Night.
The two moons that had appeared during the first two months of the mutation had now returned to normal. Only a single moon remained, casting down a faint glow.
The weather in December was somewhat cold. Perhaps because of the global mutation, temperatures had dropped very low.
When Lu Yuan left the villa,
he found himself surrounded by mountains stretching as far as the eye could see.
Weeds grew wildly, and towering trees stood everywhere. It looked like a completely untouched wilderness, with not a trace of the modern world to be found.
The place where he lived had originally been flat land, but now it had turned into a mountain hundreds of meters high, by his estimate.
His senses told him the surrounding energies were in chaos, and there seemed to be all kinds of beasts in the distance.
This was normal.
The whole world had undergone tremendous changes, and every region had been affected.
Familiar places had become strange, nothing like they used to be.
In the truest sense, overnight, the world had been turned upside down; seas had become mulberry fields.
For ordinary people, it might have been hard to accept.
But Lu Yuan was entirely different.
He had already lived through ten full years in the new era. Those had been real experiences, so this situation had no effect on him at all.
"They're almost here."
Lu Yuan walked a few hundred meters away from the villa and gazed into the distance, brilliant light welling in his eyes.
In his eyes, the night was now almost the same as day. It did nothing to hinder his vision.
So at that moment, he could see the people ahead.
A group was slowly approaching, moving very carefully and not making the slightest sound.
Judging by their auras, they weren't ordinary people. There was an unusual power within them. They were Awakened.
But weak ones.
Lu Yuan made no move. He stood where he was, waiting for the group to approach.
As for hiding in the dark and delivering a fatal blow at a crucial moment?
Sorry, that wasn't happening.
Meanwhile,
the Ninth Elite Squad of Chang Sheng Gene was feeling its way forward under cover of night.
"Captain, it should be just ahead," one of the squad members reminded him.
"Good. When the time comes, follow my orders." Captain Wang nodded, then gave another reminder. "Remember, if you can take him alive, do so. If he resists, bring back his body."
"Yes!" the squad members answered.
They had spent a long time on the road, but at last they had arrived.
Even so, they continued to move with the utmost caution. They weren't afraid of being spotted; they simply didn't want to disturb the Mutant Beasts nearby.
Mountains that suddenly appeared after a mutation like this were often home to Mutant Beasts.
Most of those wild animals had embarked on the path of evolution and were extremely difficult to deal with.
So they had to be as careful as possible.
But soon,
Wang Xing, the captain at the head of the group, stopped and stared ahead, suddenly going still.
The others were confused and were about to ask what was wrong. But when they followed his gaze, their faces filled with shock.
A short distance in front of them, someone was standing there.
He was slender and carried a bow in his hand.
But there were no arrows.
The man stood in the moonlight, his bright eyes fixed coldly on them.
"Is there something you need from me, coming to my home?"
Lu Yuan spoke, smiling.
His voice was quiet and calm, giving off an air of unshakable composure.
"Captain, that's the one surnamed Lu. It's him." At that moment, one of the squad members spoke up. He took out a photograph and compared it to the man before them, confirming his identity.
After a brief moment of shock, Captain Wang came to his senses and spoke at once. "You're Lu Yuan? Did you go to that Farm in the outskirts of Wuzhou before? Tell us, what happened on August twenty-first?"
His tone was stern, edged with interrogation.
Now that they had found him, there was no need to waste words.
At the same time, Wang Xing subtly raised his right hand. The squad member beside him understood the signal.
They immediately spread out, drawing the guns at their waists and aiming at Lu Yuan from several different angles.
He looked like an ordinary man, but he had a bow in his hand. Who knew what unusual tricks he might have up his sleeve?
Though they had all embarked on the path of evolution, they weren't about to underestimate him.
That was the result of years of training.
"You're from Chang Sheng Gene, right?"
Lu Yuan noticed the patterns on their arms and couldn't help frowning. "Why do you keep haunting me?"
He had already suspected that Chang Sheng Gene wouldn't let the matter rest, but he hadn't expected them to arrive so quickly.
As for their goal—
Wasn't it the meteorite containing the Great Luo Sword Embryo?
"Hm? Looks like you know something."
Wang Xing immediately picked up on the meaning behind those words. He pulled out his handgun and continued, "Now, I'll give you two choices. One: don't resist, and come with us quietly. Two: die!"
As soon as he finished speaking,
the squad members around him cocked their guns.
These were firearms. Even the Awakened had to be wary of them.
"You're boldly ignorant, aren't you?"
Lu Yuan shook his head. He hadn't even said anything yet,
but the people in front of him weren't willing to listen to an explanation. They were going to take him away by force.
