The girl looked at Alex with expectant eyes as it seemed she truly wished to become his slave. Alex couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable at the sight.

“Forget about it. I’m not making anyone a slave,” he said.

“Tsk, then at least make me your wife,” she said.

“No,” Alex said.

“Why? Do you not want me? I’m the strongest female in my tribe that has yet to marry. Look at my hips, I can give you so many children. My breasts are quite big too. Just look at i—”

“Stop it. I do not wish to see your breasts. All I want for now are some answers. Depending on the answers, I might just leave right now,” Alex said.

“Oh, go ahead. What do you want to ask?” Li Yun looked disappointed, but she still respectfully spoke now that Alex had shown his strength.

“First of all, is there any place with Qi in the southern continent?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” the girl said. “I’ve never seen this Qi in my life. I’ve only ever heard it from the elders.”

‘Hmm, then I should probably ask these elders when I get to the Stepstones tribe,’ Alex thought. He would also have to search for his father when he got there.

He had already searched the caravan or whatever it was that he was part of. All he could see was the different carriages being pulled by different beasts that seemed to have been tamed.

The humans were the ones walking, so he checked inside the carriages and found them to be mostly filled with various different fishes, which surprised him quite a lot.

“Where did you get the fish from?” he asked.

The girl’s eyes narrowed. “How did you know?” she asked.

“That’s not an answer,” Alex said.

“Hmph, we got it from the Maroon Bay,” she answered.

“Maroon bay? Where is that exactly?” he asked.

“In the direction where the sun comes up from,” she said. “We go there from time to time to get ourselves some food.”

“You have to go to the east to get food?” Alex asked. “And you have to take an entire caravan with you?”

“What do you expect us to do? It’s very far you know? It takes us nearly two weeks just to reach there,” she said.

“And yet you still go? Is there absolutely no food in the Wasteland other than these fishes?” he asked.

“There are,” she said. “We can eat the beasts, but mostly their meat is too tough to chew and the weaker folks in the tribe can’t even chew on it. So, we have to go get the soft meat from the ocean.”

“And it takes you 2 weeks to reach there, huh? Is the east that closer than the west?” he asked.

“West is closer,” she said. “If we were to go west, it would take us no more than 10 days.”

“Then why do you go east?” he asked with a curious expression.

“The west is off limits. There are very strong tribes there and we absolutely cannot offend them in the slightest,” she said.

“I see,” Alex said as he took in the information he heard. “How much longer till we reach the Stepstones tribe?”

“About 2 more days,” she said. “Maybe 3, or even 4. It’s hard to say how long it will take on the return since the people will have to walk instead of riding the carriage.”

“I noticed that,” Alex said. “Do you guys not have Storage bags to keep the fish in?” he asked.

“What’s a storage bag?” the girl asked.

“That explains it,” he said as he sighed. He thought of some questions he wanted to learn about and soon learned a bit more about the Wastelands.

To his surprise, there were absolutely no cities in this place. There were only tribes that liked to stay reclusive.

There were apparently hundreds if not thousands of tribes, and each one stayed about a day’s worth of travel away.

In a Saint realm Qi cultivator’s term, they would be about an hour away at most.

Even though there were so many tribes, there was one thing that was true among all of them. Strength meant status.

You either have to be very strong physically or have the potential to become very strong. This was why, even when weak, a youth was regarded more favorably than an older person.

Alex tried asking about how the people got stronger, and it turned out that it wasn’t much different than how the Blazing Earth sect’s people went through body cultivation.

The people would use slaves or take turns hurting each other to the point where one of them couldn’t even stand. At that point, they would stop for the wounded person to heal.

When healed, they would come back stronger than before.

‘No wonder she said slaves beat their masters. That is the only way to get strong here, he thought.

While the question of how they got stronger was answered, there was one other question that arose in Alex’s mind.

“How do you guys heal?” he asked.

As far as he understood, there was absolutely no possibility for someone to make pills. Heck, even medicinal paste seemed to be impossible to make with how the ingredients would be hard to find in a place like this.

Other than that, he thought of the aura-absorbing technique that the disciples of the Blazing Earth sect used, but even that should be impossible as Qi wasn’t available around here at all.

“Through the sacred flames of course,” the girl said.

“The sacred flames? What’s that?” Alex asked.

The girl looked confused. “The sacred flames are the sacred flames, of course. What else would it be?” he asked.

“Where do you get the sacred flames from?” he asked.

“Nowhere? You can’t find the sacred flames anywhere but in the various tribes. It’s been burning since generations ago, so there really is no making it. It’s just there,” she said.

‘Flames that heal? So weird,’ he thought. Just then, he thought of something and looked at the girl. “What’s the color of your Sacred flames?” he asked.

“Uhh… yellow, red, and some blue I think,” she said.

“So… it’s a phoenix flame?” he asked.

“What’s a phoenix?” the girl asked.

“Nevermind,” he said. If his guess was right then it was most definitely the Vermilion bird’s flames. ‘Those flames heal?’ he thought. The only thing he could remember of those flames was when they instantly burned his hand. There was no healing there.

“How exactly do the flames heal by the way? Do you use it to cauterize the wounds perhaps?” he asked.

“No, you just sit by its side. You never want to touch the flame itself. The sacred flames heal those that come beside it. However, for those that dare lay their hands upon, they kill them without mercy,” she said.

‘Does sound like the flames I saw yesterday,’ Alex thought.

“What about cut-off limbs? Can your flames heal those?” he asked.

“The flames cannot heal which you do not have,” she said. “If you lose a body part, you have to bring it with you when you heal, or you never will.”

“I see,” Alex said. “I’m starting to get more curious about your tribe now.”

Three days passed rather quickly. The caravan never stopped for food or drink as the men that had come along in this journey were body cultivators that needed very low sustenance to go by their day.

They would take maybe a few drinks from their water pouch and eat some dry meats. Other than that, they simply walked without resting.

They would rest once they reached their tribe.

Along the way, Alex saw 2 different caravans go past them and checked for his father on both of them. Unfortunately, he was in neither one.

If Li Yun was right and just the Wastelands alone were larger than the Crimson Empire, then it would take him months, if not years to find his father.

He definitely had to find a way out of here faster than that.

Finally, the group arrived at the Stepstones tribe’s location.

Li Yun walked out in front of him and Alex went behind her.

“My daughter!” a buffed-up man with a gray beard and no hair stood in front of her. “Tell me you were successful in this venture.”

“Of course, father,” she said. “We brought back quite a few fish this time around. I even managed to find myself a husband candidate.”

“What? You found yourself a husband?” the man who could only be chief spoke loudly in shock.

“It’s him, father,” she turned around to point at Alex who was looking at the massive canyon that lay beyond where the tribe had made their stay in.

“What?” he turned around with a confused look. “I told you, I’m not going to be your husband.”

The chief looked at Alex weirdly as well and turned towards her daughter. “Daughter, your father is old and doesn’t understand these jokes your make. If you really found a potential husband then tell me who he is. No need to point at that skinny man that has probably never seen the light of day.”

“I’m not joking, father,” she said. “I want him to be my husband. No, your daughter hasn’t gone mad. While he may not look like it, he’s actually very strong.”

“While coming here, he slapped me so hard that I cried,” she said with a blush on her tanned face.

“Is that true?” the father turned towards Alex.

“Uh…”

“Why don’t you test him, father? You’ll see whether I’m telling the truth or not.”