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Chapter 273 - Planet
🕑 Added 2025-03-26 07:00:15 +0000 UTC"Tamina, you're an expert at this. Are you sure this is your first time digging?" Anda asked, her tone filled with admiration.
"Actually, I'm quite surprised as well. I've only ever used my technique for attacking and defending before. But somehow, this felt natural to me," Tamina replied, her focus unwavering as she continued to manipulate the earth.
"Hehe. That just means you were born for digging. Maybe you should change professions after this, Tamina. You could become the greatest digger in the world, creating underground labyrinths. Or maybe a tomb raider," Anda joked, her eyes twinkling with mischief.
Tamina almost laughed, imagining herself as Anda described. The thought of becoming a professional digger or tomb raider was both absurd and amusing.
Soon, Tamina noticed that the soil composition beneath her had changed slightly. She adjusted her stance and stabbed her spear into the ground. Once again, the earth began to rearrange itself in a spiraling motion, opening a hole downward. After a few meters, something began to reveal itself—a chunk of clear ice radiating intense coldness.
"Is that... Icy Spirit Stones?" Anda called from above the hole.
"Yup. These are Icy Spirit Stones—ice elemental spirit stones that are great for ice elemental cultivators. Hihi, not a bad find for our first attempt," Tamina replied, her voice tinged with satisfaction.
"Good. We still have dozens of spots with similar spiritual energy readings around here, so we might find more. By the end of our pandaploration, we'll probably be the most resource-rich ladies in this place," Anda said happily.
Although the Icy Spirit Stones weren't compatible with her, Anda naturally wouldn't leave such valuable resources behind. Even if the Leyan Family didn't need them now, they might in the future. Besides, Anda knew someone in the family who could definitely use them—Nikita, who had an ice spirit root. These stones would benefit her greatly.
Tamina continued separating the layers of compact soil and earth from the Icy Spirit Stones. When she was done, a massive chunk of Icy Spirit Stone, twice their height, stood before them.
"Anda, store it quickly! We have more places to dig!" Tamina said, her excitement palpable. Seeing such a huge resource in front of her invoked a satisfaction she had never felt before. She was eager to find more treasures, and the thrill of exploration was finally living up to her expectations.
Anda chuckled inwardly, noticing Tamina's newfound enthusiasm. She seemed even more excited than Anda now.
"Okay," Anda replied, storing the Icy Spirit Stone in her spatial ring. She then checked the Qi-Seeking Radar, confirming that the spiritual energy reading in the area had returned to normal.
"Let's go to the next spot," Anda said.
And so, the two of them moved on to other locations with high spiritual energy readings, always heading in the direction of the towering tree on the horizon.
They found more Icy Spirit Stones in a similar manner and occasionally discovered other treasures nearby, such as rare ores with ice attributes, perfect for crafting spirit weapons or armor for ice elemental cultivators. Along the way, Anda also gathered many rare plants that were hard to find in the Cloud Continent—Snow Lotus, Ice Soul Orchid, Glacial Spirit Grass, Eternal Snow Root, and more.
These plants were ingredients for several alchemy formulas in her possession. One of them, the Ice Soul Orchid, could be consumed directly to grant extreme cold resistance for a period of time. Anda gave a few to Tamina, just in case she needed them later. Considering how vast the snowy region was, they might be here for a while. As for Anda, with Little Fiery by her side, the cold was no concern at all.
Occasionally, they encountered demonic beasts, but with Anda providing support, none stood a chance against Tamina's combat prowess at full strength. If the Demonic Polar Bear were to fight her again, the outcome would be far less one-sided.
Three weeks later, Anda and Tamina stood on the edge of an extremely high snow mountain, looking down at the landscape below in a panoramic view. The sky was clear today, and despite the clouds partially blocking their view, the sight was breathtaking. Both women had Qi barriers around them to shield against the strong, chilly winds.
"Anda, I think it might be hard for us to reunite with anyone we know," Tamina said, her voice tinged with resignation.
Anda pouted. "Why is this place so big? I want to see Leyvi! Give me my husband back!" she shouted loudly, her voice echoing across the mountain.
From their vantage point, they could see snow stretching as far as the eye could see, and the colossal tree in the distance still appeared just as far away as ever. Even from this great height, the tree's sheer scale defied reason.
