The Pursuer

Two gnoll Battle Kings exchanged a glance, shock and confusion plain in their eyes.

After a brief silence, Heiyu snapped back to his senses and called out urgently:

"Go notify the general — now!"

The gnoll Battle King clad in blood-red armor gave a single nod, his body vanishing on the spot as he shot toward the command tower at the center of the fortress.

Once he was gone, Heiyu scanned his surroundings and barked:

"Search the area! Check for enemies!"

As far as Heiyu was concerned, the Spatial Rift suddenly beginning to close suggested someone nearby was at work.

At his command, the gnoll soldiers patrolling the square fanned out and began combing the area. But for Gene Warriors of mere Battle Venerable rank, finding Lu Yuan hidden in the shadows was impossible — he could have stood right in front of them and they'd have seen nothing. They came back empty-handed.

Before long, a powerful aura surged outward. The blood-red-armored gnoll returned, trailing behind a white-furred gnoll in black leather armor who descended swiftly from the air.

The white-furred gnoll landed and fixed his gaze on the Spatial Rift, his expression darkening.

"What happened?"

Heiyu stepped forward. "General, we don't know either. Just moments ago, the Spatial Rift suddenly began to close."

"Just moments ago? No other changes?"

The white-furred gnoll's brow furrowed deep.

"None. I've sent men to search the area — no abnormalities found."

The white-furred gnoll drew a slow breath, his gaze shifting rapidly.

As a Battle Sovereign-rank powerhouse, he understood perfectly well: to influence a Spatial Rift of this scale would demand spatial force of extreme magnitude. Even a Battle Emperor — even a Battle Saint — might not be capable of it.

Unless someone possessed a Sovereign Grade Spatial Type gene.

But whoever possessed a Transcendent Gene of that caliber — what manner of being would that be? Why on earth would someone like that come after the Blood Bone Gnolls?

Could this be natural closure?

His expression churned through several emotions. Staring at the steadily contracting rift, the white-furred gnoll clenched his jaw and spoke slowly:

"Tell everyone to prepare to leave this place."

Those nearby — Heiyu included — all stiffened.

"General... are we abandoning Ice Vein Star?"

"Then can you stabilize the Spatial Rift yourself?"

The white-furred gnoll shot Heiyu a sharp look.

Heiyu fell silent.

At that moment, a figure burst through from the other side of the Spatial Rift.

It was a gnoll soldier in a gray-white robe.

He spotted the white-furred gnoll in the square immediately and flew over, his face twisted with alarm:

"Kongku — what's going on?! Why is the Spatial Rift suddenly contracting?!"

This was a Battle Sovereign from Blood Bone Star who had been standing guard at the rift's edge. When he saw it begin to shrink, he had rushed over at once.

Kongku shook his head, his own expression equally grim. "I don't know. It should be natural contraction. If it were deliberately triggered..."

He trailed off. The Battle Sovereign from Blood Bone Star's face shifted, and he glanced around with sharp wariness before drawing a long breath:

"Damn it! What do we do? Should we notify Lord Dushan and the others?"

Ice Vein Star nominally belonged to the Red Maple Empire — the Battle Emperor had long since withdrawn from this region, leaving only a contingent of Gene Warriors to prevent human powerhouses from crossing the Spatial Rift into Blood Bone Star.

Of course, that was the nominal arrangement. In practice, the Gnolls still dispatched their own fighters to harass the Red Maple Empire's Gene Warriors and disrupt the mining of Ice Vein Crystals.

With the situation now beyond the judgment of even Battle Sovereigns, their only recourse was to debate whether to summon a Battle Emperor-level powerhouse.

And then the Spatial Rift — which had been closing gradually — suddenly lurched faster. In mere seconds, it had contracted by roughly half.

Kongku and the Blood Bone Star Battle Sovereign both went rigid, something cold flashing through their eyes.

"What?! Why is it closing so fast all of a sudden?!"

A faint smile crossed Lu Yuan's face from his place in the shadows.

Once the most tangled spatial lines were untangled, bringing the Spatial Rift to full closure became far less difficult — and the pace of closure could accelerate dramatically.

On the square, Kongku made a split-second decision:

"Notify everyone in the base — prepare to evacuate!"

He was the first to charge toward the rapidly sealing rift.

The Blood Bone Star Battle Sovereign said nothing and followed immediately.

