548 Pursuit

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Alex ran across the tall grasses that were filled with sand. He held the sword in his right hand, ready to fight any beasts that came his way.

The Forbidden Fields had so much sand now that it wouldn't have been a mistake to stop calling it a field now.

Alex walked over dried grass near the river and easily ran through the river with how shallow the water was.

The sands were a little harder to run through. There wasn't enough solid land under his feet to run, so he decided to use his boat artifact to fly through the desert.

This wouldn't have been possible previously, but now that the Qi had somehow returned to the desert as well, Alex thought it was possible.

His cultivation base was still heavily suppressed at around Muscle Tempering realm, so he wasn't really sure if the boat would fly, but he had to try it.

He couldn't keep running through the entire desert when he knew how far away the ocean was.

It would take him days to reach there and by that time, that bastard would've already taken whatever it was and run away.

He couldn't let that happen. He needed to find him and kill him.

He jumped on top of the boat and put some True spirit stones in it before flying off. The speed wasn't very fast, unfortunately, but it was still better than simply running.

The sun came up pretty soon and the heat was along with it. At the same time, Alex felt the suppression around him growing as well.

He was now back to being at the early stages of the Skin Tempering realm. The boat had also slowed down to barely moving.

"Dammit!" he cried out and jumped off of it and took back his ship before running. He would have to run now that the suppression was high again.

Along the way, he saw something and stopped. It was a big snake, simply laying there doing nothing. Ning got his sword ready and charged to attack it.

However, when he got close, he realized that it wasn't moving at all. It wasn't even breathing. The snake was dead.

Alex looked at the snake, but he couldn't see any signs as to why it had died. He got close to it, the snake's head almost as large as him.

He nudged the snake with his sword, but after seeing it not moving, he proceeded to check the snake's body.

He flipped the snake around and saw a wet spot in the sands. Ning got close to it and saw a small cut in the snake.

He realized something and quickly ran up to the snake's head again and pulled its eyelids apart.

He startled himself when he saw the red, veiny eyes of the snake. It had been poisoned by the same poison as his master.

Ning gritted his teeth in anger when he realized that his master's murderer was close by.

By now, the feeling of the thing with extreme yang was already pulling him towards a certain place far away.

He didn't even have to look to know what direction he needed to be moving. His body was doing it all on its own.

He started running again. With his body cultivation, he could run for days and not be tired at all.

The speed at which he ran was obviously slower than his boat previously, but with the suppression, he was being the most efficient he could be.

'Fuck!' he thought. 'That bastard must have a flying artifact as well. One that is faster than my even.'

Alex kept running and encountered a number of beasts along the way. Some tried to fight him, but they were too weak and easily died to his attacks.

Others were already dead and were simply a trail leading him towards the bastard that had a headstart of a few hours.

Alex kept running for hours, but he never seemed to be able to find the old man. Just then, he noticed something about himself again.

His cultivation base had returned to about Bone Tempering realm. He hadn't noticed it before due to being way too focused on simply running and fighting, but now that he noticed it, he was confused.

'What's going on? How do I have this high cultivation base in the middle of the desert? Having a cultivation base itself was weird, but I thought it would be in a radius of that extreme yang. But somehow I am getting stronger the closer I am to the source?' Alex thought. Just the prospect of it didn't make sense to Alex.

"No something else must be happening," he thought. He remembered back to when the yang energy had come in and broke the barrier. After that, no one could use their cultivation bases anymore.

However, an hour or 2 later, their cultivation bases were returning to them. Alex remembered, he already had Bone Tempering realm back in the sect. He had only lost it when he entered the Forbidden Fields.

'The yang energy in the sect dissipated, and we got out cultivation partly back. The yang energy in here is somehow also dissipating and I am gaining my cultivation back again, is that it?' he thought.

If that were true, where did the yang energy go to? It wouldn't have simply disappeared into the sky. Alex couldn't understand why at one place it was dissipating faster than another.

Was it because it was closer to the source that it was dissipating slower? That too couldn't be right. He had been running towards the source this whole time, and he remembered it dissipating slower previously than it was now, even when he was getting closer.

"Unless… it's not dissipating," Alex thought. He immediately closed his eyes and sent out his spiritual sense into the surrounding. He focused on the energy in the air and could feel the Yang energy that was suppressing him even now.

He could've perhaps used his cultivation base if it were Qi, but since it was only energy, he couldn't do anything.

Just then, he noticed something unusual. The Yang energy in the area was all moving in the same direction.

Alex opened his eyes in surprise and looked in the direction they were moving towards.

The source of the Extreme Yang.

"I see," Alex thought. "So I was wrong in assuming that the Yang is dissipating from the area. It is not. Instead, it is moving back towards the source."

Alex couldn't imagine why that was the case, but it was. Whatever the source was, it was attracting the Yang energy it had spread around all this time.

"The old man spoke something about the sect treasure, right? The Tiger sect's treasure. So, is the source the Tiger sect's treasure?" he thought.

He stopped caring about those things and brought out his boat once again. Since the suppression had disappeared quite a bit, the boat was now faster than ever in this place and he flew off.

He saw many beasts along the way, some still fidgeting from being stabbed with the poison sword.

Alex understood when he looked at them. The old man was getting close, and so was the time of his revenge.