Chapter 1404: Wolfpack
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Everyone shared a similar reaction to Han Sen. As soon as they saw what lay ahead, they all wished to flee.
They ran into the invisible barrier behind them face first. Many of their faces even started to bleed, due to the speed at which they tried to escape.
When they pierced through the veil of white, they were met with the sight of a number of vicious wolves that stared back at them with dirty green eyes. It was as if the wolves had been awaiting their arrival.
Unable to go back, it was clear they had no choice but to engage the wolves and fight for their lives.
Han Sen remained silent amongst the rallying cries of his teammates, and he simply maintained his clutch on the Bulkwark Umbrella as he lifted it against the wolves that leaped towards him.
The wolves charged with a greater ferocity and a more intimidating presence than a mania-driven bull. Their fangs and their nails were like blades, itching to sink into the first victim they could.
Han Sen held the umbrella to block the initial strike of the first wolf that came for him. The strength and force of that wolf sent him stumbling back quite a bit before he regained his composure.
Fortunately, the umbrella was as hardy as it always had been. It held strong and did not break.
But it was clear to the crew that the wolfpack was in a league above them. As much as they all wished to stand their ground and battle the wolves, they knew it would be a futile fight.
Han Sen acknowledged this to be true, as well. As he held a defensive posture, he used his Dongxuan Aura to scan his immediate surroundings and identify any route or passage that might allow him to escape.
Then, he took off running into the wolfpack. With his Dongxuan Movements, he managed to sidestep and evade every attack that came for him, until he was clear of the pack and could duck into the clearing on the left.
He was racing towards a plaza that had held a number of statues. With everyone else engaging the wolves, drawing the majority of them away from Han Sen, he was easily able to make it there.
When Han Sen entered the forest of statues, he took cover and began munching on as much fruit as he could. Slowly, his sacred geno points increased, and he cramped the muscles of his torso to speed up digestion.
After eating a hearty sum of them, his sacred geno point tally increased by quite a lot. He would be a lot more comfortable battling the wolves in such a condition.
from what Han Sen could tell, there was one person missing from the group of humans that were behind him, still fighting the wolves. That person was Mister Li, and as much as he might have wished to seek him out, Han Sen had problems of his own. Like coyotes trailing blood, the wolves had sniffed him out, and unless he got moving to secure his own safety, he'd be doggie chow.
After fleeing their snapping maws, however, Han Sen noticed something strange about the method they were hounding him. It wasn't as if they were trying to hunt down and kill the intruder; it was like they were pushing him in a certain direction.
Han Sen kept on running, regardless, and eventually, he came to a place that was empty of anything remarkable.
This was, of course, bad. It was a plaza devoid of anything, removing the possibility of him taking cover. At least amongst the statues that decorated the previous plaza, he could duck and weave and provide his enemies a harder time giving chase. Here, he was at a disadvantage.
But after gobbling down a bevy of geno fruits, Han Sen had earned himself dozens of sacred geno points. If push came to shove, he'd be shoving a lot harder now.
He looked to his left and right and noticed that more wolves were appearing, seeking to close in on him. If he wanted to turn around and return to the cover of the statues, or the teammates he had left behind, he'd have no chance to do so now.
Bracing himself for a fight, Han Sen closed his eyes. When he opened them again, however, he noticed the wolves were gone. They had stopped chasing him and withdrawn, but as for the reason why, he could not guess.
He turned to take a look at his past pursuers, and he saw them standing there, growling at him with their bared fangs on full display. It was as if they had now been stopped by an invisible barrier.
"They really were chasing me here; but for what purpose, I wonder?" Han Sen thought, as he viewed his surroundings.
He had reached a garden populated with strange botanical marvels. The things which grew there were crazy, and Han Sen first noticed this when he saw bunches of carrots that were dangling from trees. Strangely, they looked to have been formed from human brain-matter, dressed with a bit of greenery on top. He didn't know if he should have looked at it in wonder or in disgust.
Han Sen continued on, wandering through this garden of sickly delights. Blood and ghastly violence seemed to be the primary theme of decoration, for there were many intestinal-shaped plants and flowers running with blood.
They were all so weird, and the sight of them made Han Sen's skin squirm. He was extremely uncomfortable in this place, as any right-minded individual would be.
Strangely, however, Han Sen could sense the lifeforces of everything that grew there, and he noted there was nothing remarkable. He was detecting them to be ordinary plants, though he had never seen such gross botany before.
