“What the hell happened to you?” Exclaimed Yu Xiang in a perplexed tone.

The cause of his outburst was one Su Rong, currently standing before him and covered from head to toe in a shiny slimy goop that was slowly dripping down onto the scorching sands of the desert.

“One of the big bastards swallowed me whole.” He bit out with a scowl, trying his best to keep any of the Earth Dragon juice to fall into his mouth. “I had to carve my way out of its stomach with no way to tell left from right and front from back.”

Lin Fen was crouching at his side, casually scooping some of the viscous liquid from the gruff cultivator’s robes and into a small crystal vial. “Would you like me to cleanse it off?” He inquired softly as he finished gathering more samples.

The fiery cultivator grunted an affirmative, his face slacking somewhat in relief.

Relief that was suddenly and brutally chased away as Lin Fen summoned a silvery orb of flames above his hand, plunging it directly into Su Rong’s body.

“Wait wait! What are you-” A low pitched ‘fwoosh’ of crackling flame overpowered the rest of his sentence, lingering for just a moment before winking out of existence, leaving behind only a sparkling clean Su Rong, frozen in place with his eyes clenched tightly shut.

Yu Xiang put a hand on the taller boy’s shoulder in an amicable gesture of solidarity. “There you go! None of that disgusting goop got away!”

The dark haired young man let out a long exhale from his nose, slowly unclenching every muscle of his wound up body- His eyes opened then, with a scathing glare directed into the far distance, his jaw working quietly as seemed to chew on some pointed words before he thought better of it.

“Why do I put up with you people?” He asked rhetorically.

The shorter cultivator favored him with his most jovial and congenial smile, squeezing his shoulder once to show his support to his fellow disciple.

“Convenience.” Yu stated matter of factly, the smile never slipping from his face. “That, and because you could always use the connections.”

Su Rong eyed him wearily, having grown mostly used to his dry and blunt humor yet still not entirely knowing when he was or wasn’t being serious. “I liked you better when you pretended to be polite, if I have to be honest.”

“Sucks to suck.” The green eyed cultivator shot back immediately.

>>>

It only took them a few more hours after their momentary run in with the desert’s fauna to reach their destination, stepping into an encampment of cultivators from all over the continent that had been erected at a safe distance from the entrance to the tomb, which looked positively massive from up close.

Men and women of all ages and all sizes strolled around between the tents and improvised stalls set up at the center of the temporary town, a makeshift bazaar rising up from the desert sands as cultivators yelled just like mortal merchants trying to get the attention of the passersby.

Robes of countless combinations of colors hanged from disciples from all the sects of the continent, only a fraction of which was Yu Xiang able to recognize.

Some of the cultivators present didn’t even wear proper sect robes, which the young reincarnator assumed meant that they were stray cultivators. He’d even seen a few monks scattered around the camp, looking starkly different from how he’d imagined them.

The dark cowls were there, but instead of shiny chrome domes atop aged faces, he saw young men with fairly mundane hairstyles, sporting carefree smiles and chatting just like any other person.

Weird.

The green eyed cultivator shook his head, it's not like he even knew anything about their orders or monks in general, aside from a few nuggets of information remaining from his previous life, so for all he knew they were completely normal.

Another perplexing sight was found in the middle of the bazaar, where cultivators of vastly different strengths, of both background and cultivation, haggled to their heart's content with nobody ever getting pushed around.

Surprisingly enough, it was Su Rong who explained what was going on to him.

"Look there." He told him, motioning subtly with a nod of his head toward a shadowy corner of the camp, just behind one of the rough stalls.

An old man was standing there, looking bored and leaning idly on an old weathered table, his eyes scanning the crowd of cultivators busy buying and selling goods and interesting knick knacks.

"That's a guard, and you'll find a bunch more here and there. Cultivators who are strong enough to make anyone who would want to start something think twice before committing, and who can crack a couple heads if needed." The fiery cultivator spoke as if he was familiar with the practice, and after a second thought, Yu came to the conclusion that that was probably the case. He was born in a corrupt city run by cultivators after all, it would make sense that the folks in charge would want someone making sure nobody messed with their profits.

Still, there wasn't a single authority lording over this nomadic conglomerate of sects and independents, so who could have put those guards in place?

Huang Lei graciously explained that one to him, her war fan gently blowing cool hair against her face as she guided him through the political powerplays and connections that permitted this encampment to exist with little to no trouble.

"There are ancient agreements at play here," She'd said in her usual airy and alluring cadence, her clear eyes scanning the crowds in search of something or someone, probably members of her natal sect, or so assumed the young reincarnator. "Pacts that have been in place for longer than all of our years put together and then some, agreed on by enough of the major players of the continent that nobody is fool enough to test just how far they're willing to let things slide." She smiled at him then, a glint of mischief shining through her expression. "Or at least nobody who is still alive at this time."

Yu Xiang got the message. Don't start shit where the big boys wanted there to be peace, or risk getting erased from existence by an angry hidden guard. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

After a quick few hours spent exploring the rows of tents, Yu and his companions returned to their sect's part of the camp, where three enormous bright red tents rose up from the sands, dwarfing the more mundane shelters with sheer size.

One of the canvas dwellings housed the inner disciple that had been chosen or paid for their place in the expedition, while another one was reserved for the few core disciple who had acted as chaperones for the group.

The last tent, standing right between the other two, was restricted for the Golden Prince's use, alongside the elder that had come with him and, naturally, Yu and the other disciples chosen by Hui Chen.

Thank the Heavens for preferential treatment, hey?

The rest of their time before the opening of the Blood Iron Tomb was spent mostly resting and consolidating their cultivation for the coming struggle, with a hard ban placed on the active gathering of ambient spiritual energy due to the unnatural state of the energy inside the desert.

The green eyed cultivator didn't need to be told twice, he didn't fancy becoming as malformed as those ugly Earth Dragons.

It was right in the middle of a pleasant nap that the time finally came, interrupting an intriguing dream where Yu was busy getting to know a beautiful pair of twins...

The young reincarnator cursed up a storm as his world started to shake, dislodging him from his plush cot and landing him face first in the sand, the inviting lips of a jade beauty replaced with a mouthful of hot sand.

"What the hell was that?" He grouched out loud. "Was someone actually dumb enough to start shit in the middle of the camp?"

"No." Cut in the young heir, his voice filled with solemn gravitas. "These tremors are a sign that the tomb is going to open soon."

His gaze swept over them.

Yu Xiang. Lin Fen. Su Rong. Huang Lei. And Feng Liu, who had been far more reserved and distant lately.

"Make your last preparations, this is your final chance to come up with something to help you during the coming tribulations." His gaze was like steel, cutting through their minds like the sharpest of blades, the air around him pushing down on them with no need to exert his aura, his raw charisma was more than enough.

Yu's emerald orbs met the Golden Prince's, who nodded at him in satisfaction when he didn't flinch back. "Leave your doubts and fears here, because they will only hold you back one you step foot inside that place."

"Steel your resolves, harden your hearts and go forth!"