Inside of the dimensional tunnel the girls casually chatted with each other, as if they weren''t about to face the two strongest enemies of the group, naturally the tree was curious about it.


    "Hey, aren''t humans supposed to be afraid death, why are you all so calm, do you trust the alpha so much, hey did he perhaps beat you all to conquer you, I remember the three horned bull do something like that…", once the three started it was hard to shut it, unless someone drew its attention to another subject.


    In this case it was Aster, since the girls were all looking at him like saying "Do something please".


    "Ahem, don''t forget the n, ording to our deal you will be staying behind in the third node''s castle, eliminate the beast army and the human cultivators, if there is still any left and then get thest yang chain link, it doesn''t matter that you can''t im its ownership, just remove it from the node, okay?".


    The tree nodded before saying with a serious voice.


    "Sure, I can do that, but don''t forget your side of the deal, once we get rid of those guys and you get the cial Liger you must… answer my questions regarding human nature!", the tree''s serious tone didn''t match it words, but Aster still nodded.


    The travel through the tunnel didn''tst that much, around five minutester they saw the end of it, Aster was prepared in case there was an ambush waiting for them, the girls suddenly felt a warm andfortable sensation enveloping them, as their skin shone with a pretty dim golden light, Alexandra included.


    For a moment she was about to demand an exnation thinking Aster was bathing her in his yang radiance, but then she noticed this was different, unlike the creepy sensation of being licked all over or observed with lust, that the yang radiance of a dual cultivator makes you feel, ording to her mother, this was easing and calming.


    Also, as someone from the Fritz family who specializes in body cultivation, she could quickly tell this wasn''t yang radiance.


    ''What is this, it feels so…fortable, why does it feel simr to my Heavenly Northern Shield, does he also have a defense-oriented body constitution?'', she wondered.


    Alexandra had yet to see Aster using the golden armor, since he has only fought using either Dragon Aura or his Sky Rendering, and has been saving his strongest state for a real fight, not because he is arrogant, but because using the full size of the armor is tiring, back with the evil spirit he didn''t go all out, as he didn''t wear the armor but just ordered it to act separately.


    She also noticed that the others didn''t seem to mind and instead looked at the ck-haired youth with thankful expressions and she remained silent, since she couldn''t feel any negative effects or any difortable sensationing from this golden light, instead of that she focused on the other side of the portal.


    The group came out of the portal andnded in front of the third castle which was being attacked by an army of yin spirit beasts, this army wasrger and stronger than the one from the previous two beasts.


    In exchange there were no human cultivators left, besides a small group of members of the young generation and some elders who were wearing full body armor, which made it obvious for everyone to which sect they belonged.


    "The castle is in a much worse state than the previous one, I''ll leave now, don''t forget about our deal", said the Runic Oak as it charged towards the beast army.


    Aster chuckled, the three had already told them where was the entrance to the area where the cial Liger was confined, not that it was that hard to find, since there were three yellow chains and two blue onesing from within the clouds a few dozens of kilometers away from his current position.


    ''Heh, so they chains are connected thanks to a spatial formation, those guys from the Yin Azure Pce are surely rich'', he thought as his pupils changed to those of a dragon, even from this distance and without using spirit sense, he could see what was hidden behind those clouds, there were two stable portals that lead to the three suns and two moons in the sky, but after all the damage the formation suffered they only worked in one way, sending yin and yang to the Silicon Forest.


    Aster was about to leave with the girls, when their way was blocked by the group of surviving cultivators, among them Aster recognized one, it was the guy who back at the beginning of the mission made Renard try to get his entry pass, the inner disciple from the Castle Armored sect, Patrick.


    That being said he didn''t look as glorious and arrogant as before, he was a bit pale as if he had seen something horrible not too long ago, judging by the fact that all his team members including the women to whom he kept staring previously, were gone it wasn''t hard to imagine what happened, either they were killed before the two spirit beasts his sect and the elder from the Marsh Domain decided to leave to rush towards the cial Liger, or they were sacrificed.


