With earth runes circling around him, the leader, Goku, continued forward. Langrum and Zanou descended slowly into the abyss along with Mira, who was sulking and refused to climb onto the whale's shoulders.

The edge of the abyss was occasionally a steep cliff and sometimes a steep slope. To avoid making noise, everyone descended very slowly, and the laws of the Earth used by Zane and Gael helped keep the ground firm and reduce the noise.

When they were already a hundred kilometers down, the whale stopped as he sensed something on the ground nearby. Then he called Mira, who approached slowly, and asked her to cover him with her mental energy. She sighed and reluctantly obeyed, and then they dug a bit, and soon, the air around them changed.

'Dragon Glass! Excellent,' Gael exclaimed mentally.

It is a piece of extrusive igneous rock, dark gray and almost gloomy, absorbing light. It is formed under very specific conditions, but the main ingredient is the presence of QI from the bloodline of a dragon.

This material existed in all universes, and with their knowledge from the Dao of the Forge God, they could manipulate it to create a quite frightening cutting weapon. It would be so sharp that cuts made by it might not even be immediately felt.

They continued forward. Soon, they found this material only once more, but they were satisfied with what they had already. They didn't know how far they had descended, but when the whale judged that their group had reached a depth of almost fifty kilometers, they finally saw the bottom.

What no one expected was to find a swamp at the bottom, and the swamp water was as black as ink. The whale then crouched next to the water before reaching out and touching the water. But then, Goku's expression changed slightly.

'This is not water. It's blood,' Gael murmured mentally.

Gael and Zane quickly took a small, sharp fragment of the dragon glass and cut their finger off, the same one that touched the water.

"Master!" Mira gave a muffled cry, and everyone was shocked.

"That is blood, and it contains a strong curse. It would be better if everyone avoided it," said the whale gravely.

"A dense amount of death QI... and now cursed blood... is there some kind of ancient corpse buried here?" Zanou asked with a shocked expression.

It was a somewhat well-founded guess, and the cursed blood made it even more eerie.

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"We'll find out if we take a look. Be careful. Don't fall into the water, or even I won't be able to save you," Goku warned and started walking.

There were some unnamed aquatic plants in this swamp, and they were also black. Zanou pondered; everything here seemed similar to the legends of the demonic underworld reported in ancient texts.

Goku then glanced at Zanou, who had a strange expression. Zanou noticed Goku's attention and then explained. "Uh... I had the opportunity to read very old texts about the planet's history. And in them, there were reports of two great wars millions of years ago... the first practically has nothing in the records. But the second recounts a fight against demon kings, who contaminated all life, creating phenomena similar to these." Zanou commented quickly.

'It seems like we should burn all the remaining crystals we have to buy knowledge about this planet. Many strange and unexplainable things happen here.' Gael said with a sigh.

They struggled to gather the crystals and cultivate themselves. But there was always something that made them lose everything. In less than a day after obtaining five thousand, they had already lost half; now they had another priority, and they would lose all the rest quickly. Still, raising cultivation without knowledge of the dangers around was the same as asking for death.

The whale just moved forward without much emotion, and everyone took steps to get closer to him. That leader was their biggest and only source of security at the moment.

They were walking when suddenly he felt his arm tighten; Mira was holding onto him. In this environment, Mira was getting more and more scared. She couldn't help but grab her master and no longer cared about the previous topic.

The whale nodded with an encouraging look in his eyes. Although he didn't say anything, his meaning was clear: there was no need to fear; he was here. Her small eyes trembled. It was as if his eyes were full of sunlight in this dark world.

"Don't pull me!" Langrum whispered angrily. Zanou was also scared and involuntarily grabbed her, who was also fearful.

"I have a long line of men who want to grab me! And no coward is in it! If you have to grab me, grab my shoulder."

Even at this time, when all their nerves were tense, hearing this almost made Mira laugh. She climbed back onto the whale's shoulder and felt good to be there again.

"Master... don't let your instincts from the past consume you..." She murmured softly in their ear.

"Nothing happened! Don't be so possessive, kid. You're not old enough for that yet," Gael replied, feeling unfairly treated.

"You keep calling me a kid... could it be you actually like big, muscular women... or perhaps green ones?" Mira seemed shocked by this conclusion.

*Pah!*

*Ouch!*

Mira rubbed the back of her head, which Gael just slapped. "Stop thinking nonsense! I only had and have one woman in my life."

Gael was clearly talking about his wife, who left him a long time ago. Zanou and Langrum heard that exchange as well, and as they looked at Mira, they had strange expressions on their faces. As for Mira, she had a slight blush on her face; she knew this master... he never had a real relationship with anyone... and she was the only one close enough to him.

'What the hell are you talking about, you idiot?' Zane retorted mentally.

'What?' Gael seemed not to understand, but soon he caught on. 'She's too young. How can she interpret things so wrong? I'm innocent.'

'She's just a few months away from turning 12. At that age on Earth, we were already madly in love with our teacher; she only has us at the moment. Don't say strange things and feed into that, idiot.' Zane spoke angrily.

Gael and Zane continued to argue mentally but remained focused ahead, continuing to walk. Soon, everyone became much more relaxed, and the weight lifted from their shoulders.

They kept moving forward. When a mountain appeared in front of them, they climbed it. After that, shiny stones appeared. At the top of the mountain, the whale suddenly crouched down and lightly cut the ground with an old saber. As a result, the surface rock was ripped away, revealing a white stone.

"That is..."

When everyone saw that white stone, their hearts tightened. They looked in shock.

"It's bone..."

Zanou's voice trembled. That white thing still emitted very faint fluctuations. It was truly bone.

As for the rocks they climbed, they were the condensation of countless years of dust. They had been climbing this bone for quite some time. If this was really the remains of an ancient corpse, how large was the entire body? Just thinking about it gave them shivers... Well, except Zane and Gael, who had seen similar things in their previous life.