"Hmm... it seems this place is far, far bigger than I ever expected. Unbelievable. No wonder we still couldn't fine other people." Tamina wondered aloud.
"Hmm... now that you mention it, everything about the Mystic Realm feels slightly different from my continent. The days and nights feel slightly longer, the gravity is a bit stronger—though with our strength, we might not notice it if we don't pay attention. Even the sun looks slightly bigger. Oh right, I've also recently noticed that there are multiple moons in the sky when it wasn't snowing at night. It feels like we're not in our world anymore," Anda mused, voicing the subtle differences she had noticed after a month here.
She had never given much thought to these details before, so the subtle changes hadn't immediately raised questions. The only thing she had noticed instantly upon arrival was the higher spiritual energy density, which was a much more common topic of interest for cultivators.
"Eh? Anda, you don't know? Did they not tell you?" Tamina looked surprised. Then she remembered that Anda was from the Cloud Continent, and given their level of development, they likely hadn't been exposed to this knowledge yet.
"What do you mean? What should I know?" Anda asked, her curiosity piqued.
"Where do you think the Mystic Realm is located?" Tamina asked, intending to gauge Anda's knowledge first.
"Where? I don't know. Wasn't it part of our continent that got mysteriously hidden for some reason in the past?" Anda replied. She had heard about the Ancient Civilization that was wiped out long ago, and some claimed the Mystic Realm was a remnant of that civilization. However, Protector Alexandra had said it was just a rumor, so Anda wasn't sure anymore.
"So you don't know..." Tamina said, her tone thoughtful.
"So what's the truth?" Anda pressed.
"The Mystic Realm is, in reality, another world—or, more specifically, another planet," Tamina explained.
"A planet?" Anda repeated, her brow furrowing.
"Yes, a planet. The world we live in—all the continents, the seas, the sky—is on a round planet. Outside our planet, there are more planets, very far away. And this Mystic Realm is one of them. Well, they called it the Mystic Realm long ago before we discovered much later that it was another planet like ours."
Anda raised an eyebrow. Why did this sound familiar? Then it hit her—Alita's airship. She had mentioned something about the owner's airship landing on the planet where the Cloud Continent was located.
"Outside the planet... you mean beyond the sky? Does that mean you can fly outside?" Anda asked. If Alita could come to their planet in her airship, then surely they could fly outside too, right?
Tamina shook her head. "We can't, not at our level. If you fly higher and higher, far above the clouds, you'll eventually encounter a flying prohibition similar to what we experience here."
"Is that so? Hmm... Now I can't help but wonder what's out there," Anda said, her gaze drifting upward.
"Hehe. We can't see it, but all the Dao Manifestation Realm experts have seen what's outside. The flying prohibition doesn't affect cultivators at their realm anymore."
"Did they describe what they saw outside?" Anda asked.
Tamina nodded. "They saw an endless void they called the cosmos—a vast, black expanse stretching infinitely in all directions, dotted with countless stars. That's what they all said."
"Endless void? That sounds scary," Anda admitted.
"That's right. That's why, even with their high realm, they don't dare to travel far from our planet. They only observe the cosmos from near the planet or from the moon. They've even developed spirit artifacts to see things extremely far away. That's how they discovered other planets. All the planets orbit around the sun."
"What? The planets orbit the sun? I thought the sun orbited us all this time. Then what about the moon?" Anda was shocked. Her worldview had just been turned upside down.
"Hihi. Don't worry. The moon orbits our planet. It's very small compared to the sun. They only look the same size because the sun is extremely far away," Tamina explained further.
Anda fell silent, trying to process the information she had just heard. It took some time for her to reimagine how everything worked. Since the Cloud Continent didn't have any Dao Manifestation Realm cultivators, there was no way for them to know this information unless one of the Cloud Continent Protectors broke through to the next realm or someone brought the knowledge back from the Protogaea Continent.
"Then what about the portal?" Anda broke the silence again.
"Hmm... about that. They don't exactly know why it happens, but they do know when it happens. There are 20 planets orbiting the sun, including ours. Every time multiple planets get very close to each other while moving in their orbits, portals appear randomly throughout our planet. The portal that appeared on our continent this time should have brought us to a planet with a rocky outer layer but hollow inside, making it a massive underground world."
