historical

"It's nowhere to be found. Nowhere!"

Alec gritted his teeth. They were far away from where the fight was happening, but they could vividly feel every tremor. Some even caused him to stumble along with the ground.

He could see the giant pillar of brownish light, he could see the giant boulder hanging over the sky and slowly dropping.

All that made him realize that he never would have been able to face that monster. What was it?

The last time he came here, he fought the Phoenix, although it was different from what it was often described to be. Instead of a flaming body, it had azure feathers and was incredibly beautiful but also powerful. Its control of blue flames was amazing.

Its flame was able to burn out the fire cast by magicians. Hell, it was able to burn out even their magic energy and even the hardest metal.

Alec paused to look at his hand, remembering the warm embrace that clasped him when he came in contact with the bird's flame.

It was difficult to explain to someone else what he had felt–it was painful, very in fact but it made him feel warm, it made his heart warm, and tears rolled out his eyes without his knowing.

The hunters that were with him then thought that it just hurt that bad. Another person did not leave to tell the feeling he had. Everyone burnt by the flame died but Alec was sure they would have died a very peaceful death even though it was by fire.

He knew it by how he felt.

That was why he was thoroughly prepared this time, he would not fight the Phoenix and instead make Li Mingwu fight it. Even now, his plan was still the same.

Thanks to the gate anomaly there were a lot of ruins to his perfect plan but he didn't care. He was desperate and would give his life to see this succeed. Now all he just has to do is lead the Phoenix to Li Mingwu.

For a moment, he feared his plan but he braced himself up the next moment. It was going to be hard, not with the level of fight that was happening between Li Mingwu and the monk. The grounds and space were tearing in the wake of their attacks. Going near somewhere like that was suicidal.

Eric watched in silence as Alec gritted his teeth in anger, they were in a dark cave, compared to several other caves it wasn't that deep but was very high, carved at the very top of the only surviving cliff of the gate environment.

They had climbed to get to this place. Hard? Yes, but they were superhuman of some sort. Climbing was nothing to complain about.

This was where the bird was the last time, it was why Alec had come here straight up after leaving Li Mingwu to deal with the monster. And the Phoenix was nowhere to be seen.

It was nowhere in the gate too, where would it be? Half of the gate was already a barren land.

"Something is wrong. I can feel it in my gut"

Just as Alec spoke, Eric subtly caught a chirping sound. It wasn't something he would have easily heard due to the loud intermittent vibrations and the battle sound carried by the wind.

This was why he carefully turned to his left and focused, trying to get if his intuition is feeding him the right thought in this instance. Because it would be a fatal thing to give Alec false hope.

"What is wrong?"

Alec's voice wanders in its echoes alone. Eric focused and began to trace the rough wall of the cave. He was sure the sound came from the left but there was nothing. It was darker than usual and he had to strain his eyes to navigate through the darkness. But he still could not find anything.

Inside the cave was a bit wide but was also straightforward and had no other tunnel. So there were only two sides to the walls, either left or right. Not any particularly seen complicated pattern.

Eric traced forward, maybe it was just his imagination because he was already reached the end of the cave, where he was sure that the sound can't be coming from.

He sighed.

Just when he was about to give up, he heard again.

The chirp sound was this time, clearer. His face swung up immediately.

"There!"

He yapped, pointing to the bottom of the woven straw basket that was slightly protruding out of a crevice in the wall. The color of the straw basket was perfectly blending with the cave walls. It was amazing how Eric managed to sight them in the dark.

Seeing it as Eric pointed to it, Alec quickly moved closer, he had to stand on his toes to carefully bring out the basket but it was easy.

His eyes shone and glistened as he brought out the basket and saw what was within it.

Two little birds, one blue and one red. They looked thin and their feathers were scanty showing off their unattractive skin. Right now, they were generally attractive compared to the beautiful bird Alec encountered when he first came here.

But that didn't make them any less what they are.

"Two phoenixes..."

Alec muttered.

Just how lucky could he get? Plus, they were chicks.

Judging by the way they look, they had probably not eaten for days. It made sense to Alec why the big blue bird was very aggressive the moment they neared this cliff, they had not even started climbing when it attacked.

It was protecting its kids.

If they had not eaten for days that meant that the Pheonix had not been home for days.

Did someone kill it? Could it have been the monk?

A situation of a monster invading gate and killing the boss monster of the gate has never been recorded. It had never happened. So all this was still a hypothesis that was carefully playing out in Alec's head.

Anyways, this worked out for his good. He gained two things from this.

The feather and two phoenixes. This was a chance anyone would trade hundred of billions for. Indeed there was a blessing in this disaster.