The moment Fang watched the meagre and pathetic effect of his lightning array, he ditched it aside. The old master proved his rich experience worth, moved at once to attack the monster head-on, joining other masters on his side to take down this worm.

Then the worm arched its upper segment, showed a circular row of sharp teeth and a bottomless pit in the middle. Out of nowhere, it roared, one that forced every single master to a halt out of immense fear.

This was how the upper realm worked; terror was the absolute ruler of these lands. And in the forbidden zones like this one, terror had another degree that was like nothing else in the world.

The roar was the first terror, then came the raining rocks.

From the huge mouth of that worm, a large number of rocks gushed out like endless hands were throwing them at the masters below. The first to respond was Fang, shouting to others to evade and retreat. Yet for many, his warning shout came a bit late to jolt them awake.

In the first wave of attack alone, almost half of the spirit masters on his side were annihilated!

Fang’s team wasn’t formed of ordinary masters; they were all old men like Fang, ones who accompanied him for a long time and trained for longer than others.

Seeing such masters who spent decades training painstakingly and non-stop to ascend, only to end up dying simply like that, came as a cold bucket of water poured over their heads. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Everyone wanted to ascend to the upper realm. Coming here was any spirit master from the lower realms. And yet, no one ever thought of what would happen after ascension.

No one ever thought they would end up dying just in their first days in the upper realm.

William watched all this without feeling any remorse. He knew how harsh it was to live and survive in the upper realm. Even if this was a forbidden zone, this was still the upper realm, the most sacred rule; power ruled!

Another reason for William’s silence was his knowledge of what was coming. Worms were very menacing monsters, but they never moved in solitude. And soon enough, this proved to be right.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

Three more fierce tremors came with three more worms appearing by the side of the first one. If a single worm was too much for the masters, four was a total abomination!

ROAR!

The sudden appearance of three more worms killed any hope for Fang and his masters. If it were just a single worm, Fang thought they had a chance if they used the arrays and traps William had prepared beforehand. And yet there were three more towering behemoths that were getting ready to attack.

The first worm didn’t feel satisfied with the survival of the other masters. It roared again, releasing another wave of deadly rocks over the masters. This time, they were prepared and evaded the rocks, yet this didn’t help to elevate their rock-bottom morale and spirits.

Until William appeared.

BOOM!

The first move William made was to unleash a barrage of explosive arrows. The arrows exploded weakly, affected in the same way Fang’s lightning attacks suffered from. And yet, for a reason, the worm he targeted started to twitch, looking like it was in immense pain.

"William!" Fang instantly recognised the signature attack of William. And yet he couldn’t tell why William’s attacks worked, and his didn’t.

The first explanation was for elemental differences. William’s arrows unleashed fire-based attacks, while Fang’s depended entirely on lightning.

To Fang, both shared the same devastating nature; both were affected by their ascension. And yet, William’s arrows proved to be more effective than his lightning.

He guessed the reason wrong. And William’s next words proved that point clearly.

"Don’t try to kill them by targeting their heads," William shouted from a distance, "aim at their part that comes out from the ground, it’s their glaring weak spots."

His words came to remind Fang of this little tip William shared before, and he forgot about. William explained how the worms used to attack, how they had to raise large parts of their colossal bodies over the ground to attack.

Once that happened, the weakest point would be the part connected to the underground piece. That part would be vulnerable as it would be under heavy pressure and weight from a large part of the ground.

Recalling this brief explanation from William inspired Fang to try to attack the monsters again. This time, he used his lightning array and successfully landed heavy blows on the worms.

This time, his lightning caused the worms to twitch, forcing them to stop their barrage of rocky attacks.

Fang’s lightning proved to be more effective than William’s arrows. After all, these monsters weren’t earth-element-based; they were darkness-based monsters. And darkness feared lightning more than fire.

The moment the towering behemoths started to sway right and left violently, other masters joined the fray. Armed by seeing how their two leading masters succeeded in harming those giants, the fifty-three spirit masters started to attack freely and openly against the parts coming out from the ground.

Then the worms started to roar, this time in pain and agony.

"Keep it up," William finally joined the frontlines. He didn’t rely on his arrows once he arrived there. He took out his sword, pointed it to the ground, before shouting, "Leave the middle two to me, focus on the other two. And stay away from the middle two as soon as possible."

His shout came to warn everyone of what was coming. Fang didn’t delay or hesitate, instantly shouted the same orders to others, bringing his masters to a safe distance before William unleashed his second technique.

"Tsk! Even if I’m a green spirit master, it’s still way too weak to kill these two in one hit."

William’s deadly technique wasn’t strong enough to kill these worms in one go. Yet it left behind many gruesome-looking wounds on them.

To his luck, the worms that appeared here were all white grade, the weakest form of monsters he would ever find in the world.