The forest was darker inside than it had appeared from the border.
Black trunks stood close together, thin blue veins faintly glowing across their surfaces, as though water flowed beneath the bark. Dark blue leaves rustled overhead, speckled with tiny points of light.
Xiao Yu walked ahead. He barely touched the ground. His second Soul Skill, Wind Lightness, muffled his footsteps, allowing him to move silently without leaving a trace.
Qin Ye followed five meters behind. She had activated Seraph's Eyes back at the forest's border, and she had enough spiritual power to maintain the skill for an entire day.
Two kilometers in, Xiao Yu raised his hand.
"The wind is strange here." He pointed to the left. "It flows in that direction, then vanishes. It doesn't hit an obstacle. It simply disappears."
Qin Ye looked where he was pointing. To the naked eye, the same forest stretched ahead: black trunks, blue leaves, and an even gloom. But Seraph's Eyes could see through the illusion.
She concentrated. The air ahead shuddered like the surface of water, and a thin, almost transparent veil gradually emerged.
Beyond it lay a clearing. Nine figures in dark cloaks with deep hoods stood in a circle around a tree. None of them moved. Only the man closest to the center had his palm pressed against the trunk, his lips moving as though he were speaking to someone.
The tree was small, no taller than two meters, yet it was completely white. Its bark, branches, and leaves all glowed with a milky radiance. Beside it, the Dark Soul Masters seemed out of place. An aura of cold and decay emanated from them, like stagnant water, while the tree radiated purity and light.
Qin Ye shifted her gaze to the ground. A circle of light surrounded the tree, its lines forming a star. It was as pure and milky white as the tree itself, emitting a gentle glow.
"What is that?" Xiao Yu asked curiously, narrowing his light green eyes slightly.
Qin Ye glanced at him and made a sharp gesture: retreat.
They returned to the squad forty minutes later. Emerging silently from the canopy of a giant plant, they landed in front of their waiting companions.
"Well? Did you find them?" Hui Mi asked immediately.
Qin Ye nodded.
"There are nine of them. They're doing something strange. They've surrounded an unfamiliar tree, and there's a star symbol drawn on the ground. Their leader also seemed to be talking to the plant."
"Could the tree be some kind of communication device?" Sheng Ming suggested, shifting her weight uneasily.
Jin Luo lazily opened his eyes.
"That seems like too much trouble for a simple communication device. Why occupy such a vast area when it would be easier to use modern technology? There's plenty of it on the Planet of Sin."
Qin Ye nodded at his remark before looking around at everyone.
"Here's the plan. Zhou Shengyang, Hao Ming, and I will take the lead. We're the main strike force. Sheng Ming will stay in the rear on support, with Hui Mi beside her. Jin Luo will control the battlefield and cover everyone. Xiao Yu will cover us as well, but if there's an opening, strike. The runaways are yours.
"We need to take them alive, so we'll start with a surprise attack. I'll hit them with Wave of Light, and Zhou Shengyang will follow with Solar Breakthrough. A few seconds later, Hui Mi, you use Chain Lightning."
The squad moved deeper into the forest. When they were about a hundred meters from the clearing, Qin Ye raised her hand, and everyone froze.
"Get ready," she commanded quietly.
Behind her, three pairs of translucent Seraph wings woven from pure light unfurled instantly. Zhou Shengyang's face twisted into predatory concentration as distinct tiger stripes appeared across it. Hui Mi silently clenched his fists, lightning crackling across his body. Sheng Ming, Xiao Yu, and Jin Luo activated their Martial Souls one after another, shimmering Soul Rings rising into the air from beneath their feet.
Hao Ming stood slightly behind them, gripping his wooden sword.
Qin Ye swept her hand sharply, and at that very moment a surge of pure energy tore through the silence of the forest.
"Attack!"
Her voice rang out, short and clear as the strike of a bell. She shot forward, and the Seraph's Sword flared so brightly that the gloom between the black trunks retreated.
"Second Soul Skill: Wave of Light!"
Nearly half her power poured into the blade. What broke from its edge was no ordinary wave of light. It was a huge, dense, blinding wave that swept across the entire clearing from edge to edge.
