Chapter 632: The Second Layer of the Abyss Brink
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
After rifling through the four dead bodies, Lin Huang then stood up and looked behind him. He vaguely heard people growling in pain earlier.
However, as he turned his head around, he could only see three dead bodies. The assailant was no longer there.
Still, he noticed that the Emperor's Heart Rings on the three bodies were still intact. He then sized up the surroundings and concluded that there was no one else there. He walked towards the corpses.
At about ten meters away from the corpses, Lin Huang stopped advancing forward. The men had been killed in the same way. There was a thumb-sized hole on their temples as if they had been pierced through forcefully by a finger. However, Lin Huang felt that it was strange as there were no traces of blood splatter.
Lin Huang did not investigate any further. To avoid having to make contact with the dead bodies and risking his safety, he extracted the three rings by using his psychic skill.
After storing the three Emperor's Heart Rings in his storage space, he took out the map provided by the black market. Upon confirming his location and the location of the entrance to the second layer, he set the next destination in his dimensional relic. He then summoned Thunder and rode on its back.
"Let's depart!" Lin Huang pointed towards the direction of the entrance to the second layer.
Thunder fluttered its wings and flew into the sky. Soon, it disappeared from the sky…
After Lin Huang had left, a woman gradually appeared from the cliff. Impressively, it was Yao Lan who had just killed the three men who had harassed her.
"He's an Imperial Censor?!" Yao Lan was shocked as Yao Huanhuan had never told her about that. She raised her head, looking in the direction where Lin Huang had just disappeared. She frowned. "That direction… It seems like he's really going to the second layer..."
Sitting on Thunder's back, Lin Huang fixed his gaze upon the ground.
Though barren, the land was not wholly dead. One could still see one to two dying trees with a few leaves occasionally.
After a short while, Lin Huang could see the group of people that had left the entrance not long ago following a low-level flight.
Seeing Thunder fly over them, some of them that were flying in the same direction as Lin Huang switched their paths to another direction.
Lin Huang spotted the two small teams that were going on a trip. As soon as they detected Thunder, they did not flee. However, they brought the passengers to land on the ground. They were preparing to defend themselves.
"It's an immortal-level rank-1 Viridescent Thunderhawk. Hide behind us!" The four leaders shouted at the crowd.
"An immortal-level rank-1! He should be easy to handle, shouldn't he?" Some of them asked.
"Although the Viridescent Thunderhawk is merely a double mutated monster, it's one of the best predators. The sky is their playground. An immortal-level rank-2 might not be able to take advantage of it. Even if immortal-levels rank-3 and rank-4 like us fail to kill it in a single hit and it attempts to escape, we won't be able to catch up with it. Once it's offended, we'll be in great trouble if we attract a flock of bird monsters. Most of them hold grudges," one of the leaders explained. "However, it seems like they're just passing by. As long as we don't block their way, we won't be their target."
"It seems like a person is sitting on its back!" A young man with 20/20 eyesight shouted.
"Yes, there's someone sitting on its back! I just noticed that." One of the leaders smiled, nodding his head. He saw that there was a figure sitting on the back of the Viridescent Thunderhawk. However, he could not identify who that was, and he was unsure of the person's combat strength. "It's actually not strange for an immortal-level to have an immortal-level monster as a flying mount. Even if he's not an Imperial Censor, they can buy the pet monster that's been tamed from many of the large-scale auctions. The only downside is that it's quite expensive."
They felt envious of the rider when they heard that. They wished that they could get to immortal-level as soon as possible so that they could buy an immortal-level pet monster as a flying mount.
Of course, Lin Huang did not know that the people were daydreaming enviously of his luck as he passed by.
After having sat on Thunder's back for more than seven hours, Lin Huang finally arrived at the entrance to the second layer.
On their way there, many of the monsters had avoided Thunder. They were afraid that they would become Thunder's hunting target.
Aside from encountering attacks by immortal-level monsters thrice, Lin Huang managed to go all the way to straight to his destination. As for the three of the immortal-level monsters that had attacked him, they were killed by Lin Huang in a blow. The carcasses were then stored in Lin Huang's storage space.
Lin Huang knew that he had reached the entrance to the second layer as soon as he saw the crack on the ground from afar that looked very much like a gaping mouth. He then patted Thunder's back and said, "Let's land next to the crack in the ground.
When Thunder heard that, it retracted its wings a little and descended towards the crack on the ground.
After a few moments, Thunder flapped its wings and landed gracefully next to the crack.
Lin Huang leaped down from Thunder's back. He patted its wings, and soon, it was recalled back into its card form.
Because Thunder was a double mutated monster, it could not be summoned on the second layer of the Abyss Brink. With its abilities, it would end up at the bottom of the food chain where most of the monsters were eager to hunt it for food.
The entrance to the second layer of the Abyss Brink looked like a wide-opened mouth when studied from an aerial view in the sky. In fact, it was actually a vast fissure towards the underground. It was a few kilometers long with a width of more than 500 meters.
Somewhere near the crack, there was a massive stone table that measured about ten meters tall.
A phrase was engraved on the stone tablet: "The crack is the entrance to the second layer of the Abyss Brink. Please do not enter if you're any lower than immortal-level rank-3. Otherwise, you'll certainly die!"
As soon as he saw the engraving on the stone tablet, the first thought that came to his mind was, "None of them actually commented on this?"
He took a few steps forward with his hand extended and touched the stone tablet. He then discovered that there was a faint white glow being emitted which blocked him from contacting the stone tablet. Apparently, it was a protective measure taken by the predecessors to prevent humans or monsters from damaging the stone tablet. The tablet must have existed for a long time. So many years had passed, but the power of the protective layer was still there. It must have surpassed the skill of a demigod.
"It's not because nothing is engraved on it. There's a protective layer, and nobody can carve it," Lin Huang laughed.
He then retracted his hand from the stone tablet and stood at the border of the crack. Looking down into the Abyss Brink, it seemed to be bottomless. Without a moment's hesitation, he took a deep breath and leaped into the Abyss Brink.
He continued moving forward and soon, Lin Huang discovered that the world beneath the fissure was like a bottle. It became wider as he moved downward.
After a minute of passing through clouds, Lin Huang finally reached its bottom.
Lin Huang was startled upon realizing that the ground under his feet was grassy.
The second layer of the Abyss Brink was utterly different from the scenery of the first layer where the plants were all dying. Instead, it looked like the outside world with spring in the air. Lin Huang had a temporary illusion as if he was back at the grassland in Division 7.
What made Lin Huang feel strange was that he could no longer see cliffs or the entrance that looked like a gaping mouth above him. Instead, above him was a blue sky with the bright sun hanging in the air…