The ascent was anything but smooth. The moment they broke into the cloud sea, flocks of flying beasts surged out like shadows with talons. Eagle-shaped, grim-faced, broad as sails, their pounding wings whipped up gale-force winds.

They were Corpse Eagles, a kind of fiend-beast. Not strong, but many as raindrops in a squall, and every one of them mean.

They clearly didn’t want anyone near the crown. They swarmed Xinyin, Celia Maya, and Wansheng like storm-thrown leaves.

On a normal day, Xinyin alone could swat a flock aside like dust. Not here. The isolation barrier was a lantern flame in a drafty room within this anti-magic field. If they struck back, that flame would snuff out.

So they turtled up. They dodged beak and claw from all directions like reeds yielding to current, and they kept the barrier alive.

They looked up. The crown’s shadow grew clearer, yet it still hung a cliff away. The higher they climbed, the thicker the anti-magic pressure pressed like deep water. Add the Corpse Eagles’ dive-bombs, and frustration jammed in their chests like a stone.

“Xinyin, Wansheng, this won’t work. Got any ideas?”

Celia Maya wasn’t born for battle magic. Her light shone in healing and warding, the soft rain and the sturdy wall. She’d been shouldering most of the barrier work all the way up.

“Mm. Tough one. The anti-magic binds us like chains, and we still have to deal with those birds…”

Wansheng’s brows knotted. Even with strength at the Zenith of Law Realm, she didn’t dare bulldoze out through the flock.

She could feel it—the Primordial Source in the anti-magic field thickening like mist at dawn. To shrug it off and erase the flock in a breath? Unless Holy Voice and Wanling were here, there was no path forward.

“Wait. What if we use bait?”

Xinyin’s eyes lit, a spark in the fog. “We lead them off with something they crave.”

“That could work. But do you have their favorite Immortal Spirit Fruit?” Celia asked, voice low as a breeze.

“…No. That’s a high-grade divine herb. You don’t just pluck those from a roadside bush.”

Even if she had one, her heart would bleed to waste it as bait. The thought pricked Xinyin like a thorn.

“It’s fine. I’ve got something more tempting.”

Reluctant as someone parting with a family heirloom, Wansheng pulled out a vial of Supreme Divine Elixir. Her face was all knots and sighs. Thankfully, Holy Voice had stocked her and Wanling well.

“Using something that precious as bait… that’s painful, isn’t it?”

Even though it wasn’t hers, Xinyin winced harder than Wansheng. It felt like tossing pearls to a hungry sea.

“You can’t snare a wolf without risking a lamb.”

Decision made, Wansheng flicked the cap open. Fragrant medicine rose like spring wind, and the entire flock went mad, their eyes hooked to the vial like starving beasts on a carcass.

It was a Supreme Divine Elixir, top of the world’s ladder. One drop could turn fate like a river bend. How could beasts not go feral for it?

“Good. Now scram!”

Jaw set, Wansheng hurled the vial downward like a falling star. The Eagles didn’t hesitate. The whole sky poured after it, and silence washed back in like a tide.

“Alright. No time to waste. We speed up.”

Wansheng fed more power into the barrier. The light steadied like iron heated and tempered, and their flight surged forward.

“Mm. We can’t waste that elixir.”

All Xinyin could do was help Celia keep the barrier spinning like a well-tuned wheel. Worse things than Corpse Eagles waited above, but the lure of the Supreme Divine Elixir was a bonfire. Everything with wings dove after it.

Ten-odd minutes later, with speed rising in steps, Wansheng, Xinyin, and Celia Maya slipped through clean air and reached the crown.

…

The crown’s vista stole a breath like cool tea. All around, thick floating clouds rolled like silver fields. Branches and leaves of the giant tree veiled and unveiled within that sea, blending with the dusk sky as if stitched by a painter’s brush. It felt close enough to touch.

Evening had come. Orange light soaked into the pale clouds, dyeing them with a hushed flame. Emerald leaves took the glow and threw it back, bright as polished jade.

Beasts roosted everywhere. Nests riddled the crown like stars across a night river. No wonder the Corpse Eagles had blocked them; territory sings loud in a place like this.

The crown sprawled wide, big as most of the Town of the Dead. With obstacles piled thick as underbrush, finding a small Magic Crystal was fishing a needle from the sea. And the crystal might not even be here.

“The view’s gorgeous,” Celia breathed, as honest as clear water. Then her brows pinched. “But searching a place like this? We’ve got about two and a half hours left.”

“The real snag is we can’t fix the crystal’s location,” Xinyin said, voice steady but tight. “The condition of ‘the lowest place’ isn’t met.”

She looked to Wansheng. “Do we have to comb the entire crown?”

“No. First, we map the place in broad strokes,” Wansheng said, calm as a mountain. “Watch the small details.”

They spent fifteen, twenty minutes circling. The wind told no secrets. No clues surfaced.

By then, the beasts who’d chased the elixir drifted back like soot after a burn. Different this time: no charge, no shriek. With so many nests around, they held their claws.

Seeing no fresh attacks, the three let out the breath they’d been gripping. Fighting here would be a millstone. Keeping the barrier spinning already wrung them dry.

There was another reason for the quiet—Wansheng’s Zenith of Law Realm aura hung over the crown like thunderheads. The beasts felt it and kept their distance.

After a minute or two of stillness, the ranks across from them parted. A Harpy Queen stepped out, woman’s face and eagle’s body, her bearing regal as a cresting wave. The surrounding beasts bowed with their eyes. Her standing here was high.

“You two are Dragon Kin, yes? And the esteemed Artifact Spirit. What brings you to our crown?”

Her voice was a bell, clear and pleasant.

“We’re looking for the Magic Crystal to power the teleportation array at the exit,” Wansheng said, straight as a blade. “Do you know anything related?”

“I see. If it’s the Magic Crystal, I’m afraid there’s nothing like that here.”

She shook her head, then paused, as if a memory fluttered past. “For the generosity of using a Supreme Divine Elixir as bait, here’s a hint—the Magic Crystal is far as the horizon, yet close at hand.”