Suddenly, a greenish-yellow river caught his eye. On the riverbed, in the churning, muddy waters, a massive 15-meter-long Titanoboa was coiled around a six-meter-long crocodile in a death constriction.
Haoyuan was stunned, his expression instantly turning solemn.
“I was sleeping in a cave deep underground, yet I was on the surface of a tropical rainforest when I woke up. Exactly how much time has passed?”
“Titanoboa lived about sixty to fifty-eight million years ago. Going by that timeline, roughly 6 to 8 million years have passed since the disaster.”
“It has already been that long...”
Haoyuan felt a sense of dread in his heart.
“So much time has passed. Anything could have happened in the interim. The dinosaurs... what happened to them?”
Haoyuan pursed his lips.
“I hope nothing happened to them...”
With a violent whip of his tail, he instantly glided hundreds of meters away, heading toward the coordinates of Dinosaur Valley in his memory.
The wild wind howled against his face, with clouds and misty rain hanging just overhead.
At this altitude, the vision he gained from his Life Tier evolution still allowed him to see clearly.
However, there was nothing on the ground.
Not a single dinosaur was in sight.
Haoyuan's heart grew heavier, filled with a terrible premonition.
Please let nothing have happened. They must still be alive.
Haoyuan accelerated his flight once more.
He suddenly felt his current speed was agonizingly slow.
The soaring pride and awe he had felt during his first experience with Aerial Flight had completely vanished.
Faster, faster.
The gale cut across his face like knives, but he did not slow down. Instead, he flew with even greater frenzy.
Like a supersonic missile, he streaked across the sky, heading straight into the distance.
Finally, after traveling an immense distance, he reached the familiar coordinates in his memory.
However, the sheer scale of change before him—seas turning to mulberry fields, lands to oceans—nearly took his breath away.
Time seemed to freeze for a moment.
He swallowed hard and swooped down from the high altitude.
Staring at the boundless, infinite ocean below him, he clenched his claws slightly as the power of Wind Grace gathered around his body.
With a sharp dive, he plunged into the water.
The seabed was teeming with fish, and sharks swam everywhere.
They swam in massive, intimidating schools, a formidable sight.
“Where... is this?”
Haoyuan was incredulous. There was not even a single rolling hill on the ocean floor below him.
Where was Dinosaur Valley? Where were the mountain ranges? Had they all been completely buried?
Haoyuan's heart sank to rock bottom. He suddenly thought of the dromaeosaurs who had gifted him their seven teeth and seven tail feathers. He remembered his resolute departure. He remembered thinking that after surviving the apocalypse, he would return to a world teeming with dinosaurs, with generations of dromaeosaur descendants waiting for him in the very same spot.
He clenched his claws tightly as tears suddenly welled up and spilled over.
His sickle claws dug into his skin, drawing blood.
He hated himself for not being trusting enough, not being brave enough.
If only he had trusted the dromaeosaurs back then and slept deep beneath Dinosaur Valley.
Perhaps he could have lent them a hand when the catastrophe struck?
If he hadn't constantly worried about evolving into a special variant, if he hadn't let anxiety consume him and had instead stayed to guard the dromaeosaurs in their final years, would he be free of such regrets today?
It was all the original sin of his weakness and excessive caution.
Relying on his talent for Thought Evolution, he had not dared to gamble or fight. Instead, he had looked down upon emotional attachments, choosing to watch from the sidelines of the river of time.
“This is absolutely awful...”
Haoyuan muttered, closing his eyes.
In truth, he knew his choice had been correct.
If he had truly buried himself beneath Dinosaur Valley, the dromaeosaurs would have known his location. If a special variant of mimic monster had infiltrated and taken their forms, he might have been blindsided.
His slumber was to last too long; he could not afford to gamble.
The enemy was unknown; he could not afford to gamble.
He did not know if what he did was right or wrong, but playing it safe meant never taking risks.
