The path through the ancient forest was quiet and Xuan Hao did not manage to spot any other Nascent Soul Realm beast like the group of wolves from earlier, so they were most likely one of the first groups of demon beasts inside the secret realm that had ended up being unsealed earlier than expected.
This was good news for Xuan Hao, as he would not have to deal with all sorts of flying demon beasts coming up to attack him while flying over the ancient forest as he made his way towards the small palace located at the border between the Nascent Soul realm area and the place where the few Domain Lord Realm demon beasts inside the secret realm were located.
Hopefully what the treasure hunter had said about the small palace was true and he would be able to gain quite a lot from his visit to the secret realm!
Xuan Hao really was curious about what sort of ancient artifact was stored in the palace at the border between the two areas, perhaps it had something to do with the formation covering the secret realm, seeing as it was located at the border where the formation pillars were also present.
"Well, I will find out when I get there…"
Flying high above the ancient tress below, Xuan Hao suddenly thought about something.
Normally, when he flew too high up on the outside, he would feel the pressure increase as the qi between heaven and earth grew denser and denser until it reached a point where it became unbearable for him to move any higher up.
Xuan Hao felt a bit curious if things were the same in a secret realm and decided to try it out.
With a quick change in direction, Xuan Hao flew straight up into the air.
Without knowing what even happened, Xuan Hao flew full speed into an invisible wall in front of him. Falling off his sword in the process as he began falling down towards the ancient forest below.
"What the hell! How come there is an invisible wall!?" Cursing a bit at the creator of the secret realm, Xuan Hao felt a bit shaken that he had not even managed to discover that there was an invisible wall of sorts directly in front of him until it was too late.
"Perhaps that was the edge of the secret realm?" Thinking about it, Xuan Hao nodded a bit at his own conclusion. After all, a secret realm was nowhere as big as the outside world and there had to be a limit to it of some sort. The qi between heaven and earth did not change either as he ascended. Always staying on the same level as it was on the ground.
"Hm? What is that?" As he was falling down towards the ancient forest, Xuan Hao discovered something below him and failed to see it beforehand as he was too focused on making his way to the border before the demon beast there began to break free of their seal.
But the thing in front of him was not something he could ignore as it literally screamed to be something from the test that had once been a thing in the ancient forest.
After getting closer, Xuan Hao made out that the thing to be a giant stone monument standing tall beneath the ancient trees.
Without looking down from the angle he was currently falling from, Xuan Hao would have never spotted the stone monument hidden beneath the ancient tress.
Waving his hand, Xuan Hao's sword intent spread out and covered his sword falling a few meters away from him and soon stabilized a few hundred meters above the ancient trees.
"Guess I will have to check it out now that I found it…" Not really thinking much about it, Xuan Hao descended down to the ground and made his way over to the stone monument hiding beneath the ancient trees.
The stone monument had several cracks running through it as the decay brought about by the passage of time was clear to see.
Walking up to the monument, Xuan Hao discovered a small path close to it spreading out towards the surroundings. Sadly, whatever the path led to had long since decayed with the passage of time as only the stone monument itself was left barely standing.
"There are some words on it… Names?" Narrowing his eyes, Xuan Hao tried to use his divine sense to make out the names on the stone monument and soon came upon the name of the stone monument itself.
But things were not that great as a giant crack had formed at the top where the title was located. Only allowing the few words reading out Nascent Soul Ranking to remain.
[Nascent Soul Ranking]
That was what Xuan Hao managed to make out from the few words at the top of the monument, this made Xuan Hao curious. Maybe some of the names on the rankings would be from people that had existed in the past?
After spending some time reading through the few history books in the giant pagoda close to the entrance of the secret realm, Xuan Hao became a bit familiar with the history of the outside world during the era that the secret realm was still up and running normally under the sect behind it and hoped he would be able to recognize some of the famous names mentioned in the history books.
"Hm… Firestarter, Fluffy Fist, Death Incarnate, Daoist Fluffy Cloud… What are these weird nicknames?" With the few topmost name being impossible to view due to the numerous cracks running through the stone monument, Xuan Hao could only view the ones at the middle and bottom of the stone monument.
But this did not help in the slightest as it was filled with all sorts of weird nicknames. Making Xuan Hao think that one of the sect rules was to pick a silly nickname…
Shaking his head in disappointment after realizing that he did not read about any of the names before, Xuan Hao decided to just throw it to the back of his mind for now and look over the history books back in the sect and see if any of the silly names showed up.