A fraction of a second later, Zhou Shengyang struck. He gathered his spiritual power into a single fist, stepped forward so hard that the ground sank beneath his foot, and punched the empty air before him.
"Fourth Soul Skill: Solar Breakthrough!"
A golden beam pierced the clearing like a red-hot needle.
The nine cloaked figures scattered. Some threw up their hands, dim violet and black rings flickering around them as they desperately tried to flare up in time.
They were too late.
The sacred energy of Wave of Light literally dispersed their defenses, and the heat of Solar Breakthrough finished what it had started. Three of them collapsed unconscious without even managing to retreat a single step.
The remaining six proved far tougher. Even so, a few burns marked their bodies, and their black cloaks were ruined. They turned toward the source of the attack as one. One of them, a bald man with a deep scar across his brow, shouted something unintelligible. It was clearly an order to regroup.
They weren't given the chance.
"First Soul Skill! Chain Lightning!"
A blue discharge leapt from Hui Mi's fingers and struck the nearest enemy. The man jerked and lost his balance, but the discharge didn't fade. It jumped to the next one, then to a third. Each jump was weaker than the last, but it was enough. The three froze rooted to the spot, mouths bared in grimaces.
Hao Ming didn't wait for them to recover. He darted forward and a second later was right beside the first of the paralyzed men. Flipping the wooden sword around, he struck the man's neck with its flat side. The Soul Master's defense burst like an eggshell.
There was a dull thud. The body flew several meters before slumping heavily to the ground.
Zhou Shengyang was already standing in front of the second paralyzed man. One precise punch, and the Dark Soul Master's lower jaw simply caved in, his teeth crunching. He collapsed without making a sound.
The third managed to snap out of the paralysis. He neither attacked nor called for help. He simply ran, a single thought showing in his eyes.
Damn it! That cursed necromancer said no one could track us!
He retreated rapidly, weaving between the trunks. He had almost made it out of sight.
Then, without warning, he stumbled on perfectly level ground and fell with a cry.
"Aaah!" he screamed, clutching his legs. Thick blood streamed from his severed tendons.
"Buddy, you run like a Diamond Hippo."
Xiao Yu appeared beside him without a sound. He spun his dagger and smiled.
The Dark Soul Master was about to activate a Soul Skill, but Xiao Yu didn't let him finish. The heavy pommel of the hilt struck his throat. The flaring ring went out, and the man went limp.
Three remained.
Two of them attacked Zhou Shengyang and Hao Ming: a sturdy, stocky man with a black battle axe and a woman with long, tangled hair.
Zhou Shengyang met the axe blow with his bare forearm. His body withstood the impact easily, and his counterstrike sent the man flying a good ten paces.
Hao Ming slid toward the woman. He let the first thrust of her dark blue spikes pass him by. The wooden sword struck short and straight at her solar plexus. The defense around her body parted without the slightest resistance.
The woman went limp and crumpled to the ground.
The man with the axe was already getting up, spitting blood. He roared and lunged forward, but Zhou Shengyang got in his way first.
One short punch to the stomach.
The man doubled over and didn't rise again.
Only one remained.
The bald man stood in the middle of the clearing. Eight people lay around him, none of them moving. Qin Ye stepped slowly forward, and the light around her grew brighter.
"Mo Tun, it's over," she said calmly.
He didn't throw himself into battle. Instead, he took a step back, his gaze sliding along the edges of the clearing as he searched for a way out.
That hesitation was enough.
Qin Ye was in front of him before he could finish the thought.
"Third Soul Skill: Shackles of Light!"
Golden chains burst from the ground and wrapped around his ankles before he could react. He lunged, but the chains yanked him down, and his knees slammed into the scorched earth.
Mo Tun knelt in the center of the devastation. A fragment of chain still bound one of his legs, and his palm was pressed to a shallow cut on his shoulder. The Seraph's Sword hung at his throat, a couple of centimeters from the skin.
"I surrender," he said, his voice trembling for real. It was that particular animal tremor that cannot be faked.
Qin Ye did not lower her blade.
But something was wrong.
She couldn't explain the feeling. A defeated enemy knelt before her, his people lay all around, and Sheng Ming was already moving among the bodies, checking who was still alive. Everything seemed to have ended exactly as they had planned.