Thus, their parting became his divine retribution.
Haoyuan stood silently in the water. For hundreds of meters around his fifty-meter-long body, the ocean surged with abyssal Water Pressure.
The internal organs of all surrounding fish ruptured under the strain, leaving them dead or dying.
Sharks attracted by the scent of blood swam closer, only to flee in sheer panic upon witnessing the horrific scene.
He stayed there from noon until sunset, and from night until dawn.
Haoyuan remained standing vertically in silence, his entire body radiating immense high pressure.
Until he suddenly thought of a possibility.
A brilliant golden light from his eyes pierced through the deep blue sea, cutting straight toward the heavens.
The dark ocean floor lit up and churned as if a blazing sun had suddenly plunged into the depths.
“Could it be... that the tectonic plates broke apart, and Dinosaur Valley drifted somewhere else with continental drift?”
The golden light in Haoyuan's eyes intensified.
The more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed.
To verify this, he swam across the surrounding seabed, surveying it closely, and confirmed once again that there were no traces of mountains.
“Mountain ranges as grand as those of Dinosaur Valley should have left some traces even after six million years.”
He spoke softly, as if analyzing, but also as if comforting himself.
Back then, the descendants of the dromaeosaurs had lived for forty-five years and were still robust.
At the time, he thought the dromaeosaurs had incredibly strong lifespans. Comparing them to the young hadrosaurs whose lifespans doubled, he estimated they could probably live for around two hundred years.
He had hoped to see them again when he woke up from his slumber.
Or even if he couldn't see them, he hoped to see their descendants thriving, witnessing the dinosaur species prosper.
That was why he had departed so decisively.
Now, not a single dinosaur was to be seen. The seas had changed to fields, the stars had shifted, and millions of years had flown by. The dromaeosaurs were undoubtedly gone.
His heart was naturally in extreme pain.
“Well, as long as there is even a sliver of hope, I must go look.”
“After all, life is about more than just surviving; there must be living too.”
“Things have already come to this. Dwelling on it won't help.”
“I should learn from this lesson and do my best to live a life without regrets.”
To "live a life" here meant experiencing a meaningful period of existence, rather than reaching the end of one's lifespan and fading into silence.
His goal was still to achieve eternal existence, looking down upon the changing universe, exploring the ultimate truths, and achieving supreme, boundless freedom.
Once Haoyuan came to terms with this, he swam up to the surface and headed toward the habitat of the Titanoboa.
“Since I'm already here, I might as well grab a bite before leaving.”
After his latest Life Tier evolution, all of his physical attributes had multiplied significantly, and his divine abilities had undergone immense transformations.
First, he needed to quickly adapt to and master them. Second, he needed to accumulate energy to prepare for his next Life Tier evolution.
Therefore, a vast amount of Energy Points was highly critical.
They were both the foundation of his ability to evolve at any moment and the key to his biological ascension.
The dragon soared through the sky, bold and free, covering thousands of miles in the blink of an eye.
Half a day later, he returned to the rainforest.
Looking down at the river, he spotted his target and swooped down with grace.
Reaching out with a claw mid-air, he seized a 15-meter-long Titanoboa and lifted it into the sky.
Suddenly grabbed, the giant snake triggered its Reflex Constriction in panic, coiling itself tightly around Haoyuan's robust Kirin Arm.
An explosive constricting force erupted from its coils.
Haoyuan raised an eyebrow slightly.
With a flick of his sickle claws, the Titanoboa was sliced into several pieces, falling from the sky.
Its 15-meter body was utterly defenseless against his fifty-meter Large Size.
Hao Yuan felt a slight swell of pride, but the moment he remembered that golden eye, hundreds of meters wide, at the bottom of the water monster's lake, his arrogance vanished.
“I must not get ahead of myself. I must stay alert even in times of peace—stay alert.”
He shook his head and laughed, opening his mouth to inhale and draw the falling blood of the giant snake into his maw.
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