The wolves were still watching Han Sen tread the garden, so there was no chance of him returning the way he had come. But, not sensing any danger ahead of him, he wasn't too wary of walking forward into the deeper recesses of the grotesque place.
The mist was getting thicker, however, and it obscured much in the distance.
There was enough visibility to see what was in his proximity, though, and he could watch the plants become more gruesome and sordid the further he went. Eventually, he came to a tree with a man hanging from its branches. His arm, as weird as it was, was growing a number of ears like a fallen log bearing mushrooms.
But that really was the shape of the tree. There was no actual human body dangling from its rotten eaves; the tree had simply been shaped like that. Han Sen's skin crawled, like it was hosting a corpse-feeding party of maggots. After all, he was sensing them to be ordinary plants. They were this strange, but they shouldn't have been.
"Strange. Why are they so creepy and wild, yet so... weak and supposedly unremarkable?" Han Sen thought to himself.
Then, Han Sen heard a noise come from behind. He saw Hezhi approaching him, from out of nowhere.
Hezhi looked to be in an okay condition. He looked a little winded, but that was the extent of it. He was free from injuries.
"Hezhi, where is everyone else?" Han Sen asked.
Hezhi answered, "I don't know. I ran by myself. You're the first of the team I've seen in a bit."
Han Sen thought he spoke a little strangely. There was a monosyllabic tone to his speech, and so he took a couple of steps back.
"Give me all your geno fruit and I'll keep you safe," Hezhi stepped forward to say.
"And how can you keep me safe?" Han Sen realized Hezhi was still himself, but he had come to Han Sen for the riches he carried.
"This." Hezhi summoned a black metal wolf, and the marks upon it showed it to be a gold geno core.
Chapter 1405: Killing Hezhi
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Han Sen was not worried at the thought that someone might come to steal his geno fruit. Mister Li, Old Qiu, Xu Yanmeng, Wang Zhao, and Zhong Sanxiao already had gemstone geno cores and would not need his geno fruit.
Only Hezhi would need the sacred fruit Han Sen possessed, so it might not have come as an absolute surprise for him. And indeed, Hezhi had been waiting for this opportunity. He was a bit of an outsider himself, and he wasn't closely associated with the others who were on the expedition, anyway. Now that he had caught Han Sen alone, it was his time to strike.
Han Sen looked at his metal wolf geno core and said, "You used this to get away?"
Hezhi said, "Yes. My geno core is called Ditto, and it can take on the form of any creature it wishes to."
"That's a fairly brilliant geno core you have, but it's a shame..." Han Sen stressed an exaggerated sigh.
"What's a shame?" When Hezhi said that, the wolf slowly began to approach Han Sen.
"Upgrading that geno core to the best it could be might yield some impressive results, but it's a shame your ascension will come to an end here," Han Sen said, his threat made clear.
"I was going to leave you alive after taking your spoils; I'll take that as permission to silence you for good." When Hezhi said this, the wolf immediately jumped towards Han Sen with its maw open.
Han Sen used his Gold Dragon Lock in response, immediately tying up the airborne wolf.
The wolf was quickly bound, and it dropped to the ground like a stone. It did its best to squirm free, but it was clearly having trouble.
"You have a gold geno core?!" Hezhi's face swiftly turned sour.
"Yeah, but it's no big deal," Han Sen said.
"Yeah... you're right. It isn't," Hezhi suppressed the sudden flash of fear he had been stricken with, and he summoned a purple sword.
It was three-feet-long, and many strange writings had been inscribed across the length of its blade.
Hezhi waved his sword, which sent beams of light shaped like the characters on the sword shooting towards Han Sen like a number of lasers.
Han Sen opened up his Bulwark Umbrella to block the barrage of plasma rounds. All the lights exploded against the protective shielding of the umbrella.
Han Sen had eaten a great many sacred geno fruits, so gold geno cores weren't able to deal half as much damage now.
"How have you managed to obtain so many gold geno cores?" Hezhi thought the umbrella was a gold geno core, too.
It was only bronze, but that spoke volumes about its efficiency. Han Sen did not respond, though; he simply summoned his Crystal Core and tossed the egg at the unsuspecting bandit.
"You were lying this whole time. You are a liar; a big fat liar! You are a demi-god with gold geno cores." Hezhi was angered by his mistake, and he swung his sword towards the egg that was headed his way.
The crystal egg was able to dodge each and every plasma round headed coming towards it, prompting Hezhi to swing his sword directly at it.
Pang!
