Chapter 496: Turning Enemies into Seeds

Bodhi's voice came from Fangcun Mountain, crossing an unknown number of hundreds of millions of li, still that same unhurried tone.

"Don't crush that ball."

"What's inside is ten times more troublesome than he himself."

Sun Wukong lowered his head and looked at the pure black sphere in his hand.

The distorted faces on the sphere's surface were still voicelessly screaming, but their struggling was much less than before.

As if being pressed down by the warmth of the Monkey Heart.

"His master's power?"

Sun Wukong wrinkled his nose, "This old thing still has a master?"

"Yes."

Bodhi's voice faded, "He's been dead a long time, but he left a trick."

"How should we handle it?"

"Let me teach you a method."

The desiccated corpse on the ground was still twitching.

The old man's body was like a deflated pig's bladder, flesh caving in, bones sticking out everywhere, black scales all fallen off, scattered in fragments on the ground.

Without the malice primordial source, the body could barely maintain a human shape.

His mouth was opening and closing.

He couldn't make a complete sound; only air leaked from his cracked lips, a hiss, like stepping on a mouse.

Yao stood in the distance, looking at that thing on the ground, her expression complex.

"Is he still alive?"

"He won't live long."

Sun Wukong glanced, "Without that thing, he's no different from dried jerky."

The clump of malice primordial source that had been peeled off was restless in Sun Wukong's palm.

Bubbles bulged on the black sphere's surface, each containing a face.

Some were crying, some laughing, some opening their mouths as if to say something.

All the expressions converged into one meaning—

Unwillingness.

Extreme unwillingness.

The sphere suddenly shuddered violently, trying to slip through the gaps in Sun Wukong's fingers.

A chill force stabbed into his palm.

Sun Wukong tightened his fingers and crushed it.

"Still jumping around?"

He took the iron staff from behind his ear and held it horizontally with one hand.

The staff's tip was aimed at the sphere.

Bodhi's voice sounded in his mind, reciting seven syllables one by one.

It was not any known spell.

It had no rhythm or meter, sounding like an offhand remark.

Yet each word landing in Sun Wukong's ears felt absurdly heavy, as if someone had stuffed seven iron weights into his brain.

He remembered it.

The iron staff pressed against the black sphere's surface.

Sun Wukong opened his mouth.

When the seven syllables left his mouth, the voice became lower and deeper.

Not a tone his throat could produce.

Rather, it sounded like an old man who had lived far too long sighing.

The faces on the sphere all stopped.

All expressions froze in place.

Then they began to wither.

Not the kind of shrinkage from being pressed small.

It was a collapse starting from within.

Like a hand pulling from the core outward, drawing out all malice, resentment, negation, and despair layer by layer, rolling them into threads and stuffing them back into the core.

The sphere shrank from fist-sized to egg-sized.

From egg-sized to marble-sized.

From marble-sized to—

a seed.

A thumb-nail-sized black seed, its surface so smooth it could reflect a person's silhouette.

But that "silhouette" was skewed, twisted, bearing a howling mouth.

That was the last trace of consciousness of the senior brother.

It had been pressed into a pattern on the seed's outer shell.

He let out an extremely faint, weak wail.

It did not come from his mouth.

It was a mental fluctuation seeping out from the seed's core.

It was like an existence that could once destroy the world, kneaded into a sesame seed and stuffed into the bottom of a glass bottle.

He could perceive, think, and hate.

But he could do nothing.

He would never be able to do anything.

The withered corpse on the ground stopped twitching at the same moment.

It was completely still.

Utterly dead.

But he died more quietly than Sun Wukong had imagined.

No explosion, no curse, no sort of "deathbed struggle".

It was just done, cracked, shattered.

A blow of wind turned it into grayish powder that drifted away.

Not even ash remained.

Sun Wukong pinched the seed, tossing it between his fingers.

When the seed fell back into his palm, it felt cool and carried an indescribable chill.

He flipped it twice, like playing with peach pits as a child.

"Where should I put this?"

He turned his head and asked Yao.

Yao thought for a moment: "Throw it away?"

"If thrown away, it could be picked up by some clueless person and cause trouble."

Bodhi's voice came again, trailing with a yawn.

"Planted."

