Chapter 208-1: Flowers That Bloom by Chance (1) |
Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range.
Abyss of Heaven Territory Node.
The Earthmind Evil Spirit stood suspended in midair, connected to the Evil Eye’s outstretched tendrils.
Its perceptual gaze immediately spread out in layers.
In an instant, the Black Tide turned into a surging sea, madly opening new territory to the east, devouring all matter along the way.
Stimulated by the mysterious commander, it quickened its steps in territorial expansion.
Time was pressing. It knew it had to devour as many resources as possible before the waxing moon ended.
If the next lunar phase switched to a weakened state, it could only rely on stockpiled resources to make it through the difficult ‘winter’ until the next strengthening arrived.
The player race’s reinforcements were still increasing. Whether it could hold out through the next winter was unknown.
Through perceptual scouting provided by the Evil Eye, it already had a clear target.
If it could devour this force, the Black Tide’s growth would reach a brand-new height.
At the end of the perceptual tendrils, a golden ocean fused with the firmament.
From the depths of the sea came a faint, low rumble, and then a behemoth like a mountain burst through the water.
Its body was incomparably vast, covered all over with golden scales, each the size of a house. In the sunlight they reflected a blinding radiance, like a moving mountain of gold. Its eyes were like two pools of burning golden flame, carrying endless vicissitudes.
A slight sweep of its colossal fins could raise golden waves hundreds of meters high, the billowing surf thundering to the heavens.
Once locked by the perceptual view, the behemoth’s dissipating vitality energy values surfaced in the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s mind.
Its gaze shifted. Not far from the golden behemoth, a terrifying creature shaped in a winding dragon-like form swam slowly.
Its body was slender, like a moray eel, fully a thousand meters long. Golden patterns on its surface flowed like molten magma, radiating scorching heat.
As it swam, its form twisted and wound. Wherever it passed, the seawater seemed stirred by an invisible giant hand, forming enormous vortices.
The gaze continued deeper into the golden world. A group of octopus-shaped behemoths appeared in the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s mind.
Their tentacles were like thick ropes, covered in golden suckers like ferocious golden eyes, weaving through the deep sea, hunting for prey.
This was a domain world ruled by behemoths.
The surging energy they shed made the Earthmind Evil Spirit incomparably tempted.
But the intensity of this special domain field also made it feel great pressure.
Although the Black Tide could grow through war, the prerequisite was to drag the opponent into a protracted battle.
If the difference in power level was too great, it would only be crushed like rotten wood.
Within this ecological chain composed of golden behemoths, there were too many powerful creatures. Launching war rashly would likely lead to a lopsided rout.
Before starting a war, it had to consider all potential risks. For the moment, investigation would remain the priority.
Perhaps it needed to try mobilizing the Battle Swarm and the player race, making them serve it and assist in winning this nearly impossible war.
Though these two evil forces were troublesome, they could sometimes be used as tools of war.
Just like the fire-playing fool who suddenly descended back then. With the help of the player race and the Battle Swarm, he won easily, and it reaped the greatest benefit from that campaign.
But that was also the only drawback. As long as the player race and the Battle Swarm intervened, the spoils could not be enjoyed alone.
After greedily cruising the golden ocean for quite a while in its perceptual view, the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s gaze turned toward the front of the golden ocean.
A foreign race stood in the way of the Black Tide’s expansion.
To approach the golden ocean domain, it had to devour this force, opening a route between the Evil Eye Tower and the golden ocean.
In an instant.
The Black Tide heaved, raising huge waves, and rolled to crush in the direction indicated by the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s will.
—
Eternal Emptiness homeland.
Splash.
A figure rose from a pool of blue water.
He had a humanoid form, nearly three meters tall, with two broken bull horns atop his head. Hot air streamed at his nostrils with each breath.
Embedded in his exposed back were 12 spirit nails engraved with spirit patterns, threads of energy surging within them.
Each time he conquered a powerful race, a spirit nail was driven into his spine. This was not only a decoration but a symbol of a milestone of conquest, witnessing the blood-soaked campaigns and supreme glory along his path.
But in fact, he did not crave slaughter.
“Ling Bone, the Black Tide is upon us.”
At that moment, an anxious voice came from a hovering light mirror in the distance.
Ling Bone turned to the mirror. On its surface was a pitch-black sea like ink, a flood that could not be stopped sweeping across the land.
The being called Ling Bone nodded coldly, his eyes devoid of emotion.
