This is very valuable information, especially crucial for the present situation in Nine Provinces.
Covered in insect blood to mask the scent of the human race, using Concealnt and Breath-concealing Spirit Runes to hide his form and aura, and now also concealed beneath the wings of the Sacred Beetle, the disguise is finally perfect.
The journey proceeds smoothly with no traces of exposure, although so larger insects still cast puzzled glances at the Sacred Beetle moving in the opposite direction. Their spiritual intelligence is, after all, a bit higher, so they are confused by the beetle's actions, but that is the extent of it.
This kind of activity is rather tedious and boring, and there is little Lu Ye can do other than occasionally guide the Sacred Beetle at each junction to prevent it from heading the wrong way.
Fortunately, he has other ways to pass the ti, such as checking on the situation with his doppelganger.
The doppelganger is now stationed at the ground fissure, having taken over for Lin Yue.
Just as Lin Yue would be wary of him, so too would he be wary of Lin Yue; however pleasant the words spoken, when faced with danger, it is unlikely Lin Yue would remain impartial given her allegiance to Ten Thousand Demons Ridge.
Thus, the doppelganger volunteered to switch places with Lin Yue, and she agreed without objection, swiftly returning to the Dark Moon Forest Pass.
With the doppelganger Li Taibai stationed at the ground fissure, along with nearly five hundred cultivators from both sects and various arrays constructing the defensive line, they dare not claim an impregnable fortress, but unless they encounter another large-scale Insect Plague like before, they should be able to cope.
Both sects' cultivators have tasted the benefits.
Previously, they needed to venture out in groups to search for traces of the Insect Race, earning battle rit in this way; not only was it inefficient, but they also risked encountering danger, such as facing Divine Sea Realm insect creatures, at which point they would need to call for their Mountain Pass Chief to intervene.
If the chief were available and arrived in ti, lives could be saved, but if unavailable or delayed, casualties would be inevitable.
Now, these worries are gone, as they can simply wait at the ground fissure, occasionally overwhelming any Divine Sea Realm insect creatures that erge with the collective focus of nurous cultivators.
When the Insect Race is not attacking, they can ditate and cultivate.
However, due to the ongoing struggle, the cultivators from the two sects have not yet fully rged, remaining distinctly separate on opposite sides of the ground fissure.
This level of cooperation is already a significant achievent.
The higher levels from both camps have noticed this model of collaboration here, with each sending strong cultivators to assess the cooperation at the two mountain passes. It is said they are considering promoting this cooperative model, but that will ultimately require ti.
Deep within the Insect Path, life for Lu Ye passes in dull monotony, simply commanding the Sacred Beetle to continue onwards.
As the distance increases, his strength is continually suppressed. Now, his abilities are reduced to only Spirit Stream Realm standards.
This suppression is alarming; Lu Ye even suspects that if he continues deeper, his spirit force might beco completely sealed.
If that happens, the Concealnt and Breath-concealing Spirit Runes augnting him will lose effect, making further infiltration impossible.
He is silently anxious, having descended to an unknown depth underground, and aside from discovering that insect blood can weaken the erosion of the origin magnetic field, no other valuable findings have erged. He is uncertain if it is worth continuing, but having reached this point, he can only persist.
At the very least, he must persist until it truly becos impossible to proceed.
A faint glimr suddenly appears in view, dazzlingly bright in the darkness.
Lu Ye is taken aback.
He has been deep within the Insect Path for over ten days, always in a pitch-black environnt, so how could there be light in these profound depths of the earth?
Surrounded by the Insect Race, he dares not peek out to investigate, for fear of revealing his location, and so he commands the Sacred Beetle to continue forward.
The light becos increasingly evident.
Once the Sacred Beetle reaches the source of the light, Lu Ye finally sees the scene before him.
And he is astonished.
What ets his eyes is an oval-shaped luminous object nearly ten feet tall and several feet wide, silently standing at the deepest part of the Insect Path. Its surface is a blurred reflection, reminiscent of an uneven mirror, with insect creatures continuously erging from within, joining the army crawling out of the Insect Path.
Each ti an insect creature crawls from the mirror, a slight ripple undulates across the mirror's Void reflection.
A portal!
There is unexpectedly a portal at the deepest part of the Insect Path!
Having frequently traveled in and out of various small secret realms, Lu Ye naturally recognizes such a structure imdiately.
But how could there be a portal here?
He initially thought the deepest part of the Insect Path would surely lead to an insect hive, but to his surprise, there is a portal instead of an insect hive.
The question remains, where does this portal lead?
Most perplexing to Lu Ye is how this portal ca into being.
Was it always there? That seems unlikely, for if that were the case, the insect disaster would have long since overrun Nine Provinces, rather than erupting only a few years ago, implying the portal appeared concurrently with the upheavals that shook Nine Provinces in recent years.
