Azrael couldn't even inspect his surroundings before several notifications flooded his vision.
(You have entered the Broken Fragment of Ancient Genesis)
(The transformed rules of the Ancient Genesis are ineffective inside the Broken Fragments)
(It is advised for the user to purchase a Small Fragment of the Rule Stone from the shop to benefit from the Transformed Rules)
---) Small Fragment of Rule Stone: Upon usage, while inside the Broken Fragment of Ancient Genesis, transforms the rules around the user similar to the Ancient Genesis. Effective for one day.
(Price: 2000 Task Points)
Azrael was truly baffled when he saw so many notifications appear before him. However, knowing he was in a dangerous place, he only gave them a brief glance before shifting his focus to his surroundings.
Looking around, he found himself standing in the middle of a barren land, its rocky ground covered with jagged edges and scattered with small hills.
The sky was a light orange hue, while the rocks and hills around them were a deep crimson, as if painted with blood. The air carried a heavy metallic stench, thick with the smell of dried blood, while a desolate aura lingered in the atmosphere—an ancient, oppressive stillness that seemed to belong to a time long forgotten.
Though the environment itself looked menacing, especially with the overwhelming stench of blood, none of them sensed any immediate danger in the vicinity.
When Luo Bingqing and others glanced back, they could see the spatial rift still open behind them, leading back into the underground chamber.
"Just how many creatures have died here to stain the entire land red with blood?" Elyara muttered in a grave tone, her eyes fixed on patches of old, dried blood that had long since turned dark black.
Luo Bingqing was equally vigilant, his expression tense as his eyes swept across the wasteland.
Azrael, meanwhile, after confirming that there was no immediate threat around them, finally turned his attention back to the notifications.
The first thing that caught his eye was, of course, the phrase: Broken Fragment of the Ancient Genesis.
When he had entered the trial ground of the Eonrift, his status window had informed him that he had entered into the Fragment of the Ancient Genesis. Yet now, within these ancient ruins, the notifications claimed he had entered the Broken Fragment of the Ancient Genesis.
There was only a single word of difference, but the implications were enormous. The latter suggested that this was once a part of a Fragment of the Ancient Genesis that had somehow been separated from the whole.
What puzzled him even more was the information about the transformed rules as he couldn't quite grasp what it was implying.
Though he understood that his status window was advising him to purchase a Small Fragment of the Rule Stone to alter the rules of the Broken Fragment into those of the Ancient Genesis, he wasn't certain what it truly meant by the "Rules of the Ancient Genesis."
'Just what is this Ancient Genesis…' Azrael frowned inwardly as he knew that both the Fragment of the Ancient Genesis and the Broken Fragment of the Ancient Genesis seemed deeply connected to it. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ novelFirｅ.net
"What's wrong?" Elyara's voice pulled Azrael out of his thoughts.
"Nothing," He replied evenly. "Just thinking about what we should do next."
As Azrael spoke, he silently purchased the Small Fragment of the Rule Stone from the shop as his status window had suggested, and it immediately appeared within his inventory.
"Let's climb that cliff to get a proper look at the area," Luo Bingqing suggested, pointing toward a towering cliff nearly three hundred meters high. From the top, they would be able to see beyond the smaller hills surrounding them.
Both Azrael and Elyara nodded in agreement, and the three of them began moving toward the cliff.
Luo Bingqing summoned several ice birds, sending them high into the sky to keep watch over their surroundings, while Azrael sharpened his focus, listening closely to the sound of the wind as it brushed across the barren land.
As they walked, Azrael deliberately slowed his pace, lagging a few meters behind Luo Bingqing and Elyara.
He quietly pulled out the Small Fragment of the Rule Stone from his inventory.
The fragment of Rule Stone was no larger than a grain of rice, glowing faintly with a soft metallic light. Yet, despite its tiny size, Azrael could feel an unfathomably strange and profound power sealed within it.
'Should I use it now?' He thought, glancing once more at its description, which stated that the effect would only last for a single day.
He was reluctant to waste it without fully understanding its purpose. However, the problem was—
'If I don't use it, I'll never know what it actually does.'
Resolving himself, Azrael channeled a wisp of cosmic energy into the stone.
The instant he did, the fragment melted into a glowing liquid and seeped into his body through his palm. A faint, undetectable wave of energy spread outward from him, extending across a radius of nearly two hundred meters.
Azrael sensed the faint energy wave, and it instantly reminded him of one of things that had happened in the Trial Ground of the Eonrift. His heart skipped a beat as he immediately guessed the true purpose of the Rule Stone.
At the same time, a stream of information flooded into his mind, explaining the true function of the Rule Stone. As he processed the details, Azrael's eyes widened in disbelief, his breath catching in his throat.
Even with his normally composed personality, Azrael nearly lost control of his emotions and he had to suppress the urge to shout out in joy.
'To think this thing would give me such a surprise…' He thought inwardly, the corners of his lips tugging upward into a rare smile.
"There's a monster ahead," Luo Bingqing's sudden voice interrupted his thoughts.
Azrael quickly raised his head, following the direction Luo Bingqing was pointing. There, about four hundred meters away, a level 23 Class-level monster lay sleeping at the base of the cliff they intended to climb.
The creature resembled a massive boar, its bulk immense, with two long, sharp tusks jutting from its snout.
Azrael's faint smile deepened as he quickened his pace, catching up to Luo Bingqing and Elyara, who were just a few steps ahead.
'Perfect. This monster will serve nicely to test the effect of the Rule Stone.'