Longzang

Chapter 616 Another one

As Wei Yuan passed through the portal of light, he once again felt that omnipresent distortion, as if it were trying to fundamentally reshape him and integrate him into this world.

The little black bird reappeared, but circled Wei Yuan several times before carefully landing on his finger. It was clearly frightened and still had reservations.

Wei Yuan was very patient. He waited until the little bird had a firm grip on his finger before asking, "Is there any energy source nearby?"

"without……"

The moment he heard the answer, Wei Yuan swiftly flipped his hand and grabbed the bird!
The little bird was originally in a state of readiness to escape at any moment, but it was answering a question and its reaction was inevitably a step slow. Moreover, it did not expect that Wei Yuan would make a move before it could finish speaking, and so it was caught.

Wei Yuan instantly exited the portal, and the Ice Crystal Divine Tree immediately replenished it with a burst of cold spiritual energy, freezing the little bird and preventing it from self-destructing. Wei Yuan nodded approvingly to the Ice Crystal Divine Tree, then handed the little bird to Yin Yang, saying, "Another one."

"Give us more, and we can get more system fragments after refining them," the girl Yin Yang said, unusually speaking a few more words.

Wei Yuan nodded, entered the portal again, and returned a moment later with another bird in his hand.

"It's getting more and more wary. This time it might be difficult to catch. I need to start exploring."

The girl nodded, took the bird, and disappeared. Wei Yuan felt that her spirituality had increased considerably recently; it seemed that the advancement of the mortal realm was an improvement for all living beings within it.

For the young girl Yin Yang, the advancement in the World of Mind has primarily raised the ceiling that limits her potential. As for the other immortal plants, apart from the Jianmu seedling, none of them have yet reached that ceiling.

Wei Yuan entered the portal again. This time, three black birds appeared in the air at the same time. They chirped and pointed at Wei Yuan, and then two of the birds warily distanced themselves from him.

Knowing it would be difficult to strike again, Wei Yuan ignored the blackbirds and began exploring deeper into the world. After all, these blackbirds didn't seem very intelligent; they'd probably forget what had happened after a while.

The world was pitch black; places a little further away were completely obscured by darkness, with only some unidentified halos outlining small patches of land. The distant horizon seemed slightly brighter, like a moonless night with stars, yet it stood out starkly against the darkness of the rest of the world.

Looking around, Wei Yuan chose the nearest set of ruins and walked towards it at a leisurely pace. His choice of direction was purely based on intuition; Wei Yuan didn't know if his luck was of any use in this world, so he dared not be careless and focused intently.

After walking a short distance, Wei Yuan's speed increased. Suddenly, he flashed past nearly a hundred feet and then stopped abruptly, scanning his surroundings with his divine sense.

Although he gained nothing, Wei Yuan still retreated a hundred feet as planned and returned to his original spot.

Thus, Wei Yuan's pace of advance varied drastically, sometimes accelerating and sometimes slowing down, and he would even suddenly change direction. If there had been an ambush along the way, he would surely be completely disoriented by now.

When Wei Yuan rushed forward another hundred feet, he felt as if he had passed by something. He turned back instantly and saw a pile of garbage by the roadside, emitting a strange aura.

Wei Yuan swept his divine sense across the area and immediately felt it weaken by a barely perceptible amount, as if it had been sucked away by something. Then, a beam of light suddenly descended from the sky, illuminating a small child rummaging through a pile of trash.

He seemed to sense something and looked up in Wei Yuan's direction. Wei Yuan hadn't concealed himself, but the child ignored him. The child looked to be seven or eight years old, with the appearance of an ordinary human, his body merely a blur.

He had eyes larger than those of a normal human, completely black with no whites. Between his eyebrows was a third eye, which was looking around but couldn't see Wei Yuan.

He had no hair, only a few ribbons growing from the back of his head, which moved on their own even without wind.

The child continued rummaging through the garbage heap and finally found a package. He then walked towards the nearby ruins. Wei Yuan scanned the garbage heap with his divine sense and saw that it was full of clumps of black, viscous substances. He had no idea what the package the child had found was.

Wei Yuan followed him, leading him to the edge of a ruin. The ruins appeared to be a village, with each house having a courtyard separated by low walls. The child walked to a house that was almost completely collapsed, pushed open a non-existent door, and went inside.

