Chapter 525 - Five Hundred and Twenty-Two:

Chapter 525: Chapter Five Hundred and Twenty-Two: "Fundamentally, It’s Not Your Fault....

In the largest stone building of the First Tribe, Fengchang ascended to the highest corridor.

He looked out to see an almost boundless sky shrouded in dark clouds, with not a sliver of clear sunlight in sight.

The thick and pungent poisonous rain fell, corroding the pitted ground.

During this calamity period, torrential poisonous rains poured down from the heavens, the searing liquid lashing against people’s skin and corroding their bodies. Only makeshift shields or stone constructions could withstand the increasingly fierce poison rain.

He continued walking, pushing open the door to a spartan room where an old man covered in black lines lay on the bed.

Hearing the door open, the old man slightly turned his head, revealing a face tormented by pain, his eyes growing increasingly cloudy.

"Fengchang..." the elder rasped with a hoarse voice.

Fengchang’s expression remained indifferent as he sat beside the bed.

"Has it come to this, Great Elder?" he asked.

The Great Elder gave a bitter smile, tugging at the corners of his mouth:

"I... had another dream last night. I saw your father, your mother, they were all looking at me with hatred. Your grandfather... he scolded me, saying I haven’t upheld the dignity of the First Tribe properly..."

Ming’an listened silently, without uttering a single word.

"Young Tribe Leader, I’ve always regretted..." The Great Elder extended his hand, already completely blackened and starting to rot, resembling the skin of a rotten black banana.

"...I regret that I was so superstitious about the oracle back then. Now, you’ve indeed proven that the succession ceremony does not require a blood sacrifice or pushing someone into the lava.

It was indeed my faith that has made me so ignorant and foolish in this lifetime. I’ve become a useless old man resting on his laurels. Despite dedicating my life to the great Bai Shen, I couldn’t even stop Cici who consorts with the Evil God..."

He coughed, his distended belly swelling as if twisted linear substances were moving beneath his skin.

This was a sign that the Curse could hardly be suppressed any longer.

Previously, when Su Ming’an and Xiber left the Stone Fortress, the Great Elder desperately tried to stop them, to no avail. Overwhelmed by his heart’s troubles, the curse in his body spread rapidly, now infesting his entire body.

The Curse was a ticking time bomb within the bodies of the people of Qiongdi, one that, when its time came, nobody could stop from exploding.

Watching the scheduled death of others had become the numb routine of the people of Qiongdi.

"Hold on a bit longer, do not let your body be dominated by the curse," Fengchang said. "Although the props to suppress the curse are no longer effective on you, stubborn will can also barely suppress it. At least, I want you to see the moment when I achieve the final victory in the battle of a hundred men."

The Great Elder shook his head:

"I... can’t hold on any longer. The pain brought by the curse is not only the physical breakdown but also the mental torment. The more I resist it, the more it invades my thoughts..."

The Great Elder’s eyes became somewhat vacant, his pupils gradually dilating.

His mouth moved slightly, and an extremely faint voice drifted from his lips:

"I still remember... what this land of Qiongdi was like before the great Bai Shen descended.

The great Lord Rock... your omnipotent grandfather, faced the same as me in his dying moments. Settling all affairs before lying in bed, letting the Curse invade him, and waiting for death with serenity... This is the fate of us people of Qiongdi.

Fate is irresistible; the Curse is part of our bloodline. It links our hearts and bones, and only by dying can we escape the shackles of this cursed bloodline...

Unless you truly can erase the Evil God, who brought upon all these curses and disasters."

"Kill..." The Great Elder’s pupils trembled, like chalk swirling at the bottom of his eyes: "...kill Cici, kill the believers of the Evil God..."

Up until his dying moment, his desire remained to kill Xiber.

This wish took root deep in his heart, indelible even by death.

Fengchang looked at him without speaking.

Suddenly, the Great Elder began to cough violently, foul blood and black mire trickling down his chin.

