Han Xuhan landed rather disastrously on the very edge of the floating island belonging to the Stardust Sect.
He didn't immediately get up from the ground, opting to survey his surroundings and assess the situation first.
Despite following the same route and entering the same spatial fissure as his three martial siblings, he had ended up landing separately. Perhaps by the time his conversation with Tun Shi Tian had ended, the spatial fissure had moved. Or perhaps he had spent way too long a time inside the void between the front and back of the fissure, leading to a delay in appearing on the other side. His martial siblings were nowhere to be seen.
Han Xuhan distinctly felt the need to create an industry to make wristwatches. Having access to the time anywhere would be fairly advantageous while exploring mysterious places like this archipelago.
The place he had landed on was filled with short, well-maintained grass. He couldn't really hide anywhere here. Realizing the danger of being detected, Han Xuhan began to crawl like a gecko towards what appeared to be a beautiful garden surrounding a small pond just a couple dozen yards away.
There were several tall, bushy herbs in the garden that made it convenient for him to stand up. Not too far away from him, a single row of identical houses had been arranged side by side neatly, with short gaps to walk through between each two. The design looked quite pleasing to the eye, almost bordering military barrack arrangements.
Right now, all the houses had their doors closed and windows shut, something that made Han Xuhan breathe in relief.
A perfect place to tackle side mission number three: Bring down a house.
But first, he wanted to have a proper look around the island.
The barrack-like buildings were single-storied but pretty tall, reaching almost five meters in height. But rather than feeling humbled by the challenge, Xuhan felt excitement, confidence even.
He knew he could make that leap. He was no longer a weak mortal who would need a ladder to reach the roof of those buildings.
Kneeling for a moment, Han Xuhan rushed forward, leaving prominent prints of his shoes on the soil. Right when he was about four meters away from the wall of the building he had targeted, he exerted every bit of power in his legs and back to jump up.
"...Hngg-Fuck!"
He had successfully reached the roof but landed on what appeared to be a pool of boiling water.
"Ouch! Agh! Fuck this!"
Han Xuhan was forced to jump on top of the brick wall that shielded the roof from prying eyes. These walls were being used to hold a large volume of water here, as it turned out. The entire roof had been transformed into a sparkling clean pool of knee-deep water, at the center of which floated a...metallic ball.
Xuhan swiftly checked his blistered feet. It wasn't clear why the water in the pool was so hot. Maybe it had something to do with the metal ball. Nevertheless, the accident didn't deter him at all. His burnt-red skin was already beginning to heal, slowly reducing the pain in those areas.
Grimacing, Han Xuhan surveyed all that he could see from the rooftop, hunched over on top of the wall like an owl.
What he saw...however, left him stunned.
Tun Shi Tian had neglected to describe some very important details, it seemed.
Han Xuhan summoned the owl immediately.
"Again? Dammit! You won't let me rest, you won't let me fly-"
"Shut the fuck up, little Tian!"
His boiling tone snuffed out the minion's annoyed yell. "What is it?" the owl asked weakly.
"Why didn't you tell me this sect looked like THIS?!"
Han Xuhan pointed furiously at the massive structure ahead, comprised of three ring-shaped islands, or more accurately, one floating island that had been divided into three circular layers where the outer layer was the narrowest, the middle layer was the most populated, and the inner layer was the most elevated area of the island.
These three island-rings were connected to each other with narrow bridges, while slowly spinning around a central axis in the inner layer that consisted of a tall, white tower.
"...Is that important? It just looks cool, that's it. This is no different from our sect," Tun Shi Tian grumbled.
"No different from our sect? Birdie, I can't even walk in any direction in this sect without the risk of falling down! Do you see the bridges connecting the rings? They're like...two feet wide!"
Tun Shi Tian cocked his head in a puzzled manner. "Fall down? Why would you...Oh!"
"Oh, you finally noticed that I'm not a bird? That I can't fly?"
"Seems like an YOU problem, master."
Han Xuhan felt like locking the owl in a cage and throwing him off the island, but he was forced to control his anger. This wasn't the time to be thinking about punishments.
Now that he thought about it, it made sense for most sects to have unique builds. Even if they didn't, here in the archipelago, they'd try something using the Celestial Gateway technique's domain system.
No wonder he had landed in a spot far away from wherever his martial siblings were! The fastest-spinning part of the island was the peripheral ring, filled with a single row of barracks for the disciples, presumably. By the time he had come out of the spatial fissure, the spot where Mu Ran, Yuen Zhou, and Xiao Wu had landed must have spun away from the mouth of the fissure.
Han Xuhan looked at the sky and tried to measure which direction and how far his martial siblings had been carried away.
The revolution speed was difficult to measure, because not only the peripheral ring, but also the middle ring and central island were spinning on the same axis in different directions constantly. There was no way to tell when a full revolution of the rings would be complete.
"Which insidious bastard thought of such a design? I should befriend him..."
