He Juan's letter had said: just keep heading west from the manor, and when you see two mountains with a massive waterfall on each side, that's your final destination.
Now, Evan Chu and the others could see just ahead: two mountains with a gorge between them, and on both sides of the cliffs, huge waterfalls crashed down from above. The water surged fiercely, spray shooting high as thunderous rumbling echoed nonstop through the valley.
Beneath the waterfalls ran a river; its surface wasn't wide, but the water was so deep you couldn't see the bottom. Evan led his group of five slowly forward.
If you called this place a scenic spot, it would absolutely qualify—lush trees and wildflowers all around, plus the waterfalls flanking the cliffs, gave the whole scene a fairyland vibe.
But to say this was the Azure Tide Ruins' teleportation site was honestly hard to believe. Evan glanced around but saw nothing strange at all—no inscriptions on the cliffs, no weird buildings, nothing out of the ordinary.
Luna Chu and Skylar Yule, still kids at heart, started picking bright wildflowers nearby. Evan found a clean rock and sat down, turning over in his mind where the entrance to the teleportation gate could be.
Claire Ouyang and Selena sat down not far from him. No one spoke; everyone just quietly soaked in the beautiful scenery, totally entranced.
"Luna, do you think the teleportation entrance is really here? Why would they put the gate in a place like this—and make it invisible?" Evan asked the Sword Spirit in his mind.
Right now, only Luna, the all-knowing Sword Spirit, could possibly answer his doubts.
"This place looks beautiful, but it's not what you think. Finding the teleportation gate is actually simple—it's invisible, but it still gives off a certain energy fluctuation. Just probe with your spiritual sense and you should be able to sense it. But be warned: what you see here might be real, or it might be an illusion. Focus only on the gate itself as real, and don't be surprised by anything else you find."
Just remember—the teleportation gate is real. Everything else, you can ignore." Luna said.
Evan was a little confused by her words, but he still calmed himself and began to sense the world around him.
At first, the sound of rushing waterfalls was still ringing in his ears, but gradually, that noise faded away.
Even with his eyes closed, images slowly began to form in Evan's mind. It was as if there were no waterfalls here, no mountains—just a towering building.
Gradually, the vision sharpened. It was a sect compound, but it had been utterly wrecked; the ground was littered with severed limbs, and blood stained everything red.
In front of a massive teleportation array stood crowds of people—each one with a sword thrust through their chest, blood still pouring out. They were clearly dead, yet none of them had fallen.
The most terrifying sight was a black-clad, masked figure gnawing on a young girl's body—his mouth smeared with blood, the scene utterly ghastly.
After a while, the vision in Evan's mind suddenly shifted—a middle-aged man in white appeared. Seeing the hellish scene, he exploded with rage and attacked the black-clad figure. Their fight was earth-shattering: every clash shook space and ground, as if the sun and moon lost their light.
In the end, the man in white defeated the masked enemy, who fled immediately. But the victor spat out a mouthful of blood as soon as the fight was over.
Then he gathered all the corpses together, summoned a blaze, and cremated them. At the end, he fired a beam of fiery red energy at the teleportation gate; in an instant, the gate vanished, leaving only four huge characters behind.
Evan saw those four huge characters with perfect clarity, and his heart tightened—the words were 'Venerable Solus.'
As the image froze, a stabbing pain shot through Evan's mind. He snapped back to awareness, finding the scenery still idyllic—mountains and rivers, nothing like the horror he'd just witnessed.
Stunned, Evan touched his forehead and found it slick with sweat. He asked Luna, "Luna, what on earth was that all about?"
"What did you see?" Luna replied, answering his question with one of her own.
"I saw four words on the teleportation gate—Venerable Solus," Evan answered.
"That's right. If you can see those words, it means you are this world's savior. Everything here is full of strangeness—everyone sees something different, but the real truth is whatever you saw.
I could only see the middle-aged man defeat the masked figure, and then the vision ended. But you saw everything to the very end—do you know what that means? And did you see the man's face?" Luna asked.
"Not really. He felt both unfamiliar and strangely familiar," Evan replied.
"That man was actually the Lord of Frostbane. This happened before the great war on the Divine Battlefield. You were once one of the sect's top disciples, and thanks to your talent and rapid progress, you broke through to the Saint Martial Realm before the age of thirty.
The masked man was Demon Lord Solus, a traitor from the Demonic Realm. As for why he destroyed your sect, that's still a mystery.
One thing is certain—this has something to do with you. As for how he led you into war with the Demon Clan, you'll have to investigate with Selena. Actually, this place is already part of the Azure Tide Ruins, but you sealed it off, leaving only a teleportation gate behind," Luna explained.
The more Evan listened, the less he understood—this was actually the Azure Tide Ruins? It was hard to believe. He steadied himself and glanced at Claire Ouyang and Selena.
He noticed they seemed to sense something too—both had their eyes tightly shut. Only then did Evan realize the place was just as Luna said: full of strangeness.
Soon, both women opened their eyes. Seeing Evan looking at them, they asked in unison, "Evan, there's something odd about this place. When I meditated just now, I saw some strange images in my mind."
"Me too. What did you both see?" Evan asked.
"I saw that this place was once a massive sect compound, though somehow it declined. The vision was blurry, I couldn't see much detail," Claire Ouyang said.
Selena looked at Evan and said, "Evan, what I saw was different from Claire's—this place was the site of a massacre, bodies everywhere, blood flooding the ground. I even saw someone—a person I could hardly believe."
"Who was it?" Evan asked.
"It was you..."
(Author's Note: Eight chapters completed today. Too bad the votes weren't strong—feeling a bit disappointed. Will update again at midnight!)