283: Chapter 284 Paradise of Monsters

After handling the traces left by the tomb raiders, Alice did not linger. She took a deep breath of the stale yet familiar air of the underground fortress—perhaps the last time she would ever breathe the scent of her homeland—and then, with a flicker of thought, she activated her skill.

【Sky-Riding Ice Shuttle】

This mythic grade displacement skill, originally from Seraphina, was executed in her hands. There were no incantations, no complex casting gestures; the ambient temperature simply plummeted for an instant, and her petite figure seemed to merge into an invisible cold current, vanishing from the spot without a sound.

The next moment, the scene before her eyes turned upside down.

The oppressive, dim underground space, filled with dust and the scent of antiquity, was instantly left behind. In its place was a vast field of vision, thin yet fresh air, and a shocking sight!

Alice appeared in the stratosphere, over twenty kilometers above the ground. Gale-force winds whistled past, blowing through her silver-white hair and dress. She instinctively steadied herself, maintaining her Divine Concealment status, and then, with immense curiosity, looked around.

She had expected to see an empty, boundless blue sky, perhaps with birds or drifting clouds. But the reality before her eyes far exceeded her imagination.

The sky was not empty.

Above, below, and all around her, in the vast airspace within her line of sight, countless buildings of all sizes were floating! These buildings were not floating chaotically but were distributed in an orderly fashion, as if following some invisible grid.

Most of them featured a style that blended classical Gothic with fantasy elements: towering spires, rounded domes, pillars carved with intricate patterns, arched windows inlaid with colored glass... Some individual buildings were as massive as mountains, while others were as delicate as models. They were connected to each other by transparent energy conduits, suspended corridors, or simply magical beams, forming an incredibly complex, three-dimensional, intertwined network of aerial cities.

The light here was exceptionally bright and constant. Alice looked up and saw a sun, even larger than the one seen on Blue Star and radiating a scorching white light, hanging in a seemingly eternal position, casting its warm radiance upon this floating complex. Because these buildings appeared to be anchored by some powerful force and did not rotate with the planet below, for the residents living within, it seemed to be eternally daytime.

"They actually live in the sky?" Alice's clear, light blue eyes were filled with unbelievable astonishment. This was a scene never mentioned in her bloodline memories. In her understanding, the Vampire race was forced to hide deep underground to escape human hunting and sunlight. Yet, humans had actually developed to the point of building cities tens of thousands of meters high?

Lin Muyang was similarly attracted by this spectacular and strange sight.

"Is building cities at such an extreme altitude done to completely isolate from the ground? To pursue absolute tranquility and safety?" Lin Muyang's voice sounded in Alice's mind, carrying an analytical tone. "The idea is good, avoiding the vast majority of potential demonic creature threats on the ground. But the cost is also high; the transportation of living supplies, personnel movement, and energy supply would all become incredibly complex. It seems the magical civilization of this world has reached a quite high level in terms of levitation and energy technology."

He didn't feel much envy for this. The environment of his residence was not his primary consideration; he felt the layout of the Eternal Garden on the ground was very comfortable. This kind of floating city seemed more like a slightly helpless solution born under specific survival pressures.

Alice was in a state of Divine Concealment, which should logically be extremely difficult to detect. But neither Lin Muyang nor Alice dared to take it lightly. This world had developed for hundreds of years; who knew if there were some special detection magic, technological devices, or innate skills capable of seeing through stealth effects of nearly level 400? Better safe than sorry.

"Start the reconnaissance, Alice. Slow down and expand the range." Lin Muyang ordered.

"Yes, Master." Alice composed herself and focused. She extended both hands, palms upward, and silently recited profound incantations; this was the method to cast Gui Wanwan's skill, 【Nether Eye】. As she chanted, fist-sized, translucent, ghost-like pale gray eyeballs emerged silently from her palms, then drifted away in all directions—up, down, left, and right—like dandelion seeds scattered by the wind, without any pattern.

Most of these Nether Eyes flew toward the deeper parts of the higher and farther floating building complexes, like invisible scouts, penetrating walls to record the internal scenes, resident activities, and energy flows. Another portion turned direction and plummeted rapidly toward the vast land below, which was obscured by clouds, like falling stars.

Through the images transmitted back by the Nether Eyes, a grander and crueler Atlantis World gradually took shape in the consciousness of Lin Muyang and Alice.

First was the estimation of the planet's scale. By comparing the flight distance of the Nether Eyes, the curvature of the continent's outline below, and some known geographical references, Lin Muyang quickly reached a preliminary conclusion: this planet, named Atlantis, had a diameter at least 1.8 times that of Blue Star! This meant its surface area was nearly four times that of Blue Star! Viewed from high altitude, oceans occupied about sixty percent of the area, and the remaining land was divided into several huge and irregularly shaped continents.

And the people living in these floating cities also had strength far exceeding the average level of Blue Star. Judging from the energy fluctuations captured by the Nether Eyes and the auras inadvertently revealed by those residents, even in this outer area, the energy level of any passerby walking on the transparent corridor made Alice feel shocked, generally above level 300! Among them, there was no shortage of individuals emitting heart-stopping fluctuations, whose strength was likely far beyond the Nation-Guarding Level Experts of Blue Star.

Even more puzzling was the city layout. In such a vast aerial domain, with many places clearly empty, why were these buildings constructed so densely, layer upon layer, as if afraid of wasting an inch of space? Moreover, these buildings were anchored by constant magical force fields and did not rotate with the planet. People living in them would forever face the sun in the same direction, losing the alternation of day and night... Was this really an ideal living environment?

