—–

As the Primordial Beasts swam forward, they quickly reached their destination amidst a sea of explosions and underwater battles; they quickly pinpointed where it was with their roars. Uroboros, the only one that could understand their “words,” spoke to the rest.

“They’re over there, right beneath that giant root! Surrounded by two smaller roots! It seems the mechanical tree found the ores ahead of time!” Uroboros said.

“What?!”

“Seriously…”

The two other Egos were left slightly disappointed and speechless. If they were to find no ores at all, this entire operation would’ve been a waste of time and effort!

And perhaps of lives, as several Immortals might die within the next minutes if they continued fighting endlessly against so many machines at once.

“Well, only one way to find out if there’s any!” Yu roared, shaping her own Aura made of Light into a gigantic, spinning drill.

“Right, yeah!” Transcendent said.

“Well, we might as well!” Yang agreed.

Their arms merged into giant drills as well, as three gigantic drills made out of powerful ethereal energies solidified into metal-like matter and began drilling through the ground, constantly breaking apart the hard stone.

Crack, crack…!

CRAAASH!

As they continued piercing through, many machines approached them almost instantly, aiming their weapons at them and firing dozens of huge underwater missiles.

“Dammit! They’re right behind us already!” Yu complained.

Her drill disappeared as she quickly manifested several shields around them, which endured the explosive missiles one after another.

BOOOM! BOOOM! BOOOM! BOOOM!

However, each explosion shattered many of the shields, as she was forced to rapidly create more over time, or else she would end up risking everyone’s lives.

At the same time, it was getting harder to break through the mountain’s stone; it was simply too damn hard!

Until…

“GRRHHH…!”

“RAAARRRH!”

The two Primordial Beasts roared, breaking through the stone with their sheer physical power and shattering the stone, digging deeper and deeper with their claws.

Crack, crack…!

CRAAASH!

Until so much stone was dug that amidst the darkness of the mountain’s interior, they found an underwater passage, still with air, leading to a mine most likely made by the roots themselves.

The mechanical roots were constantly draining the energy and light out of the walls, ceiling, and floor, which everyone realized were rainbow-colored, glistening crystals!

“W-We found it! The mine!” Transcendent said. “We must move onwards! The beasts are rushing inside!”

“Indeed, let’s hurry!” Yang nodded as Uroboros came right after her, accompanied by Yu.

“T-This is…! So many jewels!” Uroboros gasped. “And they’re all infused with Primordial Heavenly Ki, right?! The strongest energy of this world… perhaps within most Murims! All at the palm of my hands! Yes, with this, my comeback—”

CLANK!

However, Yang hit his head this time, making Uroboros’ viper-shaped head quickly grow weirdly shaped, as he groaned in pain.

“Ouch! D-Did you have to do that?!” Uroboros cried angrily, making a huge fuss again.

“If you try eating the crystals only, Anna will become stronger, you know?” Sighed Yang. “We also must focus on feeding the beasts; let’s extract them as quickly as possible!”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“I’ll keep watching the entrance! I bet some robots are going to come here to defend the mines!” Said Yu, staying behind.

The trio of Egos and the Primordial Beasts rushed into the cave as they quickly reached an area where they had concentrated on enormous, large quantities.

The three Egos concentrated their powers onto their bodies, furiously smashing the walls and the giant masses of crystals.

The crystals were naturally incredibly tough, but by concentrating Anna’s Venerable Ki and her newly acquired Armor Powers, as their bodies were covered by golden ranger armor…

CRAAASH!

RUMBLE!

The caves trembled as giant chunks of crystals fell, creating a massive pile. The two primordial beasts jumped into the feast, opening their jaws and eating everything, as much as possible.

They triturated the jewels with their sharp fangs, swallowing the little fragments and growing stronger with each bite.

They ate incredibly quickly; the huge pile of crystals was gone in ten seconds, but more piles of crystals were made as they were being rapidly mined from every single area the trio of egos detected.

“We have to hurry! Every single second is precious!”

CRASH!

“If we take too long, too many lives will be lost!”

CRAASH!

“I don’t care about lives, but I want this to end already! I am nobody’s slaveeee!”

CRAAASH!

Their attacks continued for several minutes, as the Primordial Beasts continued feasting; the caves were rapidly being wiped clean of crystals; the beasts dug deeper, quickly opening new roots of crystals, which they devoured as the egos broke them more easily for them.

