Just as Krune was about to move, something happened to his Elemental Meridians.
'Hum?'
Krune could feel that they were acting weird.
The others noticed that Krune stopped and asked.
"Is something wrong?"
Krune immediately replied.
"Oh, nothing. I just thought that I had sensed something, but it seems like it was my mistake."
They nodded, and they once again started to move in the Direction that the explorer team went.
Still, Feifei knew that it definitely wasn't just that, so she asked Krune with Divine Sense message. Different from the others, Krune's Tribulation Lightning layer doesn't stop hers from entering. This is something that Light Spirit had taught Krune how to do a long time ago already.
"What was it?"
Instead of answering, Krune made a question.
"Have your Elemental Meridians start to act weird?"
Feifei focused on her Meridians and then shook her head.
"Nope. There is nothing wrong at all."
Krune pondered a bit and then said.
"Weird, my meridians are acting strange."
"Strange how exactly?"
Krune focused on his Meridians once more and paid attention to them for a few minutes.
"How can I say it, it seems like they are excited. As if there is something here that can't help but wish for."
"Wish for? Like what?"
Krune couldn't answer that question.
"I have no idea, this is the first time they act like that. I really can't tell what is happening, but I can at least say where they are pointing me at."
Krune looked ahead and continued.
"It's the same direction as the explorer team is moving."
Feifei pondered a bit and said.
"Do you want to go take a look? It's not like we must stay with our group or not. We aren't that close to start with."
Krune declined that idea.
"There is no need. I can tell that whatever it is, it's just way too far. We would need to travel several days without stop and even so I don't know if we would arrive there. For now, let's press forward with our group. If I notice something different, I will tell you."
Krune then thought about something else.
"Oh, right! How are your predictions in this realm? Is it really being suppressed?"
Feifei nodded.
"The level of this realm is too high, I can only see as far as a minute in the future. Not to mention that this is when I'm trying my hardest, which consumes a lot of energy. So I can't keep it going. I will refrain from trying it so that I can save energy in case a battle breaks out."
Krune nodded.
"That's good, being ready for a battle is a lot more important."
Suddenly, Rarol changed direction and dashed forward.
"Rarol, what is happening?"
He just laughed and said.
"My instincts tell me that I should move in this direction, so I'm just doing it. Hahahaha!"
Everyone looked at Tinnian, and he nodded.
"Trust Rarol's instinct. It definitely won't let our group down."
Everyone then followed Rarol for a few minutes. Finally, Krune saw something several kilometers in the distance with his Divine Sense.
"It's an Elemental Flower! Wait, not only one but 5 of them!"
Except for Feifei, everyone else looked at Krune surprised. They still haven't seen anything in their Divine Senses at all! But that didn't last long. Around a minute later, Tinnian was also able to see those 5 Elemental Flowers with his Divine Sense.
"It's true, I can see them. Those flowers just entered the range of my Divine Sense."
Instead of feeling happy, their group looked at Krune with weird expressions. Even Tinnian's Divine Sense was not a match for this guy called Jolk, and he is just at the Core Formation Realm! Just how much stronger will it be once he enters the Divine Soul Realm?
In fact, Feifei had noticed those flowers almost at the same time as Krune, but she didn't say anything.
They soon arrived at the place with those 5 Flowers. But they didn't collect it straight away. Instead, they looked at the area around it. Just as expected, there were quite a few Demon Beasts around protecting them.
"Three Divine Soul Realm ones. The strongest at the 3rd Stage while the other two are in the 2nd. It shouldn't be a problem for us to scare them away."
Their group had decided that unless necessary, they won't try to kill the beasts here. Killing them would spend a lot more energy, not to mention that once the demon beast is driven to a corner, it will definitely act recklessly. If something goes wrong, their group might get some serious injuries, or someone might even die.
Everyone quickly decided on a plan and immediately attacked. The demon beasts protecting the flowers obviously retaliated as well. At first, everything was going well. Krune was giving support to the group with his Flying Shields while the others attacked.
But once the demon beasts noticed that they didn't have a chance of winning, they went on a rampage and attacked disregarding anything else.
Tinnian greeted his teeth and said.
