Published: February 12, 2025
The boundary here is not a steep cliff that rises straight up, nor is it a thick fog, and definitely not an energy-rampaging space-time gate.
It looks like just ordinary stones.
However, these stones are too similar, or rather, they are all the same, with no differences at all. They are covered with the same round pits, very regular, as if they are the mouthpieces of long trumpets.
This boundary is too obviously man-made!
Ye Zhongming couldn't imagine that a man-made boundary has trapped the people of the Bourbon Free Territory here.
Haven't those people tried to break the shackles here to see what is outside the boundary?
Yes, Ye Zhongming absolutely does not believe that this boundary, resembling the tentacles of an octopus, is naturally formed.
He carefully observed for half a day, and only after he was sure that there would be no problems did he place his hand on it, exploring in the hope of finding clues.
It was hard, rough, yet not cold.
Ye Zhongming stood under the boundary, frowning deeply.
Such a stony thing has strange aspects, such as it must have been artificially excavated, such as the absence of the chill of stone, replaced by some warmth, and how could it be so high that the end is not visible?
Yet, these strange aspects could not explain why it is like this at all.
Ye Zhongming could only walk along the boundary, hoping to find something useful, or at least a hint, from this unchanging wall.
The more he walked, the more astonished he became.
This wall, which seemed to have no end in length or height, even the bottom that meets the ground was so smooth and clean, without a hint of moss or any living organisms.
This completely contradicts the principles of the biological chain.
It was as if... every day, someone was cleaning and wiping here.
But obviously, no one would do that; even if all the people in the Bourbon Free Territory were assigned this task, they wouldn’t have enough manpower.
After walking for half an hour, what Ye Zhongming saw remained nearly unchanged.
He stopped and sat down on the ground.
Continuing to walk seemed to offer nothing but despair; it seemed to have no other purpose.
He took out the Insect Emperor Honey, forced himself to cultivate, and sought to stabilize his mind. He also released both ice birds, letting them fly upward to see if it truly was as endless as it seemed to the naked eye.
After a whole day, the ice birds returned, somewhat exhausted, conveying the message to Ye Zhongming that they had not found an end.
The last bit of hope Ye Zhongming held onto vanished.
He stood up, took out the Wind and Thunder Twin Birth, and struck at the stone wall.
Sparks flew; the weapon was sharp beyond comparison, able to cut through the crystal columns supporting the city, yet it had no effect on these stones.
Ye Zhongming sat down in despair.
To be honest, after his rebirth, he had never felt such despair; whether on Earth or in the secret realms, there were always difficulties and dangers, and death could come at any time.
But he always had a fighting spirit, a kind of confidence that allowed him to break through obstacles and strive in dangerous situations.
Yet now, he had completely lost his direction.
The boundary is impassable; this is the only way he could think of to return from this inexplicable space. If this route fails, how could he go back?
Could it really be like those previous outsiders, spending their whole life here?
His mood was very grim, but fortunately, Ye Zhongming was a person who had lived two lifetimes; he adjusted his emotions and took out the notebook to look it over.
Inside, there were many marks he recorded while translating in Lan Jin; these marks allowed him to grasp the general meaning even if he didn’t understand the text.
Previously, he had only focused on the information regarding outsiders; this time, he read through it carefully.
To his surprise, Ye Zhongming really found some other records.
Occasionally, a term was mentioned.
The "Dancing Season!"
Ye Zhongming was not clear about what this term meant, but from the surrounding sentences and context, it seemed to indicate that in the Bourbon Free Territory, there would be periodic upheavals in the entire space; this upheaval manifested as a kind of suction force, in which the strength in a person’s body would be drawn away by a mysterious power during a few pendulum swings of time, leading to a state of weakness, with recovery time varying among individuals.