At that moment, he moved his fingers, ready to test the power of the Sky Shaking Bow.
It was a bit of overkill, though.
"Take him down."
But this elite squad had trained for years and was extremely alert.
They were convinced Lu Yuan was about to resist, so Wang Xing, as their captain, gave the order without hesitation.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The next moment, the squad members beside him opened fire.
Dozens of bullets streaked toward Lu Yuan's arms, shoulders, and legs, carefully avoiding vital spots.
Clearly, they wanted to leave him alive so they could report back to the company.
But now,
facing the bullets flying toward him,
Lu Yuan didn't dodge or evade. He simply stood where he was.
Had the man been scared witless?
The thought flashed through everyone's minds, but soon they were stunned.
The bullets struck Lu Yuan's body, only to ring out like metal hitting metal before bouncing away. They pierced several trees nearby instead.
As for Lu Yuan, he didn't move an inch.
How could this be?
Those were bullets!
The squad members stared, stunned.
"Not good. He might be an Awakened too. Don't hold back. Kill him!"
Wang Xing reacted instantly, realizing that the man before them was no ordinary opponent.
He pulled a grenade from his waist, yanked the pin, and threw it.
A grenade's power was no match for bullets.
It could leave a mark even on a steel plate.
He was confident that even an Awakened couldn't withstand it. Most would be blown to pieces.
But what happened next once again exceeded everyone's expectations.
Lu Yuan suddenly reached out and caught the grenade, gripping it in his hand. Without changing expression, he squeezed hard.
Boom!
A deafening blast and a burst of flame erupted, and the ground trembled.
Yet Wang Xing and the others saw their opponent standing calmly amid the flames. He casually dusted off his hands, and not even the hem of his clothes had been damaged.
"Not bad."
Lu Yuan gauged the grenade's power. It couldn't hurt him, let alone pose even the slightest threat.
The reason he hadn't acted just now was that he wanted to test the strength of his body as it was now.
It seemed he was completely immune to conventional firearms.
The Shackled Realm
was indeed stronger than he had imagined.
"He-he's not human?" one of the squad members stammered, completely bewildered.
They had thought this mission would be easy. Who could have guessed they'd run into a monster like this? A grenade had exploded right in front of him without having any effect. Even the company's strongest Awakened couldn't do that, could they?
"Stay calm. We're Awakened too!"
Wang Xing was the captain, after all. He shouted, and then
a jade-green glow appeared in his eyes.
The muscles in his arms swelled, bursting through his combat uniform. He grew to three meters tall, his aura turning violent.
The six remaining squad members also reacted, unleashing their Awakened abilities.
But their abilities were all much the same.
Their bodies grew larger, and their strength increased dozens of times.
In no time, seven giants, each three meters tall, stood before him. Their faces were twisted, their bodies covered in glowing green patterns, and veins bulged across their foreheads. They looked terrifying.
They all attacked, uprooting trees so thick that two people could barely encircle them, then gripping them like weapons.
Such destructive power was indeed beyond what ordinary people could match.
This was the power possessed by the Awakened.
Their physical strength, speed—
every ability grew dozens of times stronger. It was terrifying, and it was what they relied on.
"I won't waste any more time with you."
Lu Yuan shook his head and took a step forward. He didn't even look like he was taking the fight seriously.
But inside him, a vast force surged forth like a volcano erupting.
Rumble!
His aura burst out with tremendous force, forming a storm that made the earth beneath his feet sink.
At the same time, a blood-red, eleven-story Blood Qi Futu suddenly appeared behind him.
Lu Yuan released the power within him, no longer choosing to hide or suppress it.
He felt like stretching his limbs a little.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
A thunderous rumble filled the air.
The moment he stepped forward, the Blood Qi Futu shook violently, sending out rings of red light that rippled like waves. Wherever those bloody ripples touched, weeds were pulverized and giant trees shattered, reduced to dust.
Within a radius of dozens of meters around Lu Yuan, the earth sank, and every plant and tree vanished.
It was as if a falling star had slammed into the ground, leaving behind a staggering trail of destruction.
Not good!
Across from him,
the seven-member squad
felt as if the man before them had suddenly transformed into an ancient, primordial beast.
The aura he unleashed made their bodies tremble and their souls quiver. They wanted to flee.
But it was too late.
As the blood-red light swept over them,
the powerful bodies they had once taken pride in cracked apart in an instant. Their bones snapped with a series of sharp cracks, crushed to pieces.
Blood poured from their bodies and soaked the ground. Every one of them wore a look of terror, like they had seen a ghost.
Hadn't they been told this was just an ordinary mission? How had they run into a monster like this?