The other Gene Warriors glanced at each other — and almost to a man, not a single one stopped to notify anyone else. Everyone bolted for the Spatial Rift.

At this rate, who had time to warn others?

The rift closed faster and faster. Kongku tore through to the other side; the Blood Bone Star Battle Sovereign followed; several of the quicker Battle Kings made it through as well.

But a number of other Battle Kings — and nearly every Battle Venerable — couldn't even reach the rift in time. The Spatial Rift sealed shut completely.

Two gnoll Battle Kings tried to force themselves through the final sliver of space — and left half their bodies behind on Ice Vein Star. Blood sprayed across the square.

The space settled. Silence crashed down like a stone.

Every gnoll standing there had disbelief written across their face.

"No!"

A gnoll Battle King let out a furious howl.

"Damn it! We're stranded — how do we get back?!"

They stood in blank-faced shock, utterly at a loss.

Then a gnoll Battle King snapped to attention: "To the ships — now! We have to get off Ice Vein Star! Once the humans find out our Spatial Rift is closed, they won't spare us!"

The Gnolls' spaceship technology was immature. They couldn't perform long-range spatial jumps — a return to Blood Bone Star was out of the question.

But at the very least, they could still navigate the star sea.

If they stayed here and humans discovered they had no supply line, an attack was a certainty. That meant death. Getting off Ice Vein Star meant drifting through the star sea with its own dangers — but that was still a far better gamble than a guaranteed end.

The Battle Kings and Battle Venerables shook themselves out of their stupor and began moving toward the spaceport.

Battle Kings could fly. Their speed left the Battle Venerables far behind.

Meanwhile, gnoll soldiers elsewhere in the base were also noticing something wrong.

Battle Kings rose into the air one after another. When they saw that the Spatial Rift in the square had simply ceased to exist, they all froze — their expressions somewhere between baffled and utterly dumbstruck.

"...Am I dreaming? The Spatial Rift is gone?"

"You're not the only one dreaming..."

"What in the hell happened?! Where's the general?! Where did he go?!"

Several Battle Kings stood at a complete loss. Then they noticed their comrades flying toward the spaceport, and seemed to grasp what had happened.

Without a word, they followed.

From a shadow at the edge of the square, Lu Yuan watched the chaos unfolding among the gnoll soldiers and raised an eyebrow slightly.

*They have spaceships?*

Generally speaking, a civilization with sufficiently advanced technology and mature spaceship engineering could reach distant planets even without a Spatial Rift. But if their aerospace technology fell short — capable of flight, perhaps, but not spatial jumps — then reaching other planets remained enormously difficult.

Lu Yuan wasn't entirely sure how capable the Blood Bone Gnolls' ships actually were.

But it didn't matter. With him here, the idea of these Blood Bone Gnolls simply flying away wasn't going to work out for them.

His figure dissolved from the shadows, reappearing an instant later at the vast spaceport.

The port held a number of fighter craft and three large ships, all sitting at anchor.

Lu Yuan narrowed his eyes. Space twisted briefly — and in the next moment, the engine rooms inside every fighter and ship were destroyed simultaneously. The power cells ruptured and detonated, explosions tearing through the vessels in a chain.

For a Gene Warrior wielding a Sovereign Grade Mechanical King gene, locating a ship's engine room was trivially simple.

The few Battle Kings who had just arrived at the spaceport watched the ships and fighters detonate and went completely still.

Firelight played across their pale, ashen faces. For a long moment, they stood like statues, plunged into stunned silence.

One of them felt his mouth go dry. His voice came out trembling:

"This... this — which My Lord would want us dead?"

The others' mouths twitched. Fear bled across every face.

The Spatial Rift's closure — perhaps that could still be chalked up to natural causes.

But they had been about to board the ships to flee, and now the ships had exploded.

You couldn't very well call that a natural explosion.

If just one ship had blown, maybe — barely — you could stretch the logic. But every single ship and fighter going up at the same time? No matter how you looked at it, something was deeply wrong.

Someone was targeting them.

And this person — capable of closing a Spatial Rift and silently destroying every ship and fighter in the same instant — was a terrifying figure beyond their comprehension.

Lu Yuan watched the few gnoll soldiers rooted to the ground and slipped away without a sound.

In truth, closing the Spatial Rift had been the whole of his plan. Destroying the ships and fighters was something he had done in passing.

As for personally killing these gnoll soldiers — that wasn't something he had in mind.

