604 Entering the Underworld

As Alex headed toward the gate of Underworld, he took out Nelson's card. "Nelson, how is the situation over there? Is it safe for me to enter the realm?" 

"Yes. You will appear in a forest, Young Master." Nelson informed almost instantly.

Alex looked up and watched the blue sky, remembering the creepy dark forest and how different this place could be. 

The spirits had gone back to the card after Alex finished his training, knowing it was the day to go to the Underworld.

He took a deep breath and stretched his right hand to the front. A small circle appeared right in front of him before gradually growing big enough for Alex to come in. The array presented itself with a dim golden-colored glow. 

On the floor of Blue Colored Realm, a complicated pattern containing a few symbols glowed in a different color. It was telling Alex, "Look at me. Here I am."

There was no need to think even for normal people because they would surely know this was the gate of this array.

Alex waved his hand and sent his Spiritual Energy to this gate. The blue light started shining brighter before releasing some kind of particles to the air. The particles also glowed in golden color and circled around the gate. It slowly raised higher and higher.

He was already inside the gate and had seen this scene from teleporting Njomo and Nelson, but never experienced it himself. "Hmm, it's certainly beautiful if you are inside this…"

Even though this looked very mysterious, Alex knew it was going to teleport him inside. The golden particles slowly formed a sphere right above the array.

*Fwoosh!* 

A sound of blowing wind echoed in his ears even though this place shouldn't have such a thing called wind. After forming into a sphere, the array glowed brightly, blinding Alex's eyes.

He ended up closing his eyes until the light stopped glowing. 

However, one second after closing his eyes, Alex felt the ground change from a smooth ground in the Blue Colored Realm into something rough and wavy ground. In the instant he recognized it, he opened his eyes only to see a sudden change of scenario.

*Crack!*

His feet flinched a bit because of this sudden change, and the ground let out a cracking sound of a branch. 

Before looking down to confirm his footing, Alex was fascinated by the scenery… In fact, no one sane would ignore this sudden change of scenery because the sun should be up on the other side, but in this realm, there was only darkness with some creepy green light flashing out of the dark cloud.

"Am I entering a horror movie?" Alex couldn't help but remark. There wasn't a single moon in the sky despite this darkness. Considering this was a Special Realm, Alex somehow could relate to such a setting. 

Alex activated his Spirit Eyes without hesitation, checking whether there was a single living being around him. Only after a minute, he could finally let out a sigh of relief, finding no sign of energy. 

He moved his feet once again, and the sound of cracking branches echoed in his ears, piquing his interest. The first thing he saw was a big brown root coming out of the ground and then a dirt trail not far from him.

Other than that, there was nothing else. However, all of it changed when he turned around. It turned out he was right in front of a tree. The huge tree with ten meters in diameters had some swirly patterns in the clockwise direction, creating a huge circle on its body.

The body was actually a gate for teleportation. If he looked with his Spirit Eyes, he could see the hidden symbols embedded inside the tree. The symbols ran through from its root to the leaves.

Alex was surprised that this one hundred meters tree held around one hundred thousand symbols. The array that sealed this place was bonafide peak rank 8 Array.

After an unknown period of time, he suddenly heard the sound of someone's footsteps. More so, it was coming toward him. 

Alex turned around as he abruptly took a defensive stance. 

As soon as the person arrived right in front of him, Alex let his guard down and looked at the handsome young man kneeling in front of him. "Nelson."

He should expect this since Nelson said it was fine to enter this realm.

"Young Master, have you finished your training or have something made you stop your training?" Nelson asked the question he couldn't utter earlier. 

"Thank you for worrying about me. I have finished my training and come here." Alex said with a gentle smile. "By the way, is this place safe? Is there any Dwarf, Undead, or Beastman around here?"

"No. You can say we are a bit far from them." Nelson calmly said and gradually stood up. 

"Hmm? A bit far?" Alex tilted his head in confusion. 

"I should reword it better." Nelson apologized and closed his eyes. "Apparently, the three races couldn't approach this place, so they made a settlement a bit farther from this place."

"I see." Alex nodded. "How about their Martial Saint?"

"No. No one could come to this area. If Young Master wants to see the reason, I can lead you to that place." Nelson nodded.

"Sure. We can go there." Alex nodded and looked up. "Still, this dark sky and the green flash… it really looks scary…"

"I can relate with Young Master. Though it appears the sky itself is the work of the three races. According to Njomo, they are more comfortable with something like this." Nelson explained. "As for how they do it, it's the Undead Race. Unfortunately, I don't know about the specific."

"It's fine. We are not going there anyway." Alex shrugged and tapped Nelson's shoulder. 

"Yes." Nelson nodded. "Does Young Master have any more questions? If not, I can lead you to the barrier." 

Alex thought for a moment and looked at the tree once more before turning back to Nelson. "Yeah. I don't have any more questions. We should go."