"What is happening here? Why are they not fleeing? Are those flowers so important to them that they decided to stack their lives to protect?"
Krune then replied.
"It doesn't matter. Since it came to this point, we can only finish off those demon beasts. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that they have no intelligence. Just focus on attack, all the defense will be performed by me alone."
They were surprised by what Krune said. Can he really protect them all alone? But to their surprise, Feifei, or better, Wulia Feier, immediately followed his plan.
Right after, Rarol laughed out loud and did the same.
"It's okay brother, my instincts say that he can really do it."
Tinnian sighed and then immediately attacked as well. He truly trusts his younger brother instinct more than himself.
Marshine and Filio didn't go all out like the other three at first. After all, they couldn't merely trust Jolk this easily as the other three. But the longer it took, the more surprised they felt. Let alone a struggle, it looked like Jolk was having an effortless time defending everyone against the berserk beasts with his Flying Shields.
With time, Marshine and Filio started to put more trust in Krune's defenses and increase their attack power. The battle continued for another 10 minutes or so when finally, the three beasts were neutralized. In the end, two of the beasts died while the strongest one couldn't stand up anymore.
But it didn't finish with just that. There were also several other demon beasts in the Core Formation Realm or below that immediately attacked after the Divine Soul Realm ones lost. Krune and everyone else was taken aback once more. It was evident that those beasts had no chance against their group, but threw their life away regardless.
Once everything was finally over, Krune's group was feeling quite tired.
Marshine looked at the corpses of the beasts around and couldn't help but say.
"What the hell was all of it? Are they some kind of suicide squad or something like that?"
Krune shook his head and said.
"We can think about it later, let's take the Elemental Flowers and leave this place first."
Everyone nodded, and they went forward to pick up the flowers. They had long since agreed on the order of taking them. Krune had offered himself to be the last one in the queue because of his cultivation while Feifei would be the one before him. In the end, he was the only one without an Elemental Flower.
Just as they finished collecting the flowers, something unbelievable happened. All the demon beasts, be the dead or the still alive ones, turned into specs of light. Those specs of light then entered into the ground and disappeared. Around a minute later, there wasn't even a shadow of a demon beast around them anymore.
Krune looked at that and finally understood.
"No wonder the demon beast put everything on the line to protect the Elemental Flowers. Their lives are directly connected to this land, and this connection is made through the Elemental Flowers. Now that we plucked them, they obviously returned to the land."
Marshine couldn't help but ask.
"Does that mean that those demon beasts had never been alive to start with?"
Krune pondered a bit and nodded.
"I believe so. I think we could consider them as being the same as the land itself. It's just a protection mechanism that the Elemental Path Dimensional Realm gave birth to protect the flowers. This also explains why the demon beasts here have no intelligence. They aren't real demon beasts to start with."
Everyone understood that getting the Elemental Flowers would be a lot harder than they thought.
After putting the flower away, they immediately departed. Still, the others couldn't help but feel someone embarrassed with this outcome, Krune was obviously the one who contributed the most to the previous battle. But he got no flower in the end.
Suddenly, Rarol greeted his teeth and said.
"Fuck this shit, I hate this feeling."
He then threw his flower to Krune.
"I will be the last one to take it. My conscience simply won't allow me to ignore the guy who contributed the most."
Krune was surprised by that. His impression of Rarol improved quite a lot after seeing his action. Still, he sent the flower straight back at him.
"I said that I would be the last in the flower taking queue, and I will keep my word. It doesn't matter what you say, I will not take you or anyone else's flower."
Rarol wanted to complain, but Feifei stopped him.
"Nothing that you say will change his mind. Just make sure that you will help when we find the next batch. Not to mention that it was thanks to your heaven-defying instincts that we found this batch anyway. Let's just move forward and collect more of them."
Rarol looked somewhat displeased but put his Flower back in his spatial ring again.
Just as everyone was about to leave, Krune's Elemental Meridians started to act weird again. Right after, some of those specs of light left the ground under Krune and immediately entered his body, or better, his Elemental Meridians. It happened so fast that only Krune and Light Spirit noticed it in the end.
'What the hell?!'