Death World

The Three Goat Temple was built on the mountaintop, and at this moment, it was completely enveloped in a thick gray fog. The fog wrapped around it tightly, reaching its densest point here.

The Daoist palace, pavilions, and towers vaguely visible within the fog looked like a fairyland when viewed from a distance.

However, when viewed from the sky, the most striking sight was not the Three Goat Temple itself, but a massive black tree faintly visible within the thick fog on the cliff.

It was a huge tree with no leaves. Its trunk was unusually thick, and dense roots were intertwined with the earth, covering the entire ground. The tree was dozens of meters tall, and its branches looked like countless ghostly hands reaching out. Innumerable vines grew from these ghostly hands, like whips held by demons from hell.

Although the Three Goat Temple had a long history, it was not a major Daoist sect. It only had some local fame, but its incense offerings were quite good.

There were only a dozen or so Daoists in the temple. Besides the abbot and his two disciples, most were professional Daoists, and the rest were temporary workers.

The Daoists were all wearing dark blue robes with straight collars, large lapels, right-side openings, wide sleeves gathered at the wrists, and white protective collars. They wore Daoist headbands and cloth shoes. They didn't look as handsome as Fang Xiu, but they were much more formal and possessed that genuine ancient charm.

At this moment, all the Daoists of the Three Goat Temple were gathered around the giant black monstrous tree, frantically performing some strange dance. They used their hands and feet, looking as if they had gone mad, continuously muttering strange words as if they had lost their minds.

The language sounded as if it couldn't be uttered by human throats. As it came out of their mouths, it felt like the sound of knives scraping against their throats, filled with an eerie quality.

"Great Lord of Death, the destination of all things that die, the controller of all life!"

"Great Lord of Death..."

"Hahahaha!"

"I pray to you, I pray for your..."

Everyone's eyes were deeply sunken and dark, and several of them were already foaming at the mouth, their eyes rolled back, yet they remained immersed in their own pleasure and madness.

They seemed to be performing some kind of frantic ritual, summoning a being from another world.

The strange black tree was dozens of meters tall, its massive trunk looking like the shadow of a devil. Its branches were like the skeletal claws of the undead reaching out from hell, and countless vines writhed like tentacles.

Moreover, it could be seen growing rapidly at a visible speed. Everything here was permeated with a strange smell, and the air was filled with the terrifying sounds of vengeful spirits and wronged souls wailing, as if thousands of people were screaming in your ears.

And in the earth, even ordinary people could see a thick, unyielding blackness gradually eroding the ground and spreading outwards. This terrifying scene was enough to drive anyone who witnessed it completely insane.

At this moment, a beam of light descended from the sky, landing on the mountaintop. It was a figure wearing a moon-white Daoist robe. His robe and silver-white long hair fluttered without wind. White light flowed down from his body, trailing a long shadow, as if white flames were burning behind him.

The light spread out from his body, dispersing the thick, lingering gray fog on the mountaintop. Like a shockwave, it cleared out a large open space, sweeping the dozen or so Daoists into it.

The black monstrous fog and strangenessentwine around them were simultaneously dispelled. Five of the dozen Daoists fainted at the same time, and the remaining few were finally freed from the controlled, frantic ritual.

The remaining nearly ten Daoists instantly sobered up. At this moment, they were all lying on the ground, their eyes gradually regaining clarity.

"How did we get to the top of the mountain?"

"What's going on? What is this?" An old Daoist, who looked over fifty and wore a Daoist crown, stood up with the help of his fawning disciple. As soon as he got up, he screamed in terror at the sight before him.

"Ah! Monster! Monster!" Several Daoists were so scared they took off running, not even caring about their unconscious fellow disciples beside them.

"Monster! Run! Run!"

Having just escaped control, they were so terrified by the scene before them that they scrambled to their feet, looking as if they had seen hell, and fled down the mountain without looking back.

A Daoist who had just woken up, confused and bewildered, followed the sound and looked forward, only to see a sight that made his legs go weak. A tall, incredibly sturdy monstrous tree had spread out countless vines, a black monstrous tree that was surrounding them. Hundreds, even thousands of meters of vines obscured the sky, enveloping them.

He was instantly so scared that he collapsed to the ground again, trembling all over. Water seeped from his crotch, emitting a foul odor.

At the same time, they also noticed a Daoist standing beneath the tree. They couldn't see his face, only his back.

His back didn't look tall, but he stood proudly on the mountaintop like a long sword, facing the black demonic tree that was dozens of meters tall and waving countless vines that obscured the sky, yet he remained unmoved.

The white-robed Daoist turned around at this moment, sweeping his long sleeves. A white beam of light swept towards them, immediately sweeping the dozen or so people on the mountaintop down the mountain. The force enveloped them, causing them to float lightly down to the mountainside several hundred meters below.

At the same time, thousands of vines wrapped around the white-robed Daoist. The dense vines intertwined into a giant sphere, constantly writhing. The strange vines looked as if they were made of tangled flesh and blood, resembling a giant tumor.

"Buzz!"

But as a sword light pierced through the vines, a beam of light shot into the sky and instantly exploded, illuminating the mountaintop with a silvery-white glow.