Strangely, there was always a beam of light in the sky, appearing from nowhere, illuminating the child and a small area around him. The area illuminated by the light would change, and things that were not there before would appear.

As the child moved, a bed appeared in the ruins, and a person was lying on it. Upon seeing the child, the ribbon hanging in front of her chest fluttered slightly, as if in greeting.

The child brought the package to the bedside and fed the woman little by little. There was very little in the package. The woman waved the ribbon, signaling the child to keep it for herself, but the child stubbornly insisted on feeding her. However, the woman was too weak to move, and eating was extremely difficult for her.

At that moment, the woman and child both looked to one side, as if something extremely terrifying had happened. A monster shrouded in black mist smashed through the window, poked its two heads in, then let out a piercing scream, crashed through half the wall, and lunged at the woman and child!
Just as Wei Yuan was about to make a move, the light in the air suddenly went out, and the woman and child disappeared, but the monster remained.

It lost its target, looked around with its two heads, and then stared at Wei Yuan before suddenly pouncing on him!
This monster can see itself? It can also see women and children that weren't originally there? This seems contradictory.

Before Wei Yuan could think, the monster pounced with astonishing speed, and a scythe-like claw was already slashing towards Wei Yuan's neck!
Wei Yuan reached out and grabbed a pile of various kinds of waste from the ruins. With a flash of golden and red light, they were sculpted into a giant sword.

A clear, bright lightning flashed across the sword. This lightning was bright and pure, extremely powerful and righteous, and was taken from the lightning magma of the outer sea.

The lightning essence was transformed from Xu Wangu's immortal lightning, making it a genuine immortal-grade substance. Before this trip, Wei Yuan had already researched it and found that among all the resources available in the mortal world, immortal lightning was the most effective against this strange world, so he brought some with him.

Wei Yuan began by drawing a circle with his greatsword, unleashing the remnants of the previous dynasty's Eternal Autumn Sword technique. His sword movements appeared extremely slow, but the monster's movements also slowed down accordingly, and finally, seemingly against its own will, it crashed headfirst into the blade of the greatsword.

A bright flash of lightning illuminated the surrounding world, and in an instant seemed to reveal many things that did not exist before.

Wei Yuan staggered back several steps, his hastily assembled giant sword shattering on the spot. The monster, covered in celestial lightning, howled shrilly before leaping into the air and exploding into ashes, followed by the fall of something else.

This solo adventure inevitably involved close-quarters combat, so Wei Yuan picked up his Eternal Autumn Sword, which had been unused for a long time.

Wei Yuan reached out and grabbed all the fallen object and fly ash. The fly ash was actually composed of extremely fine grains of sand, and the fallen object resembled a hairpin with a flower that Wei Yuan had never seen before on it.

The hairpin glowed faintly, as if it contained some unknown power. Its material was very ordinary, but its craftsmanship was exceptionally fine, comparable to that of a top artisan. Yet, for some reason, Wei Yuan always felt that the hairpin's workmanship was somewhat stiff and lacked any spirit.

Wei Yuan suddenly wondered if this was what the outer world called industrial products? Because the breastplates produced by Qingming were all the same, they were often criticized by outsiders as being too craftsman-like and soulless.

At this moment, the commotion seemed to awaken the entire ruins; many things were writhing and stirring in the darkness. Without hesitation, Wei Yuan turned and left, disappearing from the ruins in the blink of an eye.

The monster he had just fought was already at the level of a perfected Dharma Aspect; Wei Yuan had no desire to face a group of similar enemies. He returned directly to the portal, intending to take the spoils back for research before continuing his exploration.

As Wei Yuan approached the portal, the ashes in his hand suddenly began to heat up, resonating with the portal. Wei Yuan tried sprinkling the ashes at the portal, but they were all absorbed, while the portal's energy increased, allowing it to last longer.

The hairpin remained motionless, so Wei Yuan passed through the portal and handed the hairpin to the girl Yin Yang to study. He then took some Immortal Thunder Essence and entered the eerie world once again.

Upon entering, Wei Yuan immediately used whatever materials were available nearby to reshape a giant sword.

Aside from items of the Immortal Lightning rank, anything else brought into this world would be tainted by its distorted power and quickly assimilated. Therefore, Wei Yuan carried nothing with him when he came and went.

(End of this chapter)