“I know.”
Predicaments, desperate straits. Along the way, he had grown used to them.
Staring in silence at the Black Tide in the mirror for a long time, Ling Bone spoke to ask.
“Light Mirror, how many years have you followed me.”
“I have followed you through 728 years of campaigns.”
Hearing this number, a trace of emotion flickered in Ling Bone’s eyes, and scenes buried deep in memory surged to the surface.
From childhood he knew the world was vast, yet he had not imagined it was far larger than he thought.
Before entering Monster World, the small world he lived in was called Star Mound, divided into three world tiers: the Lower Furnace World, the Midcourt World, and the Star Ring World.
At that time he was merely an insignificant member of the lowest Furnace World, living by picking scraps that fell from the two upper worlds in the garbage heaps.
By the normal trajectory of growth, he should have vanished among the living, until one day he found a rust-covered light mirror while rummaging through garbage.
At first he thought nothing of it, until by accident he discovered the Light Mirror possessed a ‘parsing’ ability, able in a short time to analyze the essence, structure, weaknesses, and operating laws of things.
This ability could be used not only in battle, but also in learning, manufacturing, and repairing. It was an all-around auxiliary tool.
Even the crippled cultivation methods circulated in the lower world could be repaired and optimized by the Light Mirror into top-tier cultivation methods.
What made it even more unbelievable was that within the Light Mirror there remained a fragmentary consciousness with the ability to think.
From then on, his life’s trajectory changed.
But his living environment destined him to be weak, and he had never thought to touch the interests of lifeforms in the two upper worlds.
Under ideological branding, he even once considered handing the Light Mirror over to the order regulators.
But the rule of the world was that those who could stand at the top were destined to be few.
Even if you did not harbor thoughts of overturning the order, so long as you possessed the power to touch their interests, you would still be seen as a threat by those standing at the summit.
Possessing the potential to climb to the summit was, in the eyes of the order makers, an unforgivable evil.
Danger crept in quietly.
At the time he did not understand. He just wanted to be a dog for those enforcers of order. Why could they not spare him.
Having evaded death countless times, he began to ponder a question: why was I born at the very bottom of the world, able only to pick the scraps thrown down by lifeforms of the two upper worlds.
Why could I only crawl and struggle in the lower world, crushed mercilessly under the giant wheel of fate.
He had once thought the members of the lower world’s resistance alliance were fools, trying to move a tree like ants, utterly stupid.
His own strength became the blade that cut the shackles of ideological branding.
With the Light Mirror, everything became possible.
That day, after burying his persecuted mother’s remains, he stood before the grave pool and looked up to the sky.
His gaze pierced layers of clouds straight to the boundless firmament.
That sky which had once felt remote and inspired such awe now stirred doubt and anger in his heart.
The sufferings he had experienced, those chasms that could not be crossed, were they merely because of his own weakness.
If so, did it mean that if he had power beyond the upper worlds, he could replace them and become the maker of rules.
Countless questions surged like a tide.
Were the rules of this world natural, or shackles deliberately forged by the strong of the upper worlds to consolidate their status.
Thinking of his kinsmen who were oppressed like him, those faces struggling in misery, an uncontrollable anger rose in his heart.
A seed of resistance was planted.
He would change the world and build a perfect world of equality in his heart.
Perhaps the process would be like a moth rushing to flame, but he was willing to strive once for this dream.
After this, he joined the resistance alliance and declared war on the two upper worlds.
As his age grew and his knowledge accumulated, he gradually realized the Light Mirror’s origin was far more complicated than he had thought.
As he continually fed it resources, the Light Mirror’s memory partially recovered in the meantime.
Only then did he learn that the Light Mirror was not a divine artifact dropped by an upper world lifeform but a relic of a powerful race from an extraterritorial world, able to grow by devouring energy substances.
Relying on the power granted by the Light Mirror, he broke life’s shackles and continually surpassed himself.
After 237 years.
Starting as a weakling from the lower world, he finally led the Furnace World’s people to the summit of the world.
A few years later, he and the racial members who followed him established a new world order.
But the new order did not change the world’s structure.
The world was still composed of the three-tier structure of Lower Furnace, Midcourt, and Star Ring.
The difference was that the Eternal Emptiness race he led rose from the bottom to the top, and the former top fell to the bottom.
Only then did he discover that the world’s operation was destined to have innumerable bottoms.