Unexpected Transmigration

Li Su's consciousness flickered to life, only to realize with horror that he had become a bamboo stalk growing amidst a mountain of corpses and a sea of bones. Surrounded by surging Sha Qi and prowling giant beasts, he had just managed to cultivate a sliver of spiritual sense through trembling absorption of wandering souls when the sky suddenly darkened. A colossal beast crashed down, and as its blood drenched his bamboo body—he awakened the Devouring Evolution System!

His consciousness was a faint glimmer of light, struggling to rise from an endless abyss of chaos and darkness.

Cold. Stinging. A suffocating sensation of being pinned down by something heavy, as if he were about to be crushed into dust.

Who am I?

The remaining thoughts flickered like a candle in the wind, ready to extinguish at any moment. Memories were fragmented shards that could not piece together a complete past, leaving only a vague symbol—Li Su. Yes, that seemed to be the name.

And then what?

His perception extended outward with great difficulty, attempting to touch the boundaries of "self." There were no limbs, no torso, no heartbeat, and no breath; there was only a sense of stagnation, as if he were firmly fixed and deeply rooted in place. As if... as if he had become a piece of wood, a plant?

Before panic could fully spread, a more massive and turbulent torrent of perception forcibly shattered this nascent confusion.

The stench! A blood-reek so thick it was nauseating, almost solid, mixed with an indescribable, putrid odor of decay and malice, eroding that tiny, weak consciousness from every direction.

Surrounding his "self" was a terrifying sense of compression. It did not come from the soil, but from... countless cold, rigid obstacles filled with the dead air of despair. His consciousness trembled as it "looked"—they were piles of white bones! Beast bones of unimaginable size, jagged and hideous, stacked upon one another to form chilling mountains of corpses. Some bones still clung to dark, blackened scraps of flesh, emitting an even more intense scent of rot.

And "he" was growing at the foot of this mountain built of death. His root system could clearly perceive the viscous blood-mud and shattered bone fragments seeping deep into the soil.

As far as his vision could reach, the earth was dark red, as if soaked in endless blood for millions of years. Sha Qi drifted like fog, gray-black currents swirling and howling across the land, occasionally coalescing into vague, twisted faces of agony, only to be torn apart by some unknown force. The distant sky was forever dim, with leaden clouds pressing down so low that not a single ray of warmth from a "sun" could penetrate.

Dead silence. It was not an absence of sound, but an absence of anything belonging to "life." There was only the whimpering of the Sha wind through the gaps in the bones, like the endless wailing of lost souls.

What kind of hell was this?

Li Su's consciousness shivered; in this terrifying environment, that nascent spark of spirit felt as though it would be scattered and assimilated in the next second, becoming just another ignorant, resentful spirit in this land of death.

He instinctively wanted to curl up, but there was nowhere to hide. He was this bamboo, and this bamboo was him.

Just then, a dull roar echoed from the horizon, and the earth began to tremble violently. Li Su "saw" two colossal monsters locked in a frenzied battle. One resembled a giant lion but possessed three tails, the tips of which were bone spurs flickering with eerie light; the other was like a hideous beetle magnified ten thousand times, its mouthparts tearing through the air with a screeching sound like metal grinding against metal.

Their combat was simple, savage, and bloody to the extreme. Claws tore, armor shattered, and dark beast blood splashed like a torrential rain. Every collision made the earth groan. They were wrapped in tangible, ferocious Sha Qi, and wherever they passed, even the gray-black Sha mist was stirred up and devoured.

Within moments, the three-tailed giant lion bit off the neck of the hideous beetle, letting out a deafening roar. The victor began to feast on the corpse of the defeated, the "crunching" sound of shattering bone setting his teeth on edge.

Li Su watched until his consciousness nearly froze. Was this the daily routine of this world? Was this the "newbie village" he had been dropped into?

Despair washed over him like a cold tide.

He was just a bamboo! A bamboo growing next to a pile of corpses! Immobile and incredibly fragile. Any passing small beast, or even a stray rock sent flying by the battle of those two giants, could easily destroy him.

He didn't even qualify as an ant; he was merely... a plant on a chopping block? Or perhaps a garnish on someone else's dinner plate?

Time lost all meaning in this bloody land. Perhaps it was an instant, perhaps a million years. Under the constant threat of death and the erosion of Sha Qi, Li Su's weak consciousness was instead honed to be a fraction more resilient. The instinct to survive overcame everything else.

He could not die! At least, not die here so inexplicably!

