life copy game

Chapter 1657 The Dead World Tree (Long Chapter, Requesting Monthly Tickets)
"Big guy, should we run too?"

Sitting on He Ao's shoulders, Siwei, who hadn't spoken until now, whispered in He Ao's ear, "What do you mean?"

She listened to Denorn's plan the whole time and knew that she couldn't make a fuss at this point, so she kept quiet from the beginning.

"Ah."

He Ao nodded slightly, raised his hand, and tucked Siwei into his arms. Instead of following the fighting team ahead, he moved towards the wolf pack on one side.

It was rare for Siwei to be so quiet; she didn't speak, and He Ao felt like he was almost forgetting about her.

With this action, He Ao also got a clear look at the wolf in the mountains.

They looked like wolves, but not quite like wolves. Their bodies were long and slender, like an elongated strip, with four even longer limbs extending from their bodies, touching the ground and waving rapidly.

Their mouths are long and narrow with an opening at the front, revealing sticky saliva.

The group is now very close to the wasteland ahead, less than fifty meters away.

For extraordinary individuals, this distance is practically nothing.

But the wolf pack was clearly faster.

They are so frenzied and hungry that if a wolf in front blocks the path of the wolves behind, the wolf in front will be mercilessly torn to pieces, and even the fragments will be eaten by the pack behind.

Like a raging torrent, they cascaded swiftly down the cliffs of the mountains, howling violently, attempting to devour everything in the mountains.

He Ao raised his gaze upwards, bypassed the combat team in front, and broke through from the other side, while his gaze also fell on the combat team.

The exit in the mountains was narrowing rapidly, as a pack of wolves slid down from the high mountain ahead, attempting to block the road.

However, Denon and his combat team were not to be underestimated. They quickly changed formation and charged forward in a spearhead formation.

In the blink of an eye, it pierced the exit.

At the same time, they also made contact with the outermost pack of wolves.

Various extraordinary weapons were brought out by the combat team, and they worked together in an orderly manner to resist the wolf pack's attack. With a series of clanging sounds, the initial wolves were quickly torn apart.

Their flesh and blood were quickly devoured by the wolf pack behind them.

But the entire fighting force had already moved forward rapidly, chiseled open an opening, and squeezed outwards like a sharp knife.

If someone on the outside of the team gets injured, someone on the inside will immediately take their place.

In the end, the entire combat squad managed to break through the rapidly narrowing opening despite the wolf pack's attack and enter the wasteland.

The ferocious wolf pack stopped after seeing the entire group enter the wasteland. They stood within the boundary between the mountains and the wasteland, watching the people on the wasteland howl desperately, but dared not cross the boundary even a step.

As for He Ao, he quietly watched all of this from behind a boulder not far away.

He actually encountered the wolf pack earlier than the combat team. When he chose to bypass the combat team, he ran directly into the wolf pack that was coming down quickly.

However, unlike the combat team, the frenzied wolves did not attack him. Instead, they glanced at him and quickly moved aside, as if they were very afraid of him. This allowed him to walk out of the wolves almost without making a sound.

However, looking back now, He Ao feels that the wolves were not 'afraid' of him.

He reached out and touched the long spear he was carrying on his back.

The Spear of Vistara.

What the wolves fear is probably this gun, or something that the gun symbolizes.

He just used the gun's ability to successfully enter this twilight wasteland without drinking the blood of the giant serpent of the Central Plains.

Combined with the previous assessment that the gun was suspected of being from an unusual source.

It is likely that this gun originated from this desolate wasteland at dusk.

Considering the elements that allow this anomaly to enter and exit normally and regularly, it doesn't seem difficult to bring something out of here.

I just don't know where this gun was originally supposed to be kept.

The account of this anomaly relayed by Denor did not contain any clues about the gun.

In fact, the Anomalous Association cannot even be sure whether the gun is truly from an anomaly.

He Ao was able to be certain entirely because he possessed divine sense, which allowed him to directly determine whether an item was abnormal.

Shaking his head to clear his mind, He Ao glanced at the combat team led by Denon not far away.