That was what Wang Xing and the others were thinking. Beyond their shock,
they felt boundless terror.
Why had they provoked this man?
At that moment, forget about attacking.
They hadn't even had time to get close.
The sheer pressure radiating from Lu Yuan had already left them gravely wounded, stripped them of their ability to fight, and dropped them to the ground, barely clinging to life.
This was the crushing dominance of a higher-level evolutionary life over a lower-level one.
It wasn't even on the same level.
He was utterly crushed.
The gap was simply too vast.
When he realized this, Lu Yuan slowly reined in his aura, and the Blood Qi Futu vanished.
He froze, then looked at the vast stretch of land and vegetation destroyed beside him.
Is this how strong I am now?
But... I haven't even made a move!
Lu Yuan fell silent.
How are these people even weaker than paper tigers?
But he soon understood.
He had reached the third stage of evolution, the Shackled Realm. Combined with the various divine treasures he had fused with, his strength was beyond imagination.
And even just now, he had been deliberately holding back. Otherwise, the destruction would have been even more astonishing.
As for the seven people in front of him...
Although they were Awakened, Lu Yuan knew they were nothing more than people cultivated by Chang Sheng Gene. They had taken special drugs and embarked on the path of evolution.
As it happened, he had heard in his previous life that Chang Sheng Gene had extracted mysterious substances from certain exotic fruits and rare herbs, which could be used to create Awakened. Their quality varied, of course, and sometimes failed experiments even killed people.
Like the seven before him, at best they were first- or second-order members of the Initial Realm, and none of them would ever reach the Awakening Realm.
They had been forcibly created, so their potential was extremely low.
But to ordinary people, they were already astonishing—and plenty would be willing to try.
After all, the world had become cruel in the wake of the mutations. Power was the only foundation for survival.
At that moment,
Lu Yuan looked at the seven badly injured people not far away, his expression calm, and finished them off.
He knew this would surely bring trouble down the line, but he didn't care.
Back then, a hegemonic force like Chang Sheng Gene had been an untouchable behemoth in his eyes.
But things were different now.
If they kept coming after him,
Lu Yuan wouldn't mind paying Chang Sheng Gene a visit someday.
When he was done, he sighed faintly and tightened his grip on the Sky Shaking Bow.
He had thought he could test its power, but now it seemed there was no need in the short term. He was simply too powerful. His body alone was enough to let him roam unchecked, never mind all the other trump cards he had.
"Let's head back first."
Lu Yuan shook his head and ignored the bodies.
He went straight back to the villa, tidied up the courtyard a little, and opened his phone.
He had wanted to learn more about what was happening outside earlier, but he'd been interrupted. Now that everything was settled, he could look in peace.
Soon,
one news story after another appeared on the screen.
Three months had passed, and the outside world had been turned upside down.
Major events were happening everywhere. Regions expanding and mountains growing taller had become commonplace.
The Awakened were now the center of attention. A group of people had seized the initiative, gained extraordinary powers, and become the focus of the world.
According to the statistics, at least hundreds of thousands of people had embarked on the path of evolution during this period—a staggering number, and still growing.
The internet was in an uproar. Everyone wanted a chance to become a darling of the new era.
But the sharp rise in the number of Awakened had also led to all kinds of incidents in many places.
Some people gained tremendous power overnight and became extremely volatile. Ordinary people envied them, too, knowing that great strength might be the key to surviving in the age to come.
"The new era is here. The strong prey on the weak, the wild returns, and the law of the jungle will show itself."
Seeing the news, Lu Yuan couldn't help shaking his head.
He had lived through it before. He knew how cruel it could be.
The path of the Evolution of All Spirits had opened. It was an opportunity, but it also brought disaster and chaos.
And that wasn't all. Mutant Beasts had appeared in the remote mountain regions, wreaking havoc and devouring people. They were utterly savage.
Then there were the coastal areas.
Sea monsters, including thousand-meter-long octopuses and winged sea serpents, churned the waters and sank ferries. Together, they stirred up tsunamis that left countless people suffering.
Mutant Beasts.
They were the equivalent of Awakened among humans.
Once they embarked on the path of evolution, they became like the great demons of myth and legend.
When it came to their own kind, some people might be cruel, but they still held back.
Mutant Beasts were different. They were another species. Years of human destruction of nature, along with the indiscriminate killing of certain animals for profit, had made them feel a deep hatred for humanity. If things continued this way, they might storm some of the major cities to hunt for food. The consequences would be unimaginable.
"Going by the timing, the authorities will step in soon."
Lu Yuan thought it over, knowing this situation couldn't continue forever.
Sure enough,
he soon came across a related report.
Before you continue