Li Luo felt space warp around him as his senses faded away. It felt like forever, and it felt like only a brief moment.
Suddenly, the Golden Dragon Secret Key started to burn in his hand, then a golden light burst forth like a compass arrow, expanding until it formed a large bridge.
It breached the void, opening a way forward.
When Li Luo stepped on it, he was immediately blinded by golden light, too dazzling to look at.
His eyes were scorched sore by the dizzying brightness, and he took a long time to recover. When he finally adjusted, he saw that there was a piece of land far ahead in the distance.
It looked huge, but Li Luo was able to see its ends because of how far away he was.
He realized that the golden arrow-bridge was carrying him toward that piece of land with incredible speed.
He glanced around and saw two more beams, carrying Lu Qing'er and Qin Zhulu, and then further away a cluster of three streaks that had to be Ning Zhao, Zhu Xuan, and Lin Suo.
Casting his eye further, he could see hundreds more, all headed for the same piece of land.
They had to be the squads from other branches of the Golden Dragon Bank.
It was a spectacular sight.
The golden bridge carried him on, faster and faster, until he was finally in the air above the land, looking down at mountains and rivers that dotted the terrain.
Suddenly, a powerful, green wind swept towards Li Luo.
The green wind clashed against the golden light with a shrieking sound, biting away at it until the gold started to give way at certain points.
Li Luo already had his resonant power ready to defend himself, but when the green wind came for him, it bit through his defenses as easily as if they were tofu. His skin was torn, leaving a small gash behind.
As thin and inconsequential as it looked, Li Luo gasped sharply. The pain was excruciating, cutting deep into his soul.
More and more jets of wind were starting to pierce the golden defense now, and Li Luo started to sweat.
He saw that the others were also panicking at the sudden appearance of the wind.
"So this is Green Alioth? Terrifying." Clearly, Green Alioth not only blew throughout the Golden Dragon Dao Fields, but also around it. All who wished to enter had to pass its trial first.
Fortunately, the Golden Dragon Secret Key blocked most of it; otherwise, he would not have been able to survive even one wave of it. It was powerful enough to shred him until not even a bone was left intact.
Even with the key's protection, it was very difficult to defend against alone.
Li Luo gestured to Lu Qing'er and Qin Zhulu, then they grouped up rapidly so the golden light overlapped for all three of them.
Not far away, Ning Zhao and the others were doing the same.
Those three were all at the Evolving Resonance Tier, and were more or less dealing with it well after an initial adjustment period.
In comparison, Li Luo's squad was being worn down quickly, since they were much weaker.
If this continued, they might not even pass through the belt of Green Alioth.
"Li Luo, what do we do?" Lu Qing'er asked urgently. Although she was not too interested in the writ, she still wanted to bring Li Luo in to look for opportunities. It would be a huge waste if they could not even get in.
Li Luo thought for a moment. "We're losing out because we don't have enough resonant power. We don't know how long this belt of wind will last. If we run out of resonant power, we'll be in a bad spot.
"The wind is coming from the front. We cannot take turns tanking it at the front like the others are doing. We'll put the strongest defender in front, while the others support that person."
They turned to look at Qin Zhulu.
He cringed. With an upper eighth-grade Snarling Golden Demon Tiger resonance, he was clearly their best defender. Which meant that he had been nominated as meat shield.
Still, Qin Zhulu was cool-headed enough to consider the bigger picture, so he stepped forward mutely, taking up his duty without complaint.
"Little Lu is a very dependable man," Li Luo said.
Qin Zhulu glared at him. "Don't go around giving me weird names! Tchah!" Green Alioth swept in again, and he closed his mouth, setting his jaw grimly.
Lu Qing'er laid a hand on Qin Zhulu's back, sending forth her power. "Black Ice Armor!"
Qin Zhulu was immediately encased in shining, transparent armor with a faint, black cast to it. It protected him from much of the Green Alioth's damage.
Li Luo reached out as well, still grinning. He used his own healing powers to boost Qin Zhulu's recovery.
With their support, Qin Zhulu bellowed with triumph, drinking in the newfound boosted power. His muscles bulged, and golden tiger stripes began to show faintly on his skin.
Green Alioth blew with renewed frenzy, but with the ice armor and Li Luo's healing, Qin Zhulu stood strong.
Their advancement speed picked up.
Nearby, Ning Zhao, Zhu Xuan, and Lin Suo saw Li Luo's squad pushing ahead with a new burst of speed. This shocked them. They had expected them to be badly beaten by the wind, but they had quickly adapted.
All across the breadth of the void, streaks of gold light pushed against and then past the belt of Green Alioth, making it safely to the land beyond.
Li Luo's squad managed to make it through safely, and then a powerful gravitational force brought them back down to land. Their keys helped guide them back until solid ground was beneath their feet once more.
Li Luo looked around. He saw that they were in a deep mountain-gorge, covered in thick snow. The trees around them were frozen.
"This is the Golden Dragon Dao Fields?" all three wondered privately.
"The worldly natural energy is very dense here—it's nothing like the world outside," Lu Qing'er observed.
Li Luo nodded. This was only the outskirts of the Golden Dragon Dao Fields, but already the worldly natural energy was more saturated than he could remember. He could only imagine how favorable the conditions could be when one went deeper in. The Golden Dragon Dao Fields were truly a Mecca for cultivation.
Suddenly, Li Luo found that an extra item had appeared in his hand. It was a short piece of golden incense. This had to be what Yu Hongxi had mentioned earlier. Burn this to get your loot redeemed for dao-gold.
"Alright, let's get started. We'll head east, pick herbs, kill beasts, earn dao-gold, and then swim at the Reservoir with our treasures!" Li Luo punched the air.
Lu Qing'er looked up from her cupped hands, still trying to blow some hot air on them. "As if it'd be so easy," she laughed.
She was buoyed by the beauty of the landscape. Unlike the Umbra Cave, the Golden Dragon Dao Fields were breathtaking. There were no abominations like the Others. If not for Qin Zhulu sticking around, she would have considered this trip perfect. Dong!
Something fell from above, hitting her squarely on the head and making Lu Qing'er yelp.
She caught the object before it touched the ground and saw that it was a snow-white fruit with runic patterns on it. It also emitted an alien fragrance.
She examined it for a few moments, then turned to her team. "Do you think this is one of the rare herbs?"
The two boys looked at each other and shrugged. "Maybe. Want to try?"
They gathered a few of them, then lit the golden incense.
Golden smoke rose, circling the white fruits.
To their astonishment, the white fruits started to fade away and then disappeared before their very eyes.
At the same time, a rift appeared in front of them, and four round, golden coins rolled out, landing at their feet.
They looked at the golden dragon marks on them and fell silent.
Dao-gold... was this easy to get?
After their hellish time in the Umbra Cave, this seemed too good to be true.