They kept thinking but no idea came out, other than destroying it they didn't have other options at hand.
Yusa looked at it and said.
"The best way would be if we had a formation to stop the flow, it would not damage the gate while stopping any spiritual energy from entering."
Ao couldn't help but comment
"But we don't have any here at moment, the only way would be to go back to the city and see if we can acquire one, should we go back first?"
Krune and the other pondered a bit about it.
"It seems like our only option at moment, we shouldn't waste too much time just in case, we can also take this chance to buy a few things that might be necessary, we can even set up a cover, when we go back, we go to the guild and accept another mission for this Danger Zone, this way no one in the Headquarters or in Kaley City branch were we are registered will grow suspicious with our long time spent in here, Shinja is bound to a blood contract to protect me, so she following us is just obvious."
They nodded, that was indeed a good idea.
After concealing the entrance to the gate, they immediately moved back, this time they didn't stop for anything and moved at full speed, what had taken one week before, this time only took four days to arrive back at the city.
After arriving, they immediately parted ways, Shinja and Yusa went to buy a formation runestone to stop the flow of spiritual energy, Krune and Ao went to the guild to apply for a new mission inside the Raskie Danger Zone, they specially chose one that didn't look too easy but took a lot of time to complete.
They also bought two puppets each in case they have a need to send it to try some dangerous or suspicious place or situation.
The group also bought a few items that might be helpful and then gathered back at the city gate, this time they are really ready for what is coming.
"Shall we go?"
Everyone nodded and signed their departure at the entrance, after that they immediately moved straight away back to secret realm gate.
Another four days passed on the way back, as expected, no one found the gate entrance, which is obvious, it had been hidden down there for millenniums without anyone notice, let alone in just a little more than a week.
Once back inside, Yusa started to set up the formation runstone to stop the spiritual energy flow from the gate from passing through.
"It's ready, spiritual energy has stopped, I bought a Four Stars spiritual energy lock formation runestone this time, it was very expensive, this secret realm is better give me a good return."
Krune asked something
"How long will the runestone formation last?"
"Five days, this should be more than enough for us to deal with the illusion core I believe."
They nodded and moved back to the core of the illusion formation.
Yusa and Shinja took a look and said
"It is still working fine, but that is to be expected, we have just cut of the flow of spiritual energy, it will take some time for the spiritual energy inside to be used as well."
Krune then said.
"Let's attack the barrier, it won't break but will still accelerate the spiritual energy consumption, the fast we finish it the better."
Everyone accepted the idea and started attacking it while managing their spiritual energy, they would use at most 30% to 40% of their spiritual energy before sitting down and recover it to their peak, in case something happen they will still be in shape to battle.
Time passed and it had already been a day since they started to attack the barrier, by now it was already very dim, it wouldn't be long before it broke and they got access to the core formation, finally, after a lot of effort, the barrier disappeared.
Only then could they destroy the core of the formation, but before that Krune asked.
"Do we need to destroy it? Can't we simply take it away and put in our spatial rings?"
Shinja shook her head.
"The core of a formation is one with the formation itself, you would need to be able to keep the entire formation in you spatial ring to be able to take it away, unless you knew how to deactivate it of course."
Krune shook his head, he has absolutely no idea how to do that, he was hopping to take it back to sell in the city later, it probably is worth quite some spirit stones even if it is a relic from thousands of years ago.
'Maybe I should try to join the formations guild too, it could come in hand in a situation like this is the future.'
Since that was the case, they immediately attacked together, it showed some resistance but still broke apart in the end, it wasn't made for fending off attacks in the first place anyway.
As soon as the formation core was broken they felt like the part of the city where they were started to tremble, they immediately went up to check what was happening, when they got outside they noticed that the landscape changed, not only that, but an enormous amount of spiritual energy rushed at them, it was several times higher than what they had outside, it would be worth even if they simply stopped to cultivate here.
The city that looked the same before now seemed completely different, Krune jumped over a build and looked in the distance.
"I can see the end of the city now, on the opposite side should be the city center, where you wanna go first?"
Yusa immediately said
"To the center of course, we already spent so much time and we are still in the same place, if there is something good, it's definitely there."
The other also agreed with that, but then Krune asked.
"What if this is not the only illusion formation covering this city? We were lucky that we entered that formation through its spiritual energy source, so it was easy to find the core, but it won't happen next time."
