A tree?
Or rather, it should have been called a... strange spirit plant.
It somewhat resembled a banyan tree.
Both had long roots hanging down into the earth.
Yet this banyan tree was made of countless metals. Its leaves, branches, and nearly its entire trunk were formed from all manner of metal, gleaming brightly beneath the sunlight.
Only its aerial roots looked relatively normal.
Though they were not quite normal either, for they were translucent, with firelight flowing within. Flames containing all five elements drifted through the aerial roots, rising and burning with wild abandon.
Even from far away, a wave of heat rushed straight at him.
After his brief surprise, Zhao He realized that this must have been something his master had cultivated... but was it a spirit plant, or some sort of constructed mechanism?
"Come in."
As he hesitated, Li Ye's voice sounded directly in his heart.
He hurried into the strange giant tree.
The moment he entered, the space around him opened up.
He seemed able to see palaces, lakes, and an endless city stretching away into the distance.
Closest to him was a wooden palace where Fire-Eyed Spirit Monkeys could live freely, filled with countless Jade Banana Rice plants.
He raised his eyes and looked into the distance.
An unending stream of minerals was sent in through formations in the ground. Three-headed, six-armed Fire-Eyed Spirit Monkeys sorted them with abandon, classifying the minerals by the purity of their spiritual power, their five-element attributes, their size, and other factors before sending them into formations.
"Fire-Eyed Spirit Monkeys?"
"Eh?"
Naturally, Zhao He knew this kind of spirit beast.
He had actually seen quite a few of them. After all, he traveled around buying and selling goods, so he might even have encountered them more often than Li Ye