Chapter 1359 1359. Fire
Noah dived directly into the crack. His behavior wasn"t unusual, so the cultivators in the area didn"t even bother to look at him.
Signals and runes covered the walls of the crack and indicated the direction to take to reach the h.e.l.lish Landscape. The separate dimension had multiple entrances controlled by different organizations, and Noah flew toward those that belonged to the Balrow family.
Noah didn"t want to join any organization, but he wouldn"t refrain from using a family that desired to rope him in. His continuous refusals would eventually ruin that relations.h.i.+p, but it didn"t hurt to exploit it for now.
Entering the h.e.l.lish Landscape wasn"t hard. Noah only had to dive deeper into the crack while following the indications on the walls to reach that separate dimension.
The Immortal Lands" rocky terrain slowly turned red as Noah reached deeper parts of the crack. The temperature also rose to indicate that he was getting closer to his destination.
The scenery in his eyes changed at some point. A scarlet environment replaced the red rocks that had begun to fill the depths of the cracks.
Trails of smoke rose toward the pale-yellow sky, and ma.s.sive fires illuminated the world in the distance. Noah had suddenly found himself inside the separate dimension, and crowds of cultivators appeared in his vision when he crossed a cloud of gray fumes.
"Quite peculiar," Noah thought as he inspected the area.
The h.e.l.lish Landscape mainly contained "Breath" of the fire element, and that gave birth to a series of ma.s.sive fires that could continue to burn for millennia.
Noah saw a plain made of red soil, mountains of flames in the distance, and lifeforms that could absorb the very fire that filled the environment.
There didn"t seem to be any distinction between the ground and the flames. A large patch of terrain could take fire on its own and shrink the lands that the cultivators could inhabit.
The powerful organizations took care of extinguis.h.i.+ng those fires. Some of them could even radiate a level of power in the eighth rank, so they needed to remain outside of the inhabitable zones.
A large mansion surrounded by cultivators stood at the center of the red plain. Noah recognized the symbols of the Balrow family on the structure, so he didn"t hesitate to take out his green cards when he saw that guards approached him.
The guards performed a polite bow at that sight and let him land. They didn"t even investigate his ident.i.ty. They only reported to the leaders inside the mansion that Defying Demon had entered the h.e.l.lish Landscape.
Noah didn"t waste time in the area. He only had one advantage in that situation, and he didn"t want to lose it to purchase maps and learn more about that environment.
He needed to choose a battlefield before his pursuers reached him. The insides of the separate dimension weren"t under the protection of the three rank 8 existences in Silkpost city. Humans could fight themselves freely there.
A few experts wearing green robes came out of the mansion to greet Noah, but he didn"t even look at them and continued to fly through the separate dimension.
A red halo filled every inch of that world. That separate dimension was immense, but fires filled most of it. The lifeforms in that environment had also evolved according to that feature, so they often released flames that made the scarlet aura more intense.
Noah didn"t know where he was going. He had learnt something about the h.e.l.lish Landscape in the library, but he was unaware of many details. He could only guess where a few inheritances were due to the layout of that place.
The powerful organizations had created a series of roads that s.h.i.+elded part of the heat radiated by the flames. Those paths connected the various mansions in the h.e.l.lish Landscape and the inheritances discovered in the past.
Noah only needed to enter one of them to be safe. It was hard to follow a cultivator"s aura in that environment. Still, he didn"t want to escape from his pursuers. In his mind, it was better to kill them before they stopped underestimating him.
Vast lands made of fire expanded in his vision. Magical beasts and plants of various kinds thrived among the flames and kept track of his movements.
Those creatures could sense his species" strangeness, and Noah could feel the same when it came to their hatred toward humans. Most of those beasts shot furious glances at him only to lower them after they understood that he was a hybrid.
The world put a lot of pressure on him. The flames were hard to endure, and the heat that filled the environment could even make his centers of power sluggish.
His mind also had to endure its share of suffering. The heat and the hatred of the magical beasts filled the sky. Some of the smoke trails even contained dense versions of those features, so he had to avoid them for the time being.
The smoke could be useful to his training, but Noah didn"t want to tire himself out yet. He had to complete his business with his pursuers before enjoying the benefits of that environment.
Noah continued to fly forward, using his instincts to decide where he could lay efficient ambushes. The only neutral areas were those filled with fire, so his choice soon fell on one of them.
The world in his vision became even redder when he dived inside the flames. A series of dense fiery tongues created a surface where he could step and walk, but he soon confirmed that he could pierce them to dig deeper into the separate dimension.
Diving was the method to reach the harsher parts of the h.e.l.lish Landscape. The immense fiery scenery was only the most superficial layer of that separate dimension.
"Some powerful inheritances should manage to affect the environment at some point," Noah thought as he kicked the dense flames to create a tunnel through them. "The flames will become more intense, but I can handle the superficial layers."
The temperature rose as he continued to dive through the dense flames. Even weak gaseous stage cultivators could endure that fire and fight freely at those depths, so Noah felt the need to go deeper.
Noah had finally reached a place where he could fight without creating any mess. He could choose a battlefield where his hybrid status would grant him the most significant advantages.
A few large tunnels appeared in his vision as he continued to dive through the flames. Those were paths dug by the other organizations that any cultivator could use. They only needed to pay a fee since those roads led directly to certain inheritances.
.
.
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While Noah was busy finding a battlefield, multiple cultivators appeared in the sky of the h.e.l.lish Landscape. Dozens of experts descended toward the fiery surface and studied each other when they noticed other teams with similar intentions.
Those teams didn"t say a word to each other, but they understood that they were after the same target. That forced them to cooperate for the time being and search for Noah"s tracks together.
It didn"t take them much to guess the general direction where Noah had gone. They had experts meant to track him down, so they quickly moved toward the lands filled with fire. Their chase had begun.
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Author"s notes: My neck is killing me for some unknown reason. I can"t manage more than one chap. Will sleep and make the others.