Chapter 422 - 421: A destroyed Civilization?

Yet what caught Alix’s attention wasn’t their strength.

It was their appearance.

One creature possessed crimson skin, curved black horns, and a long tail ending in a sharp barb.

Another had leathery wings resembling those of a bat.

Some had glowing golden eyes with slit pupils.

Others carried enormous claws and jagged fangs.

Many possessed an almost humanoid body.

If not for their monstrous features...

They could easily have been mistaken for people.

Alix quietly observed them through his perception.

A strange sense of familiarity surfaced within his mind.

He stared toward one horned creature standing atop a cliff.

Its appearance...

Its wings...

Even the shape of its horns...

They all reminded him of something.

His memories from Earth slowly resurfaced.

Images from old books.

Ancient myths.

Religious paintings.

Fantasy stories.

A quiet murmur escaped his lips.

"...Why do they..."

"...look exactly like the depiction of demons from Earth?"

His voice echoed softly across the silent wasteland.

For a moment, Alix simply stood there, gazing toward the crimson horizon.

The coincidence was too great to ignore.

Earth and this world should have had no connection whatsoever.

Yet the creatures inhabiting this dungeon resembled the demons described throughout Earth’s countless civilizations with astonishing accuracy.

A faint smile slowly formed on his face.

"It seems this dungeon holds far more secrets than I expected."

Without lingering on the thought any longer, Alix gently stepped into the air.

There was no violent eruption of spiritual energy.

No deafening explosion.

He simply floated upward as though gravity itself no longer applied to him.

A faint crimson aura surrounded his body, allowing him to glide effortlessly across the blood-red sky.

The dry wasteland stretched endlessly beneath him.

Black mountains rose from the earth like ancient monuments, while countless deep ravines scarred the land.

The deeper he traveled into the dungeon...

The denser the demonic aura became.

It wasn’t evil in itself.

Rather, it was simply a different type of energy than the spiritual qi found in the outside world.

"It’s almost like another ecosystem..."

Alix quietly muttered.

"The creatures here have adapted to survive on this energy."

As he continued flying, his perception remained fully expanded.

Every movement within dozens of kilometers entered his awareness.

Nothing escaped his senses.

Soon, he arrived above a rocky canyon.

More than thirty demonic creatures were gathered below.

Some resembled horned humanoids with crimson skin.

Others possessed massive wolf-like bodies covered in black scales instead of fur.

Several winged creatures perched upon the cliffs, their glowing golden eyes constantly scanning the surroundings.

The moment Alix entered their field of vision...

Everything stopped.

Silence descended over the canyon.

Then, every single pair of eyes turned toward him.

Their pupils immediately contracted.

A strange hunger appeared within their gazes.

It wasn’t fear, nor curiosity.

It was instinct, the instinct of predators spotting fresh prey.

The instinct of predators spotting fresh prey.

One of the horned creatures opened its mouth.

"GRRAAAAAAH!!"

Its roar echoed across the canyon.

As though responding to a command...

Every demon immediately charged.

Boom!

The ground exploded beneath their feet.

Several leaped hundreds of meters into the air.

Others unfurled enormous bat-like wings before diving toward Alix from above.

The wolf-like beasts sprinted across the cliffs with astonishing agility, their claws carving deep marks into solid stone.

Within seconds...

More than thirty Tier 5 creatures surrounded him from every direction.

Alix calmly observed them.

"So..."

"I’m food."

He couldn’t help but smile.

"They didn’t even hesitate."

One winged demon reached him first.

Its enormous claws tore through the air, aiming directly for his neck.

The creature moved astonishingly fast.

Fast enough to overwhelm ordinary Tier 5.

Unfortunately, its opponent wasn’t an ordinary.

Alix casually raised one finger.

Before the claws could even touch him—

Bang!

The demon’s entire body exploded into a cloud of blood.

It wasn’t struck.

There wasn’t even visible contact.

The overwhelming difference in power alone had crushed it.

The remaining demons didn’t stop.

They continued charging without the slightest hesitation.

One after another...

Their attacks descended.

Claws.

Fangs.

Spears forged from hardened bone.

Balls of crimson demonic flame.

None of them reached Alix.

He calmly walked through the air.

Every step he took caused another demon to collapse.

Some exploded into fragments before they came within ten meters of him.

Others were sliced apart by invisible currents of wind.

Several simply disintegrated beneath the overwhelming pressure radiating from his body.

The battle...

If it could even be called one...

Lasted less than half a minute.

Silence returned to the canyon.

The dry earth was now littered with dozens of monster corpses.

Alix slowly landed.

He looked around at the battlefield.

Although these creatures possessed strength equivalent to Tier 5 cultivators...

Their combat techniques were primitive.

They relied almost entirely on instinct.

They weren’t much different from wild beasts.

Then, tiny flashes of light began appearing above the corpses.

"Hm?"

Alix watched as small crystalline stones slowly materialized before dropping onto the ground.

Dozens of them.

Each crystal radiated a faint spiritual fluctuation.

He picked one up.

The moment it entered his hand, he immediately recognized it.

"A low-grade Qi Stone."

He looked around once more.

Every defeated demon had dropped one.

Some dropped two.

A few stronger individuals dropped three.

Alix gently tossed the Qi Stone into the air before catching it again.

A thoughtful smile appeared on his face.

"So that’s the dungeon’s reward system."

"For ordinary people..."

"This would already be considered an excellent harvest."

Alix nodded approvingly.

"Not bad."

Then he looked at the pile of Qi Stones scattered across the canyon floor.

After a brief silence...

He sighed dramatically.

"...Although..."

A helpless smile appeared on his face.

"I’d prefer it if they dropped gold."

After all, his kingdom’s greatest bottleneck wasn’t ordinary resources.

It was the System. Everything demanded gold.

Compared to that, low-grade Qi Stones were useful, but they couldn’t directly help him expand the System’s capabilities.

After storing every Qi Stone, Alix once again rose into the crimson sky.

He didn’t rush.

Instead, he allowed his perception to sweep across the dungeon as he traveled.

Mountains stretched toward the horizon.

Dry rivers carved through enormous valleys.

Ruined roads, half buried beneath crimson sand, occasionally appeared before disappearing once more beneath the wasteland.

Even the terrain seemed deliberately designed.

As though an ancient civilization had once flourished here before vanishing countless ages ago.

Several more groups of demonic creatures attempted to ambush him along the way.

Some burst from beneath the earth.

Others descended from the crimson clouds.

Not a single one survived.

None of them were capable of slowing him down.

Hours later... Alix suddenly came to a stop.

His perception had detected something unusual.

"...Ruins?"

Far in the distance...

An enormous silhouette slowly emerged from the crimson haze.

As he flew closer, the outline became increasingly clear.

It wasn’t merely a ruin.

It was the remains of an ancient city.

Towering black walls still stood despite the passage of countless years.

Massive stone pillars lined what had once been grand streets.

Although many buildings had collapsed into rubble, enough remained for Alix to imagine the city’s former glory.

Broken statues stood silently throughout the streets.

Each depicted strange humanoid beings with curved horns and majestic wings spread proudly behind them.

The architecture was unlike anything found within the Pharanthia Continent.

Every building possessed sharp, elegant angles.

Dark crimson crystals had been embedded into walls and towers, though most had long since lost their brilliance.

"It really was a civilization..."