The sword beat the egg down to the ground, but it ricocheted off the floor at an even greater speed. It walloped his body with the might and swiftness of a bullet.
He had been unable to dodge, and after it struck his leg like lightning, it bounced right back to Han Sen.
Han Sen had become very proficient in wielding the egg, and when the egg was returned, Han Sen went back to wielding his umbrella. Then, he began walking forward towards Hezhi.
Feeling nothing occur when he was hit by the egg, Hezhi still possessed his confidence. He stepped forward, swinging more and more plasma rounds at Han Sen.
The light-bullets exploded in a haze of sparks against the umbrella, though, and he was still unable to deal damage to the opponent he once thought would be a cakewalk.
Hezhi gritted his teeth and continued trying to attack. But this time, Han Sen did not even use his umbrella. He simply stood where he was and let his foe try his best.
Hezhi brought his sword down directly on Han Sen's body, but the results astounded him. It did nothing, and the sword itself began to bend like rubber.
He stared at his sword in disbelief, unable to grasp why this might have happened. So, next, Hezhi used his fist to strike Han Sen.
And again, Han Sen did not dodge. He simply stood where he was and allowed Hezhi to do his worst.
The moment Hezhi's fist came into contact with Han Sen's skin, however, chills shot through his body, and cold sweat poured from his forehead. He watched as his own fist bent upwards against Han Sen, as if he was made of sponge.
Then, like an eerie ghost, Han Sen reached out his hand towards his once-pompous opponent. Han Sen was too close, and with a futile reaction, Hezhi brought up his arm to deflect Han Sen's hand.
But Han Sen simply grabbed the man's arms and ran his hand down to Hezhi's clenched fist. Han Sen latched on and did not let go, as if he was sucking Hezhi's soul dry.
Sha!
Hezhi's body was delivered one strike, and then it shattered and crumbled into fertilizer for the wretched garden.
As this occurred, the geno core was also destroyed. The sword he was wielding, however, dropped to the ground with a heavy clanging sound.
Han Sen swiftly moved to pick it up. It was a gold geno core, and Han Sen needed a replacement for his horn. He quickly pocketed it by placing it in his Sea of Soul.
Just as Han Sen was about to turn and leave, he heard more sounds.
When Han Sen turned to take a look at what lay ahead, a human-shaped tree was shambling its way over to him.
"Is this thing alive?" Han Sen asked himself, as he stepped back in caution.
The tree was not that strong, and it gave the illusion of being an ordinary plant like all the rest.
But it came to a stop near the mound of dust on the ground that was once Hezhi.
Han Sen realized the tree was coming for the man whose sequence structure he had just destroyed. The roots of the tree moved atop the mound of dust, and then, it all got absorbed.
Chapter 1406: The Waiting Shadow
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
It didn't take long for the humanoid tree to absorb the mound of dust. Its previously dull and unremarkable lifeforce then began to resemble the person Han Sen had just slain: Hezhi.
Han Sen was not sure if it was exhaustion playing tricks on his eyes, but he could then swear he was seeing the tree shrink to take on the form of Hezhi himself.
And it did, but fortunately, it did not replicate the mindset of the person Han Sen had just killed. It looked like Hezhi now, but it just stood in place without motion, where it had absorbed his remains.
Han Sen took a step back, just in case. The last thing he wanted to do was trigger or invoke the ire of something he did not have to.
After stepping back a bit, Han Sen decided now might be a good time to return to the forest of statues in that plaza. The wolves that hounded him to the garden had dispersed, after all.
Provided they stayed gone, Han Sen should have no issue returning there. He might even be able to get back to his teammates.
But as Han Sen began his return trek, he suddenly saw the brain-carrots leaping off their harboring trees to stand upright on the ground before him. It looked like the entire garden did not want Han Sen to return, for all the trees and plants began to close in around him. The way back was closed off.
So, Han Sen decided to walk forward in the way he originally had been. He spoke aloud to the garden, saying, "Okay, I'll play it your way. I'll see where you wish to lead me."
As Han Sen walked the path through the garden he had originally been on, the rest of the botanical residents returned to their initial positions, too, as if nothing had changed at all.
After walking for a while, however, the garden began to take an unexpectedly pleasant turn. In fact, it started to look pretty.
The flowers soon looked like butterflies, and the trees were sculpted like beautiful carvings and wooden furniture. It was like something you'd see in a fairytale. It looked almost unreal.
