Yang Kai had met several Ancestors before, and relatively speaking, spending time with Ancestor Xiaoxiao brought the least pressure — almost none at all.
This likely had something to do with the special cultivation method she practiced. When healing, she needed to draw upon the power of the mortal world, so her cultivation technique was inevitably connected to it.
Since she was entangled in the mortal world, her pressure naturally wouldn't be overwhelming.
"Do you believe in reincarnation?" Ancestor Xiaoxiao suddenly asked.
Yang Kai pondered briefly. "I've never experienced it, so I wouldn't dare make a claim."
Ancestor Xiaoxiao chuckled and didn't press further. She simply looked up at the sky. "I'm going!"
With those words, she shot skyward.
At that moment, inside his Small World, exactly one month had passed since the hunter couple's deaths from old age!
In the Ink Clan's Royal City, numerous Ink Clan Domain Lords wore troubled expressions. Once again, the human army was on the move.
How many times was this now? Every time the human army mobilized, it was accompanied by attack after attack from World after World. And each time, the human army only made feints, tying down the bulk of the Ink Clan's million-strong army and forcing them to dispatch small forces to intercept those Worlds.
Over the years, the number of Ink Clan killed by those World attacks had been nothing short of staggering.
This left all the Ink Clan feeling utterly frustrated.
If they had truly died in battle against the humans on the battlefield, that would have been one thing. Dying in battle was not only the glory of human soldiers but also the glory of the Ink Clan.
But their deaths had been almost entirely meaningless — all wiped out by formations laid within those Worlds, without so much as touching a hair on the human army's head.
The humans' shameless tactics had gone on for twenty or thirty years, completely unabashed and unchanged each time.
The Ink Clan simply had no solution. Whether it was the incoming Worlds or the human army making feints, the Ink Clan couldn't ignore either one — neglecting either could bring devastating damage to their army or even the Royal City itself.
They had to tend to both ends, and for years they had been led by the nose by the humans, forced into the most passive position imaginable.
Standing on the deck of an enormous warship, Domain Lord Chekong gazed toward the left side of the Royal City.
There, the humans' vast fleet was advancing as always, its momentum fierce, as though bent on a decisive battle with the Ink Clan.
But Chekong's expression remained calm.
The first and second times he had witnessed such a scene, he had issued order after order, deploying the Ink Clan army into various defensive positions.
But after experiencing it so many times, even Chekong had grown numb.
Because he knew the human army would never actually attack the Royal City. They were simply putting on a show, assuming an attacking posture.
All they wanted was to pin down seventy percent of the Ink Clan's forces in place, leaving them unable to move.
It wasn't just Chekong who had grown numb — the other Domain Lords and Ink Clan soldiers felt the same. Having not clashed head-on with the human army for over thirty thousand years, upon their first encounters they discovered that the humans' shamelessness and despicable nature far exceeded even the ancient oral warnings.
And so, under countless watching gazes, the humans' massive fleet continued pressing toward the Royal City, now only tens of millions of li away.
According to past experience, the Worlds should have already begun their assault on the Royal City by now. And when the human fleet arrived within ten million li, that was usually the moment the Ink Clan intercepted the Worlds.
At that point, the humans would either withdraw immediately or launch one more round before retreating — utterly lacking in any novelty.
"Has the situation over there been scouted out? How many Worlds have the humans deployed this time?" Chekong asked the Domain Lord beside him, his eyes still fixed on the approaching fleet.
Having experienced such formations so many times, the Ink Clan couldn't completely neutralize them, but they had developed some countermeasures of their own.
They could deploy in advance, scouting the Worlds' approach routes to determine their numbers, giving the Royal City's forces some psychological preparation.
This was no difficult task for the Ink Clan. Leveraging the convenience of the Ink Nest for transmitting messages, they could relay scouted intelligence back to the Royal City almost instantly.
Upon hearing Chekong's question, the Domain Lord beside him — one with somewhat feminine features — replied: "Word just came in. The humans are using six Worlds to attack the Royal City this time."
"Six?" Chekong's brow furrowed. "Are you certain it's only six? Could there be a mistake?"
The humans had never used so few Worlds to attack the Royal City. After all, they had used ten in the very first assault. With too few, they posed no real threat to the Ink Clan.
The female Domain Lord shook her head. "A single Lord might have miscounted, but four or five Lords can't all be wrong."
Chekong considered this thoughtfully.
If multiple Lords had scouted the situation together, it was unlikely to be false.
"Counting the time, it's only been a few years since their last assault on the Royal City. They may not have had enough resources to set up the formations — perhaps six is their current limit," the female Domain Lord said.
Though Chekong knew this reasoning held water, if the humans truly lacked sufficient resources, why not wait a few more years? They could gather enough resources and then set up even more Worlds.
The humans' behavior this time was somewhat abnormal, and a faint sense of unease crept through him.