Chapter 1885: Fear of Unknown
Of course, Rui was different.
He could record even directions in his Mind Palace, allowing him never to get lost no matter what.
"Let's get going," Rui shook his head vigorously. "We don't have any time to waste."
Every second wasted was one second less to find the Divine Doctor, bring him back, and heal his father.
The two of them immediately picked up the pace as they swiftly traveled through the Pave of Graves. Given how enormous the Beast Domain was, it would take them many weeks to travel through the Beast Domain.
The two of them traveled through the Beast Domain, experiencing its many fantasies up-front and in person.
It turned out that Kane was right.
Traveling through the Beast Domain showed Rui magical worlds that were even more fantastical than he had imagined possible.
They passed through a region with extremely light gravity and its own ecosystem of species that had adapted to the bizarre conditions of that region. Lands and rocks floated midair while trees had developed active mobile roots that could actively search for and hunt for the resources the tree needed.
Fauna, on the other hand, was much larger and heavier. On of that, they had stranger and more bizarre shapes that could never be sustained in high-gravity environments. The food chain of this region was no more than a cross-species game of three-dimensional tag with all kinds of animals leaping around in the air.
"Woah," Rui pirouetted in the air, drawing the attention of a local frog-like predator.
"RIBBIT!" It leaped at him.
Unfortunately, it was the last mistake it had ever made.
SPLAT!
Rui annihilated it with a single attack.
"Tsk, to think that an Apprentice-level beast thought it could eat me," Rui grumbled. "Hiding our power in the Human Domain was prudent, but it's self-sabotaging in the Beast Domain."
"True," Kane admitted.
In just a moment, the two of them unleashed their auras, removing the mental shackles on them.
A passive mid-grade Senior-level aura emerged from Kane, while one at the very peak of the Senior Realm erupted from Rui. A profoundly deep tsunami of peril emerged from Rui, sweeping across the region.
This was the power of one of the very strongest Martial Seniors to ever grace the Senior Realm.
The creatures in the region shivered before swiftly evacuating from the region in a hurry.
"Why do we live in the Kandrian Empire again?" Kane asked half-sarcastically and half-seriously. "We could just rule our own kingdoms, man."
"Meh, I'm not interested in ruling any kingdom, but especially not a pittance of a Squire-level or a Senior-level one," Rui remarked nonchalantly.
"Yeah, you'd rather rule a Sage-level powerhouse like the Kandrian Empire, wouldn't you?" Kane smirked.
"Funny."
The two of them moved on, finally exiting the region and returning to normal gravity.
"Man..." Kane murmured, turning around. "They built a road through that?! Have they lost it?"
Kane had a prudent point.
"I doubt it," Rui shook his head. "Most likely...this region was probably born in the past eighty years or so."
"Really?" Kane raised an eyebrow. "This region is that young? Is it really possible for so many species to have evolved so quickly to become perfectly suited for this region in such a short timeframe."
"The pacing is indeed unbelievable, but the Beast Domain is constantly in change," Rui replied. "Change from beast migration due to human expansion and encroachment. The Beast Convergence Theory proposed by the Ecologer. And just a high tendency to change due to volatile clashes between beasts in an ever-shrinking beast domain."
"...That's crazy," Kane murmured, turning back to the region behind them. "To think that we humans have caused this indirectly."
Rui narrowed his eyes.
His nerves and senses tingled as he felt an implicit sense of peril.
It was not acute nor physical. It was certainly not some threat immediately around him. It was more like he felt unsafe simply being in the Beast Domain.
It was an ominous sense of fear.
A peril that was to come.
"New plans," Rui remarked, turning to Kane. "We're heading directly to the Valley of Prisms. I don't want to waste time leaving the Beast Domain and then re-entering it. Let's get this done as quickly as possible."
"You sure?" Kane raised an eyebrow. "We could die if we make a mistake."
"The probability of that happening is low so long as we are in registered and documented Apprentice-level and Squire-level danger zones."
"Aren't only a quarter of the regions in the Beast Domain properly evaluated and graded?" Kane raised an eyebrow.
"We travel through the ones that are known to be safe," Rui remarked. "That way, we minimize the probability of running into a Master-level monster."
Of course, Rui could never get rid of the possibility of running into a Master-level monster that would kill them then and there.
The Beast Domain defied order.
It defied predictability.
The fact that his grandmother could predict such precise visions of the future spoke to not only how immensely powerful she, as a Martial Sage, was but also how powerful the Eye of Prophecy technique was.
"Let's keep our auras open in regions where we know we're the strongest," Rui suggested. "However, when we enter unknown regions of the Beast Domain, let's not only keep it closed but use our misdirection-stealth techniques as well while ensuring that the region is safe."
Both of them had mastered the Primordial Instinct technique and together would at least be able to detect non-hidden danger. If a Master-level beast roamed a certain region, then Rui and Kane would hardly fail to notice it.
"Damn, we might actually die," Kane realized.
Rui understood the sentiment. The feeling of actually experiencing real danger for the first time since his battle with the Gatekeeper and his battle with the gauntlet of assassins before that in the Kandrian Empire.
However, for one of them, he had expected and prepared for while the other was a duel. Dangerous they were, but they were known.
For the first time in a long time, Rui was reminded of the fear of the unknown.