Looking at the current situation as the palace began collapsing around him, Xuan Hao decided to quickly accept the continuation of the side quest given by the system as a new quest appeared in front of him.
[Survival Quest: Escape before the collapse of the secret realm!]
[Reward: Purification Pill x5]
This was the first quest that would kill him if he failed! A survival quest!
Xuan Hao felt that the quest was indeed fitting for his current circumstances as he could feel the other formation pillars in the distance breaking through the roots that bound them in place for countless years, as they pierced deep into the ground and began fully activating whatever formation they were supposed to execute in the past.
The formation in question began to show its might as the entire secret realm, both above and below ground began to shake violently as a terrifying energy began to brew around the pillar located at the centre in front of Xuan Hao.
"I will indeed die if I don't get out of here soon!" Muttering this to himself, Xuan Hao looked over at the original entrance to the secret realm before quickly moving over to try and open it and escape.
But it did not take long for him to realize that his attempts were in wain as the giant door leading out of the secret realm remained shut.
The only hint on how to open it that Xuan Hao got was a small lock filled with all sorts of runes placed on the entrance.
"Hm?" As Xuan Hao was lost on how to open up the gateway out of the secret realm, the blue feather inside of his interspatial ring vibrated gently and flew out in front of him and began to move towards a hidden passageway located to the side of the throne room.
All Xuan Hao could do for now was follow the blue feather and hope that it would show him a way to open the original entrance of the secret realm… Or at the very least show him another way out of the secret realm…
"W-what is happening? Why did the ground suddenly start shaking all of a sudden!?"
"Look! The earth is breaking apart!"
"Is the secret realm beginning to collapse!?"
"Let's get out of here before we end up getting caught in the disaster!"
At the same time that Xuan Hao began to follow the blue feather in search for a way to activate the original entrance to the secret realm, chaos was beginning to spread above ground as several large cracks appeared in the ground leading directly down to the underground part of the secret realm.
The people above however did not care about this as they used their fastest speed to rush towards the entrance of the secret realm. No longer caring about the fact that the Sky Empire would have set up people to block the entrance.
Getting out was their top priority as everyone knew remaining in a secret realm as it collapsed completely would leave on stranded in the void between worlds with no way to get back to their original world again. Left to float in the void until they died to a random void storm or other terrifying dangers hidden in the void between worlds.
Even if one was lucky enough to not encounter this, without any qi present, the cultivator would simply starve to death when they ran out.
This was the main reason that they no longer cared about the fact that the Sky Empire might end up taking away the different treasures that they had found. No matter what, losing a few treasures was better than dying!
"Young Lady, we should get out of here immediately! Even if those from the Sky Empire are outside, if we stay here, we will just end up dead!" Ji Yichuan pleaded with the young lady of the Flowing Cloud Sect as she seemed to not want to leave the secret realm and possibly end up getting caught by the people of the Sky Empire in the process.
"My lady, I think that Old Ji is right! Even if we lose that artifact, it is still better than losing our lives here!" The old lady seemed to understand what was going through her mind and quickly spoke up to support Ji Yichuan.
"Argh! Fine! We will leave like the rest of the people here! Let's just hope that the Sky Empire is not the only power stationed outside the secret realm…" Letting out a frustrated voice when she thought about the fact that she would might lose that artifact, the young lady reluctantly agreed to the suggestion of Old Ji and the old lady.
The artifact in question was a precious artifact of the Flowing Cloud Sect that had been passed down for generations. Even then, its true use still remained unkown.
The reason why the young lady and old lady had ended up in the Heavenly Sky Kingdom with such a precious artifact from the Flowing Cloud Sect and managed to meet with Old Ji also had something to do with this.
All in all, things back in the Cloud Sky Empire was not as peaceful as they used to be, and the Flowing Cloud Sect had ended up being targeted by another group of sects that had teamed up to steal the precious artifact of the sect.
To stop this from happening, the sect master had sent the old lady and young lady over towards the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in an attempt to hide until the unrest and chaos blew over.
"We should be able to head the Spring Flower Sect after getting out… Hah… We should have never entered the secret realm in the first place just because nobody had showed up to claim it yet among those empires and stronger sects…" Sighing in regret, the old lady blamed herself as she said this. Thinking that she should have stopped the young lady from acting so rashly and enter the secret realm to explore it.
"No use thinking about it for now. Let's just get out safely first of all" Watching the ground cracking as the earth below them began collapsing, Ji Yichuan motioned for the two of them to look at the ground beneath them showing signs of collapsing at any moment.
"Let's move!" The young lady looked around and saw a nearby ancient tree towering over a hundred meters tall suddenly tumble down in the underground part of the secret realm below them and crash into the ground a few thousand meters below.
The trio did not wait along for any longer as they quickly moved towards the entrance to the secret realm.
Luckily, they had waited close to the entrance for an opportunity to leave when the Sky Empire would start fighting with the other powers on their level for control over the secret realm, so it did not take long before they safely made their way out of the secret realm.
"Haha! Finally! We can enter the ancient palace complex!" Letting out a happy laugh, the Imperial Teacher of the Sky Empire happily watched as the pillow like object had made a small hole in the barrier big enough for them to pass through.
But just as he was about to enter together with General Liu and the two from the Onyx Empire, the entire underground part of the secret realm began shaking violently as the barrier in front of the ancient palace complex completely disappeared along with it.
From the centre of the main palace, the group of four also saw a giant pillar piercing through the main palace as it slowly began to release a terrifying energy. Slowly growing stronger and stronger with each passing second as the shaking from the surroundings grew more and more violent.
The giant lizard demon beast also sensed the changes and let out a roar in the direction of the giant pillar, but still remained locked in place. Not daring to move even a step closer, clearly afraid of the giant pillar.
A certain weird mist also stopped a few meters away from the ancient palace complex before it quickly began floating in the direction of the main palace while the group of four were locked in place due to the shock that the giant pillar had brought to them.
In the distance, a violent shaking could be felt as the Imperial Teacher and Bi Sheng could barely see the other smaller formation pillars in the distance pierced down in the ground and began linking up with the main pillar as the terrifying energy began to gather together at an even faster pace compared to before.
"T-this is a realm destruction formation!" Muttering this to himself with a shocked look on his face, the Imperial Teacher seemed to realize what kind of formation that the pillars were!
A realm destruction formation!
The only purpose of such a formation was to destroy a secret realm, but even the Sky Empire would not use such a method due to how wasteful it was compared to just causing the secret realm to collapse by itself after finding the core.
A realm destruction formation would only be used if this was not possible and even then, it would still be a waste of resources as the sheer amount of reassures used would cause even the biggest empires to feel the pain.
Worst of all, those resources used to construct the formation would forever be lost in the void between worlds after the formation successfully activated and destroyed the secret realm!
In the end, capturing a secret realm was a way better solution compared to destroying it most of the time!