The Flying Swallow Archipelago had always been remote, but only after crossing nearly half the Northern Sea did Luo Chen fully understand just how isolated it was. There were virtually no prosperous sea regions nearby, and the surrounding waters held few spirit veins capable of supporting powerful cultivators. Humans and demons alike rarely had reason to venture so far.

For years, the merchant caravan established under Luo Chen's name had been the archipelago's only reliable connection to the more prosperous parts of the Northern Sea. Without it, the islands might have remained almost entirely cut off from the cultivation world. That very isolation had allowed Yan Nantian to hide there for so long without being discovered by Devil's Snare.

The barren waters were not the only reason few people came this way. Beyond the archipelago stretched the Southern Ocean, a huge expanse perpetually shrouded in black mist. Its water touched the Northern Sea, the Southern Frontier, and the Eastern Wilderness, yet almost no one dared cross it. Some suspected the mist was the poisonous miasma of the Gu worms drifting from the Southern Frontier side. Others believed it came from the Nether Abyss in the Eastern Wilderness and carried the chill of the dead. No one knew the truth, and among those who entered, few returned to provide an answer.

One day, a lone figure slowly appeared upon the horizon where the Southern Ocean met the Northern Sea. The figure was clad in white robes bound with a crimson sash, and his long hair was tied neatly behind him. His eyes remained calm as he studied the black mist ahead, though a fierce light smoldered beneath that stillness.

Beyond the fog lay the road back to the Eastern Wilderness. The mist drifted across the sea like a curtain separating two worlds, and as Luo Chen stood before it, he felt as though he had reached the boundary between life and death.

He drew a slow breath, then swept his sleeve, forcing open a path through the black mist. He stepped inside, and the sea breeze stirred in his wake....