At this moment, he finally realized he had been deceived by those sand monsters. They were not made of sand at all, but were sand creatures!
"Damn it, these sand creatures are so cunning, not only did they trick me, but they also trapped me in this monstrous world! It seems I have to kill these sand creatures!"
As he spoke, Zhou Yan's expression instantly turned grim. His divine soul power surged out, spreading in all directions, instantly enveloping the entire space. He intended to find the sand creatures' lair and annihilate them all.
Zhou Yan's actions made those sand beasts sense the danger. Upon hearing that Zhou Yan intended to attack their lair, they immediately panicked and began to flee in all directions.
Seeing the sand beasts start to escape, Zhou Yan let out a cold laugh, "Hmph, still want to run?"
With that, he directly channeled his fire elemental magic power. Instantly, a blazing flame shot out and landed on a sand beast.
"Boom!"
The flame exploded, and the sand beast was ignited, bursting into flames. The sand beast let out a miserable cry before collapsing straight down.
Zhou Yan stepped on the corpse of the fallen sand beast, then punched and shattered its chest. In his hand, a golden sword qi materialized and fiercely pierced the sand beast's forehead, slaying its primordial spirit.
After finishing these tasks, Zhou Yan left the lava lake and sped away into the distance.
As Zhou Yan fled, he meditated on his cultivation.
At this moment, he finally understood that his divine soul power had reached the Second-order Divine King realm, which was the Nascent Soul realm he currently possessed!
Warriors in the Second-order Divine Emperor realm could use Nascent Soul power, but their strength as Second-order Divine Emperors was limited. If they used it, their Nascent Soul would completely disappear, and they would have no further cultivation resources.
"Second-order Divine Emperor, truly powerful. As expected of a genius from the Holy Land, this realm is incredibly strong."
Zhou Yan marveled inwardly. In this place, the power of a Second-order Divine Emperor was enough to sweep through any cultivator present. His understanding of the Holy Land's strength deepened.
Indeed, the Holy Land's power was extraordinary!
Just then, he suddenly saw several familiar figures appearing in front of him.
Zhou Yan's heart instantly surged with excitement.
He wasn't mistaken; those figures were indeed Li Chen and the others. Li Chen and his group were heading towards the other end of the cave, a path leading away from the lava lake. Moreover, they seemed to be exploring something.
"Haha, truly heaven helps me! So many people have come here; they must be here to snatch fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone. When the time comes, I can take advantage of the chaos to steal the Divine Dragon Stone fragments from them. I will surely succeed in obtaining the fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone!"
As he thought of this, a strong sense of longing arose in Zhou Yan's heart.
He desperately needed fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone now, for he knew what these fragments meant to him!
He had lingered here for a long time, but unfortunately, the fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone had not appeared. Now, he had finally waited for the appearance of Li Chen and the others, and he would absolutely not miss this opportunity.
With a flash of his figure, Zhou Yan caught up to Li Chen.
"Hey, stop, don't run!"
Zhou Yan shouted, then followed them, releasing his aura to block others from proceeding further.
Many people noticed Zhou Yan and quickly dodged.
"Make way quickly!"
Zhou Yan yelled angrily, "These people are all here to snatch fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone. Do you want to be killed?"
His words sent a chill down the spines of those people, who dared not proceed further.
"Hmph, consider yourselves lucky this time!"
Seeing that no one was willing to move forward, Zhou Yan no longer bothered with them and sped ahead, closely pursuing Li Chen and the others.
Zhou Yan's cultivation was higher than Li Chen's, and he was also a disciple of the Holy Land. Therefore, although those people feared Zhou Yan, they did not dare to truly provoke him.
"Look quickly, Zhou Yan is chasing a group of sand beasts! Those sand beasts are all Second-order Divine Emperor realm demonic beasts. There are many of them. Let's flee quickly, or Zhou Yan will surely catch up and kill us!"
A young man shouted loudly, then grabbed a group of young girls and fled for their lives.
The other young men and women did the same.
These people were all disciples of the Holy Land, venturing out to obtain fragments of the Divine Dragon Stone. However, they never expected to encounter Zhou Yan, a Holy Land disciple, here, and that he intended to deal with them.
These young girls were female disciples of the Holy Land who often enjoyed recreation here. Moreover, these Holy Land female disciples, with their charming demeanor, dared not act arrogant in front of Zhou Yan. Instead, they feigned weakness.
Seeing that those people were not listening to him, Zhou Yan directly summoned his flying artifact. His flying artifact was a treasure named the Thunderbolt artifact, a supreme-grade artifact of immense power, capable of increasing Zhou Yan's speed by more than five times.
Under his control, the artifact moved swiftly, instantly surpassing everyone and closely following them until they reached the edge of the lava lake. At this point, the artifact's speed gradually slowed down.
Clearly, it had consumed a lot of energy and needed to recover, otherwise, its speed could not be maintained so high.
After a long rest, Zhou Yan walked forward.
A smile appeared on Zhou Yan's lips.
"Haha, you fools, I have caught up to you!"
Zhou Yan leaped between the surrounding trees a few times, arriving in front of Li Chen and blocking their path.
"You're that Zhou Yan, right? I never thought you'd dare to chase after us!" Li Chen said coldly.
"Hmph, that's right, I am Zhou Yan!" Zhou Yan said proudly. "However, I don't mind telling you, I have already advanced to Third-order Divine Venerable, while you haven't even reached the Third-order Divine Emperor realm!"
Upon hearing Zhou Yan's arrogant words, the surrounding crowd couldn't help but laugh. They all thought Zhou Yan was crazy, claiming to be a Third-order Divine Venerable, and they had no idea where he got his confidence from.