The moment he passed through the pupil, Qianye felt as though he had just passed through a thin membranous layer to enter an unfamiliar world. Variegated patches of color appeared around him from time to time, as well as brilliant beams of light.

In this world, there was no sense of direction to grasp, nor could one feel the flow of time—the lack of dependable sensations was inexplicably distressing. Even someone of Qianye’s constitution immediately felt his vision blur and was soon overcome by the urge to vomit. However, he couldn’t even do that because he couldn’t feel his own body and the surroundings.

Qianye tried hard to differentiate the things that he could, with the fortunate help of the Eye of Truth. Under its powers, the changes in light around him suddenly slowed down, allowing him to see—if just barely—that there was something within the beams of light.

Qianye willed it and found that his body could move accordingly. He consciously maintained a good distance from the appearing light beams. As expected, when one of the beams slowed down, he finally saw that there was a mass of land spinning slowly within it.

The landmass was almost as big as the Qin Continent, with shades of jade green everywhere. Apparently, it was a thriving land, but Qianye simply couldn’t remember which one among the twenty-seven continents was shaped like that.

The handful of continents at the very top of the world was devoid of all life, and apart from a few top experts, few could ever set foot on them. There were no records of these continents in the empire’s records, either. It could also be that Qianye’s authority never reached that level.

Just as he was thinking, the belt of light passed by rapidly and vanished into the depths of the chaotic world.

Another mass of light began to form up ahead. Similarly, there was a landmass at the center of this radiant sphere, one Qianye had never seen before.

Just like that, Qianye was made to see scenery he had never before witnessed. There were seven or eight continents he had never seen before, as well as unimaginably big mountains and giant creatures that could occupy half of a continent lying down. He beheld rippling underwater mirages, countless marine creatures, and massive entities—living beings or otherwise—roaming the void. All of these toppled his current knowledge.

Yet, Qianye didn’t know what he was seeing nor could he tell if they were real. This kind of floating seemed to go on in an endless cycle. Time and space were in utter chaos, or perhaps they simply did not exist.

While floating aimlessly, Qianye inadvertently noticed a certain scenery which shook him!

It was a large continent, but the imagery was too blurry to discern its details. It was made up of a crescent-shaped landmass with dozens of small islands dotting the other side.

Qianye had never seen this continent. He was just about to study it in detail when a small familiar-looking island caught his attention. Upon careful inspection, he found that this small island was similar to one of the continents he had seen before!

He suppressed the shock and continued the observation.

Seemingly affected by Qianye’s will, the imagery slowed down to allow for a leisurely observation.

After looking at it repeatedly, Qianye finally confirmed that he had seen this island before. It was just that the landmass wasn’t an island the last time he saw it—it was a continent much larger than the four belonging to the empire. Now, it looked just like a small island due to the enormity of the neighboring continent.

At this ratio, this continent was probably even bigger than the twenty-seven continents combined. And this scene wasn’t even complete. It merely depicted a small corner of the giant world. Qianye couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed at how large this world was!

It was somewhat odd that such a place had never appeared before in the records of Evernight.

It could be temporarily concluded that this continent wasn’t within the Great Maelstrom, otherwise, how could the people not know? The Empire and Evernight had been going in and out of the maelstrom for many years. Qianye felt that what he saw wasn’t an illusion but something that existed in reality. It was just that only Qianye managed to see it for some reason.

If it was just his imagination, it wouldn’t have been so complete, so clear, and a perfect match with the one he had seen.

Could it be that there was a boundless new world beyond the void? Was it this new world that was drawing the peerless experts of every generation into exploring the void passages?

At this moment, a giant door had seemingly opened up in front of Qianye, affording him a matchless view of one standing at the peak of the world.

In addition to being mentally shaken, Qianye also felt waves of unbearable pain as sensation returned to his body. Every inch of his skin seemed like it was on fire and being torn apart. A strong sense of danger also appeared once more in his heart.

Fortunately, his ancient vampire constitution was extremely powerful. Despite having lost his senses, his blood core was operating just as before, delivering auric flame blood to all parts of his body and regenerating his injuries. Judging from the current situation, it could be said that there was no danger to Qianye’s life as long as he had essence blood remaining.

