The end of the world is approaching, I'm handing myself over to the country.

It's really him!

Live!

"Holy crap! The national team is on the field?"

"Even the experts are personally fighting the boss? Is this event that prestigious?"

"Stop talking nonsense! Make way for Professor Chen!"

It's unclear who shouted first, but the chaotic, fleeing crowd seemed to have been paused.

The next second, everyone spontaneously changed direction.

They deliberately spread out to both sides, clearing a path to the lake on the monster-infested battlefield.

Several heavily armored players even roared and activated their defensive skills, enduring the attacks of the withered giant and buying time for this special team.

"Protect our experts!"

"Damn it, even if I die today, I'll make sure the professor finishes his journey!"

These words instantly moved the people nearby to tears: "Damn, that's true brotherly loyalty!"

But before the person next to him could finish being moved, the man continued, "Otherwise, all the materials I invested would be wasted!"

Everyone: "..."

Rough words are not rough.

You can't afford to mess with Yuan Jing, no matter who else you're against.

The players, who had originally planned to retreat, displayed astonishing unity at this moment.

The forest's consciousness also took notice of these uninvited guests.

She could sense that these people were very weak, so weak that they were almost negligible.

But their calm and united demeanor made her feel inexplicably uncomfortable.

"Garbage is garbage. Even if you pile it up, it won't become any more valuable."

Under the desperate cover of the players, Professor Chen Yu led his team to the edge of the now polluted lake in an orderly manner.

They ignored the roaring, withered giants around them, and they ignored the pungent stench.

"Let's begin," Chen Yu calmly instructed.

His teammates immediately opened their respective spatial weapons, but what they took out were not scrolls or potions shimmering with magical light.

Instead, they were glass test tubes sealed in metal suitcases, labeled with complex chemical tags.

The liquid in the test tube is mostly colorless and transparent, and looks no different from water.

They unscrewed the test tubes and poured the liquid inside into the lake one tube at a time.

There was no explosion, no light, not even the slightest energy fluctuation.

The liquids silently dissolved into the dark brown poisonous water without causing any ripples.

After a brief moment of astonishment, the forest's consciousness erupted into a burst of utterly mocking laughter.

"Hahahaha...cough cough..."

She laughed so hard that it aggravated her injury, causing her to cough violently.

"Foolish ants...is this your hope?"

"How many bottles of water?"

"This? That's it?"

Forest could clearly sense that the liquid contained almost no energy, and to a king-level being like her, it was no different from pure water.

This was the funniest joke she had heard since she woke up.

However, the next second.

Her laughter stopped abruptly.

Instead, there was a gasp of extreme horror, as if someone were being choked.

The lake water was still the same polluted lake water.

However, the giant tree in the center of the lake began to undergo some indescribable and terrifying changes.

Its immense vitality is dissolving in a bizarre way!

Large chunks of bark no longer peeled off, but instead became soft and sticky, turning into puddles of grayish-black mud that slid down the tree trunk.

The sturdy wooden structure crumbled silently, losing its support.

The breath of life is gushing out at an avalanche-like speed!

This is no longer poisoning or injury; it is being completely decomposed and erased at the most fundamental structural level of life!

"Uh... ah..."

The sound of the forest became hoarse and dry, as if squeezed from the throat of a corpse that had been dried up for hundreds of years.

The once melodious voice of a young girl aged by more than a few decades in a short instant; it seemed to have spanned several centuries!

"You... damn it, what... did you... actually fall down?!"

The voice no longer held any arrogance or resentment, only pure, instinctive fear and bewilderment.

A player who had just recovered from the shock looked at this miraculous scene and then at Professor Chen's team, who seemed completely unfazed, and couldn't help but burst into laughter.

He pointed to the giant tree that was "melting" and laughed as he complained.

"Hahaha! You're dumbfounded now!"

"This is the power of science!"

The players' maniacal laughter still echoed across the battlefield when the giant tree, which was "melting" at a visible speed, suddenly stopped collapsing.

"puff--!!"

A muffled thud was heard, as if something had been squeezed out from the inside.

A large mass of grayish-black viscous substance was ejected from the center of the rapidly shrinking tree trunk and crashed heavily onto the murky lake shore.

Upon seeing this, countless players quickly moved away.

The mucus writhed and slowly slid down, revealing what was wrapped inside.

It was the figure of a woman.

No, to be precise, it was an old woman.

Her skin was as dry and withered as a dried orange peel, with deep furrows covering her cheeks and neck. Sparse white hair clung to her scalp, and she was curled up on the ground, exuding an aura of decay.

The surrounding players were all stunned.

Her extremely aged appearance was a world apart from the youthful voice that, though filled with resentment, still retained a certain charm.

Is she the very essence of the forest?

Under everyone's watchful eyes, the old woman used all her strength, trembling as she propped herself up.

She ignored the thousands of players around her, and she also ignored the nonchalant professor team.

The forest moved laboriously, step by step, in one direction.

Every step she took seemed to drain the last bit of her life.

The forest stretched out a wrinkled, bony hand, reaching towards the silent depths of a dark forest beyond the battlefield, and uttered a weak and desperate plea in a dry, almost throat-tearing voice.

"elder brother......"

"Please... help me..."

"I...I can't breathe anymore..."

The voice carried a hint of childlike grievance and dependence, creating an extremely eerie contrast with her aged appearance.

elder brother?

Everyone was stunned and instinctively looked in the direction she reached out.

There was nothing there except for the elongated, shadowy tree shadows cast by the light.

A deathly silence.

There was no movement, no response.

The humanoid figure in the forest froze in place, its outstretched hand trembling in mid-air.

The forest seemed unable to comprehend the situation before it; its murky eyes first showed bewilderment, then urgency, and finally, a cold despair of being abandoned by the entire world.

Forest cried out again, this time with a trembling voice filled with disbelief.

"elder brother?!"

Her response was still silence.

The dark forest coldly watched her, as if she were a complete stranger.