Modern Cultivation : The Strongest Couple Bonded by Vampire System-Chapter 585: A Mountain?

"Uncle, is this really the place?"

Alex and Aira floated in the air, looking down toward a huge mountain. The mountain was almost three times the size of Mount Everest.

’Based on the map, this should be the place. Just what happened in all these years?’

Alex spread his mana like a wave to see through the mountain.

At first, he didn’t find anything.

But when he pushed deeper, all the way hundreds of meters underground, he started seeing building shapes.

his only made him more confused.

What kind of fight could end with a mountain sitting on top of flat ground. There was no way this happened naturally.

Someone must have done something during the fight. Or maybe they created the mountain on purpose to hide the ruins.

Alex and Aira landed on the ground. He then put his hand on the mountain.

He didn’t have any earth element abilities. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t manipulate it.

Using his abilities, Alex poured his mana into the soil and the stone. He didn’t command the earth.

Instead, he forced the material to obey through raw control, sensing density, weight, and the pressure points inside the slope.

He treated the mountain like a puzzle.

For an ordinary awakener, carving a tunnel here would be a nightmare. You needed to calculate the load above, the angle of the walls, the stress lines, and how the dirt would shift after each removal.

One wrong cut and the cavern would collapse.

Even if you could move earth, you would still die if you didn’t know how to keep it stable.

But for Alex, it was simple because his control was precise enough to do all of that in real time.

His brain could read the structure while his mana adjusted the support.

He moved the dirt in controlled stream.

He compressed some layers into tighter blocks and relocated others into stable pockets deeper in the ground.

When he met hard rock, he didn’t try to crush it blindly.

He flooded it with mana, found the weak seams, and separated it in clean sections.

He then reinforced the tunnel’s edges with compacted earth, sealing cracks before they could spread.

The ground started to shake.

As if welcoming him, it parted open, creating a tunnel to the underground.

"Wow, how could you do this, Uncle?" Aira asked, amazed.

"It’s not hard," Alex said. "I just move the dirt somewhere else so we can pass."

It sounded simple, but only someone with his level of control could say that.

Aira took out a sphere from her pocket. She activated it with her mana.

It floated near them, creating a steady light.

"What’s your abilities, Aira?" Alex asked as they walked through the tunnel.

Aira shook her head. "I’m not an awakener, Uncle. I just learned how to control mana for convenience."

"Convenience?" Alex repeated.

Aira nodded. "Most things require mana to control now."

In the past this wasn’t the case, because not everyone could use mana.

But now with mana cultivation, even those that didn’t awaken can manipulate it.

Alex glanced at her. "You learned it young."

"I had to," Aira said. "My parents didn’t want me to be helpless."

She hesitated, then added in a smaller voice, "And I didn’t want to be a burden."

"At what circle your cultivation is?" Alex asked.

"Level three," Aira answered. "But don’t expect me to fight, Uncle. I really cannot."

Alex smiled. "Don’t worry. You will just take care of the base."

They kept walking.

While talking, Alex kept deepening the tunnel effortlessly.

After his ability went on rampage before, he could use it far more easily now.

It seemed like the ability had evolved, since it didn’t cost much concentration anymore.

Alex didn’t know if it was illusion or not, but he felt he could think two different things at once now with ease.

Aira watched the walls shifting at his will, then lowered her voice.

"Uncle, where were you all this time?"

Alex didn’t look at her. "Why?"

Aira frowned slightly. "I just think if you’re here, things will probably change."

"It probably will. That’s why I feel guilty."

She looked away, then muttered, "I hate that I understand."

Alex stopped for a step, then looked at her. "You feel guilty too?"

"Yes..." Aira said quietly.

Before she never feel like this, but now after meeting she start feeling guilty.

"I should have learned mana cultivation better. I should have become stronger. That way maybe I could protect my father."

Alex sighed, then turned back and began walking again.

"Unfortunately we cannot return to the past. So train to become stronger from now on."

Aira quickened her pace beside him. "Uncle, is time travel impossible?"

"If this is the real world, then yes, it’s impossible," Alex said.

"It will only be possible if the world we live in is just another simulation by a higher being."

The thought of time travel had passed through his mind many times.

When his father went missing, Alex had tried his best researching it.

But after many attempts and many dead ends, he accepted one bitter truth.

Going back in time was not something possible.

The closest thing science allowed was time moving differently depending on speed and gravity.

If you move close to the speed of light, your time can slow compared to people who stay behind.

If you are near something with extreme gravity, time can also run slower for you.

That was real.

But that was not going back.

That was only moving forward differently.

Even if you could push that limit to absurd levels, the result would still be the same.

You could leap into the future, just like what happened now, when he go to other planet and return back home.

Time has jumped to the future.

But the past? That’s impossible.

The biggest wall was causality.

The past is the chain that creates the present.

If you could change the past freely, that chain breaks.

One change could erase the reason you made the change in the first place.

Science called it paradox.

To Alex, it was simpler.

A world that allows that kind of mess would destroy its own logic.

There was also the problem of energy and structure.

Any theory that even hints at backward time travel requires conditions beyond what’s possible.

Alex looked at the shifting tunnel wall and stopped.

He already reached the end.

Behind this place was the city ruin, and the city was large.

Alex needed more time to move a large amount of dirt to clean the ruin.

"Move back a little, Aria."

Alex’s mana, qi, and life force began to churn.

This time he started drawing runes in the air.

Weird symbols appeared, flickering in and out of existence.

The ground vibrated again.

A low rumble rolled through the mountain like a deep breath.

The runes spun slowly, then locked into a pattern.

A pressure wave spread outward.

The dirt and rock around the tunnel mouth began to shift.

Layers of earth folded into each other like pages being forced into a single block.

A wide empty space was carved out in the ruin below.

Aria could feel the air change.

The pressure in the tunnel became heavier.

The runes glowed brighter.