Treasure-hunting: Into the Unknown

On the ground stood the warriors, all with stiff backs and shock plastered across their faces. They had expected the Sun-swallowing Beast to negotiate peacefully with Jace and Zachary, but instead, it spewed out flames that flailed around wildly trying to envelop them. The chaos further seemed to seal the two's eventual fates.

Most looked ahead silently with pale faces. Some of the more timid ones trembled with fear, their legs wobbling as they turned to jelly.

"Dad..." Pollard trembled as he could only watch on with a horrified expression. If he could fly, he would have already done so with no hesitation.

"Harley!" Goliath's piercing gaze fell on Zachary. This man was his key to the Xiao Clan. If something were to happen to him now, all his plans were guaranteed to be failures. If he'd known this, he would already have taken the man away forcefully.

Everyone's eyes now fixated on the burning flames, hoping that there would once again be some miracle.

A ball of fire hurled out from the flames, crashing loudly into the ground like a meteor. As soon as it did so, the ball burst apart with such force that it dug a pit several meters deep. Suffocating volumes of smoke rose slowly into the sky.

Everyone rushed towards the site of impact.

After the smoke dissipated, two obscure figures slowly came into view. Their clothes were singed and their faces were covered with dust, but fortunately, they seemed otherwise unharmed. Jace and Zachary looked towards the warriors, their expressions unreadable.

Just as the crowd was about to breathe a collective sigh of relief, Jace suddenly fell to his knees and spat out a mouthful of blood.

"Master Jace!" Zachary hurried towards him. The accident was so sudden that he didn't have time to take shelter in the system. Fortunately, Jace was strong enough to protect him in time. Otherwise, he would be in worse shape right now.

However, he was unable to

s completely healthy.

"Pollard, if something bad happens to me, you must get your sister back. You will be the future leader of our clan. Don't let me down!" Jace patted Pollard's shoulder. And with that, he propped himself up, then flew up to the beast once more.

"Dad..." Pollard wanted to go after him, but Zachary pulled him back wordlessly.

"Don't you dare stop me, Harley," Pollard said coldly.

"Even if you follow him, you won't be able to help. On the contrary, you might even be a distraction," Zachary said in a matter-of-fact tone. Indeed, in the face of something as powerful as that, their Imperial Level strength was close to worthless.

"Pollard, Harley is right. Right now, we can't do anything else but survive," Goliath said softly.

Pollard clenched his hands into fists as his body trembled, overcome with anger at himself for being too weak.

"I'll take you two into the system first," Zachary insisted.

"Joan is also here," Pollard blurted out in sudden realization and looked around frantically. Among the chaos, however, he couldn't get even a glimpse of her.

"You go in first. I'll go find her," Zachary promised, giving Pollard a reassuring gaze. Pollard and Goliath then immediately vanished into thin air as soon as he touched them.