The world the lake opened into was different from the planet Shijie. Instead of a world teeming with bio-diversity, this world seemed devoid of life. A landscape of granite, sand, and crystal as far as the eye could see.

Even taking flight, there was little to see. I hovered above the planet, high enough that I could see the curvature of the planet in detail. There were no mountains, no chasms, and no other bodies of water. The planet was empty, a landscape of sand, silicon, and crystal.

It was beautiful in its own way. The crystal scattered across the ground refracting the sunlight from a red star, the sky a mixture of pink and yellow. The cooler star was probably why the planet wasn’t a fiery inferno. What was most noticeable was that the planet did have world energy; in fact, the Qi seemed double or triple the density of what could be found in the Four Element Sect.

That was probably the reason the Alpha noticed a change in the water. The high density of Qi was leeching through, and the water was being infused with this new Qi that was denser. As I gathered and cultivated a strand of world energy, I discovered that it was purer, already filtered, and heavily infused with Earth and Light elements.

Even aspected with those affinities, it would be easier for every other cultivator and me with different elemental affinities to cultivate here. The Qi was so abundant and easy to draw that the extra work needed to transform the elements it resonated with to something I could use would make it worth the bother.

“The Alpha wanted me to warn you that we have discovered life. Hostile life that has attacked our people,” a Hindel guard informed me, one that had shown real ability with flight. He had been willing to warn me, even flying away from the only source of water and the exit back to our world to gain my attention.

“Thank you,” I replied, acknowledging his words before I left, diving towards the Alpha and her pod to see if they needed help. He tried to keep up, but I had more experience with flying and could control the wind as well as water; he stood no chance of matching my speed.

I hadn’t noticed any flying creatures filling the skies of this strange new world, nothing that might pose any danger, so I wasn’t worried that he would be attacked as he followed.

The scene of Hindel defending against a psychedelic nightmare greeted my arrival. The crystals and silicon that were spread across the ground had coalesced into a small army of monstrous creatures, none of them taking a form that made sense. My perception strained to decipher the information I was gathering.

My senses returned information on creatures that followed no real reason or order. Appendages, tentacles, legs, eyes, mouths, those parts of the anatomy that I could understand were nowhere to be found. How they moved, tossed projectiles of tempered silicon, or defended against the Hindel’s attacks was beyond my ability to codify and understand.

I pulled heavily on the [Dao of Movement] to slow down the frenetic energy and motion they were displaying, trying to understand what was happening. Even with time slowing to a crawl, I was unable to parse how the creature did what it did.

And it was a creature. An animal of some type; I just wasn’t sure what kind. It could even be sentient, or each construct a collective of crystallized sentients joined together to defend their territory from perceived invaders.

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My examination didn’t go unnoticed by whatever this thing was. Somehow the chaotic mass merged with my perception, invading my mind and drawing me into a collective. A crystal network that worked in harmony with each other. Each crystal slotted into a regimented position that defied reason in the churning chaos of uncertainty I had observed.

Order out of Disorder. Structure out of Chaos.

My thoughts and my soul were prodded and poked at, examined in the same manner my perception used to analyze. Unlike the attack that the Hindel suffered under, the mental intrusion seemed more questioning, more an attempt to understand who and what I was than an actual attack.

I wondered how the fight below me had started. Did the Hindel react and attack in fear once they noticed the earth rising and transforming into this amalgam of crystal, silicon, and sand? Or were the indigenous lifeforms predisposed to attack when they encountered carbon base life?

As the creature examined and prodded into my mind, I sifted through its own set of confusing memories. It wasn’t sentient, I quickly determined. It acted more in response to some primal instinct than intelligent reflection. But it did think.

If I had to compare its intelligence, I would compare it to that of a virus. That is, if a virus was able to invade your mind and decide if you were food or brother. That was the nature of the examination the melding of my mind with theirs would determine.

Part of the colony or food. Those were the only two possibilities the organism could process.

A silicon-based life form and carbon-based should have had nothing in common, but we did. We both cultivated Qi. The creatures were a basic lifeform, barely above the single-cell stage of life—an apotheosis of pure yin and yang, a collection of cells that channeled this world’s energy.

As far as I could tell, they were all but immortal. Even if they were shattered and ground into fine sand, they would remain part of the gestalt of yin and yang this planet exemplified.

And they had decided that I was a part of their colony. Once their decision was made, they retreated from battle, ignoring the Hindel and the bombardment of water Qi attacks that the Alpha and her guards were unleashing.

This world was filled with life, simply a type of life that we had no real chance of understanding. But it seemed that life had deemed us harmless and would ignore our intrusion. At least as long as we refrained from destroying the ecosystem.

This world would make for a perfect place to set up Qi condensing arrays. The greater concentration of energy that could be found here would allow the Sect to offer cultivators better opportunities than could be found even in closed-door facilities.

The lake, earth, and light Qi that was abundant near the dividing line between worlds were pristine, never having been ‘polluted’ or ‘purified’ by any carbon-based lifeform.

The old monster cultivators that were trying to break through to Immortal Venerable Realm should find that last step before ascending to the Heavens easier to accomplish here. If the crystals would identify them as harmless, it would certainly be safer than those areas of condensed Qi, the most potent cultivators needed to find or foster on Shijie.

Shijie was vast and had barely been explored, and that created a problem for the higher-tiered cultivators. If they attempted to establish an area in the wilds to ascend, beasts and demons noticed the stirring of Qi as they absorbed immense world energy and would attack.

They would attack an unending beast tide until the Immortal Venerable was forced to retreat, suffered defeat, or prevailed over the beast tide. They could defeat the tide, but fighting without end left them no time to cultivate and breakthrough.

It was the reason there were so few cultivators to reach that realm. The world the Elves controlled simply wasn’t tame enough to support and protect those Immortal Venerable cultivators from beast tides.

Here, that consideration might be moot.

This place might allow for a new renaissance in cultivation. Stronger cultivators would pay for the chance to cultivate here. As they ascended, the payment the Empire might demand would be expanding the borders of the Empires, claiming more land and resources for the next generation of cultivators to use.