They were sitting on the wasteland, quickly bandaging their wounds.

Denon did indeed recruit elite warriors. Under that intensity of impact, the entire combat team suffered no casualties, and the injuries were fairly evenly distributed, with only one or two individuals sustaining more serious injuries.

At the forefront of these warriors, Denon was helping them bandage their wounds while carefully observing their surroundings.

Soon, he spotted He'ao behind the boulder. He breathed a sigh of relief and, with his back to the others, nodded slightly to He'ao.

He Ao nodded slightly.

Then he raised his eyes and looked up at the sky.

The place where they were standing was also a reddish-brown wasteland, but unlike the wasteland they had encountered when they first entered this anomaly, this wasteland was darker in color, and there were boulders ranging from several meters to tens of meters in size scattered everywhere.

Above these colossal rocks, in the blood-red sky, amidst the crimson clouds, floats a giant serpent.

The giant serpent's body was so enormous that it was half-hidden in the clouds and mist, almost filling the entire sky.

But the giant snake had already fallen silent.

Its body was broken into several pieces, and its head was also cut off, hovering between the body pieces, looking into the distance.

Meanwhile, Denon was also looking up at the giant snake corpse in the sky.

Soon, all the combat team members had their wounds bandaged and received treatment.

They rose and, led by Denon, moved in the direction the snake's head was looking.

But this time, He Ao didn't follow. Instead, he turned his gaze and found the giant snake's severed tail.

The tail was pointing in a completely different direction from the snake's head.

"Are we breaking up?"

The tiny figure climbed out of He Ao's arms, sat on He Ao's shoulder, and asked softly.

"Hmm." He Ao nodded slightly and moved forward in the direction the tail was pointing.

Soon, Denon and his fighting force disappeared into the faint twilight, and Heo quickly passed through the giant rocks.

The twilight light seemed to be paused, remaining fixed in the sky, making it impossible to tell the time.

I don't know how long we walked, but even the glow of this conceptual twilight seemed to have dimmed a little.

He Ao raised his head and looked ahead.

A magnificent, enormous shadow, seemingly connecting heaven and earth and resembling a wall of the world, appeared in He's field of vision.

From a distance, it seemed as if the entire world ahead was shrouded in this enormous shadow, stretching from one side of the horizon to the other, from the earth to the very top of the sky, until it was completely obscured by clouds.

Crystal-like undulating patterns covered the surface of the shadow, and distorted and torn spacetime was spread around the shadow.

Rising mountain ranges undulate beneath this shadow, some lying prostrate on the earth, others extending into the depths of those shattered spatial rifts.

He gazed at the magnificent shadow, at its enormous form.

After he had completely outlined the shadow, he realized what it was.

A tree stump.

Mountains are its roots, crystals are its skin. It stands tall between heaven and earth, and even a simple tree stump extends deep into the clouds.

The "soil" in which it "lives" is not the earth, but a series of chaotic spaces.

Its roots penetrate into these spaces, perhaps drawing energy from them as well.

He lowered his head, staring at the broken space and the scattered 'mountains' beneath the tree stump in front of him. He then looked up at the giant snake corpse above him.

The snake's tail pointed in his direction, towards a certain crevice in the mountain range.

[By passing through the dead roots of the World Tree and following the direction of the giant serpent's tail in the Central Court, one can reach the Fountain of Wisdom.]
He stared at the huge tree stump, the description of the 'secret passage' that Denon had collected echoing in his mind.

Is this the 'World Tree'?

He lowered his gaze and continued forward, quickly approaching the edge of the tree roots that resembled a mountain range.

This tree stump has stood here for who knows how many years. The gravel covering this huge root makes it look like an undulating mountain range.

The glow of dusk gradually dimmed as Heo drew closer.

This radiance has no specific source; rather, it exists purely as a concept.

The concept of twilight seemed to be diminished in the presence of this giant tree.

He Ao raised his head and glanced at the sky.

Part of the giant serpent's body was obscured by the huge shadow of the tree stump, but fortunately, its tail was still visible.

