Chapter 216: Devouring and Contamination

The moment has arrived.

Wang Shan watched the instinct‑driven Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue in the distance; its movements grew slower and slower, and each swing's energy ripple was weaker than the last.

It was like a battery about to run out, futilely flickering its final spark.

Meanwhile, his grandson Wang Zhitao, after devouring enough appetizers, had gradually adapted to the intensity of this high‑dimensional distorted energy; his complexion remained pale, but his eyes shone astonishingly, and the aura of Spiritual Power around his body grew denser.

We can't wait any longer.

If we wait any longer, Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue's Golden Core will be completely drained by this strange land, which would be a waste.

"Taozi, protect your brother; from now on, watch grandpa's move."

Wang Shan placed his two grandsons in a relatively safe corner and set a simple energy barrier. He turned, his cold vertical pupils for the first time actively and completely fixed on the twisted flesh.

This time, he was no longer luring, no longer probing.

It was a hunt.

Roar!

Seeming to sense a mortal threat, Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue abandoned its attacks on the few remaining mutated beasts and turned all its hostility toward Wang Shan.

Wang Shan laughed, his hoarse, harsh laugh filled with wild madness.

He did not retreat; instead, he stepped forward.

With that step, his Ten Thousand Beasts Reversal technique was driven to an unprecedented extreme.

"Come!"

A low roar erupted, not from the throat but from the chest, resonating through every inch of flesh and bone.

Centered on Wang Shan, a terrifying suction suddenly burst forth.

If Wang Zhitao's Devour Yuan Overlord Body had been a trickle before, now Wang Shan was a bottomless vortex, a black hole that devoured everything.

Hoo—!

A gale roared inside the Cave.

All the Spiritual Power lingering in the air—whether the remnants of Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue's self‑detonation, the gray decayed chaotic energy leaking from the ground, or the blood qi released by dying beasts—rushed toward Wang Shan like countless rivers converging into the sea.

"Ugh—!"

Even though Wang Shan's flesh was at its peak strength, the chaotic torrent of energy struck him, eliciting a painful groan.

Too chaotic, too messy!

It was as if someone poured a pot of boiling oil, a basin of ice water, a barrel of poison, and countless red‑hot iron sand straight into his body.

His body began another violent transformation.

Muscles beneath his skin writhed wildly, as if countless live snakes were slithering inside. The newly grown bone spines clacked, becoming thicker, longer, more ferocious. His stature rose again, and black, foul‑smelling slime began seeping from the gaps in his scale armor.

On the system panel, the number indicating the degree of mutation was soaring wildly out of control.

90%…91%…92%…

The warning alarm was sharp and piercing, but Wang Shan ignored it.

Pain?

Of course it hurts!

The pain was such that he almost believed he would explode in the next instant, turning into a puddle of mindless mush.

But alongside that extreme pain came an unprecedented sense of control.

He could "see" the gray energy flooding his body, brutally reshaping him, polluting his flesh into a form sharing their origin.

And in this process, he also gained the…right to command that power!

It was like a beast‑tamer, though bitten all over by the fiercest beast, finally grasping the reins that control it amid the blurred flesh.

"Not enough… not enough!"

Wang Shan's gaze pierced the energy torrent, fixed rigidly on Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue.

That's the main course!

He gaped his mouth wide and inhaled deeply.

"Roar—!"

The polluted Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue let out a mournful roar that was no longer human.

It sensed its shattered Golden Core being forcibly drawn out by an irresistible force!

Not only the Core's energy, but also its life force, its lingering soul, its everything!

"My… my power…"

A faint, broken consciousness filled with endless fear and resentment drifted along the energy torrent and was "swallowed" by Wang Shan.

Within that thread of consciousness, Wang Shan saw Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue's most vivid memories before death.

He saw its endless reverence for a being called 'Lord', its fear of this mission's failure, and its hatred and incomprehension toward Wang Shan, the 'outlier'.

"Lord… save me…"

Unfortunately, its Lord could no longer hear it.

"Your thing is now mine."

Wang Shan gave a feral grin, violently stirring and compressing the ingested, polluted Golden Core energy within his body, and then… blasted it outward!

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Several strands of solid black light erupted from the tips of his raised claws, bearing a decayed, ruinous aura, instantly slashing through space toward Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue.

There was no earth‑shaking explosion, not even a loud sound.

The black light entered Ten Thousand Heavenly Virtue's body like a scorching branding iron pressed onto beef tallow.

Heh heh heh—

A wisp of black smoke rose; where the black light struck, flesh began to rot and dissolve at a visible speed, turning into foul‑smelling pus that dripped onto the ground.

"Ah… ah… no… no!!!"

Wan Tiande let out a final, desperate, pain‑filled scream.

It could clearly feel its Golden Core, the foundation that bore its hundred years of cultivation and glory, being corroded, shattered, and torn apart from within by that same‑origin power, yet brimming with beastly and devouring desire.

Its life‑fire was extinguishing rapidly at an irreversible pace.

And Wang Shan, after devouring that power, felt his connection to the entire Cave reach an inconceivable level.

If before he could only borrow the Array's power,

now he feels himself… is the Array!

He is this Cave!

Every rock, every inch of ground seemed an extension of his body. He could freely manipulate all the pollution energy in this space, turning it entirely into his domain.

The scales on his body grew darker and denser, flashing a cold, hard luster of metal mixed with bone. The claws on his five fingers lengthened to nearly half a foot, their sharp tips glinting with a chilling light that made the heart race.

He no longer bore any trace of a human shape.

It is a monster cloaked in human skin; after devouring another Golden Core cultivator, it finally tore off the disguise, revealing its truest, most terrifying form.

The price?

Wang Shan, of course, knew what the price was.

It is "pollution", a growing distance from being human, and the constant risk of being Counter‑Devoured by that power, sinking entirely into a beast that knows only killing.

So what of it?

He lowered his head and glanced at the two grandsons tightly embracing in the corner, shielded by an energy barrier.

As long as he could keep them alive—whether they become monsters or fall into an endless abyss, never to be reborn—Wang Shan was willing to accept it.

He lifted his head, looking at the now completely silent Wan Tiande, reduced to a broken, rotting husk.

The hunt is over.

But the disaster triggered by the Golden Core's self‑detonation has only just begun.