"Today... you are to inherit the position of the Young Tribe Leader, and there’s much you need to do. I shouldn’t keep you here..." he said and then lifted his hand: "...You go now, leave, stay away from me. The future of Qiongdi... I leave it to you."

Fengchang shifted slightly to the side, as if about to leave.

But before he left, he gave the dying Great Elder another look.

"I went to the underground tunnel yesterday," he abruptly said, "I... saw the ruins of a laboratory and found a few family letters written by someone else."

The Great Elder, eyes open, looked at him, his gaze flickering slightly.

"’God-making Project.’" Fengchang said, "Is Lord Bai Shen... a construct created by outsiders?"

"—You witnessed with your own eyes the descent of Lord Bai Shen five years ago and saw Him transform into the firmament and die," the Great Elder stared at him intently. "You are the Young Tribe Leader of Qiongdi, and you... are the last person who should doubt the authenticity of Bai Shen."

"..." Fengchang’s fingers tightened.

He closed his eyes, regulated his breathing, and after a moment, stood up.

"I’m leaving."

He took steps, one after another, toward the door, the ominous and cursed atmosphere intensifying behind him.

He knew that once he walked through that door, he would never see the old man behind him again.

Great Elder Fengsi Zeven, the strongest in Qiondiland, sustained the ruling position of the First Tribe during its transitional period for decades, dedicated his life to the succession of the Tribe and the worship of Bai Shen.

But at the same time, it was this man who, five years ago, forced Xiber to jump into the magma as a sacrifice to the gods, indirectly causing the death of his parents and destroying his family’s happiness.

He hated this old man, yet he couldn’t punish him, and even for the protection he had been given, he had to be thankful.

This was the end of a lifetime’s blind faith for the old man, dying under a curse.

...This is the standard ending for the people of Qiongdi who worshipped Bai Shen.

A Sacrificial Crown appeared in Fengchang’s hand, to be worn at times of significant tribal events.

As the crown, resembling blood-thorned brambles, settled on his head, he heard a hoarse, dry voice barely audible from behind.

"...Feng Qiqi."

The old man’s voice floated from behind, filled with an indescribable bitterness and complexity:

"In my life, I’ve neither achieved great feats nor made grave mistakes, living plainly. Apart from decent strength, I have nothing to show for it. I... still haven’t been able to break through that Black Wall, nor escape the fate of a Qiongdi man."

"But I have no regrets, nor do I feel sorrow for it."

"I just want to ask you one thing."

"For my overly obstinate faith... for my indirect role in the deaths of Sik and Chushan..."

"...do you still hate me?"

Fengchang closed his eyes.

He didn’t turn around, as if the person behind him didn’t exist, only taking large strides forward.

"It’s the time of disaster; toxic rain is falling outside," he muttered to himself, "I have to set up a Rain-Proof Formation now."

Such a casual remark, as though he was saying "Remember to put on an extra layer."

After that comment, he heard no more voices from behind.

When he looked back, he saw a large, transparent Soul Stone on the bed covered with muck and decaying matter.

Staring at the Soul Stone that the Great Elder had become, he seemed to see through it, witnessing countless scenes.

The fire that had burned in his memory still tormented him to this day.

"It wasn’t your fault at all, it wasn’t anyone’s," he said:

"...It was I who set that fire."

"Ding dong!"

Su Ming’an opened his eyes.

The poisonous rain drifted, and dark clouds pressed close to the ground, as if night had descended.

The tribe at the foot of the mountain seemed to be engulfed by a black torrent, and the ground was full of corrosive rivers formed by the accumulated rain.

Stone houses had collapsed, bodies were everywhere, and people were shivering under the buildings, barely clinging to life, the scene was like the coming of the apocalypse, the scent of death pervading the land.

In the moment he saw this scene, his heart was swallowed by an unusual emotion, giving rise to the desire to rush into the rain and suffer in their place.

He knew that this was the influence of the Hundred Gods occupation. After mastering the two main elements of becoming a god, "Energy" and "Faith," it merged with his already highly compatible "White Examination" occupation to form a god-like occupation.

