After Nie Li had been gone for a moment, Xiao Kuang and his group arrived in a hurry.
"You said that young master appeared again? Where is he?" Xiao Kuang looked around — there was no trace of Nie Li anywhere.
"Young Master Xiao Kuang, we wouldn't dare lie to you! He really did appear. Ask the other vendors around here if you don't believe us!"
Soon enough, the guards received confirmation — Nie Li had indeed shown up, but had left again almost immediately. Many people in the area had spotted him.
They never expected that Nie Li had actually come back from the Black Spring. Wasn't that a dead zone? None of them dared enter, and they had no idea what method Nie Li had used to survive inside for so long. Since Nie Li was still alive, a huge weight lifted off their shoulders. Their next move would be to relocate the entire clan to the City of Radiance.
Nie Li sprinted through the jungle, darting forward along the way.
Although he was only at Gold Five Star, he now had a goddess as his bodyguard. Nie Li felt far more at ease and secure.
Nie Li didn't plan on returning to the City of Radiance. The Desert Divine Palace was too far away, and the round trip would take too long. If something happened to the City of Radiance in the meantime, he wouldn't make it back in time. So the question was — should he go check out the Dark Guild's headquarters?
First he needed to pin down the Dark Guild's location before he could go up against them. Rumor had it that the Demon Lord was currently in closed-door cultivation, and both Long Sha and Gui Sha had been injured. With the Flame Empress's strength, there was no need to fear them anymore.
He'd heard that the Dark Guild's headquarters was an enormous underground world. Nie Li was filled with curiosity about what it was really like there.
Following the route described by the ancestor Ye Yan, Nie Li made his way toward the Dark Guild's location.
"Where are you headed now?" the Flame Empress asked.
"I'm going to an underground world!" Nie Li gave her a rough rundown of the relationship between the Dark Guild and the City of Radiance.
After hearing Nie Li's explanation, the Flame Empress's face turned cold as ice. "Constantly threatened by demon beasts, on the verge of extinction, yet they still turn against their own kind. Slaughtering each other — how utterly outrageous! If I ever lay eyes on them, I'll kill them myself with my own hands!"
Nie Li had only mentioned it in passing, but he hadn't expected the Flame Empress to be so outraged. What Nie Li didn't know was that in the past, the Flame Empress had experienced something similar. She had been betrayed by traitors within the human race, which was why she could tolerate nothing more than betrayal!
The Demon Lord remained the greatest threat to the City of Radiance.
Even with Nie Li's full-powered strike from the Myriad Demon Spirit Formation, he had only managed to injure Long Sha, one of the Demon Lord's subordinates. If the Demon Lord emerged from his cultivation, the City of Radiance could very well face utter destruction.
It was only after meeting the Flame Empress that Nie Li truly understood.
The powerhouses at the peak of the Legendary realm in this world didn't cultivate the power of the Heavenly Dao to break through — they cultivated Laws. Very few in this world had the capacity to cultivate their minds and comprehend the power of the Heavenly Dao. In his previous life, Nie Li had stumbled into the space within the Book of Time-Space Demon Spirit, which was how he had obtained an entirely different cultivation path.
The Book of Time-Space Demon Spirit did not belong to this world!
The Demon Lord might well be pushing to reach the Spirit God realm at this very moment. Once he reached that level, the City of Radiance would fall into his grasp.
Gradually, Nie Li ventured deep into the mountains. Following the route marked on the map drawn by the ancestor Ye Yan, he entered a cavern.
Along the narrow, winding tunnel, he pushed deeper and deeper into the earth. The walls on either side were cold, damp rock — all of it carved out by hand. Scattered across the ground were the bones of humans and demon beasts alike. Clearly, demon beasts and humans had once clashed fiercely here, and the humans had fought a rearguard action, retreating deeper into the cavern.
When the Dark Age arrived, the inhabitants of the main world were hunted down by the demon beasts. By that time, the Guardian Spirit Gods of the human race were already dead or grievously wounded. No one could stand against the demon beast clans anymore.
Nie Li had originally believed that a coalition of human Legendary powerhouses had attacked a demon beast that had broken through to the Legendary realm, which had triggered the endless slaughter. Now he realized there was a deeper reason behind it all.
After traveling several thousand meters along the narrow tunnel, Nie Li felt a faint membrane blocking his path. Someone had set up a barrier.
Nie Li was about to figure out how to break through it when he saw the Flame Empress, already sitting on his shoulder, wave her right hand. The barrier crumbled apart.
"A barrier of this level is completely useless against the power of Laws," the Flame Empress said with a shake of her head.
This barrier could at most hold off a Black Gold–level powerhouse. How could it possibly stop the Flame Empress, who commanded the Law of Fire?
Nie Li shrugged. Having the Flame Empress's help certainly saved him a great deal of effort. He continued on for another several thousand meters, descending ever deeper underground, until the view suddenly opened up before him — a vast, expansive world stretched out before his eyes.
"This is… the Nether Domain?" the Flame Empress said, her expression turning serious.
"The Nether Domain?" Nie Li was also a bit confused. If even the Flame Empress was this surprised, the Nether Domain had to be something extraordinary. In his previous life, he hadn't spent much time in this world, so there were many places he knew nothing about.
"Apart from the human race and the demon beasts, there are many other races in this world. Many of their powerhouses have also mastered the power of Laws. Both the demon beast clans and the human Spirit Gods must show them a measure of respect."