Rise Of The Worm Sovereign

Having found Yu Guowei, Shirong finally started to ask him what he wanted to.

"So what is it that's exactly going on? Something that the king or the others don't know?" Shirong questioned.

"Umm… I am rather clueless as well, young master. Whatever the king told you is accurate, and I know the same as well. I've already contacted our other informants in the Burrow light kingdom and the Bing Kingdom; the information I got from them matches the intel we have right now." Yu Guowei spoke.

Hearing this, Shirong furrowed his brows. He didn't know, but the entire thing made him feel strange and as if something was missing.

"Though, young master, what happened to your mission? There was no contact with you and after the fire, I assumed the worst." Yu Guowei questioned.

"The mission is completed and I know why uncle Quan died." Shirong answered.

"You do? How?!" Yu Guowei asked hurriedly.

Even he himself was every curious and wanted to know how someone as strong as Ji Quan could go missing and then die. It was not like the man was some inexperienced junior that was lucky to break through to the Nascent Soul realm early on.

No… he was once a Dao Shell realm cultivator and was over three hundred years old. He had plenty of experience and knowledge and thus there was little chance that something could have caught him off guard.

And since Ji Quan had died in an area that was under the administration of Yu Guowei, the Ji clan was always breathing down his neck. If it were not for his good record and that the clan found no signs of foul play, they might have just decided to get rid of him as a means to vent their anger.

And hearing that Shirong went missing did not do well for him. That was also the reason why he had hesitated in contacting the Ji clan, which he should have done the moment the fire started.

"I can't tell you the details as they are a bit confidential and need to go through the clan first, but I can tell you this much… whatever caused the fire… it is linked with the death of uncle Quan." Shirong replied.

Hearing this, Yu Guowei was startled. If something as strong as a Dao Treading realm beast was involved in this, then he could understand how Ji Quan managed to die in the Dread Coil marsh.

But this also reminded him of another thing.

"Wait, Young master! Did you encounter any ruins there?" Yu Guowei questioned before quickly taking out something from his storage ring.

Shirong was a bit surprised upon hearing about ruins from Yu Guowei and wondered how he knew about that. But he waited for him to show whatever the man wanted to show him right nows.

Yu Guowei took out what looked like a long scroll from his spatial storage treasure. The scroll was a meter wide and about ten meters long when fully unrolled. 

"See this young master? Were there any such markings there in the ruins?" Yu Guowei asked, while pointing to the unrolled scroll.

Shirong saw that on the scroll, several markings and patterns were printed down. They weren't written but looked like someone had taken a charcoal rubbing of some monolith. Shirong furrows his brows and observed the markings.

A few seconds later, his eyes went wide as he recognized several of them.

"Where did you get these?" Shirong questioned.

"One of the informants got this from the Jiao Dian city in the Bing kingdom." Yu Guowei answered.

"Jiao Dian city? Wasn't that city burned down?" Shirong questioned, feeling doubled.

"Yes, young master. The Bing kingdom sent out multiple people to investigate it, among which was one of our informants as well. The city does not exist anymore and is reduced to less than rubble.

The rocks and stones around it have melted, not to mention the rest of the things. But the thing is when they went further deep, they found something strange underneath everything.

A few of the cultivators including our informant, were at the Nascent soul realm and thus used their stronger spirit sense to probe the ground, discovering that there was actually a hollow space below.

After some difficulty excavating, they managed to unearth what looked like ruins. They were in a horrid state, but they still managed to find several things. These markings were something he obtained there as well and he took them himself so there is no chance of manipulation." Yu Guowei explained.

Hearing this, Shirong felt even more strange. While he did know that the fire in the Jiao Dian city and the one in the Dread Coil Marsh were somehow linked, he did not know exactly how.

"Did they find anything else?" Shirong questioned.

"Most of the ruins were severely affected by the heat, either crumbling under it or directly melting. Even the rubbing we obtained was only cause it was taken from a pillar that was buried deep within other pillars and thus it managed to survive.

But yeah, in addition to this, the informant also mentioned that some of the kingdom's people found a few fragments of what looked like statues. We were unable to figure out what they were but one of the fragments looked like a beak." Yu Guowei said before taking out another scroll.

"Here's the sketch of that fragment," Yu Guowei stated.

Shirong looked at the small sketch which was of a beak and instantly recognized it.

'Isn't this the same as that bird beast statue from the temple?' Shirong thought.

"I asked you this since I found it to be related to what young master just said. If the cause of Elder Ji Quan were related to the disaster at the Dread Coil marsh, and the fire in the Jiao Dian city was said to have been made by the same beast, I reckoned you must have seen or known something more about this." Yu Guowei answered.