The Primordial Beasts began growing larger and larger, their auras so powerful they began to rapidly warp space around them; the Egos gasped, realizing the hidden power within them was finally beginning to truly awaken!

FLUOOOSH!

As this happened, they dug deeper; the mechanical roots of the tree were completely inert and didn’t have a will of their own, not bothering to attack them at all.

However, they didn’t risk it and ignored the areas around the tentacle-like roots, so the rotos wouldn’t wake up or something.

Crack, crack…!

“Huh? What’s this place?”

“Watch out! The floor is shattering!”

“Eh?!”

CRASH!

Eventually, they reached so deep a huge open area opened for them, where all three egos fell from with the beasts.

As they fell, more voluntarily than involuntarily, as they could fly if they wanted, the egos and the primordial beasts ended up reaching a large, wide space within the mountain.

The entire cave was filled with the same beautiful crystals, but aside from that, there was another crystal, a gigantic one as big as thirty meters.

“Where’s this place? Another cave interior?”

“No, wait, that’s…”

“What’s over there?!”

The trio noticed something strange: inside of the crystals, there was a silhouette of some sort of being, which had been crystallized alongside these crystals. It had been resting there for too long, waiting for someone to come and free it.

“It’s shape… is weird…” said Transcendent.

“It looks like some sort of… chimera?” asked Yang.

“…It is indeed one!” Uroboros said. “It seems to be slightly humanoid, its body composed of various animal body parts… Like those beast people from this world, but it has horns, fur, scales, a tail, and wings… How odd.”

“No wait, I recognize them now!” Transcendent said. “Don’t you remember, Yang? When did Anna learn about those beings that existed before the Beast people of Bestia? Their ancestors?”

“Wait, you mean that’s… A Dokkaebi?!” Yang wondered.

“It matches the description pretty well, and if it has been down here all this time, crystallized in these powerful crystals that possess so much power… it might have somehow survived eons down here, or at least, its body seems intact; I don’t know if it’s dead,” explained Transcendent.

“But is it okay to free them?” Uroboros asked. “We don’t know if they could be some new vicious enemy we would have to deal with! I suggest we leave it be and let these animals eat other crystals.”

“I agree…” Transcendent nodded. “It would only create unnecessary risks to free such an ancient being; we shouldn’t risk anything if possible.”

“Okay, you’re not wrong,” Yang nodded. “Let’s leave it at that! Beasts, we’ll mine the rest for you—”

“ROOOAARRR!”

“GAAAOOOO!”

However, out of nowhere, the beasts became wild, roaring and furiously breaking through the gigantic crystal while growing larger, at least ten times their original size.

CRAAASH!

As they did that, they ate all the crystals that exploded out of their attack, growing even stronger. They became so powerful the crystals around them began to shatter apart and fly towards their bodies, absorbed instantly.

“W-Wait a second! Stop!” Transcendent panicked.

“They’re breaking through that thing’s prison!” Yang said. “Can we stop them now?!”

“It would be suicide! They have gone crazy with power!” Uroboros said. “We have to be prepared for whatever that thing might be, though.”

As they glanced at the sleeping being, suddenly…

TRUUUM!

Its eyes opened, revealing themselves to be reptilian and completely crimson red.

As the eyes opened, a shockwave of immense power was released from this being.

And then…

Crack, crack…!

Countless cracks started spreading through the entire crystal, imprisoning it!

“So it was alive!” Transcendent panicked.

Crack…!

“It’s powerful enough to shatter these tough crystals with its aura alone?!” Yang gasped.

CRACK!

“Whatever this Dokkaebi is… Its power must be immense…!” Uroboros muttered.

CRAAASH!

The crystals finally shattered into pieces and then rapidly merged with the Primordial Beasts, who had cleaned the entire place.

However, their wild roars stopped, as they suddenly fell silent, glancing at the entity that had stepped out of the crystal prison.

“…”

The Dokkaebi, who seemed incredibly tall compared to the beast people, being almost four meters in height, walked forward.

Wearing ancient Korean-styled clothes, the furry and scaled creature looked around their surroundings.

And then…

“Uwah…”

Yawned lazily.

“What the hell happened here? Huh? Wait, did I sleep for too long?” She groaned. “Oh damn… Uuhh, can you tell me what has happened in the last millennia? Hey~ I’m talking to you…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

Anna’s Egos and even the Primordial Beasts were left speechless.

Despite being so strong and intimidating, this Dokkaebi ended up having an unexpectedly carefree personality!

—–

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep