During the Abyssal War, within a Tier-Five world called "Eser."
This world was shrouded in eternal night all year round. Even so, it still gave birth to various civilizations. At first, diverse nocturnal plants allowed life to gradually emerge here. As time flowed through the Astral World, intelligent life eventually appeared—a night-dwelling race known as the Koken.
The Koken had light-gray skin, somewhat long arms, sparse transparent down covering their bodies, and hair like glossy, slender cables. Their most distinctive feature was their eyes: a pair of clear, azure-blue eyes that shone in the darkness.
This Tier-Five world known as Eser was more commonly called the World of Eternal Night. It produced many unique resources. Some of its rare ores, extraordinary characteristics, and various wondrous plants all possessed the three traits of darkness, life, and faint light. When these three broadly useful extraordinary traits were combined, their value skyrocketed.
As a result, the "world key" that allowed entry into the World of Eternal Night was extraordinarily valuable. Such extremely valuable world-key items were collectively called tickets by the major Paradise factions.
Tickets naturally had different grades, ranging from Level 1 to Level 5. The higher the grade, the greater the value. The world key to the World of Eternal Night was roughly Level 3.8.
At this moment, within the World of Eternal Night—the Tranquil Forest.
The Tranquil Forest, filled with glowing plants of various colors, possessed a fantastical beauty. Deep within this dark, luminous forest, where beast roars occasionally echoed, an ancient tree stood entrenched. It was a hundred meters tall and looked like a giant tree-man. There was no vegetation within several hundred meters of it, as though all other plants feared its existence.
Of course, it was worthy of fear. As one of the strongest beings in the