1347 Incompetent?
Leah was stunned for a moment before her expression warped. Was this Dao Pedestal Realm brat trying to make fun of her?
But to her surprise, the moment Ryu pointed out a direction, he began to move. It wasn't just him, but even Ianjor began to move as well as though he had utmost confidence in what Ryu was doing.
Empana frowned. No matter how much confidence he had in Ryu, this was a little too ridiculous. Everyone else had taken several minutes to even gain a faint idea of which direction to go in. But Ryu didn't even take out his Matrix and just pointed in a direction. What was going on here?
Everyone looked toward Empana to see what they would do, however Empana remained silent for a long while, looking toward Ryu's back. And yet, Ryu seemed to have no intention of slowing down, he didn't look for Empana's approval either.
It was then Empana seemed to realize that now that Ryu and Mae were in here, what could happen had suddenly opened up to a world of possibilities. They weren't tied as one group, precisely because of Mae's existence. It was very possible that the portal had registered the existence of two people with Birth Rights.
After thinking to this point, Empana followed without a word. Although there was a hint of dissatisfaction in Leah's expression, she didn't dare to say anything now that Empana had gone forward, there even seemed to be a hint of attraction in her eyes.
Mae looked toward Ryu's side profile, seemingly wondering the same things as everyone else. However, Ryu only gave her a smile.
There were simply too many fools in the Ruin Master profession, a lot of snake oil salesmen. The shame of it all was that many of them weren't even aware that they were. The reason Ryu had simply pointed out a direction to walk in seemingly without much thought was because he really hadn't put any thought into it.
The Matrix was a double edged sword. It could give you a great deal of information, but it could also give you too much information. A good Ruin Master was first separated by their skill in knowing when to bring this tool out and when to ignore it.
This cavern they were in was just an enormous catacomb, it was far too vast, and produced way too many variables. If one really wanted to pick out the perfect path, it wouldn't just take a few dozen minutes, it would take decades, centuries, even. The only way to avoid that was by having a mind so powerful that it could take in so many variables at once, but Ryu wasn't in that state just yet, and the Demon Races were far too poor in this regard.
Ultimately, it was a better use of his time to simply pick a path. This would narrow down the possibilities and then he could go from there.
Ryu stopped, looking to the side. With a "why not" sort of attitude, he strolled into what looked like a cave opening, but was really just one of the many tunnels that let into and out of this enormous space. All the while, he thought about just what kind of place this was and what its purpose was.
It was all very interesting. This was a fight for a Birth Right, so why were people allowed to bring in so many helpers? Why was it so reliant on Ruin Masters to find success? Shouldn't it be testing the worth of those with a claim to the treasures first?
Ryu casually took out his Matrix to check something, but then put it away barely a few seconds later as though he had already seen all that he needed to see.
Three hours later, Ryu stepped out from the long winding tunnel. To the astonishment of those around him, they had returned to the vast underground catacomb. Every location looked the same and it felt like they had just been walking around hours with nothing to show for it.
Leah, who had been holding her tongue all the while, erupted once again.
"What is the meaning of this?!"
Ryu didn't respond, looking around with a curious gaze. But this only made Leah's response all the more fierce. Her body flickered and vanished. She appeared before Ryu, her fair hand snaking out to grab toward his collar. But before she could succeed, a chilly wind made her retreat, a look of vigilance taking hold of her pretty face.
"Am I very familiar with you?" Ryu looked at her for the first time, speaking coldly. "Keep your hands to yourself."
Leah was stunned before her shoulders started trembling in anger. Why was Ryu speaking as though it was some great injustice to be touched by her?!
"You're an incompetent, bumbling fool pretending to be something that you're not, and yet you still have the cheek to say such a thing?! You've brought us right back to our starting point, don't you feel any shame or embarrassment?! We were in the same place for over an hour and didn't see even a single group return, but you've made a ridicule of us all!"
"Is that so?" Ryu asked, his gaze turning toward a certain direction.
Leah was stunned. She had been so enraged that she hadn't really looked around, but when her head turned in the orientation of Ryu's look, there was indeed another team. They were easily two kilometers away from them, but such a range was insignificant to Sky Gods, it was more surprising that Ryu had spotted them before she had.
Indeed, they had entered the tunnel for three hours, what was one hour in the face of that? For all they knew the teams had only returned after they had been in their own tunnels for that long as well, causing them to miss them by an initial two hours.
"So what?!" Leah countered angrily. "Doesn't that just mean you're both incompetent?!"
It was unsurprising that voices echoed quite far in the catacombs. Due to Leah, they were spotted immediately.
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