In Ye Feng's Humvee,
"Chirp-gururu~"
"Ooooh ooh ooh~"
A unique call sounded out, it was the small reconnaissance colorful chicken that Xiao Xiao had bought earlier from the black market in the Arcane City.
The small reconnaissance colorful chicken had been well-cared for by Xiao Xiao during this period. It was no longer as emaciated and sickly as when it was first bought, but had become much sturdier and full of spirit, its feathers regaining their luster.
At this moment, the small reconnaissance colorful chicken was curiously observing everyone inside the Humvee...
"I really didn't expect that the direction towards Treading Star City is the same as the direction indicated by the Arcane Compass~!"
Ye Feng, in the passenger seat, was quite pleased. He had been torn before, having to choose between the Genesis Lamp and Treading Star City...
"The current direction is like this... moving further forward, it's hard to say..."
Yue Yan, in the back seat, who was observing the map of Treading Star City, chimed in.
...
A few days later, in the early morning,
"Speaking of which, Yue Yan, what's with your ice-blue radiance? It seems like arcane energy, but it also feels like True Qi, and there are even fluctuations of heaven and earth energy!"
Ye Feng, who had just finished breakfast, said to Yue Yan while playfully teasing the small reconnaissance colorful chicken.
"Oh, this is quite normal for me. You'll understand later~"
Yue Yan answered vaguely, "Speaking of which, Ye Feng, how did you manage to... control such a terrifying power as Tribulation Fire..."
"This... how should I put it... I'm not entirely sure myself..."
Ye Feng scratched his head. "During my tribulation, I sensed a trace of a peculiar aura within the Tribulation Fire... and then I was able to control it..."
"A peculiar aura, huh..."
Yue Yan frowned and fell into thought.
...
Ye Feng, Xiao Xiao, Qiao Ying, and Yue Yan drove the Humvee forward, stopping to walk whenever the roads became too rough.
...
One noon,
"Big Brother, there seem to be people from the Dark Holy Cult in the distance!"
Ye Feng was practicing that mysterious set of movements by lifting a large boulder when Xiao Xiao's startled cry rang out. She was currently observing with binoculars from a large tree not far away.
"Dark Holy Cult? What's going on?"
Ye Feng frowned slightly, put down the boulder, and leaped to Xiao Xiao's side.
He took out his binoculars and looked in the direction Xiao Xiao was pointing. He immediately spotted a small village in the distance, where a few people were engaged in burning, killing, and looting. The clothes of these people bore the unique Ouroboros symbol of the Dark Holy Cult.
"Let's go take a look!"
...
Half an hour later,
"Tha... thank you..."
The villagers who had just escaped death looked at Ye Feng with fear in their eyes and thanked him. On the ground nearby lay the corpses of the Dark Holy Cult members.
"Oh, you're welcome!"
Ye Feng waved his hand indifferently and then examined the supplies being transported by several Dark Holy Cult members – a large, square stone block.
"It's a Stone of Hope?!"
Ye Feng looked at the familiar pattern on the surface of the large stone block, quite surprised.
"There are a total of thirteen of these Stones of Hope... they seem to be keys to opening the Ark of Doom..."
"Speaking of which, I already possess three Stones of Hope... adding this one makes it four..."
Seeing the Stone of Hope, Ye Feng couldn't help but recall what Ling Xi had said before.
"Click-clack~!"
"Clang~ Crack! Cough~~"
At this moment, a mechanical sound emanated. It turned out to be a group of survivors captured by the Dark Holy Cult members, whose arcane energy bombs were being disarmed by Yue Yan.
"Thank you!"
"Thank you, Goddess!"
"Thank you, hero!"
The group of survivors thanked them with panicked haste and fled.
Subsequently, Ye Feng, Xiao Xiao, Qiao Ying, and Yue Yan began searching around the small village.
Because those abnormally large and extremely hard stones had their exteriors made of a special material called 'Star磐' (Xing Pan), they were actually shells used to protect the Stones of Hope. The real Stones of Hope were prism-shaped stones emitting a faint white light from within the Star磐 material...
One had to find the Annihilation Array to obtain the true Stone of Hope...
...
About an hour later,
On a mountainside,
"Ye Feng, over here!"
Qiao Ying's cheerful voice rang out.
"Oh, okay~!"
...
"Buzz! Bang!"
As a blinding flash of light passed, the Star磐 shell of the Stone of Hope disappeared, and a prism-shaped stone emitting a faint white light appeared in Ye Feng's hand.
"This is the fourth one!"
Looking at the prism-shaped white light stone in Ye Feng's hand, Qiao Ying was quite excited. "However, Ye Feng, the Stone of Hope that's still wrapped in Star磐 material will likely be more troublesome!"
"Normally, the Stone of Hope and the Star磐 slab inscribed with the Annihilation Array wouldn't be far apart... but if some Stones of Hope are discovered and taken away, the Star磐 slabs with the Annihilation Array inscribed on them are hard to find..."
She paused, a hint of helplessness in her tone.
"It seems so... we'll see~"
...
Night fell,
"Big Brother, look, it's the survivors we saved during the day!"
After finishing dinner, Xiao Xiao pointed to some conversations in the survivor channel for Ye Feng to see.
"Damn it, everyone be careful of people wearing clothes with this pattern, these guys specifically capture survivors!"
Below this sentence was an image of clothing, which coincidentally bore the unique Ouroboros pattern of the Dark Holy Cult.
"Yeah, these guys seem to be members of an organization called the Dark Holy Cult..."
"That was close, if I hadn't encountered a kind group today, I would have definitely been taken somewhere by those guys!"
"Me too!"
"Everyone, pay attention, it's not necessarily clothes, some have tattoos..."
...
After browsing the news in the survivor channel with Xiao Xiao for a while, Ye Feng turned his attention to his personal space warehouse.
Since he could truly control Tribulation Fire, the expansion speed of his space warehouse had increased significantly...
Counting the automatic expansions from before... Ye Feng roughly calculated it had already been...
"Huh? What's going on?"
As Ye Feng was about to estimate the size of his space warehouse, he suddenly discovered that it had changed drastically. An endless sky had appeared... he... he could only estimate the ground area now...
"Hey, Pipi, what's going on?"
Ye Feng couldn't help but ask in his mind.
"It's the change that happened after your first tribulation... I was also very surprised at the time, because the space warehouse suddenly had a sky... now the expansion of the space warehouse is just the expansion of the ground..."
Pipi's voice quickly replied.
"No way... this endless sky... over 3000 square meters of ground... this space warehouse... wait, is this still... a warehouse..."
Ye Feng's consciousness wandered through the exceptionally large space warehouse, muttering in surprise.
"Huh, what's that?"
As Ye Feng curiously looked around the space warehouse, which had large areas of grassland, forests, and lakes, he suddenly spotted some white objects in the distance...
...