Ren sharpened his mental focus, zeroing in entirely on the sickening pulse of corrupt energy.
It didn't take him long to isolate the purple thread. Amidst the overwhelming, chaotic ambient noise of the Black Swamp and its bizarre, symbiotic ecosystems, the corruption stood out like a festering wound in a festering wound.
He tracked the invisible, jagged line of movement as it sank aggressively into the deep earth, plunging far beneath the shallow mud.
He narrowed his perception, tightly following the corrupted signature the exact same way a hunting hound relentlessly tracks the scent of a predator that absolutely does not belong in its forest.
"We are changing course," Ren told Zhao, his voice tight with sudden, unwavering focus. "Mark the exact coordinates of the grid we are leaving behind. We will come back and finish mapping this sector later."
Zhao didn't ask a single question.