And yet...
Qin Ye turned her head sharply.
A man stood by the white tree.
The same height. The same face. The same wound on the shoulder.
It was Mo Tun.
He leaned his back against the white trunk and smiled. His palm rested on the bark with almost tender care, as though he were touching not a plant, but the most precious treasure of his life.
Qin Ye froze for only an instant.
That was enough for her to realize she had been fooled.
"Stop him!" she shouted, rushing after him.
Hao Ming was already moving. He didn't ask questions or try to understand what was happening. If Qin Ye, who until now had kept perfect composure, suddenly shouted, then the danger was far greater than it seemed.
Mo Tun didn't even turn his head.
A sixth black Soul Ring flared beneath his feet.
"Sixth Soul Skill: Devouring Earth!"
The tree blazed. The milky radiance glowing from its trunk wavered. The light flowed along the bark, slowly at first, as though the tree itself were trying to resist, then faster and faster, streaming toward Mo Tun's palm.
He was absorbing it.
White lines coiled around his fingers, climbed his wrist, slipped beneath his sleeve, and spread through his body. The veins in Mo Tun's neck bulged, filling with a strange, almost ghostly light. Thin white patterns appeared at his temples and crept toward his cheekbones.
The tree was dying before their eyes.
Its white leaves darkened and crumbled to ash. Blackness rose up the trunk from the very roots, swallowing the milky glow. It reflected no light and left no smoke, as though the wood were not burning but turning into emptiness.
Thin rays pierced through from deep within the trunk. With every passing second there were more of them, until the light that had seemed so soft and pure moments earlier became blinding.
Hao Ming had almost reached Mo Tun when the ground shuddered beneath his feet. He barely kept his balance, but he didn't stop.
The light no longer fit inside Mo Tun's body. It seeped from under his eyelids, burst out between his fingers, and showed through his skin. The hand pressed against the trunk shone so brightly that the outlines of his fingers almost vanished.
The next moment, everything fell silent.
Not gradually. Not the way the wind dies down before a storm.
The sounds simply vanished.
The rustle of leaves. The crack of branches. Hao Ming's footsteps.
Even Qin Ye could no longer hear her own breathing. She didn't know what exactly had happened, but her instincts screamed of danger.
"Get back!" Her shout rang out at the exact moment the tree split.
The black trunk tore apart from roots to crown. White light burst outward.
For a fraction of a second, the clearing vanished in blinding radiance. It didn't merely flood the space. It seemed to force everything else out of the world, erasing shadows, the outlines of trees, the very earth.
And then the shock wave hit.
The soil heaved.
Huge slabs of turf were ripped from the ground, and roots were torn out. The nearest trees snapped at the base, their trunks hurtling across the clearing and crushing everything in their path. The air became one continuous roar.
The wave spread outward from the tree in every direction, sweeping the forest from its path.
The shock wave overtook everything within its reach.
It reached Hao Ming first. He had time only to cross his arms in front of his face. The blow came almost point-blank, and for a moment the world turned white and soundless.
His arms burned as if they had been thrust into molten metal. The skin on his forearms split, and the wooden sword in his fingers cracked, fissures running from hilt to tip.
He was torn off the ground and carried backward over roots and stones until he slammed into something solid. He rolled, struck the ground again, and the air left his chest together with blood.
Qin Ye was a few steps behind him. Her three pairs of wings closed in front of her like a shield, and the wave struck them with such force that the light scattered into sparks.
She was ripped from her place and thrown back.
Zhou Shengyang was next. He had time neither to leap aside nor to gather a defense. His chin pressed to his chest, his forearms locked before his face, the muscles in his arms bulging like ropes.
The wave caught him and dragged him across half the clearing. He stopped only when he crashed into a fallen trunk.
Hui Mi, who stood farther away, gave no thought to himself. He turned and dashed to Sheng Ming, scooped her into his arms, and turned his back to the center, pressing her head against his chest.
The blow landed between his shoulder blades, and the air left his lungs in a hoarse groan. The ground burst beneath his feet. He arched under the force, but did not loosen his arms.
Xiao Yu reacted instantly. His first and second Soul Rings flared at once.
"First Soul Skill: Wind Step! Second Soul Skill: Wind Lightness!"