With no way off Ice Vein Star and their supply line severed, once human Gene Warriors stumbled upon them, these gnolls were as good as dead regardless.

Lu Yuan gave it no further thought.

He appeared on the icy plain some distance from the base, a smile settling onto his face.

Closing the Blood Bone Gnolls' Spatial Rift was naturally a boon for humanity. He'd done his part.

*Time to head back.*

Just as he was about to leave, a figure materialized before him without warning — an elderly man with long white hair and a kind, gentle face, his ears tapered to fine points. An Elf.

Lu Yuan blinked, and a chill ran through him. He studied the Elf elder with quiet wariness.

*How did this person just appear?*

*I didn't notice anything at all?*

*This is absolutely a supreme powerhouse.*

*Why would someone like this have their eye on me?*

His mind churned with questions as he quietly readied himself to bolt if needed.

The Elf elder smiled warmly. "Young man — the Spatial Rift just now. You closed it, didn't you?"

Lu Yuan paused, then met the Elf elder's gaze with a careful smile. "Senior, I'm not sure what you're referring to."

"Heh heh... No need to worry, young man. I mean you no harm. The spatial fluctuations on your person are rather pronounced — I can still detect them."

As he spoke, Lu Yuan suddenly felt the space around him solidify. His pupils contracted slightly, and a sharp, startled look crossed his face.

*Spatial force? This Elf elder also engraved a Spatial Type gene?*

*His cultivation must be at Battle Emperor level, at minimum.*

*A powerhouse of that caliber who also carries a Spatial Type Transcendent Gene — someone like that must rank among the absolute pinnacle even within White Cloud Star Domain.*

The Elf elder seemed not to notice Lu Yuan's reaction and smiled on:

"Young man, I possess a Spatial Type Transcendent Gene myself — so naturally I can detect the residual spatial fluctuations still on you. What I didn't expect was that you're nothing more than a Battle King, and yet you've engraved what must be at least a Sovereign Grade Spatial Type gene. Truly a remarkable young man."

A glimmer of genuine admiration lit the Elf elder's eyes as he studied Lu Yuan, as if trying to take in every detail.

Ice shot down Lu Yuan's spine.

*Thank goodness this powerhouse has no way to see the Evolution Cube inside me — and doesn't know me personally.*

*Otherwise, things could get genuinely dangerous.*

He let a slightly sheepish smile cross his face. "Thank you for the kind words, Senior. I've just been fortunate."

"Heh heh... Everyone has their own fate and fortune. If luck can be converted into strength, then luck is itself a form of strength."

The Elf elder chuckled, unbothered.

"What brings you to me, Senior?"

Lu Yuan was certain this Elf elder had come specifically for him.

The Elf elder's smile carried a faint air of mystery. "You'll understand shortly."

Lu Yuan was thoroughly puzzled.

*Shortly? What will I understand?*

Just then, he felt it — an intensely dangerous, sinister aura. Something that seemed capable of freezing his very soul.

It immediately called to mind the aura of the flesh mass he had encountered in the Valley of Night.

This one was somewhat weaker by comparison — but unmistakably the same in nature.

*An Aberration Feral Beast?*

Alarm flared through him.

*Why would an Aberration Feral Beast appear here?*

The answer came before he could think further. The sky above the icy plain tore open with a snarl — and in the next instant, an enormous black creature came hurtling through the spatial tear.

It was hundreds of meters long, its entire body armored in black scales, three pairs of razor-sharp claws, and black wings sweeping wide at its back.

Unlike the aberrated beasts he had encountered before, this creature bore none of those grotesque tentacles or eyes. Instead, strange green markings wound across its entire body like veins, winding from head to tail without a gap.

The moment it appeared, an overwhelming presence erupted like a gale, radiating outward in every direction.

On the icy plain, a blizzard had been raging just moments before. The sheer force of that aura scattered it instantly, blowing it apart as though it were nothing.

Cold sweat poured down Lu Yuan's back. A prickling sensation crawled up his scalp.

*What in the hell is that thing?*

The Elf elder's expression hadn't changed in the slightest. He chuckled pleasantly:

"As expected, it came. Though this Pursuer's strength is rather underwhelming — merely Sovereign Grade."

Lu Yuan: "..."

*Who in the hell calls Sovereign Grade 'underwhelming'?!*

He was absolutely floored.