He didn’t know what this occupation represented; no one had ever had such an experience before, but the changes it brought were indeed solid. He could now accept others’ faith like a deity, to manifest powers.

Although he could only use defensive barriers for the time being, once he got his hands on the Annihilation and Curse Authorities, he would possess terrifying suppressive and destructive powers.

...It seemed that he was indeed evolving in the direction of a charlatan.

"Ding-dong!"

A white key suddenly appeared in his hand, bearing the number 10000/10000 – the exact amount of faith he had obtained so far.

He put away the white key; it wasn’t much use, essentially a token of proof that he had the ability to collect the "Faith" element.

But then he suddenly remembered something else.

He took out a rusty key, which looked almost identical to the white key.

This key had fallen at his doorstep on the first day the instance activated, and he had never known what it was.

Now it seemed that it might be something similar... Could this be the Jiu Shen Faith Key?

The number displayed on the rusty key was 9800/10000, almost full.

As he looked at it, a flash of white light suddenly illuminated it, and the value jumped to 9850.

Due to a lack of clues, he also placed the rusty key in his backpack next to the Hundred Gods Key, without dealing with it for the time being.

"... Do you still hurt?" Beside him, Xiber opened her eyes.

Around her, tentacles resembling black snakes coiled, causing her pallid face to stand out like a patch of white snow in the darkness, and when she looked at him, the gentleness in her eyes seemed even more pronounced—as if she had caught sight of hope.

The adventurer before her had become the person most likely to achieve divinity.

She could tell that he was only one step away from joining the ranks of Bai Shen in his current state.

"It hurts a bit," Su Ming’an said.

... In fact, it hurt a lot.

Although he was no longer tormented by the poison rain and even the previously eroded wounds on his body had been automatically repaired, the anguish of the people of Qiongdi was still being shared by him.

He stretched out his hand to the sky.

"Shield," he said.

Emotion Value points were deducted, and a milky radiance flashed into existence.

Like a thin layer of egg membrane, it emerged from his hand like white tissue paper and darted toward the sky that rained poison—

People from the Tribe who were fleeing in panic and gasping for breath suddenly found silence around them.

The rain seemed to have stopped.

They looked up to see a layer of faint white light, like a thin film, spread out beneath the sky swirling with black, twisted matter, completely blocking the toxic rain.

The scope of this shield wasn’t broad, protecting only up to the Third Tribe, but the highly corrosive poison rain had ceased its fall, no longer able to harm them.

On witnessing this scene, someone suddenly burst into tears.

They still remembered, five years ago, when the curse from beyond the sky was about to invade the ground, it was the sudden descent of Bai Shen, transformed into the firmament, that bestowed them a blessing, allowing them to survive.

That pale light, like a bridge connecting their lives, rewarded a lifetime of faith.

The devout believers had finally awaited the arrival of their deity.

At this moment, they once again witnessed the descent of the compassionate, merciful, powerful, and kind deity they had long worshipped.

That deity—stood on a high hill, His white body enveloped in a dazzling light, those white tendrils representing goodness and light unfolded like petals, emanating a sense of sanctity in their eyes.

He was behind that white light, vaguely visible as though a veil draped over a frameless painting, bringing tears to their eyes.

The white light of protection that enveloped the world emanated from Him, like a Path of Purification.

—It traversed pain, death, and hell, allowing their weary and sorrowful souls to find rest.

Su Ming’an pulled back his hand, and thanks to the gratitude of the Tribespeople, his Emotion Value was restored from 200 points to 400 points.

"Let’s go, to the First Tribe," he said to Xiber.

He needed to raise his remaining 10 points of san immediately so he could withstand the pain that racked his body; his current state was just a brief moment of clarity.

And the best method to raise san...

Was to kill Players.

—He planned to head to the First Tribe in the identity of a Bai Shen successor, to meet the Son of Bai Shen.

Together with this heretic who is rejected by the world.