Over the next few days, Li Yuan pored over maps of the realm and the Great Zhou. His worldview expanded at once.0

He discovered that this world had no monolithic northern or southern powers—no equivalents of nomadic tribes or southern barbarians. The Great Zhou stood almost alone, surrounded only by minor tribes or territories controlled by individual sects.0

It reminded Li Yuan of a line from a famous cosmic-horror novel he had read before crossing into this world—0

“We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.”[1]2

But this realm didn’t quite match that sentiment. Ghosts and demons had already begun prowling the Great Zhou, and strange territories full of horrors were rumored at the edges of the map. Indeed, Li Yuan knew from Yan Yu that some ghost domains were so pitiful they couldn’t even find humans to kill. So, they resorted to purchasing victims from Feng’er’s black market shop.0

In other words, the more remote and desolate the region, the weaker the local ghost domain. With scarcely any living souls to devour, how would such a ghost domain thrive?0

Still, that was just Li Yuan’s...0