Han Sen soon came to a lake. Its surface was still, glassy, and blue like a clear summer's sky. At the center of the lake was a stone tablet. In front of it stood a man.
This person wasn't someone Han Sen was familiar with, and as he walked closer to get a better look, he saw that the man was clad in sparklingly white, clean clothing. He wasn't the sort of person you'd expect to see in such a sordid shelter.
"My child; you are finally here," the man in white clothing said.
"Are you talking to me?" Han Sen asked.
"Of course, my child." The man seemed to be speaking to Han Sen, but his attention seemed affixed to the stone tablet he was in front of.
Han Sen thought it weird, that the man continuously referred to him as my child.
"Who are you?" Han Sen asked, with a frown.
Han Sen knew this was not someone whose voice he had heard before, and neither was it a person he had seen before.
"I could ask you the same, but only my children are capable of coming here. So, that is what I can best assume you to be." The man in white clothing spoke in a very relaxed manner. He spoke as if he had awoken from a restful slumber, and was at peace and tranquility.
"Speak plainly. It has been a long day, and I'm not in the mood for games." Han Sen spoke with a stern voice, primarily because he could not stand being called my child any more than he could stand being called boss.
"I am a shadow, and I have waited for your arrival for quite some time," the man in white clothing said.
"My arrival? Me? You know who I am?" Han Sen thought the man was very strange.
If it wasn't for the mist skating gracefully across the lake, Han Sen would have been able to scan the man and get a clear reading of who or what he might have been.
"Yes, but it does not matter. You are here; therefore, you are my child," the man in white clothing said.
Han Sen was getting annoyed. The man was speaking quite a bit, but he wasn't actually saying much.
Han Sen summoned his crystal egg with the desire to throw it at the man.
He'd had enough of being called his child, so he cared little for who the man believed him to be. He wanted to shut him up so he could continue with the expedition.
Before Han Sen could lob it, though, the man suddenly said one more thing which stayed his arm. He said, "This is the only thing I can give you."
The man walked into the tablet as if he was a ghost, passing through a wall.
The stone tablet had once been empty, but was now scrawled with a few additional words.
"God has returned..."
Han Sen was quite surprised to see the words of Life Door now appear on the tablet. He peered at the tablet a little closer then, and before his eyes, the entirety of Life Door began to show up on the stone.
The words appeared one by one.
Han Sen was delighted, though, and he quickly tried to remember everything that was written down.
After reading it all, he felt as if his Blood-Pulse Sutra was starting to run by itself and generate a brand new geno core.
Han Sen always believed he was going to create a geno core with it, but there was something prohibiting him from completing the process. There was always a snag he was getting caught on.
But now, just seeing Life Door written before him on such a pristine lake, it had freed up whatever was hindering his progress. The Blood-Pulse Sutra got to work producing a new geno core with no trouble now.
"This place really is connected to Blood Legion. That man must believe I am a part of Blood Legion," Han Sen thought to himself, as he read the text and did his best to memorize it.
When the text was all revealed, his Blood-Pulse Sutra began to fire on all cylinders. The process of producing a brand new geno core was well underway.
The black crystal was also triggered, prompting more of that black fluid to taint the mixture.
This was the first time Han Sen had the ability to watch the geno core produce. Before, he had always been under fire and unable to, and he found it remarkable how much the substance created looked like a supernova.
Han Sen was rather shocked when he laid eyes on the finished geno core.
Chapter 1407: Real Blood
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
The Blood-Pulse Sutra's geno core was a miniature version of Han Sen himself. It was like a little figurine, shaped to replicate his body perfectly.
As Han Sen stared at it, his bewilderment heightened, as something most strange occurred.
It was as if he was watching time itself rewind around the miniature; he actually watched it get younger. It went backwards, becoming a teenager, a child, a baby, a fetus, and then blood.
Bronze Geno Core: Bronze Real Blood
Han Sen did not know what to say, and it felt as if his lingering thoughts had been left suspended. It was a strange sensation, seeing a figurine of himself grow younger in less than a minute.
"Child, the trail you tread is one you must blaze yourself. This is all I can do to help you."
The light that hovered on the tablet then departed the stone, becoming the white-clothed man again. And this time, Han Sen was able to see his face.
Han Sen was certain he had never seen this man before. He did not look like Han Sen's father, grandfather, or even his great-grandfather.
The man didn't resemble Han Sen himself, either. They didn't look at all related, so the reason why the man constantly referred to Han Sen as his child was completely unknown.
