Upon stepping out of the Mushroom Forest, Fang Hong instinctively stopped in his tracks, for before him lay an endless expanse of cracked land, the surface resembling drought-ridden areas of the aboveground world, with wide cracks and a hue of volcanic ash gray, upon closer inspection, fine cracks were intertwined with wisps of black smoke.
Fang Hong knelt down, lightly touching the ring on his hand— it was the Ring of Golden Flame that had absorbed the power of Dragon's Golden Eyes in Dolifen, a portion of Nikopolas's power within the ring indeed reacted, stirring just like when he had touched the black river water on the eighth level.
Fang Hong withdrew his hand, and the leading knight turned his head around, thinking he was inspecting the land, kindly explained, "This is scorched earth, the landscape of the eleventh layer beneath the relics, we came directly from the Bottomless Depths and crossed two layers, the terrain here is actually influenced by the lava layer beneath."