He turned and ran with all his might. But even so, the wave caught him in the back and threw him forward.
Jin Luo stood at the edge of the clearing. A first violet ring flared beneath him, and his fingers snatched a card from his fan.
"First Soul Skill: Draw!"
A shield card came up, second rank out of five. A transparent dome unfolded around him, thin lines running across its surface.
The wave, spent by the time it reached the far edge, struck the barrier and held for barely a fraction of a second.
Cracks spread across the dome by the dozens, crossing into a web, and it shattered into shards of light. What remained of the blow flung Jin Luo over his shoulder, and the sky turned upside down.
The wave swept beyond the clearing, breaking trees as it went. Splinters flew in a fan into the darkness, the earth collapsed in rings, and whitish steam rose from the craters.
Everything that had recently been forest was reduced to debris, upturned stumps, and torn slabs of turf.
Gradually, the shock wave subsided.
The wind died down. The dust slowly settled, revealing the mangled landscape. The air smelled of scorched earth, splintered wood, and blood.
Jin Luo lay on his side, pressing a palm to his face. Blood seeped between his fingers.
"Damn," he breathed, and even his own voice seemed too loud to him.
Hao Ming lay on the ground. The sounds were gone, and it felt as though his body had disappeared. Pain came late, but when it arrived, it flared everywhere at once: in his chest, his ribs, his arms, his head.
He tried to inhale, but his lungs didn't respond. White spots swam before his eyes, and a ceaseless ringing filled his ears.
He couldn't tell whether he was lying on the ground or still falling.
Then the cold came.
It began in his fingers, where they touched the earth, and crept upward like a thin icy thread.
Wrists. Elbows. Shoulders.
The pain didn't go away, but it grew distant, as if a current were carrying it off. His body grew heavy and cold, and beneath his ribs his heart beat weaker with every passing second.
Am I dying?
The thought didn't frighten him.
It was a long-forgotten feeling, yet at the same time far too familiar. It was as if he stood at the edge of an abyss, one step from being swallowed by the darkness.
His fingers twitched and with difficulty found the ground. He tried to draw up a knee, but even that simple movement brought a new wave of pain.
His throat tightened, and a weak, broken rasp escaped his mouth.
The cold was creeping toward his chest.
I don't want to...
Hao Ming had always known he could die at any moment. But knowing and accepting were two different things.
I want to find out... I want to remember... who I am...
Still, consciousness slipped away.
Blackness stood right at the edge of his vision, soft and warm, unlike the cold within, and called him to lie down in it and stop.
He was barely holding on.
A little longer, and it would take him.
The last thing he saw was Mo Tun, standing where the white tree had grown only moments ago.
He no longer looked the same.
Thin white scales had appeared where the scar had been. They ran along his temples, descended along his neck, covered his arms, and disappeared under his tattered cloak. His skin had grown paler, and his features seemed smoothed, rid of their former coarseness.
His expression had changed too.
The tension and greed were gone. In their place was a calm that was even and almost lazy. It was how a man looks when he already knows the outcome of a conversation and merely lets the other finish his sentence.
His eyes had turned blue, clear as the ice of high mountain lakes.
There was neither fury nor pain in them.
And that was what made them more frightening than anything else.
Soul Rings slowly revolved around Mo Tun.
The first.
The second.
The third.
They were neither white, yellow, violet, black, nor red. Each ring shone with a milky-gray light, as though cast from moonlight.
The fourth.
The fifth.
The sixth.
The seventh.
The eighth.
All eight rings lined up around him, rotating with serene smoothness.
Silence fell over the clearing. The man standing before them was no longer an ordinary Soul Master.
Mo Tun had become a Saint (Rank 8).
He unclenched his fingers and clenched them again, as though testing how well his new hand obeyed him. Then he surveyed the ruined clearing, his fallen comrades, and those struggling to rise from the mud.
A smile appeared on his lips.
"A pity the plan fell apart so easily," he said, shaking his head slightly as though apologizing to someone unseen. "Still, I think I can explain everything to the wizards."
He said it without anger or irritation.
As though losing nine subordinates, destroying the forest, and finding a group of barely living enemies standing before him were nothing more than a minor inconvenience.