Ancient Tears BloodLine

Star University – Residence

After the end of the discussion, I left the Dean’s office. I exited and started heading towards the territory of the Thunder Flame Faction. It was my first time coming and going from this place alone.

Earlier, the Purple Mark Guard and others used to bring me here. Now, I could come and go whenever I wanted. I saw the unauthorized zone in the Dean’s territory. It had to be the place where the gateway to the secret lands was located.

I recalled entering one of them before.

Swoosh!

I flew across the unauthorized territory without stopping anywhere. I reached the Thunder Flame Faction territory a few minutes later. I stopped at the entrance and landed on the ground.

The next second, I stepped inside and started walking towards my residence. I didn’t inform the faction leader or my masters; I decided to see them tomorrow instead.

I was going to get some rest in my room. I had spent the entire previous day out in the open boundary land. On the way, I came across some faction members on the footpath.

I looked a bit untidy due to the battle, so it was normal for others not to recognize me. I moved past them, but as I walked by, the warriors felt an unknown pressure.

The pressure was strong enough to squeeze their hearts.

For a second, they paused and froze where they stood. They waited until I had left the area.

"Who is he?"

"I felt a suffocating pressure from that person," a warrior of the Black Flame Palace uttered.

"That person could be a senior. He must be a Purple Mark Expert," another warrior said.

As a Gold Mark Warrior himself, he had felt the pressure too. Hearing this, the faces of the others changed drastically. They immediately rushed back towards their palace.

Meanwhile

I arrived in front of my residence. It looked the same as before, aside from needing a thorough cleaning. I opened the gate and walked up to the door, using my key to unlock it before stepping inside.

I turned on the lights and saw dust and spiderwebs everywhere. It would take time to clean all of this up, but I headed to my room first.

I checked the bedroom; it was in the same condition. I immediately set to work cleaning it up.

Time passed.

I completed the work in an hour. Next, I lay down in my bed to sleep. Dean Jerome had loaded my brain with too much information, and I needed as much rest as possible right now.

...

Dean’s Office

On the other hand, Dean Jerome did not remain idle. He began the process of officially shutting down Boundary No. 5. Boundary No. 5 was no longer functional.

Moreover, the land had been overturned and all the structures there had been destroyed. Even if he wanted to send warriors there, they wouldn’t be able to stay. there were no tents or shelters left whatsoever.

It took him an hour to finalize everything. After doing so, he sent a message to the higher-ups under Elder Jane.

Zack Lockwood would be under their care next. Dean Jerome could no longer make decisions when it came to Zack Lockwood.

Now, all he could do was wait for their response.

...

Foreign Creature Side

The Venom Maw Elder wanted one of its kin to enter Boundary No. 5.

It wanted to verify the strength of the target firsthand. It hadn’t taken the reports from the lower command seriously at first. If the target could be easily killed by its kin, it would seize the opportunity to purge the lower command.

Then, the higher-ups in the lower command would have no way to escape punishment.

Time passed.

It didn’t take long for one of the half-step Red Mark Venom creatures to make the attempt. When the higher-ups in the lower command heard about this, they were thrilled.

They believed that this time, the target was guaranteed to die. Consequently, they began pouring in more resources. However, everything changed when the Venom Maw creature tried to breach the barrier.

It couldn’t even leave a dent. The spatial barrier had become completely solid, as resilient as a world barrier. The foreign creatures didn’t realize that they were already too late.

Boundary No. 5 had long since been declared non-functional. The Venom Maw creature realized something: this had been done by the humans.

It immediately ordered the lower command to verify whether the battlefield status had changed. The higher-ups of the lower command were terrified.

They had received no prior intelligence about this. The Venom Maw kin left the area in anger. Soon after, the lower command verified the report: Boundary No. 5 was no longer active.

The official reason stated by the humans stunned them. The report claimed that Boundary No. 5 had been overturned and the terrain destroyed by a foreign creature, but it deliberately omitted which creature had been responsible for the destruction.

The foreign creatures understood why: the human side did not want the general public to find out about the Thorn Reaper. To humanity, the Thorn Reaper was a relic of ancient history, and the common people had no idea such a creature still existed.

If the public were to learn about it, widespread panic would ensue. This revelation was a double-edged sword for the foreign creatures.

Had the news been made public, it would have indirectly aided the foreign creatures, the greater the civil unrest, the more chaos would follow.

They could have exploited that turmoil to cause even more bloodshed. In that sense, the secrecy was bad news for them.

On the other hand, because the report was suppressed, the other human factions would likely keep their guard lowered.

Knowing that the human factions were far from united, the creatures could seize this window of opportunity to launch a surprise attack on the battlefield.

However, the higher-ups in the lower command had far more urgent matters to worry about. With Boundary No. 5 officially sealed, they had no idea what to report to Elder Venom Maw.

The Elder would be expecting results, yet the boundary was already closed off. Still, they dared not deliberately delay delivering the news, prolonging the inevitable would only make their fate far worse.