Chapter 1250.2: The Lost Ancient City

The void darkened the moment the pool of Terra Light Magneticus was procured; only the Terra Grass in the ground glowed with a dim blue hue. The group swiftly picked all of the grass before reassembling to leave with contentment.

“We can’t take our original path back!” Hua Fengwen suddenly said. “The disappearance of the Terra Light Magneticus will disperse the Earth Light Magneticus outside. That will draw curious eyes to come investigate.

“Many sixth step kings visited in the hundred thousand years I was trapped, but they all failed. The sudden vanishing of the pillar of light will definitely attract their attention.”

“Don’t worry, they’re all focused on the key in Jin Naluo’s hands—” the little fox stopped talking as soon as she started.

An imperceptible shaking traveled to them from all directions—someone was attacking this part of the land.

“So fast!” Lu Yun’s eyebrows shot into his hairline. “Come on, we’ll leave from the bottom of the pool!”

He retrieved the abyss and took point, jumping into the big pit left behind by the pool.

“What a damn shame, even the sand at the bottom of the pool was a treasure,” the little fox grumbled.

Lu Yun smiled ruefully, busily setting up another layout. It opened a new passage at the bottom of the pool and whisked them away.

Boom!

The void shook as a crack opened up and a figure darted through it.

“I was a step too late!” The frosty tones belonged to a woman. “Dammit, they didn’t even leave behind a blade of Terra Grass. Who did this?!”

……

“What a haul, what a crazy haul!” The little fox jumped up and down on the Immortal Region Glory and would’ve flashed back into her true form if Lu Yun hadn’t stopped her.

“We’re richer than the Redbud King now, aren’t we??” She swung Lu Yun’s arm around with utter glee.

“The Redbud King can spend her purple crystals however she’d like. Can we say the same for what we have?” Lu Yun answered impatiently and flicked a sideways glance at her. However, he couldn’t hide the joy in his eyes either.

A pool of Terra Light Magneticus, Terra Stone Magneticus, and Stellar Stone Magneticus… their combined value was more than likely on par with the Redbud King’s mountain. There were plenty of purple crystals in the Hongmeng, but treasures such as the stones were something that could only be chanced upon and not actively sought out.

“Come, let us head to Multitude City and occupy part of it. Let’s become a mover and shaker in this Multitude Region!” Hua Fengwen declared with heroic spirits.

He wasn’t a Multitude king—he’d traveled to this territory to carve out a kingdom of his own. He suddenly pressed his hand to the helm of the Immortal Region Glory and infused it with a heady rush of power.

The ship immediately sped up by more than a hundred times and streaked into a thin line of light that melded with the void.

……

Three days later.

“This is Multitude City?” Lu Yun swallowed hard when he saw the loftily majestic metropolis in front of him.

“I.., think so? I’ve never actually been, so I don’t know the way.” Hua Fengwen awkwardly scratched his head. “But the words over the city gates do proclaim it to be Multitude City, so… why isn’t there anyone here?”

He was rather baffled by the empty streets of the city in front of them.

Multitude City was the most prosperous city in the Multitude Region and sat in its center. Commotion should’ve been hustling and bustling through its gates, crowds jostling and shuffling past each other while sweat and voices filled the air. It shouldn’t be the dead quiet of what they saw in front of them.

True enough, the city was vast, and vaster than any that Lu Yun had ever seen before. He couldn’t see to its end even with his current abilities. It gave him the feeling that he was situated in the Redbud Plains.

It was so incomprehensibly limitless and every black brick in the simple and broad city walls seemed to speak of the many vicissitudes of life—markers of time itself!

Lu Yun could read the power of time in the city walls.

“I get it!” The Meteorite King’s eyes suddenly widened with dismay and he spoke fearfully, “The lost ancient city… Legends speak of an ancient city lost somewhere in the Multitude Region that belongs to the dead. The living should not come near it or lay eyes upon it. What are we doing here??”