Nelson nodded and began leading him. However, as Alex took one step from his position, a red ball of light suddenly came out of his body. At first glance, it looked like Fabio came out, but the light turned into a woman figure. The wind swayed her long red hair before the person in question turned around, revealing a mature beauty.

The first time Alex and Nelson saw this person, they realized something was off. They knew this person, but her face looked younger, and her facial features looked more charming and fresher.

Alex took a breath first before asking, "Are you Stina?"

The woman tilted her head, not understanding his question as the answer was obvious. "What do you mean, Master? I am Stina, of course." 

"Uhm…" Alex glanced left and right before saying, "Sorry. You should look at yourself first."

"What do you mean?" Stina frowned before Alex took out a mirror from his Inventory and pointed it to Stina.

She took the mirror from his hand and looked at herself in the mirror before dropping the mirror in shock. She glanced at Alex, Nelson, and Alex again. "Is that me?"

"Yeah."

"My look changes when I'm in my prime?" Stina exclaimed in surprise. 

Alex made a confused face and raised his hand, telling her how he can know? "I don't know. You tell me." 

"Still, since I am in my prime, Kyle should also love this look better." Stina seemed to be thrilled with this. "Right, if you are advancing your cultivation, you should be able to live longer." 

"Well, isn't it good? Now you are with us and will have the chance to enter Martial Saint or even higher?" Alex smiled gently. 

"Yes." Stina's reaction wasn't normal. She abruptly fell on her knees before a sobbing sound echoed in everyone's ears. Clenching her palms tightly, she said. "I can… I can live with Kyle for a long time… After these few thousand years waiting, finally… Finally…"

Alex and Nelson exchanged looks and smiled. Alex walked toward her and kneeled before patting her shoulder. 

"Master… *sob*... Master… I… can't thank you enough." Stina let out tears of joy and it couldn't stop, showing how happy she was.

Alex smiled helplessly and said in a soft tone. "I am also happy for you."

"I'm sorry for this display, Master." Stina tried to hold back her tears before going back inside his body. She didn't want to distract Alex with this.

Alex closed his eyes and couldn't stop smiling. He was happy from the bottom of his heart, seeing Stina get her happiness.

Nelson came to him and silently watched him from the side. This was Alex's previous nature. He would always be overjoyed when something good happened to his family and friends but would become a demon feared by thousands of worlds when they stepped on his tail. 

Alex stood up and took a deep breath. "Let's go."

Nelson simply nodded and said, "Yes."

He led Alex to the outer ring of this forest before finding a monolith covered with symbols. The monolith was a ten meters tall white stone standing right in the entrance of the forest. "This is the one that creates the barrier. Njomo said he couldn't go back to this place after entering… So it also becomes our problem. Even if Young Master doesn't mention it, I will still lead you to this place."

As if he didn't hear him, Alex looked at the monolith with his Spirit Eyes. "A peak rank 8 Barrier? Is this a one-way barrier?" 

One minute…

Five minutes…

One hour…

After observing the array, a flash of enlightenment appeared on his eyes. "So that is the purpose of this array…"

"Young Master?" Nelson felt relieved when Alex seemed to have understood the array. 

"This is not a one-way barrier…" Alex smiled before reaching a thin layer of screen and walking through it.

"Young Ma-" Nelson widened his eyes, never expecting Alex to go out. "Young Master, you need to fix the barrier first… If you are outside there…"

Despite his rumbling, Nelson still believed that Alex had a way to fix the barrier even from the outside. However, thinking of how Alex walked past the barrier like he was possessed by something made him worry. 

"Ah!"

It was when Alex suddenly let out a surprised tone and face, the worry in his heart intensified. He thought, 'As expected, Young Master didn't realize he had walked through the barrier. This is not good…'

Albeit… his worry proved to be unnecessary. The reason Alex had such a reaction was the meaning behind the array.

Before explaining what he understood from this array, he noticed the shock in Nelson's face and made a weird smile. He slowly walked back to him, passing through the barrier like nothing.

"How?" Nelson didn't understand Array, so he had trouble comprehending this action.

Alex smiled. "This is not a one-way barrier but a barrier to block every other creature other than humans. I have found the trace of Human blood as a recognition process… So, only I can enter this barrier. If you want me to reconstruct the barrier, I can though." 

Even though he was surprised, Nelson still shook his head and answered with rational thinking. "No. It's better we don't do anything about it. If what Young Master said is correct, then we can use this place as our base. All those Martial Saints who might attack us won't be able to do anything if we stay inside this barrier."

"True enough. The Martial Saints are troubles…" Alex agreed. "If they want to attack us, we can retreat to this barrier and go back when we are stronger."

"Yes. I agree." Nelson nodded. "Besides, this barrier covers quite a big area because I have seen many monoliths around this area."

"Oh." Alex wasn't surprised and simply nodded.