Soon, an image transmitted back by a Nether Eye partially explained the possible reason for this layout.

That was at the edge of a relatively remote floating area where the buildings were lower and older. A huge transparent magic shield made of deep purple energy, like an inverted bowl, covered this area. And outside the shield, densely packed, there were hundreds of giant monster birds, with bodies comparable to small passenger planes, covered in ink-black feathers and eyes as red as blood, frantically attacking the energy shield!

Each pounce was accompanied by a harsh friction sound and violent ripples on the energy shield. The beaks and claws of these monster birds flashed with metallic cold light, and from time to time, they spat out corrosive shadow breaths, burning gusts of green smoke onto the shield.

"Around level 420... Mythical-grade Demonic Creatures, Shadow Rippers." Lin Muyang quickly determined the level and race of this group of giant birds through the detection ability attached to the Nether Eye. This level, if placed on Blue Star, would be enough to sweep through any force other than him and his young ladies, and it would be no exaggeration to call it a world-ending disaster.

What caught his attention even more was the situation inside the shield. In the buildings inside, there were many figures; many Class Transferees were gathered at the edge of the shield or on watchtowers, releasing various long-range attacks at the monster birds outside. Fireballs, ice spears, lightning arrows, holy light bullets... Colorful magic and skill lights flickered inside the shield, bombarding the monster birds, but most could only leave shallow wounds or were offset by the shadow energy on the monster birds' bodies. Their attacks had little effect on the thick-skinned and numerous monster bird flock.

These people's faces were full of anxiety and fear; some were using devices similar to communication crystals, seemingly calling for help urgently. Obviously, they could not solve this crisis themselves and were asking for reinforcements from more powerful entities or specialized defense troops.

"So that's it..." Lin Muyang understood. "The aerial city is not absolutely safe either. It will still be attacked by flying demonic creatures. The dense buildings are likely to concentrate defensive power, share the protective barrier, and reduce the defense area and cost. Not rotating with the planet may also be to maintain the stability of the barrier, or to always face a specific direction conducive to defense or energy absorption?"

Just as he was thinking, the Nether Eyes sent to the ground finally penetrated the thick clouds and transmitted the scene below.

And the scene he saw made even Lin Muyang, with his current state of mind, feel a strong shock, and even a hint of chill.

The ground.

The land that once nurtured the Atlantis civilization had now almost completely become a paradise for demonic creatures!

On the vast plains, herds of armored rhinoceroses as huge as hills were running, each step triggering tremors in the ground; the deep forests had long since changed beyond recognition, with trees twisted into hideous shapes, and shadow leopards, as swift as shadows and spitting poisonous mist, shuttling through the woods; from the continuous mountain ranges came deafening roars, and vaguely visible giant dragons with wings on their backs and bodies covered in magma were flying between their nests; in the turbid rivers, lakes, and seas, undercurrents were surging, and from time to time, tentacles comparable to ships or giant mouths full of sharp teeth protruded from the water surface...

Cities? Civilized settlements? Almost no traces of any scale could be seen. Occasionally, some broken walls could be seen, covered by vines and moss, telling the story of the demise from long ago. Only in a very few places were there some solitary, sturdy buildings resembling military outposts. These buildings usually occupied strategic terrain, were covered by powerful magic barriers, and inside were teams of high-level Class Transferees, generally above level 400 or 500. They were in a hurry and extremely vigilant, seemingly executing tasks of reconnaissance, collecting specific resources, or guarding a key node.

Lin Muyang even saw a team of about ten people, protecting a few young Class Transferees with significantly lower levels, carefully crossing a swamp covered in gray mist. The heavy armored warrior leading the team had a level exceeding 500; he held a giant shield, his eyes scanning the surroundings like a hawk, not daring to relax in the slightest. And those young people followed closely behind, their faces filled with a mixture of nervousness and excitement. They seemed to be looking for something—likely the entrance to a low-level secret realm suitable for these young people's levels.

"The ground has been completely occupied by demonic creatures." Lin Muyang's voice sounded in Alice's mind, carrying an unprecedented solemnity. "Humans were forced to migrate to the sky. No, perhaps not entirely migration, but more like a strategic contraction and defense."

He compared it with the current situation of Blue Star, and a sense of urgency rose in his heart. The humans of Blue Star currently still occupied most of the land; although the threat of demonic creatures was increasing, it was far from the desperate situation of Atlantis where the land was lost and they had retreated to the sky.

"The Atlantis World's Class Transferee civilization developed hundreds of years earlier than Blue Star, with richer resources, more advanced technology, and generally stronger individual strength. Even so, they were still forced to this step by demonic creatures..." Lin Muyang's thoughts raced. "The evolution speed of demonic creatures, or rather the version update pressure of this world, is likely much more intense than that of Blue Star. The growth speed of human Class Transferees generally seems unable to keep up with the pace of demonic creatures becoming stronger."

This was a dangerous signal. If Blue Star continued to develop along a similar trajectory, would it face the same situation hundreds of years later? Would the land be carved up by powerful demonic creature groups, and humans only able to huddle in limited aerial fortresses or underground cities to survive?

Of course, this would only happen if Lin Muyang hadn't appeared.

Alice was also silent, looking through the Nether Eye at the land under her feet—familiar yet strange, and now occupied by terrifying demonic creatures. This was once the place where her ancestors lived; although her race was later forced underground, the land had an attraction rooted in the bloodline for any living thing. Now seeing her home planet turned into this state, she felt a complex mix of emotions.