Sect Leader's Rise to the top!

Kai carefully walked closer to the river of magma. The basin was already covered in an unbearable heat, which only got worse the closer he got. Kai endured the heat until he reached the outskirts of the magma river where he could finally reach the odd vegetation. The area closer to the river of lava was dotted with numerous giant holes at seemed to be endless. Kai made sure to stay away from there.

"Any further in could be too dangerous...", Kai thought as he turned to inspect the nearby tree. It had extremely skinny branches that were as black as coal.

[???] [Grade-?] [Qi: ?]

Kai was surprised. This only happened when he tried to inspect large bodies of nature like lakes and mountains, but this tiny tree was giving him the same error.

"Could it be part of a larger body somewhere?", Kai thought as he felt one of the branches and found that it was cool to the touch. He ran his hand along the tree base, all the way down its trunk, and only when he was close to the roots, did it start to feel hot.

"What an interesting tree...", Kai thought. He broke off one of the branches, then tried inspecting it separately.

[Ardent-Wood branch] [Grade-2] [127 Qi]

"Just one branch has this much Qi...", Kai thought in amazement. He had already experimented with trees on the outside, but no matter how big the chunk he cut off was, Kai would only get [Grade-1] branches, logs, and stumps with low amounts of Qi.

"I wonder what these trees are connected to that's allowing them to store so much Qi...", Kai thought as he decided to cut off a few more branches to experiment with later.

Kai looked around and some more until he found one of the small red flowers that dotted the barren-looking surface. Its color was bright crimson and was covered with interesting patterns. Kai found that it had an uncanny resemblance to tiger lilies. He picked it then carefully analyzed it.

[Ardent-Fire lily] [Grade-2] [569 Qi]

"Now that's a lot of Qi for one single flower!", Kai thought while excitedly checking to see what other types of herbs were around. At that moment, Kai felt a dangerous presence and quickly activated [Primordial-Dragon Scale Armament]. As soon as he did, a sudden burst of searing hot steam came crashing down on Kai, pushing him backward.

The intensely hot steam seemed to have a corrosive attribute and was slowly eroding Kai's clothing, however, his new armor endured the erosion which was a testament to its durability. Kai looked over to the source and noticed a large mollusk-like creature stuck on the rocky ceiling. Its shell was covered in rock-like patterns which allowed it to blend into the environment. It also gave off almost no Qi fluctuations and had a very faint sense of life which is why Kai had not noticed it until now.

[Ardent-Fire lily] [Grade-2] [569 Qi]

"My clothes! I have to invest in some higher quality clothing that won't just melt away in every fight..." Kai whisperer while being thankful that his scales could cover his naked body. The contrast between the golden-brown scales and black armor made Kai look like a heroic armored beast.

Kai analyzed the creature while moving away from the corrosive steam.

[Ardent-Giant Mollusk] [Grade-2] [893 Qi]

"You got me good there...", Kai said while picking up a small rock off the ground.

"Allow me to pay back your kind hospitality!", Kai said as he threw the rock with all his might. The rock made a small booming sound as it left his hand, and the next moment, a loud crashing noise was heard as the rocky ceiling shook. The giant mollusk fell directly into the lava with a cracked shell.

It seemed to be in pain as it flailed around the lava. From what Kai could see, it seemed to be slightly resistant to the lava, but not completely as its shell was penetrated. it opened its maw-like shell and released even more corrosive steam, but Kai simply took a few steps backward to avoid it.

After a few minutes, the creature stopped flailing and simply got dragged down into the depths of the lava. Kai looked around and noticed a few more giant mollusks on the ceiling, but decided to ignore them since they were quite far away.

"I've made too much noise so something is bound to come looking for me..." Kai thought as he quickly stuffed his bag with herbs and branches. There wasn't a lot of variety with most being [Ardent-Fire lilies], so Kai simply gathered as many as he could while running along the lava river. He avoided the giant mollusk's strike zones and moved fast to get out of the area.

He had not come across any [Grade-3] herbs, but Kai was secretly relieved. Old man Song had mentioned that the [Grade-3] herbs would only bloom around the place where the [Grade-4] illusion demon was birthed. So as long as Kai didn't see those herbs around, he felt that he was relatively safe.

As he moved, Kai heard a sudden noise from behind. He looked back, only to discover that giant worms similar to the one he seen at the entrance were bursting out of the ground around the area where he had thrown the rock. They flailed for a while until they realized that there was no prey around, then quietly dug back into the ground.

"So that's what those holes were...it's a good thing I stayed clear of them..." Kai thought as he kept moving forward. He had a tight deadline to keep. The herbs were nice, but this place seemed to only have [Grade-2] beasts. One of Kai's primary goals was to reach the area with the [Grade-3] beasts and hunt as many as humanly possible. To this end, Kai needed to move quickly.

A few hours after Kai had left the area, a strange veiled woman entered the basin, followed by two people that Kai would have recognized as Hou Zhou and Song Wei.

"T...thank you for saving us", Song Wei said quietly with her arms in front of her.

"He came this way...are you completely sure that the beasts ignored him like he was invisible?. If you're lying to me!...", the woman said in a terrifying low voice.

"Y...yes, I am sure!..." Hou Zhou responded with fear in his eyes while remembering the way that this woman had saved them. It had left a terrifying impression on him that would likely last forever. At this moment, Hou Zhou wanted nothing more than to be as far away from her as possible.

"Good!...", she said with a sinister smile. The woman summoned a strange floating carpet then grabbed the two by their collars and threw them on. She then jumped onto it and stood at the front. The carpet floated above the ground then moved quickly.

As they flow over the large holes in the ground, large masses of worms would pop up as if sensing their presence. However, the carpet flew high enough that the worms could not reach so they could only flail around on the ground in futility.  The woman expertly steered clear of the mollusks showing that she was familiar with this place and moved them in the direction that Kai had gone.

Song Wei gripped Hou Zhou in fear while the latter could only chastise himself for following Kai which got him into this situation.