"..."
Faced with the innocent expression filled with confusion, Xuan Hao stopped himself just as he was about to grab the rabbit demon beast and throw it into the water.
Squeak?
Not understanding why Xuan Hao was looking at it in a rather weird way, the rabbit demon beast slowly tilted its head with an even more confused expression than before present on its small fluffy face. Resulting in Xuan Hao feeling even more awkward about what he had been planning to do.
But… If I don't throw it in the water, there is no way I will be able to figure out how it was able to make it through the water so easily…
Whoosh~
Squeak!?
Splash!
Before the rabbit demon beast had any time to react, Xuan Hao gently shook his sleeve over the edge of the terraced pool. Resulting in the rabbit demon beast falling straight into the crystal-clear water below.
SQUEAK!
Splash~ Splash~
Not at all having expected to suddenly end up in the water, the rabbit demon beast splashed around in panic for a short moment before calming down. Soon beginning to slowly swim toward the edge of the terraced pool before starting to climb back up to the small dry stop with the tree where Xuan Hao was standing and observing its every move with his divine sense.
Squeak!?
Reaching the top, the rabbit demon beast let out a confused squeak filled with anger. Not understanding why Xuan Hao had suddenly waved his arm, that had ended up causing it to fall out of the sleeve and into the water below.
"My bad, I thought you were holding on to my sleeve…" Not intending to admit that he had planned for it to fall into the water, Xuan Hao somewhat awkwardly apologized to the rabbit demon beast who was now staring directly at him with what could be described as the cutest frown he had seen, while he handed over a handful of spirit stone.
Squeak!
Only letting out a slightly offended squeak, the rabbit demon beast grabbed the spirit stones Xuan Hao handed it before climbing back up his robe. Entering s sleeve before hiding away inside the small hidden pocket inside of it. Not showing any signs of wanting to come out any time soon, Xuan Hao also felt the presence of the rabbit demon beast's aura change, as it consumed the spirit stones and entered a state of meditation.
"At least I managed to get the information I wanted…" Muttering this to himself as he decided to leave the rabbit demon beast alone, Xuan Hao thought about what had happened to the rabbit demon beast when it fell into the water.
Different from what he had seen when he casually observed the rabbit demon beast swimming through the crystal-clear water in the past or what he himself had managed to observe during his time in the water, this time around, Xuan Hao could clearly see what happened to the rabbit demon beast the moment it entered the water.
To start with, the speed that the energy of the rabbit demon beast was being absorbed was noticeably slower compared to when he had entered the water and there was no sign of this being due to some special ability of the rabbit demon beast. Meaning that there was no way for him to slow down the speed at which his energy was being absorbed by the crystal-clear water.
Although this had not been a problem so far considering that he only had to swim a little over a hundred meters so far, there were some terraced water pools up ahead that stretched on for close to a kilometer. Even with his strength, he doubted he would be able to hold on long enough to swim to the other side before his energy ran out and he was swallowed by the crystal-clear water.
However, he also discovered that the space around the rabbit demon beast was twisting and stretching in the direction that the rabbit demon beast was swimming. Trapping it in some kind of spatial tunnel, that made travelling a distance of a few meters become several kilometers long.
But… how am I supposed to use my dao domain to negate this with the Dao of Space, when keeping my dao domain active for a few seconds uses up most of my energy? Even if it increases my speed of traversing the water, I doubt that it will be anymore effective than just swimming through the spatial tunnels…
Gazing towards the mountains in the distance as he thought about how to make it through the water without using all of his energy before reaching the other side, Xuan Hao could not help feeling worried when looking at the large body of water located in between the mountains and the place where the smaller terraced pools of water were located.
Haaa… Given that I will have to recover my energy every time I pass through one of the terraced pools of water, it will at least take a few days before I can reach the last one located between the mountain and the rest of the terraced pools. Maybe I will be able to find a way to negate the effect of the spatial tunnels created by the water now that I know that they are there…
Whoosh~
Splash!
Not wasting any more time, Xuan Hao stepped over the edge and plunged into the water of the next terraced pool of water before starting to swim towards the edge of it. Not relaxing in the slightest during this time, as he also made sure to release his divine sense to observe the spatial tunnel that trapped him the moment, he entered the water. Trying to figure out if there were any flaws in the spatial tunnel that he would be able to take advantage of, while at the same time also trying to experiment with how much energy he would have to put into his dao domain to start affecting the spatial tunnel.