With his senses restored, the entire world transformed once again. All of the strange phenomena receded like the tides and the world went back to its original state—all dimensions, direction, and time, as well as visible objects.

Within a split second, Qianye realized that he was mid-air and that there was a huge body of water below him. The shore, dotted with verdant trees, stood not far off in the distance.

Without enough time to react, he fell straight into the water and sank down rapidly.

The water here seemed different from that of the empire, possessing only a surprisingly small amount of buoyancy. It didn’t look very deep, and visibility wasn’t so bad in the light green waters. Qianye could see from the bottom all the way to the top without using his True Sight. He simply gave up on trying to swim, opting instead to hold his breath and walk along the bottom—he was poking his head out of the water before long.

Qianye swept the water droplets off of his head, and then left the water to catch his breath. Looking back, he found himself standing beside a majestic lake, one so large that one could hardly tell if it was a lake or a sea without tasting the water.

Qianye glanced around at the woods behind.

There was a familiar yet strange feeling originating inside the grove. The woods were made up of ancient trees that blotted out the skies—verdant, exuberant, but dark and gloomy. The wind from within carried a cold humidity that cut to the bones and the faint sounds of unknown creatures. None of the trees here were identifiable to Qianye.

The flora and fauna of every major continent was a required course back at Red Scorpion. Qianye couldn’t claim he knew all of the common plants, but he did know most of them. Being unable to recognize a single tree in the entire forest, now that was abnormal.

Qianye walked into the woods with plans to explore its borders. The first step he took immediately left a deep print in the ground.

The soil around the lakeshore wasn’t mud but made up of firm-looking stones. Normally, Qianye would need to spend some effort if he wanted to leave a footprint on stone. It was quite odd that a casual step would leave a footprint.

Qianye gave it some thought before touching his necklace and producing East Peak from it.

Immediately upon appearing, the sword sank downward in Qianye’s grasp—he almost couldn’t hold on and had to exert urgent force to lift the blade up. East Peak, at this point, was almost ten tons in weight.

From this, Qianye confirmed that the gravity of this new world was at least several times stronger than the Empire and Evernight. He only felt a slight bit of discomfort because of how strong his body was. Any ordinary person might have sustained injuries and probably wouldn’t be able to stand up.

Qianye waved East Peak around to get himself used to the new environment.

He knew he was probably in the Great Maelstrom. It was just that Song Zining never mentioned that the gravity here would be so terrifying. The Empire had explored the place several times, so there had to be some intelligence regarding it. With how capable and connected Song Zining was, it was impossible for him not to have seen them.

According to imperial records, the explored parts of the Great Maelstrom were not so different from the Empire and Evernight. There was definitely no mention that the gravity was over ten times stronger.

At this point, Qianye had already realized that he had arrived directly into the depths of the Great Maelstrom.

This was both good and bad. The good thing was that this area hadn’t been explored yet, which means that the vast resources here were yet untouched. The bad thing was that he would have to face more unknown dangers. Many dangers within the Great Maelstrom were fairly lethal to the geniuses of the two factions. Information from the explored regions stood proof that the further away from the tunnel, the more dangerous it was.

The dangers here came in many shapes and forms. There were all kinds of powerful beasts, small but venomous insects, and extremely toxic vegetation. Some of the more dangerous species were poisonous at times and not during others.

The dangers Qianye had to face were even greater. Gravity was just one thing and the dangers in the environment were another. What’s more, he didn’t even know where he should be going.

At this point, Qianye felt a wave of nausea and wanted to vomit. This wasn’t normal at all. Fortunately, Qianye’s perception and control over his body were far beyond that of an ordinary person. He immediately found out that the root of the problem was still gravity.

As someone with auric flame blood, both his flesh and bones had been remodeled and strengthened considerably. Comparatively, his innards were quite weak. Under the terrifying effects of increased gravity, his weaker organs were starting to give in and show small breaks.

Despite that, the regenerative and adaptive capacity of the ancient vampires seemed to be at the peak of Evernight. His innards started healing on their own after a while and began showing early signs of strengthening. Although this was just an early adaptation reaction, it would still afford great help in his quest to acclimatize to the Great Maelstrom.

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