Deep within the glaciers of the Northern Wasteland, a fissure spanning the ice layer emitted an ominous ghostly glow. This fissure appeared ordinary, but upon approaching, one could hear faint sounds of spatial tearing, and the surrounding snow and ice. Tang Xiaoqi led an exploration team to the edge of this fissure, each person feeling the chill emanating from the depths of the void.
"Monitoring arrays show the spatial fluctuations here highly match the third suspected point from astrolabe divination." Lin Suwen held a compass-shaped magical artifact, its needle spinning frantically. "But energy readings are extremely unstable. I suggest first deploying detection puppets."
Xiao Qi shook his head: "Void energy interferes with all magical artifacts. Only personal exploration will work." He turned to face the carefully selected five-person team: "Remember, our mission is to confirm the entrance, not combat. Upon discovering anything abnormal, retreat immediately."
The team members included: Lin Suwen, skilled in formations; Zhao Tiezhu, adept at defense; Mu Xue, sensitive to energy perception; Cang Ya, a Snow Wolf tribe warrior familiar with the Northern Wasteland environment; and Ouye Zi, an experienced overseas cultivator. This team represented the Alliance's top capabilities, but facing the unknown void, no one dared take it lightly.
Xiao Qi leaped into the fissure first; others followed closely. The moment they passed through the fissure, everyone felt a sudden disorientation. This was not ordinary spatial teleportation but some even more bizarre experience—as if the entire person had been disassembled into countless particles, then reorganized in another place.
When vision returned, they found themselves in a fantastical world. There was no sky or earth here, only countless broken scenes floating in the void: a corner of an iceberg adjacent to fragments of desert, broken walls of a palace intersecting with remnants of forest, even some never-before-seen strange creatures visible swimming in the distance.
"So this is the void..." Ouye Zi murmured. "Even more bizarre than the records describe."
Lin Suwen immediately began laying a positioning array, but the array had barely lit up before it flickered violently and ultimately collapsed into scattered starlight. "Impossible! The laws here are completely different from the outside world!"
Suddenly, a fragment of scenery in the distance shook violently, and from it emerged countless semi-transparent strange creatures. They had no fixed form—sometimes like swimming fish, sometimes like flying birds—all emanating a chilling void energy.
"Void mayflies!" Ouye Zi cried out. "Quick, dodge them! They devour all energy!"
But the warning came too late. Cang Ya, who was leading the charge, was grabbed by several mayflies. He roared and swung his battle axe, yet found his attacks passed directly through these creatures' bodies. "They have no substance!"
More terrifying things happened. The mayfly swarm suddenly changed direction, surging toward Lin Suwen like a tide. Her protective spiritual light rapidly dimmed under the mayflies' gnawing.
"Form array!" Xiao Qi shouted. The Qinglian Domain instantly expanded. The pure purification power made the mayfly swarm retreat slightly, but these void creatures quickly adapted to the purification power and began charging more ferociously.
Zhao Tiezhu stood in front of Lin Suwen, his body cultivator's distinctive blood energy burning like fierce flames. The mayfly swarm shrieked sharply upon contact with the blood energy, clearly wary of this utterly yang and rigid energy.
"It works!" Zhao Tiezhu's spirits lifted. "These ghosts fear yang energy!"
But just as everyone thought they found a solution, the entire void suddenly violently shook. The distant scenery fragments began spinning madly, forming a massive vortex. From the vortex's center, a tentacle made of pure darkness extended!
Wherever this tentacle passed, even the void itself collapsed. Those scenery fragments, upon touching the tentacle, directly turned into nothingness, as if they had never existed.
"A void devourer!" Ouye Zi's face turned ashen. "Retreat! This is not an existence we can oppose!"
Xiao Qi made a decisive judgment: "Retreat! I'll hold them off!"
He operated the Qinglian Domain to its fullest, attempting to block that terrifying tentacle. But what shocked him was that the purification power was almost ineffective against the tentacle—it seemed to be the embodiment of "nothingness," on which even purification could have no effect.
The tentacle slowly reached toward the team. First in its path was Mu Xue, who was maintaining the retreat formation. Her ice-element Dao laws were as fragile as paper before the tentacle, and she was about to be devoured!
"No!" Cang Ya suddenly roared, his entire body transforming into a silver light that crashed into the tentacle. At the moment of contact, he detonated his entire cultivation!
"BOOM—"
The massive explosion temporarily blocked the tentacle's advance, but also made the already fragile void even more unstable. Countless spatial rifts spread like spiderwebs, scattering the team members.
"Cang Ya!" Zhao Tiezhu's eyes nearly burst from their sockets, wanting to rush back for rescue, but was blocked by a suddenly appearing spatial rift.
Xiao Qi endured the grief, operating the Creation Pot at full power to temporarily stabilize the surrounding space: "Go quickly! His sacrifice must not be in vain!"
When the last person rushed out of the fissure, the entire glacier began collapsing. Xiao Qi was the last to leap out, then turned to completely seal the fissure entrance with a sword strike.
Back at the temporary camp, when taking inventory of personnel, everyone's heart sank. The six-person team that set out now had only five left. Snow Wolf tribe warrior Cang Ya had forever remained in that terrifying void.
"It's my fault." Xiao Qi's voice was hoarse. "I underestimated the void's danger."
Mu Xue gently shook her head: "If the Alliance Leader hadn't sealed the entrance in time, perhaps none of us would have returned."
Lin Suwen organized the collected data. Although the loss was heavy, this exploration was not without. They confirmed the authenticity of this entrance, recorded the characteristics of void mayflies, and most importantly—they witnessed the terror of the void devourer.
"According to data Cang Ya transmitted before his sacrifice," Lin Suwen's voice choked, "that void devourer was likely a guardian left by the demonic entity to guard the entrance."
This news sent chills down everyone's spines. If even the guardian was so powerful, to what terrifying degree was the demonic entity's main body?
That night, Xiao Qi stood alone outside the camp, gazing at the sealed glacier to the north. The astrolabe in his arms glowed faintly warm, displaying locations of other suspected entrances.
Every entrance could be more dangerous than this one. But they had no choice; they had to continue exploring.
"Alliance Leader," Zhao Tiezhu walked up to him, "next exploration, take me along. Cang Ya's revenge cannot go unavenged."
Xiao Qi didn't answer, only tightly gripping the Nirvana Flame Sword in his hand. The blade reflected his determined gaze.
This failure would not stop their advance. On the contrary, it made everyone more clearly understand: the final showdown with the demonic entity would inevitably occur in this void beyond common sense.
And they must make every preparation.