“Yes, that’s, that’s right! This is the place!” concurred a Skyfall King with chattering teeth. “Our destination is Multitude City, which is why its name appears over the doors of this lost city. I corralled my thoughts just now and changed my destination to Skyfall City. Sure enough, I then saw the placard for Skyfall City over its doors!”

“Then will it turn into the fourth realm if I want to go to the fourth realm?” the little fox blinked and asked hesitantly.

“No, you’ll only see a mental illusion.” Lu Yun shook his head. “Why don’t we go inside for a look?”

“Are we not going to Multitude City anymore?” The little fox didn’t seem to care much for this city.

“We can’t.” Hua Fengwen took a deep breath. “We can’t go anywhere else other than here. I’d heard of this ancient city before arriving in the Multitude Region, but never thought that I’d really run into it a hundred thousand years later.”

He turned around and saw another city behind them, the exact same as the one before them.

“There’s a city in the sky as well.” The Meteorite King looked up. The same city and city gates were facing them.

They were surrounded by a city.

“Since we’ve stumbled across it, let’s go inside for a look.” Lu Yun didn’t mind their current circumstances. “If legends of it exist, that means there are people who’ve safely departed its premises after running into it. If someone else can leave safely, I’m sure we can do the same.”

Of that, he was confident of.

In his eyes, this city was just an extremely complicated layout. It wouldn’t be difficult to dismantle as long as he located its center point.

Creak—

The heavy city gates rasped out hoarse groans, like they hadn’t swung open for hundreds of millions of years. A heavy stench of decline and decay rushed into the group's noses as they fully opened.

“Have there really been people here before?” the little fox asked with difficulty, covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve.

“I don’t know… Its legends exist within the Multitude Region, but there doesn’t seem to be a concrete example of who’s seen it before,” the Skyfall King mused.

“This city really is a bit big for us.” Lu Yun tilted his head up and up and up. Just the city gates alone were almost a hundred thousand kilometers tall. Any casual mark in the gates was a path to the heavens in their eyes.

It wasn’t that the gates had been purposefully made this large to showcase the stature of the city, but that it was proportional to its residents. The citizens were most likely some sort of giant or titan since the city gates were several thousand kilometers thick. Lu Yun couldn’t tell what material they were made out of.

“As we thought!” The group’s expressions changed after entering the city proper.

All of its buildings were at least several thousand kilometers tall, with some so elevated that their rooftops couldn’t be seen—those were at least five hundred thousand kilometers tall. Of one thing Lu Yun could be certain, and that this city was completely empty. There was nothing alive inside.

A skull several hundreds of kilometers across appeared abruptly in front of them, staring straight at them with empty eye sockets.

It was the skull of a dog.

“The city gates have vanished.” The Meteorite King brought out Quiet and took a deep breath. “Master, what should we do now?”

“Stay here and don’t move.” Frowning faintly, Lu Yun felt there was something a bit off about where they were.

He suddenly called upon Size Manipulation and grew explosively—one meter, two meters, ten, a hundred, five kilometers, five hundred… five thousand!

Lu Yun stopped when he was five thousand kilometers tall and finally found himself to be in harmony with the city. Everything appeared very natural, showing that the buildings by the side of the road weren’t meant for people. They were the dens of some sort of animal.

“What kind of a place is this?” The strange feeling grew stronger in his heart.

His body expanded once again until it was five hundred thousand kilometers tall, but he still couldn’t see the limits of the city. He remained fully synchronized with it, as if a body at this height was the true master of this city. Buildings that were tens of thousands of kilometers tall by his feet were still the homes of animals.

“Bigger!” Setting his jaw, he grew another ten times until he was five million kilometers tall.

The city still dwarfed him, but he also continued to be one with it.

“What the heck?” Lu Yun was certain that the city hadn’t changed along with him, that the buildings had been like this all along.

etvolare's Thoughts

There's definitely something very weird about this city.