Lordi didn’t falter. His figure, cloaked in the crimson afterglow of his Blood Spectre Footwork Art, surged forward with relentless purpose. He charged toward the ancient tree, his steps silent yet forceful. The mountain’s oppressive aura meant nothing to him; he moved as if he owned its secrets, as if the array’s illusions were mere parlor tricks.
Ruru pushed herself to match his pace, her Cloud Walking Rain Step carrying her like a wisp of mist over the uneven terrain. Her lungs burned, sweat slicking her brow, but her eyes stayed locked on Lordi’s back, his silhouette a beacon in the dark. "Lordi-kun," she whispered under her breath, her voice a mix of awe and desperation, "you knew all along, didn’t you?" Her trust in him burned fiercer with every step, a flame that drowned out her doubts.
They reached the shadow of the ancient tree, its vast canopy swallowing them in a pool of deeper darkness. Lordi halted abruptly, his body still under the AllFullOS System’s iron grip, his face a mask of unshakable calm. The crimson energy that had trailed him dissipated, leaving only the faint hum of the mountain’s magic in the air.
Ruru skidded to a stop beside him, her breath ragged, her heart pounding like a war drum. She gazed up at the tree, its towering presence almost suffocating, and then at Lordi, whose sharp features betrayed nothing but quiet certainty. Her voice trembled with a mix of trust and anticipation as she spoke, her words soft but heavy with hope. "Lo... Lordi-kun, is this it? Is the true exit of the array here?" Her beautiful eyes searched his face, wide and earnest.
The air around the Ancient Stone Well thickened, heavy with the cloying stench of rotting earth, a sickly sweetness that coated Ruru’s throat and made her stomach churn. The forest had fallen into an unnatural hush—no insects chirped, no leaves stirred, only the slow, mournful creak of the ancient tree’s branches swaying under the mountain’s cold breeze. Moonlight filtered through the canopy, casting jagged shadows that danced like specters across the ground. The massive tree loomed over them, its gnarled silhouette a silent guardian of secrets too old and too dark to name. Its bark, etched with centuries of scars, seemed to pulse faintly, as if the tree itself were breathing, watching, waiting.
Ruru thought Lordi was leading her to freedom, to the exit of the Gloomwater Phantom Lily Array, but the truth?
Lordi’s heart was heavy with uncertainty and doubt. Yet despite his inner turmoil, he noticed this Senior Sister Ruru’s unwavering trust in him remained steadfast. Her faith in him was unshakable—so much so that he didn’t know whether to feel grateful or utterly speechless. Ruru’s wide, trusting eyes bored into him, her faith a weight he wasn’t sure he could bear.
Things hadn’t gone as planned. Not only had the AllFullOS failed to escape this cursed place—somehow, Lordi was back inside the Hanz Estate. Before, he had merely been unable to break free from the Gloomwater Phantom Lily array’s illusions. But now, the situation was far worse. He was trapped in the deadliest depths of Twin Peak Mountain, with no way out.
If the system’s cultivation session was interrupted, if it faltered for even a moment, there would be no running, no hiding.
Silently, Lordi cursed the AllFullOS with every vile word his mind could conjure, damning its recklessness to the abyss. "You glitchy, soul-sucking piece of motherfucker junk—why in the hell here?" But his body, still a puppet to the system’s will, betrayed no trace of his dread.
Yet, to Ruru Rosa, this Junior Brother Lordi Payne appeared utterly unshaken—his demeanor calm, his expression unreadable, as if the surrounding dangers meant nothing to him. With steady, deliberate steps, he approached the ancient tree, his posture composed. His steps were measured, his posture radiating a quiet arrogance, as if the mountain’s terrors were beneath him. Without hesitation, he pressed his left palm against the gnarled bark and resumed cultivating the Spirit Swallowing Technique, as though the world around him had faded into silence.
Ruru’s breath hitched, her heart swelling with awe despite the creeping unease. "Lordi-kun," she whispered, her voice trembling with hope, "you’ve found it, haven’t you? The way... out?"
~ Ding! System Notification Chime
In Lordi’s mind, the System chimed happily.
[AllFullOS: Version 1.0.0]
> Substitute Cultivation Material: [Thousand-Year Souleater Kodama]
- Status: Gifted successfully.
> Resuming cultivation process...
The ancient tree moved.
