"There is no need!" Grandmaster Jinho replied, waving a hand to dismiss Aji's offer. He felt no urge to test the youth's capabilities. What purpose would a test serve anyway? After all, Jinho had refused to take the field when Saint Yonan sought his aid twenty years ago.

According to Gayatri, Aji commanded a mysterious form of internal energy whose exact parameters and spectral traits evaded conventional measurement. Gayatri's sensory abilities had been unable to gauge his aura—proof enough that Aji's cultivation ran extraordinarily deep, a fact Jinho recognized instantly. As for whether Aji was truly the direct disciple of the Three Legends, Jinho chose to let the matter rest.

"Very well, I will not press the issue further," Jinho offered as a parting word. "However, remain on your guard! You must coordinate seamlessly with your comrades."

"Naturally, Master Jinho," Aji replied with a respectful nod.

As late afternoon approached, the Sky Squad members donned unassuming traveling clothes and departed in their three designated strike teams. Aji's group made their way toward the western coast adjacent to the Tulisma Forest. Riding their mounts to the forest perimeter, they dismounted, leaving the horses behind to advance on foot. Leaping into the dense canopy, they glided across high branches, penetrating deeper into the wilderness.

The Tulisma Forest was an ancient, sprawling woodland—the densest and most expansive forest on the entire continent.

Shortly after entering the treeline, the ambient light dimmed as heavy, dark storm clouds blanketed the sky above the high canopy. Rain was imminent. Each team carried compact shelters, and the operatives kept an eye out for natural stone ledges or caves along the hillside to seek refuge if the weather turned violent.

Sure enough, the sky turned pitch-black as blinding bolts of lightning shattered the clouds. Gale-force winds whipped through the canopy, bending massive ancient trees to their limits.

Aji's group secured shelter inside a spacious cavern. They knew the other two teams would similarly be hunkered down in tents or rock formations until the tempest passed. Leaning back against the damp stone wall, Aji closed his eyes, extending a subtle thread of his internal aura to survey the surrounding forest.

The aura thread sank deep into the earth, spreading outward across vast distances. Aji was intimately familiar with this long-range sensing technique. Nearby, his squadmates sat cross-legged in deep meditation, regulating their internal cores while waiting out the storm.

Aji's sensing aura branched through the earth like tree roots, penetrating every pore of the soil and expanding rapidly across the entirety of the Tulisma Forest.

Focusing his intent, Aji synchronized his mind with the expanding energy web. In an instant, a vivid, multi-dimensional mental map of the forest materialized in his mind, highlighting every living entity above the ground.

The resolution of his sensory perception was absolute, revealing hundreds of life signatures scattered across the woodland. The Tulisma Forest had already transformed into a convergence point for independent martial artists, rogue sects, and dark army operatives. Though their precise hideouts remained concealed, Aji could accurately gauge the density of their aura signatures.

Among the detected signatures, a heavy concentration of dark magic stood out. The dark forces had already gathered in force. More concerningly, several signatures radiated an exceptionally dense, suffocating volume of dark aura.

It's them... It must be!

Aji opened his eyes, his tone calm yet serious. "The dark army has assembled inside the Tulisma Forest."

His warning put his teammates on high alert. Both Gayatri and Alicia had already picked up faint traces of spiritual resonance throughout the region, but Aji's declaration confirmed that high-ranking dark entities were present in force.

The Five Gates!

If the dark generals were on the field, the Tulisma Forest was destined to become a catastrophic battleground. They needed to broadcast a warning to the other teams and notify regional military command immediately.

"Are you certain it is the Five Gates, Aji?" Gayatri asked, her eyes narrowing.

"Who else could command such overwhelming dark parameters?" Aji replied. "Their aura density is capable of crushing ordinary cultivators."

The seven operatives in the cavern drew their weapons. Alicia immediately activated her long-range communication artifact, channeling a high-priority distress signal through the array to project her voice to specific receivers.

She transmitted a warning to Barsha and Astro, detailing the presence of the dark army and the confirmed deployment of the Five Gates. The message urged both teams to maintain absolute vigilance and broadcast an immediate alert if they encountered the dark generals.

Meanwhile, on the eastern side of the forest...

Barsha's team had pitched a reinforced tent beneath a rocky outcrop to shelter from the gale. When her communication artifact flared with Alicia's message regarding the Five Gates, Barsha's expression hardened. The presence of the dark generals confirmed that the Tulisma Forest was indeed the coordinates where the Moon Flower would bloom.

Barsha turned to Lao, asking him to perform a localized aura sweep around their perimeter.

Nodding, Lao slammed both palms onto the ground, discharging a pulse of internal aura into the earth. The energy wave radiated outward, sweeping a two-kilometer radius in all directions.

Within his sensory zone, Lao detected several distinct human life signatures—a mix of independent martial artists and dark operatives—though all were positioned at a safe distance, likely taking shelter from the storm.

