Hao Xuan's eyes were half-open. He was standing at the very edge of the summit, surrounded by seething chaos while peering further in as if in a trance.

In front of him about three meters away from the edge was a swirling mass of especially dark matter. It looked to be both solid and liquid at the same time. It was pulsating regularly, akin to a beating heart.

It was located inside a solid structure, a wooden gateway that hovered above a solitary cloud.

The gateway itself didn't have any marks or engravings other than the number "1" at the top beam. It seemed to be chiseled out of a single piece of redwood rather than something that was put together piece by piece.

All the surrounding clouds were revolving underneath this gateway, forming the same rings that were in the world outside. It didn't look like the summit was obstructing them in any way since they were still moving at a consistent speed.

But since everything was shrouded in a layer of darkness, it was difficult to determine the distance between each one, yet their relative size and rotation could still be easily seen by the naked eye.

The first ring was rotating anti-clockwise, the second clockwise, and the third anti-clockwise again, their directions reversing after each one. But strangely enough, only six rings were visible in here as well.

Other than the rotation and the direction of the rings, everything else was a mirrored reflection of the scene outside. They were two sides of the same coin, just opposite in every meaningful way.

Hao Xuan's eyes fluttered repeatedly, opening and closing before returning to the half-closed state. It looked like he was sleepwalking, just inches away from falling off the summit.

There were thin and large spiderweb cracks all along his legs and feet. Before it couldn't even be seen where he ended and the summit began but now he was starting to be separated, bit by bit becoming whole.

His body on the other hand was at a critical juncture. The whirlpool had erased any sign of the previous meridian systems. Just the biggest five remained standing.

The whirlpool was beginning to slow down and the churning chaos within was moving slower and slower as time passed. There were sparks of electric current running through them like veins, slowly giving shape to something completely new.

If the scenes inside Hao Xuan's body observed, one would think many days had passed. It looked both fast and slow at the same time. But in the world outside, barely half an hour had passed.

And just like that time trickled by, from half an hour to hour, to two hours and then three, finally stopping at eight.

The frequency of the thunderstrikes had increased considerably. Now they were actually striking the ground underneath at random spots, seemingly appearing out of thin air since the rings that were generating them could not be seen by anyone else.

Whisps of white smoke were escaping from the eight large cracks that were caused by the lightning strikes, one per hour. A viscous red and yellow liquid was leaking from the cocoon, forming a small puddle underneath.

The area around three hundred meters of the cocoon was covered in charred marks from the occasional lightning strikes. Most of the trees were burnt and nothing alive could be seen there.

But just outside this boundary three groups of people were peering towards the cocoon with eager gazes. They of course belonged to the demihumans, the barbarians, and the humans.

Each of them was headed by their respective leaders. The two princesses stood at the forefront of the Demihuman tribes, watching on with furrowed brows followed by Elder Iya and kart along with the other two bodyguards.

The Barbarians were the fewest in number, being led by a well-built male and female couple wearing animal hides that gave off threatening auras.

The human tribes were led by an aged man in white clothes. He had a long white beard coming down to his stomach and a wooden staff which he held onto for support. He looked like a walking corpse from afar, weak as one could be but the wary and alert gazes of the barbarians and the demihumans said otherwise.

He casually stood there with a kind smile stroking his beard, looking like an ordinary grandpa. Next to him was a teenage boy with an expressionless face. He glanced left and right coldly but his gaze never lingered on anyone for longer than a second.

Both the demihuman princesses were staring at the sky while mumbling something under their breath.

When the ninth hour passed, a wriggling bolt of lightning broke free from the rings above and struck the cocoon, startling the spectators from every side.

*BOOOM*

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