476: Hubris

Hubris

1In a place filled with volcanos of all shapes and sizes, both active and inert, earthquakes were nothing out of the ordinary.

But when the entire mountain range which was tens of thousands of kilometers long and perhaps just as wide moved in its entirety, that was anything but normal.

Hao Xuan was standing in the entrance of the cave that was dug out by Henrik and company to take cover from the rain when it felt like someone had pulled the rug from under his feet. He stumbled forward, almost falling headfirst towards Ceni who was standing nearby but managed to regain his balance at the end and quickly straightened himself.

But many of the others weren't as lucky and were thrown off their feet. Several pieces of loose rocks fell from the ceiling and hit a few people. Thankfully everyone here was a cultivator so something like this wasn't enough to hurt them seriously no matter how weak they currently were.

"What the hell is that?!" Henrik asked while being helped up by Hazel, who was like a professional bodyguard by now.

Hao Xuan had just arrived at this place and didn't even have time to say anything to Henrik when it hit them.

He turned around to face towards the place where all the cultivators that chose to stay with Dai Zhi were. There were still a couple of volcanos between them but he could still feel the stifling sensation of being buried alive coming from there.

And if he could feel it from dozens of miles away, what would it be like for the people that were still there?

"Come, we have to leave right now. It's not safe here," Hao Xuan shouted and walked out of the cave, letting everyone get ready.

Borrowing a shoulder from Hazel, Henrik also limped over.

"Is it really that dangerous? We are so far and most of the cultivators from the three institutions should already be there by now. Dai Zhi called for reinforcements from all of them."

Hao Xuan shook his head silently. When he said 'here', he meant this planet, not this particular mountain.

"Trust me, we can't be anywhere near this place when it wakes up. Doesn't matter if it's a hundred cultivators or a thousand, it will only feed that thing," Hao Xuan mumbled and gestured for Salome to come over.

He was his responsibility so he would take care of him at the very least. Salome smiled like a puppy whose owner had just noticed him and ran over.

"You guys ready?" Hao Xuan asked the rest of the people one last time, getting confirmations from most of them, and the ones that wanted to go join Dai Zhi changed their minds after what happened a few seconds later.

A deafening roar and an intense earthquake followed by a muffled boom was carried over to their location.

Many people peered towards the source of the commotion with bated breath and saw five massive, sharp bones jetting out of the volcanos surrounding the roach camp location.

It was soon followed by numerous other explosions and bursts of light that were bright enough to be seen from so far away.

"Hurry, let's go!" Hao Xuan yelled, waking them from their dazed states.

They still hadn't recovered their cultivations all the way so most of them couldn't call out their contracted beasts, if they even had any.

And those few that could had to help the injured people on first.

With Hao Xuan's non-stop urging they quickly made their way out of the mountain ranges and were on their way towards the walking city.

With nothing else to do, Hao Xuan couldn't help but recall the words he had seen in the Imperial Prison. The words that had left him with nothing but despair for the future.

After getting surrounded by the horrid creatures in the hall below, instead of going back, Hao Xuan chose to make a run for the control room instead. He used every technique at his disposal and even Nidhora's power to its absolute extreme, almost turning into a half-dragon half-human hybrid by the end.

And after fighting for two hours straight and expending most of his Qi reserves, Hao Xuan finally managed to reach the control station of the prison which was located several miles underground.

As expected, it was one of the only places still safe from the corruption of this.... 'thing' that had taken over the rest of the prison.

There he uncovered some details about what was being held in there.

The God that was acting as the warden had also left a few scribbles before ultimately sacrificing himself. After translating, it read something like this:

"It is our fault that things have come to this. We tried to pry open secrets that weren't meant to be seen and somewhere along the way, we noticed it wasn't just us anymore. But something new, or rather, something predating even us had joined our ranks."

"Nothing works against it. It has no consciousness, no ability to reason. Yet it outsmarts us at every turn. How many of my brothers have died? Even hell couldn't contain it so how could we possibly kill it?"

"We thought we knew everything. We opened a door to the beyond thinking that whatever was on the other side was weaker than us. And in our hubris, we brought upon our end."

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