The depressed atmosphere made him feel like he had once witnessed a great race brought down. There was only despair and sadness.
Grey sighed and walked into the ancient ruin. He made sure to be careful of broken pieces of rocks and rubble scattered everywhere.
Long ago, humans found out that there was an ancient race whose entire existence was brought to extinction.
The technology of the race was way advanced than what humans had now so... they tried to integrate it into their technology.
Making stuff like spatial rings, or teleportation inscriptions. Or even arrays.
As he walked into the ancient ruin, he felt the walls and the inscriptions written on them. But they were turning to dust.
After walking deep into the ancient ruin, he saw large room. The ceiling of the room looked broken and some debris even fell to the ground. In the center of the room, was an altar of over three meters.
It once polished and pristine wood now falling apart and reduced to rubble. As his hand glided over the surface of the altar, he felt some writings on the altar and cleared the dust to get a better look. But the writing was in a different language and made little sense to him.
But he brought out his jade slip and copied some of the language and put his slip back after writing some of them that he felt was important.
By the time he left the altar room and explored the rest of the ruin, he came across a throne room. There were four thrones made out of smooth cut out obsidian. With two thrones standing out a little.
The biggest throne had the sign of a crown while the second throne to its right ad the sign of a tiara. The other two thrones had a simple scepter and a sword.
Theses things were confusing to Grey who hadn't seen a royal palace before, but he still took notes and recorded it in his Jade slip as well and burned the memory in his mind.
After visiting the throne room, he wandered the halls and came across a corpse. The corpse was lying against the wall with his hand reaching out for something.
When he approached the corpse, he saw that the clothing he wore was still in good condition despite the thousands of years it would have stayed here.
But as soon as his hand touched the corpse it turned into dust, leaving only the black shroud behind.
Grey warily picked up the dark shroud and studied it. It was made out of black linen and silk, but it felt tough like it wouldn't tear easily.
He checked the pockets and found a couple of jade slips in it. But the jade slips looked worn out and ancient. Like it would soon fall apart.
'This looks to be some magical item.'
He came to the conclusion when he felt nothing was off with the shroud and tried to put it on.
At first it was too big for him and made it looked oversized, but just as he inwardly cursed at his small size, the shroud shrunk down and covered him perfectly.
He was surprised and removed all doubts about it not being a magical item.
As the black shroud covered his entire body, he felt a little warmer and could even circulate his spirit essence better.
"Too bad there's not a manual for how to use a wanderer's shroud."
He lingered for a few seconds and then decided to keep the shroud on.
But considering he now had new clothes that reduced offered better protection and even helped him circulate his spirit essence, he was very happy.
The rest of the exploration into the ancient ruin resulted in nothing else and no discoveries so he left after a short while.
He turned his head back to look at the ancient ruin taken over by the forest and sighed.
For some reason, he had not seen any mutated creatures inside the ruin. He was half expecting to be attacked but no such thing happened.
He couldn't come up with a conclusion so he left soon after. He had come out with something useful after all.
He sighed as he gazed at the melancholic ruin one last time before he turned back and headed deeper into the forest.
Minutes after heading into the forest, Grey jumped over a spot were there was dried tree leaves and dirt.
A big lizard as big as Grey leaped up to him. It maw opened ready to bite his head off. Although Grey was a little surprised, he didn't allow it show on his face and calmly evaded the leaping lizard.
He wondered how a lizard this big could have hidden itself so thoroughly.
The lizard glared at him and lunged at him again. But he gracefully dodged the lizard and brought out his blunt knife.
A second later, there was blood on the knife while the lizard had a deep stab wound on it's belly.
The lizard squealed in fright and attempted to run away but Grey calmly sped up and before the lizard could run far, Grey had stabbed the lizard's head with his blunt knife.
The lizard shook and convulsed before it lay completely still. Grey stood for a few minutes... after making sure that it was really dead did he release his guard, but only by a little.
His stomach grumbled, a reminder that he had not eaten since yesterday. He shook the blunt knife an drops of blood fell to the ground.
He started slowly cutting the flesh of the lizard. Just cutting little meat slabs from the dark skinned lizard.
The lizard had poison in its body, but since Grey had experience with certain mutated creatures like this, he knew which parts had poison and which did not.
After cutting enough meat slabs, he collected its poison and used some to melt the lizard until it turned into a puddle of black blood.
He lingered a bit and then sped in his original direction. He released his aura and many weak mutated creatures that sensed him retreated in fear while the stronger mutated creatures warily avoided him and allowed him to pass.
Cultivating Kai-kai kitan made his actual realm seem higher so he could exert some influence on the corroded zone.
Whenever he encountered a strong mutated creature, he would always avoid it and instead turn in another direction.
After gliding through the forest from tree to tree, he saw something that made his eyes shine with excitement.
His expression was still aloof but his eyes seemed to have gotten a little warmer.
He was close to his former abode.
Some minutes later, he was at his broken house. Its walls still dilapidated and falling apart. The roof broken and sunlight filtering in through the cracks.
He sighed and calmly took a step inside. There was no sign of mutated creatures or bizarre existences... but his door was still broken and some miscellaneous items scattered around which brought him relief.