Half annoyed, half amazed, Han Xuhan surveyed the chaos in the middle ring curiously. Tun Shi Tian hadn't been wrong about this.
These guys appeared to be absolutely indisciplined.
At least one-third of the disciples were fighting each other, while another third watched the fights. The remaining third were fervently discussing something around a large table, on top of which sat a fat spirit beast that he was all too familiar with.
It was a brother of Luo Yi's pet, Meatball...or sister, he couldn't tell. It was in its transparent form, showing the rankings of the sect. Han Xuhan had seen the rankings just half an hour ago. The cockroach sect was still holding the topmost position with absolute dominance in terms of points.
They had asked Luo Yi about this mysterious sect that had popped out of nowhere to snatch the position of the new champion of this decade, but she kept smiling mysteriously without providing an answer. The same situation applied to all of their elders. No one would talk about it for some reason.
Shaking his head, Han Xuhan focused on the tower at the center of the floating island...s.
The central ring was more like a disc, surrounding a tower that floated by itself, untouched by the soil of the island. The walls of the tower were an unnaturally bright shade of white, shimmering under the sunlight. From the angle of his vision, he could see its floors going down below the surface level of the island as well as above. If he could get a glimpse of the bottom of the island, he would probably be able to tell how many floors were there in total on the tower. He could see at least a dozen above the surface.
Fortunately, the hundred-something disciples of the Stardust sect were too occupied with whatever they were doing to notice a lone man hunched on a rooftop at the peripheral ring of the island, sitting behind one of many metal balls.
After surveying the situation for a while, Han Xuhan took out Fang Xie's magic-infused hit-list from his pocket.
Unfurling the scroll, he looked for any signs of ink appearing on it. But the yellowish blank page indicated that he needed to get closer to the disciples to get proper results. This sect looked rather impressive, and Han Xuhan distinctly recalled Brother Feng Jun's craftiness inside the Holy Land of Laws.
Fang Xie should definitely have a target here.
Keeping the scroll in hand, Han Xuhan jumped down from the roof and checked the houses one by one until he found his target- a house with an unlocked window.
Tun Shi Tian had to go through some stretching and squeezing to enter the house.
Five minutes later, Han Xuhan was garbed in the white uniform of the Stardust sect, with the bandana around his forehead hiding his hair, ears, eyebrows, and half of his eyes too.
Pulling the collars up, Han Xuhan walked towards the closest bridge between the outer and the middle ring confidently.
Han Xuhan landed rather disastrously on the very edge of the floating island belonging to the Stardust Sect.
He didn't immediately get up from the ground, opting to survey his surroundings and assess the situation first.
Despite following the same route and entering the same spatial fissure as his three martial siblings, he had ended up landing separately. Perhaps by the time his conversation with Tun Shi Tian had ended, the spatial fissure had moved. Or perhaps he had spent way too long a time inside the void between the front and back of the fissure, leading to a delay in appearing on the other side. His martial siblings were nowhere to be seen.
Han Xuhan distinctly felt the need to create an industry to make wristwatches. Having access to the time anywhere would be fairly advantageous while exploring mysterious places like this archipelago.
The place he had landed on was filled with short, well-maintained grass. He couldn't really hide anywhere here. Realizing the danger of being detected, Han Xuhan began to crawl like a gecko towards what appeared to be a beautiful garden surrounding a small pond just a couple dozen yards away.
There were several tall, bushy herbs in the garden that made it convenient for him to stand up. Not too far away from him, a single row of identical houses had been arranged side by side neatly, with short gaps to walk through between each two. The design looked quite pleasing to the eye, almost bordering military barrack arrangements.
Right now, all the houses had their doors closed and windows shut, something that made Han Xuhan breathe in relief.
A perfect place to tackle side mission number three: Bring down a house.
But first, he wanted to have a proper look around the island.
The barrack-like buildings were single-storied but pretty tall, reaching almost five meters in height. But rather than feeling humbled by the challenge, Xuhan felt excitement, confidence even.
He knew he could make that leap. He was no longer a weak mortal who would need a ladder to reach the roof of those buildings.
Kneeling for a moment, Han Xuhan rushed forward, leaving prominent prints of his shoes on the soil. Right when he was about four meters away from the wall of the building he had targeted, he exerted every bit of power in his legs and back to jump up.
"...Hngg-Fuck!"
He had successfully reached the roof but landed on what appeared to be a pool of boiling water.
"Ouch! Agh! Fuck this!"
Han Xuhan was forced to jump on top of the brick wall that shielded the roof from prying eyes. These walls were being used to hold a large volume of water here, as it turned out. The entire roof had been transformed into a sparkling clean pool of knee-deep water, at the center of which floated a...metallic ball.
Xuhan swiftly checked his blistered feet. It wasn't clear why the water in the pool was so hot. Maybe it had something to do with the metal ball. Nevertheless, the accident didn't deter him at all. His burnt-red skin was already beginning to heal, slowly reducing the pain in those areas.