He Ao followed the direction of the tail and continued walking forward.

As he ventured deeper, he encountered more and more fragmented spacetime around him.

Some spacetime rifts are even thousands of meters long, with a thick root piercing into one of them.

He Ao stood at the edge of the crack and looked inside, seeing only chaotic and distorted scenes, and some broken pieces of land drifting in the void.

It's like the remnants left behind after a space shattered.

This anomaly suggests that there was previously more than one 'space'.

Of course, it's also possible that this anomaly was generated in the form of a broken, bizarre shape.

Anyway, the sheer size of this wasteland surprised He Ao. He even felt that the area of ​​this wasteland was larger than the total area of ​​the twenty-six cities in Northeast China.

No wonder it was classified as a level 0 exception.

He Ao withdrew his gaze from these spacetime rifts and carefully continued forward along the edge of the rift.

The enormous serpent's tail still hung high in the sky, guiding his way, while the surrounding light grew dimmer, as if moving from dusk into night.

As the light and shadow dimmed, He Ao's perception was also suppressed to a limit, and even his divine sense could not leave his body for more than three meters.

He continued forward, passing through one spacetime rift after another, with Siwei sitting on his shoulder, looking around curiously.

The spacetime beyond these cracks has been largely shattered, leaving only surging nothingness and fragments of the remaining earth and sky drifting within it.

It was as if this anomaly had once been the site of a massive and terrifying war that shattered the entire world, leaving only this wasteland.

Occasionally, He Ao would pause before some spacetime rifts, observing the fragments drifting in the void.

The fragments were completely desolate, devoid of any plants or life, but one could still vaguely make out some dilapidated buildings.

Some of the fragments were so close together that He Ao could even see the intricate patterns on the buildings, as well as scattered pieces that looked like tableware and weapons used by humans.

At one point, He Ao even had a sense of déjà vu, as if he were exploring the ruins of the martial arts world.

However, the fact that this giant tree still has these spaces suggests that it is more like some kind of destroyed fantasy world, and even more thoroughly destroyed.

Although the martial arts world has lost its civilization, at least some plants and some life still exist. But in this 'twilight wasteland', there is nothing left.

He looked up at the enormous shadow of the tree stump that almost blocked out the sky and everything in his field of vision.

In Denon's 'data', this tree is called the 'World Tree', which sounds like some kind of core hub of the world.

Now, all that remains of this thing is a huge tree stump and its root system that extends deep into the spaces of destruction.

He lowered his head and continued forward.

If this thing is simply an anomaly that appeared out of thin air, then it is indeed quite detailed and rich in content.

The surrounding light had completely dimmed, plunging into utter darkness.

He looked up at the sky. The giant serpent's tail still floated above the blood-red sky. The sky was not completely covered by the tree stumps, but was filled with 'twilight', which had somehow turned into 'starlight'.

In the dim starlight, a faint rustling sound could be heard.

An invisible sense of 'being watched' emerged from the tree roots that resembled the surrounding mountains.

He looked up at the source of the spying sensation, but as soon as he raised his gaze, the spying vanished instantly.

He looked away and continued forward.

The void was filled with a ghostly blue starlight, and as he ventured deeper, the feeling of being spied on grew stronger.

Denon's file did not mention these spying incidents, so it's highly likely that he was unaware of them.

But Heo knew before he came in that there were many unexpected events involved in this anomaly, which is why Denon warned him that the mission was very dangerous.

However, these spyings did not actually disturb He'ao. They just watched from a distance and did not approach, whether out of fear or worry, it was unclear.

Soon, He Ao finally reached the end of the direction the snake's tail was pointing.

He looked up, and from there, the giant serpent's tail was completely out of sight.

In front of him, a tree root rose high, creating a wide 'doorway' in the ground.

Behind the doorway, a thick fog filled the air.

The surrounding space rippled slightly, as if it were connected to some unknown region.

It seems that this is indeed a 'secret passage'.

Pass through the dead roots of the World Tree to reach the Fountain of Wisdom.

He Ao slowly lifted his foot and walked forward.