Lu Ye is unsure what lies beyond the portal, yet the strongest possibility is the location of an insect hive, given the continuous ergence of the Insect Race creatures from the portal.
Behind that portal lies the source of the insect disaster.
Lu Ye suddenly felt as if he had touched upon the truth of a particularly hidden event.
Clearing the clutter from his mind, he issued a command to the Sacred Beetle, which then marched forward towards the portal.
He wanted to enter and see what kind of place this portal was connected to.
His vision transford, the void fluctuated, seemingly crashing through an invisible mbrane. Once Lu Ye regained his sight, a radiant light filled his eyes as he entered another world.
He made this judgnt because ever since he entered the Insect Path, his spirit force, which had been eroded and obscured by the origin magnetic field, completely recovered at that mont.
In other words, there is no origin magnetic field here.
This was evidently not deep underground.
Looking around, his vision was filled with densely packed Insect Race, countless in number, even more terrifying than the largest Insect Plague he had ever seen—present both in the sky and on the ground.
Lu Ye concealed himself even deeper.
In the Insect Path, if he exposed himself, he might still have a chance to fight his way out using the Dragon Throne to return to the surface. But if exposed here, his fate would surely be grim.
He now faced two choices.
One was to retreat through the portal, as it was right behind him, a step back would return him to the original Insect Path.
The second was to continue to explore.
Lu Ye naturally would not retreat, having co this far, only to give up halfway seems unreasonable. So many strong cultivators of the Divine Sea Realm in the Nine Provinces had been searching for the source of the insect disaster to no avail; finally arriving here himself, he must take a clear look.
However, he didn't act imdiately but began inspecting the condition of his doppelganger.
With a thought, he could still perceive everything on the doppelganger's side without any barriers.
Examining the battlefield marking, he could also contact others.
This ans he was likely still within the Nine Provinces, but of course, he could also not be in the Nine Provinces, as long as the portal remained open, his connection to the doppelganger would not be interrupted, and the battlefield marking would still function.
The only certainty was that this place was enveloped by the Nine Provinces Heaven's Augury.
Unlike the Blood Refinent World, where even the battlefield marking could not be detected.
This slightly comforted Lu Ye; as long as he remained within the range covered by Heaven's Augury, there shouldn't be significant issues.
The surface held too many Insect Race, seemingly filling the entire world, although the Sacred Beetle was quite large, the world was filled with even larger Insect Race, colliding back and forth, the Sacred Beetle's form staggered.
Lu Ye hurriedly directed the Sacred Beetle to fly, to avoid the nurous Insect Race and gain a higher vantage point to see farther; he was eager to discover what kind of world this really was.
Ascending higher, the shadows of the Insect Race around him beca fewer and fewer.
Until the Sacred Beetle could no longer ascend, Lu Ye quietly peeked out to observe.
First looking at mid-air, there were many flying Insect Race in his view, each exuding a fierce aura, yet fewer in numbers compared to those on the ground.
Moreover, the Sacred Beetle was flying high enough to largely avoid exposure; additionally, the Concealnt and Breath-concealing Spirit Runes were continuously maintained, as long as Lu Ye didn't cause too much commotion, he wouldn't attract the Insect Race's attention.
Looking down, there was an endless sea of Insect Race, densely packed throughout this world, and in the far distance, there seed to be a hill standing, with even more hills looming further out.
Lu Ye saw a colossal, hideous creature on the ground, thrashing about and shrieking incessantly.
This was an Insect Race he had never encountered before, even from afar it exuded a strong sense of oppression, indicating its considerable power.
Lu Ye suddenly recalled when he returned from the Blood Refinent World to the Nine Provinces, he saw floating lands scattered around the periter of the Nine Provinces. At that ti, he speculated those floating lands were gateways to the secret realms within the Nine Provinces, including places like the Ten Thousand Beasts Domain and the Soaring Dragon World he had visited.
He had glimpsed formidable Insect Race figures on one of the larger floating lands, although he quickly entered the Nine Provinces and couldn't see them clearly.
Was he not mistaken then?
The location he was in now might just be that giant floating land he saw back then?
This should also be a secret realm of the Nine Provinces World, but its scale is so vast it can hardly be described as a re small secret realm—It's a major Insect Race secret realm!
There have always been Insect Race in the Nine Provinces. Lu Ye had encountered an Insect Plague during his ti in the Spirit Stream battlefield, puzzled about the origins of those Insect Race.
In retrospect, the source should be this place.
The Spirit Stream battlefield's Insect Plague, a trial of Nine Provinces Heaven's Augury for Spirit Stream Realm cultivators, doubled as a reward since slaying Insect Race could earn rit.
It stands to reason that the ergence of the Insect Plague in the Spirit Stream battlefield is likely under Heaven's Augury control.
If so, what about this insect disaster in the Nine Provinces?
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