang Kai gave him a wink, then flickered and vanished.