The feeling had returned. Alex had barely walked 10 minutes north in this treacherous desert, and he was already finding a new yang jade.
He got happy and sped up the pace. A new monster came towards him, with the intention of killing him, but he didn't care. Monsters were very normal for him now and he could kill them easily.
However, that did not mean that it was a swift process. Due to the increased pressure on his body, fighting the monster was more taxing than usual.
"At some point, I won't be able to fight at all," he thought. He was already second thinking about his decision to walk directly up north as more monsters were showing up.
Still, the feeling of being near a yang jade was too enticing, so he didn't go back.
He finally arrived at the place that contained the yang jade. It was a simple land, filled with sand everywhere like any other place in the desert. His body was telling him it was right there, but he couldn't see any.
"Sh*t, is it buried?" he thought. He started moving away from the sand from the place he sensed the yang jade from. However, the sand would slide down from the pile he made, filling the hole again. It was slowing down his progress a lot.
He hadn't interacted with sand before and was really annoyed by what was happening. In the end, he started using more force to throw the sand further away such that it didn't go back into the hole he made.
After 10 minutes, he finally made a meter deep hole and jammed his arm through the rest. When he pulled his hands back out, he was holding a yang jade.
It was the second yang jade he had found after coming to the Forbidden Fields. He looked at the stone in his hands and sighed in relief.
"It's not a waste of time if I got at least 2 right?" he thought. He was breathing heavily now as the pressure from the surrounding was making him feel as though he really was nothing but a mortal.
His super-human abilities from being a body cultivator were questionable at best right now.
He took out his sword and looked at it. The metal sword no longer had the same edge as it did when he first got it and was full of dents and chips on it.
"Even my sword is almost as destroyed as I feel," he said. He used his spiritual sense and barely managed to send the yang jade into his storage bag. The pressure was starting to catch up to his spiritual sense too.
"Damn, should I even go on anymore?" he thought. However, a familiar feeling arose inside of him. There was another yang jade nearby.
After a while of deliberation, he went to find that one as well. He fought another few monsters and managed to defeat them. However, the sword was getting more and more tattered and he didn't know how much longer it could hold on. He didn't know how much longer he himself could hold on.
However, there was one good outcome from all of this happening. Just like all the monsters in the desert, his body was getting stronger as well.
It was very slow and annoying, but he was cultivating his body right now. The pressure was making him cultivate his body. It didn't have the same efficiency as his body cultivation with Pearl, and he doubted that anyone could start body cultivating here just like that without at least having a muscle tempering body.
But, if one did have that, they could do it.
Alex could sense one more yang jade a little further away. He didn't want to go there, but it was close enough that he didn't care about the dangers.
He walked towards it and slowly felt that the feeling wasn't getting stronger at all, no matter how close he got to it. The yang jade was right in front of him now and he still didn't have an increased feeling of wanting it.
The pressure was crashing on him harder than ever, but that was not what was causing this loss of want for the yang jade. No, it was actually another feeling of want coming deep inside from him.
This one was similar to how he felt around yang jades but far stronger than any. He could tell that it was somewhere far away in the north, and even then… the feeling of wanting it was much stronger than the yang jade right in front of him.
"Just what is there?" he thought in awe as he looked to the north. It was around 1 am at night, and he couldn't see clearly, but he was sure he could see nothing in that direction even if he wasn't suppressed all around right now.
He picked up the yang jade and unconsciously started walking forward, but then he stopped.
"What am I doing?" he thought. He shook himself out of the intense want his body was making him feel, and started walking back in fear.
"What the hell is there that is making me do things against my will?" he spoke in fear. He immediately turned around and started running in the opposite direction.
Once he was sufficiently far away and could barely feel it anymore, he stopped. The previous time he was here, the yang jades were masking its location, but now without the yang jades, he could feel the small sense of desire his body was giving off.
He could tell that whatever was there in the north was very good for him, but right now, it was very dangerous for him.
"I can't go there right now. I get suppressed the closer I get to the north and at some point, I will end up having to find a monster and d— "
Suddenly, he heard movements in the sand and looked back. Behind him were two pitch-black scorpions standing side by side. They had found themselves a meal.