Reincarnation Of The Strongest Spirit Master-Chapter 1431: The Failed Copy of the Fox Monster!

The Fox alone was a terrifying, seemingly insurmountable obstacle—a scar on his past and a shadow over his future. Now, he had to contend with a second, equally dangerous force lurking in the darkness, one that was just as likely to kill the Fox as it was to exterminate humanity.

What truly gnawed at him was the realisation of his own ignorance. In his past life, he had been a powerhouse, a man who thought he knew the secrets of the heavens.

Yet he had never heard of these Mystic Arts practitioners—neither human nor monster. He had never suspected that the "Great Catastrophe" was an engineered harvest.

He had died believing the Dark Masters were the architects of the world’s end, never realising they were just the hired help.

"What determines when a world is ready to be destroyed?" William asked suddenly, breaking a long period of heavy silence.

The three captives exchanged puzzled, hesitant looks. "We don’t know the exact criteria," the oldest replied. "We haven’t had enough time to investigate the internal logic of those monsters. But from the fragments we gathered, the harvest is usually triggered by one of two events: either the rise of a promising monster candidate within that realm, or the appearance of a foe so terrifying that the realm must be ’reset’ to eliminate the threat."

"I bet this time it’s the appearance of a monster in human flesh," Becky chimed in, trying to crack a dry joke to cut the tension.

Lara remained silent, her eyes fixed on William, watching for his reaction. William, however, simply offered a calm, knowing smile. He had already come to the same conclusion. His presence in this life was an anomaly, a variable the universe hadn’t accounted for.

He recalled the Black Serpents’ words during their first encounter—they had called him a "failed copy of the Fox monster." It seemed his spiritual signature was so potent, so "other," that the monsters had mistaken him for a manifestation of the Fox’s own essence.

He didn’t know yet if that mistaken identity was a blessing or a curse, but one thing was certain: he was destined to clash with these "farmers" sooner or later.

As William sat there, weighing the strategic implications of a two-front war against rival monster factions, Becky took over the questioning. She pressed the three for the current whereabouts of the monster leaders, the specific details of their plan for this world, and the location of their primary military assets.

The answers were largely what William expected. These Dark Masters were mercenaries; they weren’t particularly interested in the long-term ecological goals of the monsters.

Their immediate orders involved rallying the disparate Dark Master cells across the continent and luring the masters of the opposing kingdoms into a unified attack against William’s guild. It was a classic "divide and conquer" strategy—or rather, "unite and slaughter."

Finding little value in the tactical details of a war he was already winning, William let his mind wander to their current predicament. He looked around the plaza, his spirit sense scanning the dead portals.

"We have no portal linking us back home," William said, his eyes moving toward the three captives. He recalled what Lara and Becky had told him before about what happened down there.

As the silence of the aftermath settled over the plaza, William turned his attention back to the logistical nightmare of their displacement. 𝒻𝘳𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝘯𝘰𝑣ℯ𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝘮

The fortress sat atop a jagged peak, isolated by leagues of "dead zones"—territories so choked with spiritual decay and roaming monsters that a trek back on foot would take a month of gruelling travel.

Lara and Becky moved closer, recounting the final, bloody moments of the conflict at the mountain’s base. As they detailed the fall of the enemy commanders, a spark of opportunistic hunger flickered in William’s eyes.

"Tell me," William interrupted, his voice laced with a sudden glimpse of hope, "that you had the foresight to harvest the spatial rings from the leaders who directed the siege down below."

Becky froze, her expression shifting as she looked from William to Lara and back again. She let out a soft, exasperated huff. "Ah, so the rumours are true then. She really did learn the art of scavenging every scrap of a battlefield from you, William. You’re a terrible influence."

William couldn’t help but let out a short, sharp laugh that echoed against the palace walls. "You’ll thank me later for this ’terrible influence.’ It’s the difference between being stranded in a wasteland and sleeping in your own bed. Now, give me the rings. Let’s find our ticket out of here."

"Wait... you mean..." Becky’s eyes widened as the realisation finally dawned on her. She slapped her forehead in a gesture of pure self-reproach. "The command centre! I never even thought about it!"

Lara, however, remained the only one standing in a state of confusion. She watched as William took a handful of high-grade spatial rings from her and began to systematically dismantle their spiritual locks. "What are the two of you talking about? What did I miss?"

She didn’t have to wait long for her answer. With a satisfied grunt, William reached into the third ring and pulled out a shimmering, crystalline sphere that pulsed with an internal, azure light. It was a high-tier Portal Core.

"We have our ticket home," William said, holding the orb aloft.

Lara’s eyes brightened as the pieces clicked into place. The dark master army that had besieged the mountain hadn’t just appeared out of thin air; they had been establishing a massive forward operations base.

To move an army of that size, the commanders would have needed multiple portals, which meant they carried spare, high-capacity portal cores to replace any that were damaged during the campaign.

Becky and Lara expected William to immediately begin the ritual to link the core back to their home city, but he didn’t move. Instead, he stayed where he was, fiddling with the orb in his hands, his gaze drifting toward the horizon.

A slow, calculating smile began to spread across his face—the kind of smile that usually preceded a world-altering event.