Grimacing, Han Xuhan surveyed all that he could see from the rooftop, hunched over on top of the wall like an owl.
What he saw...however, left him stunned.
Tun Shi Tian had neglected to describe some very important details, it seemed.
Han Xuhan summoned the owl immediately.
"Again? Dammit! You won't let me rest, you won't let me fly-"
"Shut the fuck up, little Tian!"
His boiling tone snuffed out the minion's annoyed yell. "What is it?" the owl asked weakly.
"Why didn't you tell me this sect looked like THIS?!"
Han Xuhan pointed furiously at the massive structure ahead, comprised of three ring-shaped islands, or more accurately, one floating island that had been divided into three circular layers where the outer layer was the narrowest, the middle layer was the most populated, and the inner layer was the most elevated area of the island.
These three island-rings were connected to each other with narrow bridges, while slowly spinning around a central axis in the inner layer that consisted of a tall, white tower.
"...Is that important? It just looks cool, that's it. This is no different from our sect," Tun Shi Tian grumbled.
"No different from our sect? Birdie, I can't even walk in any direction in this sect without the risk of falling down! Do you see the bridges connecting the rings? They're like...two feet wide!"
Tun Shi Tian cocked his head in a puzzled manner. "Fall down? Why would you...Oh!"
"Oh, you finally noticed that I'm not a bird? That I can't fly?"
"Seems like an YOU problem, master."
Han Xuhan felt like locking the owl in a cage and throwing him off the island, but he was forced to control his anger. This wasn't the time to be thinking about punishments.
Now that he thought about it, it made sense for most sects to have unique builds. Even if they didn't, here in the archipelago, they'd try something using the Celestial Gateway technique's domain system.
No wonder he had landed in a spot far away from wherever his martial siblings were! The fastest-spinning part of the island was the peripheral ring, filled with a single row of barracks for the disciples, presumably. By the time he had come out of the spatial fissure, the spot where Mu Ran, Yuen Zhou, and Xiao Wu had landed must have spun away from the mouth of the fissure.
Han Xuhan looked at the sky and tried to measure which direction and how far his martial siblings had been carried away.
The revolution speed was difficult to measure, because not only the peripheral ring, but also the middle ring and central island were spinning on the same axis in different directions constantly. There was no way to tell when a full revolution of the rings would be complete.
"Which insidious bastard thought of such a design? I should befriend him..."
Half annoyed, half amazed, Han Xuhan surveyed the chaos in the middle ring curiously. Tun Shi Tian hadn't been wrong about this.
These guys appeared to be absolutely indisciplined.
At least one-third of the disciples were fighting each other, while another third watched the fights. The remaining third were fervently discussing something around a large table, on top of which sat a fat spirit beast that he was all too familiar with.
It was a brother of Luo Yi's pet, Meatball...or sister, he couldn't tell. It was in its transparent form, showing the rankings of the sect. Han Xuhan had seen the rankings just half an hour ago. The cockroach sect was still holding the topmost position with absolute dominance in terms of points.
They had asked Luo Yi about this mysterious sect that had popped out of nowhere to snatch the position of the new champion of this decade, but she kept smiling mysteriously without providing an answer. The same situation applied to all of their elders. No one would talk about it for some reason.
Shaking his head, Han Xuhan focused on the tower at the center of the floating island...s.
The central ring was more like a disc, surrounding a tower that floated by itself, untouched by the soil of the island. The walls of the tower were an unnaturally bright shade of white, shimmering under the sunlight. From the angle of his vision, he could see its floors going down below the surface level of the island as well as above. If he could get a glimpse of the bottom of the island, he would probably be able to tell how many floors were there in total on the tower. He could see at least a dozen above the surface.
Fortunately, the hundred-something disciples of the Stardust sect were too occupied with whatever they were doing to notice a lone man hunched on a rooftop at the peripheral ring of the island, sitting behind one of many metal balls.
After surveying the situation for a while, Han Xuhan took out Fang Xie's magic-infused hit-list from his pocket.
Unfurling the scroll, he looked for any signs of ink appearing on it. But the yellowish blank page indicated that he needed to get closer to the disciples to get proper results. This sect looked rather impressive, and Han Xuhan distinctly recalled Brother Feng Jun's craftiness inside the Holy Land of Laws.
Fang Xie should definitely have a target here.
Keeping the scroll in hand, Han Xuhan jumped down from the roof and checked the houses one by one until he found his target- a house with an unlocked window.
Tun Shi Tian had to go through some stretching and squeezing to enter the house.
Five minutes later, Han Xuhan was garbed in the white uniform of the Stardust sect, with the bandana around his forehead hiding his hair, ears, eyebrows, and half of his eyes too.
Pulling the collars up, Han Xuhan walked towards the closest bridge between the outer and the middle ring confidently.
