He froze, mid sentence, eyes widened in disbelief — his jaw nearly hitting the ground to emphasise his shock.

    "Brontes is here???"

    Standing not far from him was the unmistakable form of the Divine beast. Brontes, in all his glory, loomed over the strange terrain in his miniature form, practically radiating raw power from his body.

    Alex blinked several times, trying to convince himself this wasn''t some trick of the System. But no — this was the real deal.

    Brontes stood there and looked around lazily and partially confused, with his two bright eyes scanning the surroundings with an alertness that Alex hadn''t seen since the beast''s slumber back on his ship.

    His black and blue scales shimmered faintly under the light of the Expanse''s skies, and the faint crackle of the lightning energy surrounded him.

    "How...?" Alex whispered, in a race of thoughts. He hadn''t brought Brontes here, in fact he didn''t even know such a thing was possible! Hell, the beast was sound asleep in his own chamber on his ship while Alex was doing his thing and making his preparations.

    And, as if sensing Alex''s presence, Brontes turned his head and locked his massive eyes onto Alex for a second.

    For a moment, he seemed surprised, but then his expression softened into what could only be described as relief and Alex quickly found a human sized lizard-like beast flying towards him, attacking him with a storm of licks!

    Alex felt his heart race when he saw Brontes, a Divine class beast, pounce at him, but he quickly calmed down thanks to the bundle of cuteness that was Brontes.

    Alex noticed something quite peculiar though; Brontes was smaller in this place than he was back on his ship.

    At the moment, as Alex held him, he could tell that he was much smaller indeed. About the size of a five year old child.

    He held the smaller Brontes in his arms and his mind raced through the possibilities as a flood of emotions washed over him.

    "25,000 kilometres of range now?"

    His perception had grown significantly now that he''d become a higher life form. Before, it capped out at around 3000 kilometres maybe? But now, this was a leap far beyond that he anticipated.

    With this enhanced awareness, Alex could sense every non living thing within the surrounding 25,000 kilometres.

    ''I guess this is one of the downsides of not having Mira here with me... Not being able to detect living, sentient beings sucks.''

    However while he was mid thought, his brows raised as his spatial perception had picked up something interesting.

    His spatial perception painted a vivid image of the surrounding landscape in his mind, among which he pinpointed something unexpected so early into his journey here — a city.

    Nestled within a natural basin, surrounded by jagged cliffs and glowing rivers of liquid light, the city seemed quite cut off from the rest of the world. There were only a few roads leading in and out, and while Alex couldn''t detect living beings in the Primoridal Expanse, that didn''t account for inanimate objects.

    He could count on his hands and feet the number of carriages coming in and out of the city, which for a city of that size was quite unusual.

    The sight of the city itself was quite surprising though.

    Cities in the Primordial expanse weren''t exactly rare, there was just a vast distance between each one so coming across them took quite some effort and travelling.

    Being able to find one so close to his entry point could only be attributed to his luck.

    "A city, huh?" Alex murmured, intrigued by what he had found.

    He stretched his arms and glanced at Brontes, who was busy sniffing the ground nearby.

    "Might be worth checking out. At the very least, they should have some information or useful resources for a city this size."