He began to experiment, like a drowning man grasping at a straw, desperately sensing his surroundings. Beyond the blood and Sha Qi, he sensed something else—the extremely weak, broken thoughts filled with pain and chaos drifting from the piles of white bones and the newly dead beast carcasses.

They were fragments of remnant souls.

They drifted unconsciously, most torn apart and assimilated by the violent Sha Qi, while a few slowly dissipated.

A vague thought entered Li Su's consciousness: Perhaps... these things could be... absorbed?

The thought carried a natural temptation. He tried to focus all his spirit to pull the nearest faint glimmer—what appeared to be the soul-scraps left behind by a small beast.

The process was clumsy and difficult. He failed countless times, the soul-scraps blown away by the Sha wind again and again. But Li Su did not give up; this was the only method of "cultivation" he could conceive.

Finally, just as his consciousness was nearly exhausted and about to fall into silence, that faint glimmer tremblingly touched his bamboo body.

In an instant, a cold, chaotic stream mixed with the fragmented memories of a beast's roar merged into his consciousness.

It worked!

Although the process was painful, like swallowing shards of ice, that insignificant replenishment was crystal clear!

The fire of hope was ignited.

Li Su began to attempt it more frantically. He was no longer picky; whether it was the stronger remnant souls drifting from powerful beasts or the broken thoughts of the weakest creatures, as long as he could reach them, he would laboriously pull and absorb them.

His consciousness grew bit by bit through this slow and painful accumulation. From the initial state of being ready to extinguish at any moment, he became able to barely maintain stability in the Sha wind; from only being able to sense the small area around his bamboo body, he gradually learned to "see" further.

He "saw" more bloody battles, "saw" strange plants devouring passing insects and beasts, and "saw" terrifying figures occasionally sweeping across the sky, blotting out the sun.

He was trembling and walking on thin ice, not daring to make any large movements for fear of attracting the attention of any entity. He was just an ordinary bamboo growing by a pile of corpses.

Absorb, refine, grow... the cycle repeated.

He did not know how much time had passed, but his consciousness finally solidified to a certain degree, allowing him to perform an initial internal inspection. He "saw" himself—a bamboo about three zhang tall, emerald green throughout, yet with an exceptionally tough texture. On the bamboo body, there were faint, mysterious black patterns, traces naturally formed after he had absorbed a large amount of remnant souls and Sha Qi.

He had birthed a complete spiritual sense. He was no longer just a glimmer of light, but a "spirit" with clear self-awareness.

However, before he could even savor this joy, a catastrophic disaster suddenly descended!

The sky darkened without warning.

It was not the gathering of storm clouds, but a giant beast of indescribable size falling from the high heavens!

Its shape was beyond description, resembling an ox yet not an ox, its body covered in ink-black scales that reflected a cold, metallic light. Countless twisted, broken bone spurs grew from its spine, some of which were still writhing. It had clearly undergone an unimaginably brutal battle; half of its skull had collapsed, one giant eye had become a bloody, mangled black hole, and the remaining pupil was frozen with monstrous violence and unwillingness.

It was too large; the shadow of its fall alone covered the entire sky within Li Su's field of vision! The terrifying pressure was like a tangible tsunami, crushing down!

Li Su's spiritual sense shook violently, nearly shattering under the impact of this arrogant and tyrannical pressure! He could only watch in despair as that massive body drew closer, carrying the aura of total destruction, and crashed down!

BOOM!!!

The world shook violently! A terrifying shockwave, carrying mud, sand, and shattered bones, spread outward in a frantic ring, flattening and pulverizing everything within a hundred miles!

The mountain of corpses and sea of bones where Li Su stood was reduced to dust in an instant.

He thought he was dead for sure.

However, the massive beast's carcass happened to crash down less than a hundred feet in front of him. Before the destructive shockwave arrived, the dark, murky blood pouring from the giant beast's wounds like a waterfall had already washed over him first!

Scorching! Boiling! It felt as if molten lava were being poured over his body!

The blood of the ferocious beast, containing terrifying energy and a violent will, instantly submerged Li Su's bamboo body. Under this extreme heat and energy impact, his spiritual sense let out a silent shriek, his consciousness instantly torn to shreds and plunged into endless darkness.

In the final moment before his consciousness completely sank, he seemed to hear an extremely faint, yet incredibly clear "ding" sound.

Immediately following, a cold, mechanical, and emotionless voice resonated directly in the deepest part of his dissipating spiritual sense:

[High-concentration evolutionary energy infusion detected... Conditions met...]

[Devouring Evolution System... Binding...]

[Binding successful!]

Darkness became the only melody.