This time it was Shinja that answered.
"No need to worry, we can use our communicators map function to escape the next ones, before, we couldn't do that because we could only put markers inside of the formation, so it was useless to use it to escape outside, but if the marker is outside, then it's easier, we just need to follow it to leave the formation, even though it will look like that we are walking in circles, in fact we will be moving straight forward outside the formation."
Krune and the other agreed with that, if they could use the markers to find the way back to the gate, then they can use it to escape the next ones.
"Alright, let's go then."
They put down the markers in the map function of their communicators and immediately moved in the direction of the city center, with no illusion formation to hinder their path they finally could see differences in the city the further they moved in.
After moving during two days, they could see a gigantic wall ahead, they could have got here much faster, but to be safe they moved slowly until they got to this place, even so they still fell inside another two formations, but thanks to the markers that they were leaving on the way, it was very easy to leave them, illusion formations are not barriers, they don't stop people from moving out as long as they are moving in the right direction.
That wall seemed to separate the commoner's city from the center, it was very well conserved, it didn't look like it had suffered with all the time that had passed at all, for normal people it would be impossible to simply climb to the top, but not for foundation establishment cultivators like them, it was way too easy, but when they finally got close to the wall, they finally found the first living being, or better, not exactly a living one, but a puppet, and there was several of them at that, they seemed to be patrolling the wall on its top.
"What should we do, try to barge in without they noticing?"
Krune shook his head.
"Those puppets don't seem to be weak, although we probably can deal with a few of them it would be troublesome if we are found and we were attacked by all of them together, I don't think that their order are to attack anyone they see, it seems like they are just there to stop people for entering without permission, since that's the case, there should be a gate somewhere in this wall, we better go there and check things first."
Yusa and the others nodded and started to follow the wall, on the way, Krune showed himself in front of those puppets to check his theory, the puppets looked at him from the top of the wall but didn't do anything, after Krune left they went back to their patrolling.
"As expected, it seems like that the orders that they received a long time ago is still valid, protect the wall, don't let anyone without a permission pass, that should be basically it."
Yusa looked at that and couldn't help but be surprised.
"There is so many of them, how come they are still working after so much time have passed."
Ao answered that.
"That's not hard to imagine, since they have so many puppets, they might have other puppets specialized in repairs of other puppets like themselves, as long as a source of spiritual energy is available for them to recharge, they are practically immortals."
Krune and the other agreed with that idea, unless the cultivators inside are still alive and repairing the puppets themselves, this could be the only explanation.
It only took then a little more than an hour to arrive at the gate, just like the wall, the gate was also enormous, but it didn't matter, what mattered is that it was also guarded by puppets, there was no signal of life anywhere.
They approached the gate and the puppets that were covered in dust due to the long time without moving came back to life, they formed a line in front of the gate and looked straight away at Krune's group.
It was obviously that they wouldn't let their group pass, but they weren't moving to the gate anyway, but to a building beside it, this building was different from the others in the city behind them, it was very well maintained and a few puppets could also be seen inside. They entered the building and were all extremely alert, if something happened they would flee straight away and think about another way after.
"If we are not wrong this should be the place where we can get a register to go inside, just like any other city outside, so we shouldn't be attacked, but keep your guard up just in case."
They moved slowly and reached a balcony where a puppet was sit, the puppet looked at them and spoke with a robotic like voice. But Yusa and the others face immediately changed.
"I don't understand a single word at all!"
Ao commented.
"That is to be expected, this is a place from several thousand years ago, it would be weird if they spoke the same language as ours."
"What should we do?"
But before they could even thinking about a way, Krune went forward and spoke with the puppet in the same language, Shinja and the others looked at him as if they had seen a ghost.
Krune looked at them and said.
"He is asking our names, local of origin and how long we intend to stay inside."
Ao and the others jaw dropped.
"How can you understand their language? Have you seen these things before?"
Krune shook his head.
"That's why you should study more, back in the guild I had to cultivate during the night, but doing that alone was a waste of time, so while I cultivated I also studied the contents available on the network, I intend to one day leave this planet, so I downloaded a lot of different languages available in the system for me to study, this puppet just so happen to be talking one of those hundreds of languages that I memorized."
Hundreds of languages… While cultivating on top of that!
They could only think.
'It would be great if his EQ was as good as his IQ.'