Yes, I became a god just by exercising.

Chapter 64 The Demise of Civilization

The whole city was burning.

The flames were fierce and violent, seemingly unstoppable, spreading along the buildings to the unseen horizon.

Countless giant jawed beasts, enveloped in flames, howled and screamed as they ran between the buildings.

A scene resembling hell.

Xia Fa forced himself to calm down, took a few steps, and hid behind a giant wall that was half broken.

He didn't know why he had been teleported to this place even though he had clearly exited the Ghost Realm, nor did he know what had happened here.

The most urgent task is to first observe the situation clearly before considering how to extricate oneself.

If all else fails, there are so many houses here. Once we get that unknown sealed artifact, we can just rush into a house or the dining room of a palace, find a table and a chair, and sit down...

Thinking this, Xia Fa nodded slightly, becoming much calmer.

He half-squatted down, leaned his shoulder against the wall, and poked the wall with his hand.

The moment my fingertip touched the marble wall, my entire index finger turned bright red, like a branding iron that had been heated to a high temperature, and immediately poked a small hole in the wall.

The molten lava flowed down the small hole, and Xia Fa casually blew on it, his breath carrying wind, snow and ice shards, which immediately cooled the small hole, and even the lava quickly turned black and solidified.

This is the simplest application of the Etheric Source Secret Contract's power, and it fits perfectly here.

Countless cries, roars, and screams, accompanied by the stench of burning buildings or charred corpses, permeated the air through the walls.

Xia Fa steadied himself, pressed his eyes close to the small hole, and surveyed the entire city, beginning to gather necessary intelligence and information.

He certainly wouldn't recklessly rush towards the palace complex to retrieve the sealed artifact, but with the artifact so close, he wouldn't easily give up because of the potential dangers.
After he had fully planned everything, he decided to take a risk.

The city in front of us is surrounded by mountains on three sides, resembling a "U" shape.

The unique complex built by the giant jaw beasts stretches along the "U"-shaped exit into the boundless distance.

I was on the hillside to the left, a high vantage point that offered a panoramic view of everything.

This place should have been a villa in the suburbs, but now only ruins remain, and even the walls are blackened.

Not far away, a headless giant jaw beast corpse was crackling and burning, most of it already burned away, with charred organs faintly visible from the ribs.

It seems that he is the owner of this villa.

"The palace where that sealed artifact is located is situated at the innermost part of this area, surrounded by mountains on three sides, and built against the mountain..."

"If I go downhill, I should be able to get there in a few seconds at full speed..."

Xia Fa was plotting in his mind. Although he was only a fungus-level superhuman, he had signed a secret contract with the Ether Source that had more comprehensive capabilities.

This means that in situations where he needs to travel quickly, he can simply cast a "wind speed" effect on himself, causing his speed to increase dramatically.

"Was a war fought here?"

"wrong……"

Xia Fa's gaze swept around the palace complex, trying to find any possible enemies.

Suddenly, his pupils contracted slightly, as if he had seen something extremely strange.

From the western gate of the palace, one after another, giant jawed beasts seemed to have lost their minds, screaming and howling as they ran out.

No, rather than calling them "giant jaw beasts," in Xia Fa's eyes, they are now closer to "demi-humans."

These giant-jawed beasts all walked upright like humans, relying on their short, thick legs even when they were running for their lives.

The scene looked extremely bizarre because the heads of the giant jaw beasts were so large, like a grape on a toothpick, that it even gave Xiafa the feeling that their heads might fall off at any moment as they ran wildly.

Yet they still chose to run away on two legs, as if they had broken free from the life of wild beasts and become humans in civilized society.

But what surprised Xia Fa even more was that these giant jaw beasts... were all wearing clothes!

Previously, all he had seen were the severed limbs and remains of giant jawed beasts. Although he had noticed some scraps of cloth, he hadn't given them much thought. Only now did Xia Fa realize that these giant jawed beasts, despite being bizarre beasts, seemed to have actually developed a rather modern civilization in this place!