    Patrick saw all the beauties that were surrounding the ck-haired guy in front of him, and first he felt jealousy, but then he remembered that everyone else in his group was used as sacrifices by the elder, except him because he has earned some merit with the young master, and he instead cunningly smiled.


    "Hey you, hand over those your possessions and those women and then join us to fight that strange being, I''ll put up a good word for you in front of the young master, since he knows how to "appreciate" beauty, wee from the Castle Armored sect so don''t get any fun ideas…", before Patrick could finish speaking his head separated from his neck.


    The other cultivators who couldn''t react on time were in shock, while Agnes who just slightly unsheathed her sword returned it to its scabbard, but that wasn''t all the other cultivators, then slowly looked downwards and then grabbed their necks as they noticed there was a cauterized line on them.


    Their eyes contracted in fear before life left their expressions as they copsed on the ground, dead.


    "Humph, these clowns from a mere ten ranked Ster System are getting annoying", she said.


    Nerissa more or less understood the real meaning behind Agnes''s words, because her master has told her that no matter the background of her enemy might be, she shouldn''t hesitate and either kill or use the life-saving treasure she gave her depending on the situation, she will handle everything else.


    Alexandra frowned, her supposition about Astering from a high ranked Ster System was reinforced.


    ''If he doesn''t worry about the tenth ranked one, then he muste from one of the top five, but from which one, was he lying about curing my mother then… no he could be from one which wasn''t involved in that, he made an oath'', she had unconsciously formed a much better image of Aster at this point.


    Though she didn''t lower her guard, she wasn''t that quick to judge despite the fact that he was one of the dual cultivators, she hated so much, but it still worried her that she might be in presence of someone from the top five Ster Systems of this Heavenly Quadrant.


    "Are you noting?", Aster''s voice woke up Alexandra from her daze, Aster and the others had started to fly since they needed to catch up with the beasts, Alexandra gazed at Aster and she put her thoughts at the back of her head, in any case she will learn the truth soon, so for now the priority was to get out of this ce as fast as possible.


    …<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Aster and the girls flew at fast constant speed, surprisingly Eris didn''t create a barrier to help them all move as fast as she could, which would have definitely cut the time they needed to reach their destination, but there was a good reason to it and was rted to the n she created with Aster''s help.


    "That is the entrance, remember don''t leave the group, these beasts and the cultivators are different than the previous ones", said Aster as he descended from the sky followed by the girls who nodded in affirmation.


    Theynded in front of a big hole on the ground, originally there should have been a giant rock with a seal here, but the beasts probably destroyed it, so the entrance was now open for anyone, they didn''t even try to copse the tunnel because that might take them too much time.


    Aster looked at the sky and more urately at the two chains, but Eris who also looked at them, shook her head at him.


    "We have to cut the connection between them and the Liger first, or you might kill it if you go for the chains right now", she said.


    Aster shrugged, for a moment he thought of using Annihtion to destroy the chains, it was brute but simple way to solve the problem, but Eris saw through him and she warned him that, it might work but there was a chance the spirit ice was destroyed along with it.


    "Let''s do it the pacific way then", said Aster as he jumped into the hole on the ground, followed by the girls who were giggling.


    ''What "pacific", we also know the n you know?'', they thought in unison.


    The hole on the ground led to a tunnel that extended a few kilometers into the ground, it was quite dark here but Aster solved that with just letting out a but of his golden toned spirit energy, it wasn''t annihtion, but his normal spirit energy which also has a bright golden color.


    The girls gathered around Aster, while most were happy that he illuminated the tunnel, Felicia pouted since she enjoyed the previous dark environment, but she also got closer to Aster since they will bending soon.


    At the end of the tunnel, they reached what will be stage for the final battle, it was a maze made out of bright yellow walls that reached all the way to the rock roof of this underground space, surprisingly both the ground and the roof was covered in that bright yellow mineral which reminded Aster of the crystal trees.