"Who are you? The leader of Blood Legion?" Han Sen asked, his raised voice gilded with a certain sternness.
The white-clothed man merely smiled, and he said, "Remember, your fate is not pre-determined. It is forged through your will and desire; no external, higher power governs it."
After that, the light on the tablet began to fade, and the man alongside it. All that remained was the faceless tablet in the center of the lake. At that same moment, all the plants in the shelter came alive, crying rivers of blood as if to summon a world-ending flood.
"If that guy was the leader of Blood Legion, I wouldn't be surprised. But even though he looked human, he carried the aura of a spirit," Han Sen thought to himself.
At this point, Han Sen was relieved that he had taken the time and been fortunate enough to learn and practice both the Blood-Pulse Sutra and Life Door. Had he skipped one of those, it was highly likely he wouldn't have been standing where he was at that moment. Repeatedly, people had come to believe he was a successor to Blood Legion, so it was certainly paying dividends, bit-by-bit, in his investigations.
The strangest thing, though, was that his Nine-Life Cat pendant was a relic that supposedly belonged to Blood Legion. Even here, of all places, it did not resonate any sort of power. It was as lifeless as it had been over the previous days.
If that man was the leader of Blood Legion, he should have been able to just sense the pendant's presence. Others had done so before, so this was a given.
It was a shame he had gone now, though. He had vanished with the silent grace of a wisp. Any more answers Han Sen might have wished to glean didn't seem likely to be gotten right now.
Han Sen turned his attention to the bleeding plants, and he watched a certain thicket bend and move aside to form a path for him.
"If that man thinks I'm a member of Blood Legion, the plants won't want to hurt me, will they?" Han Sen wondered to himself.
Han Sen walked the trail and found himself exiting the garden, but it wasn't by the same path he had used to enter. He had ended up going further, and he now found himself standing before a palace.
The entrance was wide open, and directly beyond it, Han Sen could see a bronze coffin. Strange symbols and enigmatic lines of text were scrawled and inscribed across it, and sitting atop the coffin was a beast.
The beast was asleep there, and its fur looked like a gentle fire.
"This is the place the survivors spoke of before they died; the beast sure does look like the Nine-Life Cat," Han Sen thought.
As Han Sen pondered this curiosity, his pendant finally came to life. It began to pull Han Sen forward, clearly wanting to visit the beast. He was going to pull it out from beneath his clothes, but just before he did, Mister Li and the others came staggering forward from another direction. Mister Li seemed surprised to see him there.
"Han Sen? You're alive! That brings this old mind some comfort; I feared we had lost you in the scrape with those wolves." Mister Li's rough voice was varnished with genuine concern for Han Sen's wellbeing.
"I'm lucky to be alive; I can tell you that much," Han Sen said, stressing each word with a nearly-winded facade.
Mister Li stepped forward, asking, "So, how did you escape the wolves?"
"I don't know... there was so much going on. There were so many. It's all a blur; but I went through the plaza with all those statues and reached a garden. I traversed it to reach this place." After Han Sen's half-hearted explanation, he approached the others with a question, asking, "And you, Mister Li? How did you and the others get here?"
"It was a trial that was no different than your own adventure. But you... you only have a bronze geno core. For you to make it through on your own, well, you weren't kidding about that luck you possessed, eh?" Xu Yanmeng's words were fine at face-value, but the tone with which he spoke expressed doubt about the validity of Han Sen's tale. He wasn't entirely convinced, that was for sure.
The wolves were strong, and stronger than the average mutant creature, that much was certain.
They might have been okay, in a series of one-versus-one matches. But an entire pack of the beasts had assaulted the group, and the team was fortunate to make it through.
For Han Sen to escape their pursuit with no wounds, that was suspicious.
Han Sen wasn't planning to explain, though, and their doubts did not concern him. He merely asked them, "Is this the bronze coffin they spoke of?"
Mister Li and the others examined their surroundings, having not taken them in when they first laid eyes on Han Sen. Their faces turned a ghastly shade of pale when they saw the coffin, as was described. The beast was sitting atop it, just like they had heard.
The previous team had all ended up dead after coming here. There were more people in that team, so the new team's prospects of making it out themselves did not seem good.
"It sure looks it." Mister Li did not take his eyes off the beast that was lounging atop the coffin.
"Mister Li, how should we proceed?" Zhong Sanxiao asked. He sounded very polite and respectful, this time around. Something must have occurred earlier on, for Zhong Sanxiao to regard Mister Li with admiration now.