A thunderous boom split open the sky.

The five travelers spilled from a rent in midair, tumbling like loose stones before catching themselves above a sprawling range of jade-green peaks.

“So this is the Hundred-Beast Range?” Leopold asked, steadying his sword-calloused hands against the wind.

Vermilion Demon Lord hovered beside him, crimson pupils narrowing while he surveyed ridge after ridge of untamed wilderness.

All around, the land pulsed with life: distant avian shrieks carried on the wind; somewhere below, something enormous pounded through a valley, each footfall shaking loose pebbles from cliff walls. In the vault of heaven, a shadow with wings wider than a house glided past the sun.

Yet what drew every gaze lay to the northwest. Nearly a thousand miles off, a column of black-red resentment energy spiraled upward, and beneath it rolled the unmistakable thunder of battle-steel on fang, spell on spell.

“Not good!” Winslow muttered, face turning ashen. “That’s Myriad Beast Valley. Malevolent Path Hall is already attacking it!”