Rumble…!
The heavy gate grinding along the ground's surface caused the area to tremble as it was slowly pushed open by Leon with brute strength.
Aria smiled shortly before following after Darlene.
Her husband was right.
Regardless of the truth that lies at the end of Primal Chaos, it did not matter to them. What's important is to grow strong and overcome the tribulations of life.
As Darlene followed behind Leon closely, she was confused about the entire topic. The subject seemed too advanced for her to follow along.
Even so, she understood one thing from Aria and Leon's discussion—that the world was ending, supposedly.
"Is the universe really ending? How do we even know that?" Darlene inquired doubtfully before saying, "I didn't even know that was possible…"
"You can say that we have overestimated the universe's ability to live long years and have forgotten the fragility of life. We, as humans, should have known about that best, but I guess everyone didn't expect the universe to be included. So yeah, Primal Chaos is coming to an end," Leon replied.
"I have seen the dimension crack that will eventually bring death to this world and the rest of Primal Chaos at the center. On the other side of it lies an endless sea of chaos that swallows all material existence, reducing them to nothingness."
"When did you get the time to go there?" Darlene's eyes widened with surprise at Leon's claim before quickly adding, "Is that even possible?"
"Physically, hard to say. At least, at our current level, it is not possible to go there," Leon shook his head and said, "However, my soul has reached a certain level of quality to come in contact with the world's law and was summoned during my meditation."
"There, I also met two seniors, the Celestial Ruler of Gaia, Celestial Earthshaker, and a much older World Tree, Saint Voidflame."
Aria did not seem surprised hearing this as Leon has mentioned them to her before.
However, Darlene was immediately taken aback before she looked at Leon doubtfully and asked, "Hubby, you… didn't fall asleep and dream all this up, right?"
"…"
Leon was speechless.
Nevertheless, Darlene suddenly felt cold from the quick drop in temperature, causing her body to shiver before Leon pulled her closer and kept her warm.
"Anyway, let's focus on this trial," Leon stated before saying, "A slight distraction could cost us our lives here. After all, this trial is supposed to possess some level of danger—but what kind of danger exactly, we will find out soon enough."
Bang!
The entrance suddenly shut tight behind them, sealing them inside the tomb and cutting off the little bit of light there was, plunging the tomb into darkness.
Snap!
Leon shortly snapped his fingers before a wisp of intense flames lit up on his index finger and reilluminated the dark space.
Despite his efforts to improve their visibility, their visions were shortly obscured by freezing cold mist flooding into their surroundings.
Aria and Leon easily resisted the cold, but Darlene had zero immunity to the cold with her regular physique, resulting in her body shivering again despite the warmth coming from Leon's body.
Leon frowned before erecting a mental barrier to ward off the freezing mist from contacting her body.
A few moments later, Darlene recovered from the cold and expressed her gratitude with a sneaky peck on the cheek before she shortly asked, "Where did all this cold mist suddenly come from?"
"We probably stepped on a formation plate upon our entry and activated some formations in this space," Aria stated, stealing the words right out of Leon's mouth just as he opened them.
Leon shook his head with a wry smile.
Nevertheless, the three of them continued to advance as the freezing mist became denser and denser, turning their field of vision into a blanket of whiteness.
At the same time, the temperature dropped to a terrifying degree which could instantly freeze a regular person.
Without the mental barrier protecting Darlene, she would have been in serious trouble.
As a layer of ice began to form over the surface of Aria and Leon's body, clothes, flesh, and all, Leon shortly paused his steps.
"This seemingly ordinary cold mist formation is turning into a bigger problem than I initially anticipated. I'm afraid that the power of this formation has already reach Tier-4 or possibly higher," Leon mentioned.
"If we cannot break free from this formation, we are going to be in trouble."
"Leon, I have a feeling there is more than just one formation running in this space. A cold mist formation to obscure our vision and possibly a confusion formation to mess with our sense of directions," Aria stated with a worried look.
"Right," Leon nodded and said, "The combination of these two types of formations that obscure our vision and mess with our directions seem to be a pretty standard formula in most tombs."
"Even the Divine Ice Phoenix Palace back in the Divine Realm have these two formations set up around their sect on a larger scale to ward off most cultivators from trespassing in their territory."
"I didn't expect this demon to be quite adept in the art of formations, though. So I'm a bit surprised and unprepared for this," Aria knitted her brows and said, "It's going to be difficult to break this formation."
"Yeah…" Leon nodded and calmly said, "I do have some attainment in formations but unraveling a formation is much trickier than creating one. Still, it's not like the situation has reached a desperate point. So there's no need to fret—yet."
Given the number of trump cards in his arsenal, Leon was not worried about their safety. If they could not overcome the formations, he could just take everyone inside the Worldspace.
Even so, if the first tomb they entered already has a difficulty of this level for their trial, how hard would the other tombs be?
"If I'm not wrong, this is only an Arch Demon-level tomb. The Eternal Night Secret Realm supposedly has Demon Lord-level tombs and Demon King-level tombs as well," Darlene informed as her eyes flickered with enlightenment.
It was most likely due to how difficult the tomb trials are that most tomb still has their functions and treasures intact despite the number of times the secret realm opened and people entering it.