Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

"Yaana?"

Auntie Duna looked toward the young woman with an incredulous expression. She had never seen Yaana have such a look in the time she had known the young girl. However, now that she thought about it, she remembered that when she met Yaana for the first time, one of the first questions she had asked back then was if she was talented enough to reach the pinnacle.

Yaana's lack of talent had left a scar on her life for as long as she could remember. Even until she was an old lady on her death bed, she had never given up trying, to no avail. However, then came this woman who promised to sweep her away to a world she had never seen before.

Yaana didn't want to just become a pawn to some organization that enslaved her for a lifetime of servitude. If she was going to cultivate, it would be for the expressed purpose of keeping up with Ryu and staying by his side. So…

Back then she had asked if she was talented enough to reach the top of the world. This wasn't because she was afraid to work hard, that was something she had already been doing to no avail for the whole of her life. However, what that time had also taught her was that hard work wasn't enough sometimes.

What Yaana wanted to know was if she would be strong enough one day to not have to abide by any of the orders of the Guild she had joined. If the answer was yes, she would go without hesitation. If the answer was no… She preferred to die a peaceful death, one where she knew that she had remained faithful to Ryu even if he couldn't be by her side.

Yaana turned toward Auntie Duna, her eyes lit like two lanterns. She was so excited that the space around her trembled, threatening to collapse.

When Auntie Duna saw this, she sighed. She had been able to tell back then that there was something Yaana was chasing after, and that that something was likely a man. But, she hadn't expected them to meet so soon or like this.

"Little Nunu…"

The change was abrupt. Yaana didn't even wait to hear Auntie Duna's words before her expression turned a frightening shade of cold. It was as though she had become a completely different person.

Her hair waved about like foggy tentacles, each with a mind of their own. The space around her solidified to the point that it was difficult for those in her group to even breathe, let alone move.

"I already said it the day we met, Auntie Duna. If the Necromancer Guild stands in between me and Ryu, even if you can stop me for now, when I grow powerful enough, I will destroy it!"

Yaana didn't say anything else before she shot into the skies.

Many were shocked that young girl had suddenly done something most if not all of the elders here didn't dare to. And yet, despite the fact her speed was hundreds of times what Ryu's had been, she too seemed completely unaffected by all the spatial ripples.

Before anyone could react, she too had disappeared into the portal above.

Auntie Duna opened her mouth to speak. But, in the end, she sighed and shook her head.

Back then, Yaana's knowledge of the cultivation world was so small that Auntie Duna felt the man she was chasing couldn't have possibly been all that special. The fact Yaana was born on the Mortal Plane was shocking enough, how could two such geniuses be born there in such quick succession? So, Auntie Duna had agreed, feeling that as Yaana saw more of the world, all of this would be forgotten. She had simply said everything Yaana wanted to hear back then.

But, who would have thought that this young man would actually be such a genius? This made things several times more complicated.

She hadn't even said the words she was planning to, but she could sense that Yaana's trust of her had already hit rock bottom. That little girl was far too sensitive when things were related to that boy she was chasing.

"… Stabilize the space! Hurry up!"

Realizing that two had already entered, the elders and other geniuses below began to scramble, activating formation after formation to make it safe to enter. They worked quickly. Not even ten minutes later, a flood of geniuses surged forward, all of them entering as well.

**

When Ryu appeared and his vision stopped swimming, the first thing he did was use [Third Perspective] to check his surroundings thoroughly.

It only took him a moment to realize that he had appeared in the middle of a winter snowstorm. Not only was knee deep snow all around him, trees that seemed formed of sharp icicles formed a forest all around him.

The trees of ice towered around him, many standing at several hundred meters tall, some even several kilometers tall, and all of them could be seen right through with a single glance.

'This snow isn't normal.' Ryu thought with a frown.

He wasn't afraid of cold, but every time a snowflake fell onto his skin, he felt a small portion of his qi being sapped away. Even when he tried to ward it off with a layer of qi skin, it would eat away at that as well.

'Interesting…'

Due to the purity of the ice trees, they couldn't obstruct Ryu's vision in the slightest. He could see all around him for tens of thousands of miles. However, there seemed to be nothing but endlessly flat land and more and more trees.

There was just a single exception, a looming mountain in the distance that felt both a few steps and millions of miles away at the same time. It was eerily similar to Shrine Mountain in the way its size played ocular tricks on the mind.

'I guess that's where I should go…' Ryu thought.

Just as he was about to move, he froze. His senses surged into the Incubator only for his pupils to constrict into pinholes.

Sarriel. She was no longer there.

'This world…'

Ryu could only think of one explanation… Random teleportation.

But, how could this Legacy World, born on the mere Blossom Plane, ignore the barrier of an Origin Grade treasure to stop Ryu from sneaking in help? What level did it have to be at to accomplish that?

What the hell was this place?