I took off at full speed, chasing after the animals ahead to find out what they were up to. I flashed through the forest with the wind hitting me from all directions. I ran straight for an hours without rest but I still had the strength to keep going, but I was starting to feel hungry. It didn't take me long to hunt down a small beast, eat it, and continue venturing deeper.
I didn't come across any high-level beasts which seems like they were all heading in the same direction, and their speed was top notch. Maybe I couldn't even catch up to them in a week. I kept going, stopping now and then to eat again before continuing my journey, running deeper and deeper. Like that, a week passed.
But eventually, I caught up. When I looked at my map, I saw something I could not wrap my hands on. The map was full of dots, showing that the place ahead was packed with beasts but still a bit far from where I was. But what could make all these violent and savage beasts head in the same direction?,
Isn't that going to be bloody, the strong killing the weak? Or is there something so valuable that they are willing to risk their lives just to be there?,
I had to find out what it was.
I pushed forward with even more speed, and I could see I was closing the distance between me and the beasts. It wouldn't even take a day before I reached the location they were heading towards.
Now I was standing on a cliff, looking down. All those dots I saw earlier on the map were right below me. From where I stood, the beasts looked like tiny dots because of how far away they were. The whole area was packed—no empty space at all.
Now that I was close enough, I could see a huge stone cave standing in front of the beasts, separate the northern part from the southern part. The stone was massive, and I could clearly make out its structure even from far away. It looked like it pierced the sky. But strangely, I wasn't sensing anything precious from it with my eyes. So why were so many beasts risking their lives to gather here?
I decided to check my map and was wowed.
The cave's structure on the map looked even bigger than I imagined. The map couldn't even fit the whole thing—it stretched out both west and east without an end in sight. It looked like beasts were also gathering from the northern side of the map, and the dots on that side were even larger, which meant those beasts were from the deepest parts of the forest.
"What are these beasts planning?" I asked myself. But then I noticed something.
I zoomed in on the map and saw that inside the cave, right in the middle, was a big dot. Way bigger than any of the other dots I had seen.
I was shocked and unsure what it meant. Could it be another animal? A powerful one hidden deep inside the cave? How could a beast be that big?
But what made me even more suspicious was that the dot kept blinking like a flashing light and it hadn't moved from its spot at all.
I decided to wait and see what would happen. I found a good hiding spot at the top of the cliff and kept watching my map closely. The only new thing I noticed was that some dots were disappearing while new ones were still arriving. But none of them had entered the cave yet. It looked like they were all waiting for something. And I realized why some dots were disappearing—it was because fights had broken out. There's no way so many wild beasts could gather in one place without some of them fighting. The ones disappearing were the ones that had died, while new ones kept arriving in large numbers to replace them.
It was actually entertaining to someone like Lin Wei, watching all this. And he felt like he was learning a lot from it.
"In this life, if you're not strong enough, others will trample you. And new ones will always rise to replace those that fall. Life goes on," he thought. "I will do everything I can to make sure I'm not someone else's stepping stone. Instead, I'll be the rolling stone."
Lin Wei kept watching as more dots appeared and others vanished. One thing was certain—the number of dots was easily in the hundreds of millions, if not more. It seemed like every beast in the entire wilderness had gathered here. The same wilderness that he had spent months trying to escape. This was actually the best time to explore their lore, since they weren't around to guard it. He could gain a lot. But he didn't want to miss this event—they were all clearly here for a reason, and he had to find out what it was. Especially that flickering dot in the cave.
While he was still thinking about it, a roar suddenly echoed. It seemed far away, but he still heard it clearly from his hideout. He looked toward the flickering dot in the cave, but nothing was happening there. Instead, on the northern part of the cave, the beast dots there seemed to be clearing the way. A much larger dot suddenly appeared. The other dots made space for it.
Lin Wei immediately knew that whatever that dot represented, it was a beast to avoid. It was bigger than any other dot he had seen so far. But as time went on, even more big dots appear.
From time to time, a distant roar echoed again. And sometimes the ground would tremble from a deep rumble.
His attention was suddenly drawn to the north part of the cave. He noticed a very small dot appear—so small that if he hadn't zoomed in, he wouldn't have seen it. But what shocked him was how much space was cleared for this tiny dot. All the bigger beasts gave it room to move forward. After reaching the front, it stopped. Lin Wei couldn't understand how something so small could command such respect.
Soon, even more small dots appeared—sometimes in groups of two, three, or more and the nearby beasts gave way to them too. Lin Wei stayed in his hideout, watching everything. Like that, a whole week passed. More and more dots appeared.
The map couldn't even keep up anymore. There were just too many dots.
Then one day, a roar echoed across the heavens. Lin Wei, hiding in his spot, was shaken by it. It was the loudest roar he had ever heard so far and it comes from the north side of the cave, a group of 100 dots appeared, moving in two straight lines toward the cave. All the other beasts made way for them. In the middle of that formation, three dots stood out—they were being guarded by the others.
These three dots didn't pause for a second. They went straight into the cave, the first to do so.
Not long after, another group appeared. This time, 16 dots, with two dots in the middle. They entered the cave without stopping too. More and more groups came, each with the same formation.
Only these organized groups entered the cave. The others that came in small stayed at the edge of the cave entrance. The same thing was happening on Lin Wei's side too which is the southern part. Only two batches had entered the cave so far. And when those two batches appeared, every other beast went silent until they fully vanished inside.
Lin Wei was shocked at how intelligent the beasts were. That made him even more curious. He zoomed in on the cave again with his map treasure.
The flickering dot was still at the center. But now, more dots had gathered inside. Ten dots were in front of the big flickering one, and more were behind them. Each of the ten dot that have lined up in the front of the flickering dot had smaller flickering dots inside—very tiny ones that blinked faintly, almost unnoticeable.
Then, one by one, the small flickering dot that is coming from the ten dots that lined up at the front row began separating. Each one moved toward the big flickering dot at the center. Every time one of them reached it, the central light grew bigger and brighter. When the last small flickering light entered it, the weather changed instantly—even Lin Wei, far away in hiding, felt a sudden chill down his spine.
Then came a roar louder than anything he had heard before. It echoed ten times. Right after that, all the beasts outside roared together. The sound shook the ground. Rocks vibrated. And one by one, all the beasts started entering the cave.