What had been still, silent, now twisted—its gnarled trunk contorting like a waking beast, bark splitting with a wet, splintering crack. The air turned rancid, a putrid miasma of decayed earth and spoiled marrow that clawed at Ruru’s throat.
Thick, black sap bubbled from the wounds, stinking of rotting meat and curdled blood. And then—
Dozens. Hundreds. Glowing crimson, slit-pupiled, blinking open all at once, locking onto them with a hunger that was alive.
The name hissed through Ruru’s mind like a dying breath.
Not a tree. Never just a tree.
The kind spoken of in choked whispers, in stories meant to terrify reckless cultivators who wandered too deep into the dark. They did not feed on earth or rain—they fed on souls. A single brush of their creeping roots, and a cultivator’s spirit would be ripped from his body, leaving only a gasping, twitching shell behind.
...was awake. Its presence a violation of the natural world, a Foundation-stage horror that pulsed with malevolent life.
The branches shuddered, stretching like broken fingers, leaves trembling in a soundless, rasping laugh. The earth beneath them writhed, something slithering just beneath the soil—roots, tendrils, something that wanted them, that ached to burrow into flesh and feast.
Countless eyes blinked in eerie unison, their ravenous stare locking onto Lordi and Ruru with a hunger that seemed to strip the warmth from their souls.
A Foundation-stage abomination. A thing that should not be.
And it had seen them.
Ruru’s blood turned to ice, her heart a frantic drumbeat against her ribs. Her legs trembled, rooted to the spot as the Kodama’s crimson eyes bored into her, each one a promise of oblivion.
Ruru’s mind reeled, a flood of terror connecting the dots. The truth struck her like a blade to the gut—this was what had twisted Shirley Quinn into that grotesque, half-skeletal horror being. No wonder a peak Ninth Layer Qi Refinement expert, armed with her Ninth Layer Enlightenment-stage Twin-Tailed Fox demon beast battle pet and an entire squad of elite Eighth Layer cultivators... had all died here, in this cursed place.
Only Shirley had escaped.
And even then, half her soul had been devoured.
This Kodama was the nightmare that had claimed them. Ruru’s teeth chattered, her hair standing on end as her heart sank into a pit of dread. She stood frozen, her legs trembling, on the verge of collapsing under the weight of her fear.
And then Ruru felt it—a torrent of pure, overwhelming spirit energy surging from the Kodama into Lordi’s body, vast and violent, roaring through the air like a tidal wave.
Lordi’s palm remained pressed against the tree, his form unshaken as the Spirit Swallowing Technique roared to life within him. The air crackled, the tree’s red eyes flaring brighter, their hunger now tinged with something like anger.
Ruru’s voice caught in her throat, her words a strangled gasp. "Lordi-kun... what are you doing?!" Her tone was a frantic mix of disbelief and desperation, her trust in him warring with the terror that threatened to swallow her whole.
Yes, Lordi was still cultivating the Spirit Swallowing Technique—drawing the Kodama’s essence as spirit energy into himself.
Ruru’s bones turned to ice. Her teeth chattered uncontrollably, her hair standing on end as primal terror seized her. Every instinct screamed to run, to flee, to do anything—but her limbs refused to obey.
Her vision swam. Her knees buckled.
She was going to faint.
Or worse—lose her mind.
Atop the left peak of Twin Peaks Hill, within the main hall of the Hanz Clan Ancestral Shrine, something stirred.
Donovan Valdez’s eyelids fluttered open, his vision swimming into focus—only to be met with decay.
The once-grand hall of the shrine was now a skeletal husk, its walls bleached gray as if drained of all life. The air tasted of ash and something older, something wrong.
What the hell is this place?
He lurched upright, his breath sharp in his throat. Around him, the other Dominator Squad members groaned awake, limbs clumsy with disorientation.
Their last memory? The shrine’s innermost bead curtain parting—and then nothing. No warning. No struggle. Just a force, cold and inexorable, yanking them into the dark.
A ruin that shouldn’t exist. A silence so deep it gnawed at the ears.
Donovan’s lips parted, a command forming on his tongue—
Then a voice shattered the stillness.
Deep. Resonant. Alive in this dead place.
"Fellow sect comrades."
Every hair on Donovan Valdez’s neck stood rigid.
The words rolled through the hall like thunder.
"Which holy peak of the greatest Abyss Pit Sect do you hail from?"