It was so bizarre, yet it possessed an epic grandeur, like witnessing a group of black bears in the mountains develop a city-level civilization.

The giant jawed beasts that ran out of the west gate of the palace were dressed in sky-blue or light pink silk dresses, and double-breasted coats that fit them surprisingly well.

Although they look very strange, there is no doubt that these giant jawed beasts learned human weaving and clothing production techniques and perfectly integrated them into their civilization.

In addition, Xia Fa also noticed that the giant jawed beasts, which were clearly dressed as men, had tattoo-like patterns engraved on the top of their heads, between their two small eyes, on their huge oval heads.

The patterns were mostly swords, lions, wolves... and the colors were black or a somber red.

As for the giant jawed beast dressed as a woman, its head is decorated with patterns of roses, jasmine, and other flowers.

A group of about a dozen giant jawed beasts fled the palace complex like madmen, as if they had encountered something extremely terrible.

Xia Fa felt a chill run down his spine, realizing that there might be some unknown danger in the palace.

But this did not deter him in the slightest; he decided to continue observing and wait for the right opportunity to act.

At this moment, seemingly as the giant jaw beasts ran out of the palace, countless giant jaw beasts also ran out from many buildings and houses in this city surrounded by mountains on three sides!
They wailed, cried, and screamed... it was hard to tell whether they were fleeing for their lives or simply making a futile struggle because they had completely lost their minds.

"The civilization of these giant jawed beasts... has actually flourished to such an extent?"

Xia Fa was somewhat surprised, because he saw a hundred thousand giant jaw beasts run out, densely packed, almost turning the entire city complex black.

Even so, the houses inhabited by these hundreds of thousands of giant jaw beasts seem to occupy less than one ten-thousandth of the area of ​​this boundless city.

These escaped giant jaw beasts were clearly just commoners among the giant jaw beasts, all dressed in tattered cloth clothes or skirts.

The patterns on their heads are extremely simple, even somewhat rough.

Although it still features patterns like lions, bears, or roses, it is clearly of much lower quality compared to the giant beasts that escaped from the palace.

To be honest, the moment Xia Fa saw so many giant jaw beasts, he felt a chill run down his spine.

Because... the Jaw Beast is bizarre!
The supernatural and humans have always been mortal enemies!
The supernatural beings have a great fondness for human flesh and blood, or human souls, and some even feed on negative emotions such as human pain, sorrow, and torment.

At the same time, humans will also hunt down the supernatural for the sake of the extraordinary essence or the secret contract.

Now, the giant jaw beasts, which are almost insect-level creatures, have actually established a preliminary civilization, and their population... no... the number of creatures is so prosperous and thriving, with preliminary estimates suggesting there are hundreds of millions of giant jaw beasts.

If one day, a powerful being were to emerge from this Jawed Beast civilization and lead the Jawed Beasts to attack human society...

It's important to understand that the Jawed Beasts that have developed civilizations are not like the Jawed Beasts in the Cave Realm who simply attack like mindless beasts.

They will certainly build armies, practice battle formations, use weapons, and even employ all sorts of insidious or cunning schemes and treacherous plots.

And then there are the most terrifying, malevolent ritualistic magic arrays, similar to "warp-plunder"...

Xia Fa felt a chill run down his spine just thinking about it.

Fortunately, we don't know what happened yet, but the civilization developed by the Jaw Beast is about to be destroyed.

It's incredible that the supernatural could develop a civilization, just like humans, demi-humans, and humanoid supernatural beings, and such a massive one at that...

If the scholars of the major churches found out about this, those old guys would probably go crazy and rush over to get the research data immediately!

As he was thinking, suddenly, in the distance, shrouded in the city's mist, a colossal figure, as large as a mountain, riding a warhorse as large as a mountain, slowly appeared.

Xia Fa was jolted, and his pupils suddenly contracted!

This is... an unknown entity resembling a heavily armored cavalryman!
An unknown being comparable to the nine righteous gods!

An unknown entity that almost made him lose control just by casually casting a glance at him!

And now, it... is slowly riding its horse towards him!

(End of this chapter)