    "Those are all yang umtion crystals", mumbled Nerissa, the girls were also surprised, the amount of the crystal was amazing, it was hard to estimate the prince it will fetch if someone could take it, the only problem is that it seemed to be a single piece, if dismantled then it will lose a lot of value, and putting it into a spatial ring was impossible as the yang was so strong it would interfere with the formations.


    The cave suddenly trembled, there was a huge shing from the center of thebyrinth, meaning either the spirit beasts were fighting among themselves or against the Liger.


    "Tsk, it''s going to take us too much time to decipher thebyrinth, should I make a straight path towards the center, Aster?", asked Agnes as she prepared to unsheathe her sword, she believed she could burn through the thick crystal walls if she got serious.


    But to her surprise Aster shook his head as he took out the map he got from the evil spirit, no, from the soul fragment of the Blood Despair Sovereign, the old man was surely the type to not be honest to the very end.


    "Though that guy said he only knew a few ces of the middle area, he once saw where the Liger was imprisoned after that hand attack destroyed the whole forest, and since he also forcefully looked into the memories of the Patriarch of the branch of the Yin Azure Pce, he drew the secret passage used by them to bypass thebyrinth", he said as he showed them the map.


    Aster then walked towards the entrance of thebyrinth and he then touched a few different ces in a special sequence, at first nothing happened but once he touched the wall for the 108th time, lines which connected all the ces Aster touched appeared on the wall.


    After a couple of seconds, the wall shook a bit before an opening of around four meters of height and three of width appeared, the same applied to all the walls that were in front of that one, forming a path towards the center of thebyrinth.


    They didn''t lose any time and instead rushed into thebyrinth with Aster leading them, thebyrinth was actually bigger than one might think in a rough calction Aster thought they ran through around fifty or so kilometers, before the sounds of battle could be hearding from a few dozens of meters ahead.


    Once they reached the center of thebyrinth what appeared in front of them, was the scene of the two spirit beasts fighting each other, as well as the two cultivators doing the same, there were some bodiesying down on the ground here and there, which were probably the subordinates of those two.


    But that''s not what caught Aster''s group''s attention, but the thing at the center of the room, there was a giant yellow cage united with a chain that came from above, and inside of it there was it.


    The block of ice which the Blood Despair Sovereign mentioned, was broken mostly broken, the yin chain was buried into the ethereal body of an eighty-meter tall, white tiger which was covered in blue light.


    The beast looked between something real and an illusion, but the way it was making the cage tremble every time it hit it with its paw, and the loud roar made one incline towards the possibility that it was real.


    Unfortunately, such tricks didn''t work for Aster''s new eyes, he could see that every time it attacked ice formed on that part of its body, in a sense a spirit element was simr to a spirit form, he learned that after meeting Esmeralda in her true appearance back at her secret realm.


    It was a mix between an incorporeal form and an element, Esmeralda was more ethereal because her element used to be only wind, but since she also learned jade attribute, she could be solid, that''s what Kana used to punch Ley''s disgusting face, sending him flying towards the ground back then.


    Aster suddenly smirked while he kissed Aria''s soft cheek, he couldn''t think of a better spirit ice than this one for his ice princess whocked in the physical strength aspect.


    "Weren''t you jealous of Alice''s armor, well, I found one for you", he said to Aria, who blushed in response, Alice was the one to get her ability as Stair Maiden first, so in the time Aria had yet to awaken hers before Aster took her first time, she was a bit jealous of Alice''s golden armor.


    Of course, she was happy when he got Rigel''s mes, it''s a power thatplements her fighting style and her ice attribute perfectly, the problem is that she has yet to learn how tobine the mes which use soul energy to freeze and her attribute which is based in spirit energy, as those two things repel each other.


    The permafrost she just recently learned after Aster helped her reinforce her jade-like bones, which improved her physical body, was the prototype to something much greater, and she could see some hope in aplishing her goal with this spirit ice.