Published: March 2, 2025
The starry sky was vast and boundless. Victor lay on Tang Haofei's shoulder, his limbs tightly gripping Old Tang's battle attire, while Tang Haofei simply trudged ahead.
Old Tang's strength needed no further mention; over the millennium, he had broken the life and death battle resolution every year, and by now, his power was unfathomably high. As the space continued to fracture, Old Tang and Victor flickered like ghosts in the void, swiftly traversing towards the distance.
As they moved rapidly, the distance to Bai kept closing.
However, the endless starry sky was, after all, endless.
Even with Tang Haofei's strength, it took him and Victor more than three years to finally approach Bai's location.
"This is it."
Tang Haofei put away the locator in his hand and pointed to the giant planet that had suddenly appeared before him and Victor. Hearing this, Victor focused his gaze forward.
Before them was a brown-yellow planet that continuously rotated. It was far from the star of this system, receiving insufficient light, which gave it an aura of cold, lifeless stillness.
"Are you sure?"
Victor asked, seemingly doubtful as to why Bai had chosen such a planet as a temporary residence.
"If the locator isn't lying to me, Bai should be here."
With that, Tang Haofei steadied Victor and rushed towards the brown-yellow planet.
...
The warrior plummeted at high speed, slicing through the sky like a meteor. His battle attire rubbed against the thin atmosphere of the brown-yellow planet, releasing faint blue ions. By the time Tang Haofei descended and landed on the ground, his battle attire had turned to ashes.
He was methodically searching through the Spatial Ring, preparing to change into a new outfit, while Victor lay on Old Tang's shoulder, squinting his eyes to assess the surroundings.
The oxygen concentration in the air was low, filled with various impurities, and the land was barren with no agricultural value—In Victor's eyes, this was a discarded world, unsuitable for normal Earth life forms.
However, an eleventh-level strongman, after all, belonged to an abnormal existence...
One person and one cat were momentarily still until the ground below suddenly cracked open. Following that, a gigantic worm, magnified hundreds or thousands of times, burst out of the earth, its spiraled mouth opening wide to swallow Tang Haofei and Victor whole.
Accompanying this was a tremendous tremor as the worm burrowed back into the soil, causing sand and gravel to fly. In the blink of an eye, Old Tang and Victor had disappeared from their original spot.
...
The ground continued to shift as the massive worm devouring Victor and Tang Haofei slithered through the soil.
With its slippery body, disgusting mucus, and foul odor—this ugly creature was both hideous and repulsive, but undoubtedly, the underground was its domain.
The worm moved swiftly below ground, and soon, it arrived at a natural cave, which was connected in all directions, with a howling wind stirring up sounds.
Just as the worm was about to make another move in this place, its body unexpectedly shrank...
It was like a spring being stretched and then suddenly recoiling; the immense force caused the worm to roll twice, as it seemed to have sustained some injury.
Then, a wave of mental energy suddenly surged from deep within the cave.
"Silence!"
This voice was sharp, as if containing supreme power, causing the worm's body to tremble and, at once, it endured the pain and became motionless.
The voice rang out again.
"Isn't it a joy to have friends come from afar?"
Not a single sound could be heard.
The atmosphere seemed to freeze until a "rumble" echoed from deep within the cave, countless giant worms crawled out, and at the forefront, the largest worm had Bai Zheng standing on its head, clad in a white robe, looking solitary and complex. After a moment, he forced a smile.
"I was just saying, how long are you two planning to hide... By the way, is it that warm inside this thing's belly?"
"Rip."
As if in response to Bai's words, the worm that had swallowed Old Tang and Victor suddenly exploded, splattering mucus all over Bai.