The Madness of the Immortals

"This continent..."

After leaving Yao Xian'er's cave, Su Min changed her attire. She now wore a loose, pitch-black robe, a mask, and a wide-brimmed hat—completely concealing her gender.

Of course, this outfit was also a treasure. Unless she unleashed her full power, even Mahayana experts wouldn't be able to detect her. After all, her soul power was exceptionally strong. With her tall stature and this disguise, she was now utterly unidentifiable.

"Ahem, one-two-three, three-two-one... Testing, testing... Good."

Hearing her own hoarse voice, Su Min nodded in satisfaction.

"Walking around as a woman here would be troublesome."

Then she surveyed the barren land before her. The sun hung dimly in the sky, casting a blood-red glow. If she were Superman, she'd probably be weakened here. But Su Min didn't care about the eerie sunlight—what bothered her was the desolation stretching endlessly before her.

This kind of scene was unthinkable in the Heavenly Continent. There, life flourished everywhere—except in a few extreme environments. Under decent rulers, most people lived comfortably.

Especially after the rebirth of the world, when spiritual energy surged, life became even better. For example, crop yields there were absurd. In the modern world, wheat might yield 1,000 pounds per acre at best. But here? 4,000 pounds easily—without pesticides—thanks to the nourishing spiritual energy.

So most people in the Heavenly Continent lived relatively prosperous lives. Unless their rulers were outright tyrants, starvation was rare.

But this place?

Barren. Desolate. A wasteland.

Bones littered the cracked earth. Even though she'd mentally prepared herself, Su Min was still taken aback.

"This is worse than the Great Wei Dynasty when I first arrived."

She pulled out the materials Yao Xian'er had given her—a list of the Seven Dark Kings, each at least at the early Mahayana Stage.

"Guess I'll hunt them down one by one."

The jade slip clearly marked their locations, and they were actively moving around. These so-called "kings" had all ascended by fusing soul fragments, making their presence blatantly obvious.

But the slip lacked detailed information about them. And unlike Yao Xian'er, Su Min wasn't reckless enough to charge in blindly.

"I need to scout first. Maybe I can find some remains of a Solar Body cultivator or something."

After confirming the nearest Mahayana expert was too far to sense her, Su Min cautiously released her divine sense, covering a radius of several hundred kilometers.

Any further would be risky—the dark energy here was too dense, forcing her to restrain her power. Yao Xian'er needed over a century to recover, not just from her injuries but also to purge the dark corruption from her body.

Su Min, however, was fine. Her Five Elements Sacred Body had strong resistance to such things.

"Hmm?"

Suddenly, she paused. Within her detection range, she sensed a cultivator—only at the early Golden Core Stage.

"The overall strength here is... weak."

In a flash, she vanished, reappearing near a hidden cave.

Even before entering, a nauseating stench of blood assaulted her senses.

"What the hell are these people doing?"

Disgusted, she probed inside with her divine sense—and immediately regretted it. Inside, a filthy, blood-stained man with wild hair and twisted, insane eyes muttered to himself:

"Immortal pills... I must refine immortal pills... I will ascend..."

Then, without hesitation, he threw a limbless little girl into a grinder.

No screams. Just pulp.

Her flesh and blood flowed into a massive cauldron below.

"..."

Su Min's hand clenched violently.

The next second, the man appeared in her grip, his neck caught in her fingers.

"G-g-gah—?!"

The man had no idea what was happening. One moment, he was refining his "medicine"—the next, he was staring into the eyes of death.

Then, something bizarre happened.

His withered, aged face twisted into ecstatic reverence, and he reached out with grime-covered hands.

"O Great One! I offer you abundant flesh and blood! O Bountiful Deity, grant me transcendence—AAGHH—"

POP.

Before he could finish, his head exploded.

Su Min: "..."

"What the fuck? Am I some kind of eldritch horror now?"

She stared blankly at the headless corpse. She'd only leaked a sliver of killing intent, hoping to interrogate him. But instead, he'd gone insane and self-destructed.

"Did I just become a 'glimpse-and-go-mad' Lovecraftian entity?"

Shaking her head, she incinerated the corpse. She'd planned to kill him anyway, but this was... unexpected.

The reason for his death was clear:

His so-called "immortal pill refining" involved grinding people—those with soul fragments—into raw materials. He'd then fuse those fragments into his own soul. But his soul had become unstable. Faced with Su Min's overwhelming pressure, it imploded—part of it trying to flee, another part worshipping her as a god.

The result? Splat.

As for his victims—Su Min mercilessly erased them too.

The moment he died, the control marks on them vanished. But instead of fleeing, they turned on each other, tearing into each other's flesh like rabid beasts. They were ordinary people, at most at the Body Refining Stage. In this hellish world, the only way to grow stronger was to consume others, absorbing their soul fragments through cannibalism.

Su Min released a wisp of her Unity Stage aura, instantly crushing them all.

Then, with a flick of her finger, a tiny, multicolored soul fragment floated into her palm.

"Too small... and too polluted."

She couldn't absorb it directly. She had to purify it, removing the dark energy and memory residues, turning it into pure soul energy.

But there was a catch:

If direct fusion gave a 100% boost, her method only yielded 1%.

"But at least there's no side effects."

She'd never recklessly fuse these things into herself.

"My alchemy's hit a bottleneck anyway. Maybe this place is an opportunity."

With a thought, she purified and absorbed the fragment.

For a Unity Stage expert like her, a Golden Core-level fragment was insignificant, it didn't even budge her cultivation.

She needed more. Much more.

Her gaze turned toward the horizon.

"Time to hunt a Mahayana."

~

Su Min reappeared above a sprawling city.

"This is... depressing."

The city housed 500,000 people, yet not a single cultivator among them.

In the Heavenly Continent, even ordinary folks could reach the Body Refining Stage easily. A city this size would've had several Golden Core experts.

But here? Nothing.

"This is the 'dark forest' in its purest form."

Landing silently, Su Min shifted her appearance using her Illusion Ring (Earth Grade High)—transforming into a scholarly young man. She strolled into the city, immediately sensing an oppressive atmosphere. Choosing a teahouse, she ordered some snacks and eavesdropped.

"Sigh... When will this end? It's almost time for the 'Fulu Mountain God's' sacrifice again."

"What can we do? If the Mountain God is displeased, calamity will befall the city."

Su Min's eyes narrowed.

Pulling out a map, she quickly located Fulu Mountain—a massive range spanning 100,000 kilometers.

"So the 'Mountain God' is one of them."

In this world, cultivators operated alone, driven by instinct to kill and devour each other.

The "Mountain God" had undoubtedly claimed this territory, demanding sacrifices—children with soul fragments—to sustain himself.

"Time to pay him a visit."

A predatory grin spread across Su Min's face.

Why fight fair when you can ambush?