"The Nest?"

Screeee!

My question was covered by the loud cry of the hybrid Roc as its wing flapped and brought us to the sky, but…

'This is…'

The place the Roc was standing on seemed to have been elevated from its place as if a small earthquake had taken place…

"A turtle…?"

"Well, you can say so, but it's too much of an exaggeration to call it a turtle. We call it the Earth Diving Behemoth, it's our land 'guardian'."

The piece of earth that seemed to have 'jumped' a level or two above ground had the shape of a giant turtle, towards which the sect higher-ups that we left behind moved and appeared to be entering into its shell through some sort of a passage.

Though the existence of the 'King Roc' didn't bring me too much surprise thanks to its fragmented lineage, the surfacing of this 'Behemoth' that had a quarter bloodline of the 'Black Turtle', also known as 'Xuanwu' in eastern mythology, once again pointed towards the same point.

'It seems like my chances of finding a dragon here might not be that low after all…'

Finding half a mythical beast act as a sect 'guardian/mount' might not mean much, but two in the same place meant that it was no longer just a coincidence. Even looking at the other sects that were also preparing to leave, there were several strange-looking creatures that had some weird bloodlines which I didn't even know about.

It was obvious to see that while I didn't encounter that much wildlife during my stay in the Nature Domain, it seemed like that was just because I didn't know where to look. The results brought in by 'Eye of Knowledge' gave me quite a bit of hope that I might not have to stay in the domain for long.

"Though we call it a land guardian, its method of travel is moving underground. The Behemoth's speed is actually quite fast once it dives, so they wouldn't lag behind that much…"

After the late betrayal event that Blade had gone through, his sentences seemed to grow shorter and shorter, yet for once, he seemed to be quite talkative today as he made the effort to explain in detail...

"Which means… we are heading directly to the Roc's nest?"

Though it was a bit confusing for that to be our destination, the only nest that came to mind and was suitable for the situation was the Roc whose nest was situated on the actual summit of the Tower of Trial, perhaps…

"Indeed, after all, didn't you mention that you have yet to practice an 'Elemental Control' manual and asked for my help in that aspect? Since you seem to be in a hurry to leave and we would need the Roc's help for that task anyway, then we might as well get to it since it's convenient anyway."

'I guess it's not that hard to guess…'

Having not directly said that I would be leaving soon after the war was over and only hinted at it, Blade seemed to have picked up my plan from the way I acted, which didn't exactly show much attachment to Elemental Blade Sect.

However, what I didn't expect was that Blade seemed to have taken what I just said on the passing before quite seriously, which was obviously good news since I really did lack a complete 'Elemental Control' manual!

Originally, as the last thing I needed to obtain before leaving the sect, I was going to ask Wind for his help in this regard just like I asked for his help to support the twins, but it seemed like this was no longer necessary.

Of course, I didn't exactly about what might be on the Roc's nest, but going with through the same line of thought, there was a great probability that it was some sort of a 'safe' for the more important books that couldn't be put within the libraries of the divisions or even possibly Blade's own collection.

Either way, it seemed like the awkward moment of me stating that I was to leave the sect after receiving something wouldn't come…

Naturally, it still felt a bit awkward to be on the receiving end all of the sudden, but it probably meant that Blade wanted to hand out benefits for my help so that he wouldn't be the one on the receiving end instead.

`~~`~~`~~`

Screee!

As I observed the scenery while lightly scratching Light's head, it wasn't exactly the same one that I saw last time I was on the hybrid Roc's back.

The distance between the Elemental Blade Sect and Battle City wasn't that great, but we have already flown above two battle sites which stood out in the middle of the grassy plains. It seemed like the factions weren't the only damaged ones that needed healing, even the Nature Domain had received its own scars…

However, this was only the result of a plan that had been stopped prematurely, and judging by how things have been so far, it was obvious that the demons' involvement got stronger the farther I went ahead in stages.

As such, while I myself would very much like to live a semi-king's life within this domain and rest until what's left of the ten years had passed, I knew that if I stagnated here and didn't go further to thwart the demons' advent in other domains that they were likely to hit this domain once more, this time with a force that we can't predict neither intercept.

This was obviously the danger that came from the fact that demons had put their hands on various spatial tools to move between domains which the humans didn't have and even created quite a bit of methods to trick the suppression they had to face within the human domains…

Screeeeee!

While I was lost in thought, I quickly realized that we had finally reached our destination as the hybrid Roc cried out with most of its strength and started flapping his wings downward to get elevated enough to reach the summit where his nest was supposed to be situated.

Thud!

The landing came about suddenly as well, as the Roc seemed to have jumped once it pierced through the clouds and landed on something solid, our exact destination, The Roc's nest!

The exact spot we landed in didn't seem to be like the conventional bird nests as the huge circle shaped landing spot seemed to be completely white and also quite…

'Comfy!'

The thought couldn't help but come to me when we jumped off the Roc, which seemed to be something that Blade expected as he didn't use any elements to help him with landing nor fly down on his sword. It definitely seemed like the whole nest was made out of a material similar to silk as it absorbed us into it before elevating us again.

Walking out of the nest wasn't exactly tricky as it only covered half the space on the tower's summit but that made me wonder even more where exactly would be what we came for...

As we finally stood on the solid rock material of the tower, I immediately noticed a very small hole in that ground, one that looked like…

'The tome insertion socket…?'

Blade didn't bother explaining much as I didn't ask before taking out a book, one that had the exact same shape of tomes, yet was completely white in color, before 'inserting' it into this hole…

It was then that we… both disappeared from that place!