Lin Mu was taken aback by the sudden exclamation of Elder Niji, making him wonders if he had spoken something wrong.
"Is there something wrong?" Lin Mu asked in a concerned tone.
"Did you really spend a month in the Broken Chasm?" Elder Niji asked in disbelief.
"Yes… there's nothing down there. No beasts or any other life… no wait, there is some moss growing there." Lin Mu answered.
"How is that possible?" Elder Niji said under his breath.
"What kind of a danger is there in the Broken Chasm, anyway?" Lin Mu asked, wanting to know more.
"It is the greatest danger of the Land of Exiles… The Chasm Beasts. They are strange illusory beasts that don't have solid bodies. They live in the Broken Chasm and come out from time to time, spreading across the Barren plains, hunting for anything living." Elder Niji answered, much to Lin Mu's surprise.
"I… didn't see any of them down there. Is there something more to them?" Lin Mu was even more confused now.
"I… don't know… there should be Chasm beasts living there, I'm sure of this. I've seen them come out of there with my own two eyes." Elder Niji replied.
Hearing this, Lin Mu realized there was a discrepancy here.
"Wait, by seeing it yourself, do you mean you saw the bottom of the Chasm? Like you saw the beasts climbing all the way from the base?" Lin Mu asked for clarification.
"Of course not. The Chasm is bottomless… or so we've thought all these years. Our people who went there, either accidentally or intentionally, never returned." Elder Niji stated.
"Well, the chasm certainly has a bottom. And I've explored some of it. Sure, it is very deep, and it took me a little over a week to even climb it. The Dark fog spread at its top makes it hard to figure out directions too. Thankfully, I had some illumination tools to help me." Lin Mu elaborated.
"The Dark fog? You mean the Chasm Miasma isn't filling the chasm entirely?" Elder Niji was surprised once more.
"No, it is only floating on the top. And even then it's merely a fraction of the entire chasm's height. It was only around two hundred meters thick. A majority of the chasm down below is actually clear." Lin Mu revealed.
"This… changes everything…" Elder Niji was stunned. "Though this doesn't explain why you didn't encounter any Chasm Beasts."
"Perhaps you were just mistaken about it too?" Lin Mu said while striking his chin. "You said you've seen them come out of it, right? Like from the dark miasma?" he asked.
"Indeed. Everyone has seen them come out from there and this has been so for over a hundred thousand years of our tribe's existence here." Elder Niji stated.
'They've been in exile for a over a hundred thousand years? That's possibly longer than the entire history of the Great Zhou Empire and its people…' Lin Mu was shocked, since this was just one tribe of an entire world.
If an exiled clan had a history of over a hundred thousand years, Lin Mu wondered what the main residents of the world were like.
Pushing these thoughts to the back of his mind, Lin Mu focused on the topic at hand.
"Maybe you are not wrong about the source of the Chasm beasts. They do come from the Broken Chasm, but maybe not from the bottom." Lin Mu said after thinking for a bit.
"What do you mean? Where else would they come from?" Elder Niji wondered.
"The Miasma itself. You've said they have no solid form. Then perhaps they are made out of this miasma? It would explain why I saw none of them down there." Lin Mu explained.
Hearing this, Elder Niji had a face of epiphany and he seemed to have figured out something.
"The Chasm Beasts come out in waves every so often. This time the interval has been long, and they haven't been seen for over two months now. If what you say is correct, then… the Chasm Beasts are only in existence for a specif amount of time." Elder Niji speculated.
While Lin Mu had never seen the Chasm Beasts till now, it wasn't as if he didn't know of other similar existence. Lin Mu had read about a few such creatures that were formed from different energies or materials.
They would come into existence under specific conditions and that might be the same case here.
Lin Mu thought about it more, wondering what the reason might be for the existence of Chasm beasts.
"Why has the interval been this long? Was there anything different this time?" Lin Mu asked, feeling curious.
"Hmmm… there was indeed something. Something fell from the sky two months ago. It crashed into the reservoir, but when we went to check it we didn't find anything. All that was left there was a deep hole, the bottom of which could not be seen. Oh, and the water in the reservoir was gone too, possibly drained into the hole." Elder Niji answered.
"Fell from the sky?" Lin Mu's brows raised as a thought came to his mind.
"Did anyone see what the object was? Or how it came?" Lin Mu asked further.
"It came from beyond the clouds and created a hole through them when it fell. It was surprising as we seldom see the sky above, so the children noted it well. As for the object that fell, they said that the object glowed in a golden light.
But due to the speed at which it fell they couldn't watch it for long." Elder Niji replied.
Hearing this, Lin Mu all but confirmed what must have happened.
"I think I know what the object was and also where it went…" Lin Mu said with a wry smile.
"What?" Elder Niji questioned.
"That was me…" Lin Mu answered, letting his golden body glow.
The glow which was usually hidden, spread in the hall, illuminating it faintly.
"I was knocked out when I fell, so I didn't remember all this. But that was definitely me falling and crashing."