"Boom!"

Then, they saw the Daoist leap hundreds of meters, summoning a bolt of lightning from the sky that struck the mountaintop directly, leveling it.

At this moment, the ten Daoists who were still conscious on the mountainside below were all stunned, watching the mountaintop. This shocking scene was more real than any movie special effect could achieve.

They, who had just been fleeing and scared out of their wits, who had just been scrambling on the ground, suddenly fell silent.

But less than a second later, they saw everyone gesturing wildly with excitement, as if their hearts had exploded, constantly pointing at the mountaintop, their faces flushed red from the surge of blood.

"Founding Ancestor, the Founding Ancestor has appeared!" The old Daoist wearing the Daoist crown trembled with excitement, immediately prostrating himself on the ground. Then he raised his head, looking at the white-robed Daoist on the mountaintop, tears streaming down his face.

"There really are immortals! This is an immortal!" A professional Daoist in his thirties, who usually managed to memorize many Daoist scriptures but absolutely did not believe in immortals or gods, now truly believed.

A group of temporary Daoist workers knelt on the ground with them, their eyes filled with longing. "So, there really are immortals?"

"If immortals exist, then? Can we really cultivate?"

"Holy cow! This is our Founding Ancestor, so does that mean the cultivation methods hidden in the scriptures in our temple are also real?"

"Me, a temporary worker? Can I become a full-time employee?" A young Daoist whose hat had fallen off wiped the dirt from his face, suddenly feeling that being a Daoist was a pretty good choice.

All the Daoists of the Three Goat Temple were filled with various thoughts in their shock.

By this time, the sky had also begun to lighten. The park was surrounded by a large crowd of people and early-rising nearby residents. Even reporters from the Wei Port City local newspaper and radio station had rushed here, and more police and fire trucks had arrived at the various road entrances to Yellow Goat Mountain.

But before they could set up their formation, there was intense movement from the mountaintop. The thick fog that had enveloped the entire mountaintop was instantly dispelled, and then a beam of light shot into the sky, the sound of the explosion reaching everyone's ears with a buzzing sound.

Everyone looked up at the mountaintop in confusion, immediately seeing the fog dissipate, revealing the pavilions and towers on the mountaintop, as well as the giant monstrous tree dozens of meters tall.

But what drew their attention more at this moment was the black monstrous tree, waving countless vines that stretched towards the sky, targeting a white figure in the sky that wasn't very clear.

"Monster! There's a monster!" a child sitting on his father's neck shouted excitedly.

"Monster! No, wait, there's someone in the sky, another person!" A reporter who was unloading equipment from a car immediately raised his camera.

"Who is it! That's an immortal!"

"I told you this fog wasn't right, it's the work of a monster!" An old man who had watched the entire event nearby yesterday excitedly clapped his hands and told the people who had just arrived.

"Immortal! The immortal who went into the mountain before!" The family members of the missing people who had seen Fang Xiu enter the mountain before pointed at the figure of the white-robed Daoist and shouted repeatedly.

As the figure of the white-robed Daoist leaped into the sky, guiding a bolt of lightning from the sky to strike the mountaintop, flattening it, the entire scene became uncontrollable.

"Tree demon? Divine Firmament Lightning Method? Five Thunders Rectification Method?" A bespectacled otaku, holding his phone, was stunned at this moment, not even noticing when his phone dropped to the ground.

Thousands of people at the foot of the mountain saw this scene. Unlike the blurry vision in the darkness during the fire extinguishing at the hotel before, it was already daytime now, and everyone and every camera could clearly see Fang Xiu's figure.

But Fang Xiu was currently locked in a fierce battle with Eramon's Tree and had no time to care what the people below were thinking.

At this moment, Fang Xiu, in his soul form, merged with the Saint's Ring, fully unleashing the power of the Saintly Posture, completely destroying the trunk of Eramon's Tree. This extraordinary item, gifted by the Dominator of Time and Space from another dimension, was even more terrifying than Fang Xiu had imagined when its power was fully unleashed.

However, after Fang Xiu destroyed Eramon's Tree, he found that it was not immediately destroyed. It began to grow out of the wreckage again, rapidly regenerating. In the blink of an eye, it had grown halfway, and in an instant, it was about to recover its complete form.

Fang Xiu immediately noticed the ink-black color in the earth. In his Saintly Posture, he immediately saw the scene within the blackness.

It was a black gate. Within the gate, everything covered by the dense fog – the mountains, the earth, the lake surface – was reflected, like a projection of the real world.

It was a completely illusory world, a virtual soul world evolved from the Gaia Consciousness in the area occupied by Eramon's Tree's dense fog.

And Fang Xiu could see that beneath Eramon's Tree on the surface, an Eramon's Tree, like a reflection in water, was also growing in that illusory world.

"This is its true body!"

Fang Xiu suddenly understood. His entire body fell from the sky, transforming into a white light, like lightning, traversing the distance between the sky and the earth.

Just like that, with lightning speed, taking advantage of the moment before the death tree had completely recovered, he rushed into the black gate, breaking into that world that belonged only to death and souls.