In such an environment, only Immortal Saints could protect themselves with some measure of success. Immortal Essence cultivators could only hope that an eruption didn't happen near them.
"Careful." Dyon suddenly said. "An eruption is about to occur over there in just about 3 more seconds."
After saying these words, Dyon didn't stand on ceremony and swerved Chibi's cauldron. Crystella's ears perked up and swerved as well.
There wasn't much of a chance to doubt Dyon's words because mere few ticks later, the ground blasted apart.
A pillar of fiery red and gold, holding out with a diameter of 50 meters shot into the skies, piercing through the smoggy blue above. In this kind of atmosphere, the clouds couldn't even last, leaving nothing but a greyish blue all around.
Droplets of molten lava became the only rain they knew, falling from the skies to be accompanied by the screams of pain the Immortal Saints behind them left.
Who knows when, but the number of Immortal Saints had grown to about 12. This was probably the maximum total that could appear in this bubble world. They had likely been informed by the Immortal Saints of Zaneta City to come here. After all, the more of them there were, the more concessions they'd be able to pull from Crystella and the other two.
However, due to their ingrained biases toward mortals, many of them had snorted at Dyon's words, only to end up heavily injured.
Crystella's eyes sharpened, looking toward Dyon with a heated gaze. It was more emotion than she had ever displayed before, yet it was somehow still subdued.
"You're a Spiritual Sage?"
The eyes of those who heard this question widened. Just what kind of status did a Spiritual Sage have? Even Crystella's home world only had one, and even her grandfather had to treat him with the utmost respect.
Dyon smiled. "You could say so."
Crystella's heart quickened, as did the hearts of many others. Kywen and Tedric found it difficult to regulate their breathing. They could only console themselves, trying to hypnotize their minds into believing it had only been dumb luck.
"… You lead, then. I will point out the direction to you."
Dyon shrugged and went on ahead. The two young men were especially hoping that he would slip up, but as more time passed, it became obvious that Dyon wasn't making things up. A mortal Spiritual Sage… It really did exist!
After several careful maneuvers, the group made it to their destination half a day later.
It was a massive mountain. There wasn't a drop of lava around it unlike the pooling molten metal and rock that had slowly begun to cover half of the bubble world. However, it still glowed a furious red.
It was obvious with a glance that this wasn't the mountain's natural state. Rather… Whatever was inside of it was so hot that the mountain itself began to heat up to obscene levels, causing a terrible crimson color.
...
Dyon glanced at the reddening mountain with a curious gaze. In his current position, he could tell the temperature was even higher than the entrance to the Golden Flame Mystical World. If he approached any closer, it would be higher than any mortal world star. One could only imagine the heat bubbling up within.
"Are you going to lead the way, Spiritual Sage?"
Kywen's poisonous words interrupted Dyon's thoughts, causing Crystella to frown.
"You're not very intelligent, are you?" Dyon sent a sidelong glance toward him.
"What did you just say to me?!"
"My senses are capable of blanketing an entire bubble world, why would it matter which position I enter in? Whether I'm in the front, the back, or thousands of miles from you, it won't make a difference. If you want to target me, be smarter about it. And here I used to think Immortal Saints were such lofty beings."
The sudden sound of a snort burying a laugh spread. But when everyone's head turned in the direction, Crystella had already regained her neutral expression. Everyone suddenly felt that they had imagined the noise entirely.
Kywen's expression turned steely. He didn't believe for a moment that Dyon had the backbone to say this normally. To him, he was nothing more than a coward hiding behind a woman. He had no idea that Dyon was completely uncaring about his feelings regardless of whether Crystella was here or not.
While Saru and Lilith were distracted, Dyon put his hands on their shoulders, causing them to disappear into his inner world. They'd probably be mad about it later, but it really was too dangerous for them to be here.
"You… Where…"
With how rare spatial treasures were, how much rarer were spatial treasures that could hold human lives? The longer they spent with Dyon, the more secrets they felt he kept hidden, and the stronger the greed in the eyes of many grew.
"… I'm bored of this look already…" Was Dyon's only answer.
In a flash of golden light, he was once more wearing a pair of black sweatpants rolled up to his knees. However, he wore nothing else. His bare chest and feet roasted beneath the hot winds.
As expected, no matter how much it stroked his ego to wear something else, he would always default to this level of comfort.
'… His body is too powerful…' Crystella's eyes narrowed.
"Alright, let's go."
Without waiting for anyone else, and ignoring the nagging voices of Saru and Lilith sounding in his mind, Chibi launched herself forward, a miniature version of her spirit form standing on Dyon's shoulder.
"Follow closely if you don't want to be left behind."
"Wait! It's too dangerous."
Dyon looked back and grinned toward Crystella.
There was something about his confident smile and roguish appearance that made her heart stop for a moment. Just who was this man?
She had seen too many prim and proper men in her life. But one that stripped down to the clothing of a barbarian without a care in the world… This had to be the first.