"Our immediate perimeter is clear," Lao reported, lifting his palms. "The nearby signatures are holding position, but we must maintain a strict watch."

Relieved, Barsha immediately transmitted an official report to Commander Yarko, confirming that the dark army had mobilized inside the Tulisma Forest and that the celestial artifact's manifestation was imminent.

With the report dispatched, regional military command would mobilize heavy task forces to support the vanguard.

Concurrently, on the northern ridge...

Astro's team—accompanied by Grandmaster Jinho—received Alicia's broadcast while sheltered in a narrow cliffside fissure. Having passed the Baikra Waterfall, they had entered the forest through the northern hills when the tempest hit.

Seeing Astro's tense expression as he absorbed the transmission, Jinho stepped forward. "Is it news regarding the Five Gates?"

"Yes, Master!" Astro confirmed.

"I can feel them as well," Jinho murmured, gazing out at the storm. "This war is unavoidable."

A deafening thunderclap rattled the cliffside. BOOOOOOM!

The scene mirrored the prelude to the war twenty years ago. A clash against Lord Demon Shura's forces was once again inevitable. This time, however, Grandmaster Jinho resolved to stand alongside the young guardians, swearing he would not retreat again.

Several hours later, the storm subsided. The three Sky Squad teams exchanged spatial coordinates, agreeing to converge near the central sector of the forest. By morning, owing to the vast expanse of the woodland, they had yet to reunite. Navigating the terrain carefully, they relied on their field rations while maintaining maximum readiness for unexpected encounters.

Aji's group moved through a grove of ancient trees, passing massive trunks uprooted by the storm. Several trees showed scorched, blackened wood where lightning strikes had torn through the canopy, attesting to the storm's extraordinary intensity.

As they advanced, the metallic clash of weapons echoed through the trees ahead.

CLANG!RATTLE!CLANG!

Leaping into the canopy, the team glided across the high branches to investigate the disturbance.

Reaching a clearing, they observed a fierce skirmish underway below. A squad of ten dark army operatives was engaging roughly fifty martial artists wearing matching sect robes. Despite being outnumbered five to one, the ten dark operatives held the upper hand, meeting the sect members stroke for stroke.

"Those are disciples from the Sun Radiance Sect," Nagada noted, identifying the crest on their robes. "It's a prominent school with branch academies across all five continents."

The Sun Radiance Sect had evidently dispatched a contingent to secure the Moon Flower upon detecting the regional atmospheric shifts.

The fifty disciples—led by two senior instructors—were struggling against the dark operatives' volatile attacks. The two factions had clearly crossed paths while scouting for the celestial artifact.

"We should intervene," Nora urged, reaching for his broadsword.

Aji checked the field. "Very well. Two of us will be more than enough."

Nagada and Nora exchanged a brief nod before dropping from the canopy. Controlling their momentum seamlessly, they drew their steel mid-fall. Nagada materialized on the forest floor, thrusting his broadsword forward. Guided by telekinetic aura control, his blade transformed into a silver arc, striking down three dark operatives in rapid succession.

Simultaneously, Nora touched down, swinging his massive broadsword in a wide horizontal arc. The kinetic shockwave shattered the dark operatives' guards, neutralizing the remainder of the unit in a single pass.

The surviving Sun Radiance disciples stared in awe at the two young masters who had saved them.

The disciples explained that their grandmaster had ordered them to survey the Tulisma Forest following reports of the Moon Flower's impending bloom. Nagada and Nora formally introduced themselves as Sky Squad members, advising the disciples to fall back to a safe distance before departing to rejoin their team.

Meanwhile, in the eastern sector...

Barsha's team navigated a dense path through the woodland. As they advanced toward the central rendezvous point, they stumbled upon a scene that made even seasoned warriors recoil.

A massacre had taken place.

The corpses of over a hundred martial artists lay scattered across the forest floor, their bodies showing severe trauma accompanied by residual wisps of dark magic.

"These victims were high-tier cultivators," Barsha observed, examining the scene with a cold eye. "To annihilate a force of this size so decisively... one of the Five Gates must be on the field."

The rest of her team agreed with her assessment.

"From this point on, total stealth," Barsha commanded softly.

Nodding, the operatives suppressed their aura signatures, moving cautiously through the high branches. They were still a considerable distance from the other teams and needed to complete the rendezvous as quickly as possible.

In the northern sector...

Astro's group—guided by Grandmaster Jinho—uncovered a devastated campsite. Tents had been shredded by explosive dark magic, and dozens of independent cultivators lay dead among the debris.

The Moon Flower was a celestial prize of absolute power, drawing martial artists from across the world into a deadly struggle where human life was treated as cheap. Driven by personal greed, many rogue factions had entered the forest independently rather than forming a united front.

Their desire to claim the fourth celestial artifact for themselves had made them easy prey for the dark army.