"Huh?"

"In the farmland."

……

Sun Wukong looked at the seed in his hand, then at the battlefield beneath his feet, which he had thrown into chaos.

Fragments of shattered space and black scale shards lay everywhere.

The light wall of the golden prison cage still glowed, but inside there was nothing left.

Only a clean breeze and a mess on the ground remained.

Fine then.

Then let's plant it.

"

He grabbed Yao's wrist with one hand, and a golden light flashed beneath his feet.

The two turned into a shooting star and shot into the distance.

Passing through a new star domain propped up by vine-covered giant trees.

Passing through newly born stars and planets still condensing.

Flying all the way to the edge of this new universe.

There is nothing here.

It is neither darkness nor emptiness.

It is a hazy, undefined chaos state.

Like a blank canvas waiting for an artist's brush.

Sun Wukong's foot stepped onto a patch of not-yet-formed gray soil, his shoe sinking half an inch, bringing up a damp earthy smell.

He casually kicked a hole in the ground.

The hole wasn't big—about palm-wide and two fingers deep.

Then he tossed the black seed into it.

The seed landed at the bottom of the hole, making an extremely soft "tap".

The gray dirt on the hole's wall trembled slightly."

You're just going to do it like that?

"Yao watched from the side, the corner of her mouth twitching."

What else?

Still need to dig a flowerpot?

Add some water?

"Sun Wukong bent over, gathered two handfuls of dirt, and covered it

After covering it, he still felt it wasn't firm enough.

He lifted his foot and stepped on it twice.

Left foot down, right foot down.

He stepped hard, packing the soil solid.

His footprints were clearly imprinted on top."

All right.

"He brushed off the dust on his hands, rubbed his fingertips

Then he stepped back two feet, hands on his hips, looking at the small dirt mound that had been trampled flat.

Three breaths.

The dirt clump moved.

A black sprout shot out from a crack in the soil.

As thin as a toothpick, trembling, it bore two unopened leaf buds.

It grew quickly.

The sprout became a sapling, the sapling became a branch, the branch became a trunk.

Within ten breaths it grew taller than a person.

The trunk was pure black, as if cast from poured ink, its surface lacking bark texture, smooth and glossy with a dull sheen.

But the leaves were different.

Every leaf was glowing.

Golden-green light.

That was the product transformed by Sun Wukong's Creative Force.

The former negation, despair, and malice were sealed within the trunk.

What blossomed in the canopy was the vitality extracted and transformed from that malice.

The wind blew, the leaves swayed, and specks of light drifted down like scattered gold.

Those specks of light fell on the gray soil, and the soil's color deepened a shade.

It gained nutrients.

It gained vitality.

Given time, this barren edge of the universe will also sprout greenery because of this tree.

Sun Wukong stared at the tree for a while.

Faint patterns could be seen within the trunk.

Like a twisted face.

The mouth was open, but no sound could be made.

That was Senior Brother's final appearance.

He was forever sealed within the tree's core.

Alive, conscious, watching as this universe grew livelier and more prosperous.

But he could do nothing.

He could only be a landscape tree.

To provide shade for any living beings who passed by later.

Sun Wukong thought this was pretty good.

Better than killing him outright.

Let's go.

He patted Yao's shoulder.

Won't you take another look?

There's nothing to see.

Sun Wukong turned, hoisted his iron staff onto his shoulder—just a tree.

"

He walked a few steps, then stopped again.

He looked back at the black tree one last time.

A faint, feeble whimper came on the wind.

One couldn't tell whether it was the wind or the sob of the lingering consciousness within the tree's core.

Sun Wukong tugged at the corners of his mouth.

It wasn't a smile.

Just a tug.

Then he strode off.

Yao followed, glancing back at the lone tree glowing at the edge of the universe.

From now on, whoever passes by will see it.

They will wonder why this tree grows in such a desolate place.

They will approach it, touch it, study it.

Then they will see, in the trunk's patterns, that mouth that can never close.

They will understand——

Some things are happier dead than alive.

A muffled yawn came from the direction of Fangcun Mountain.

Bodhi's voice trailed over, bland and indifferent.

Monkey, come back.

There's a guest.

"

Sun Wukong's footsteps halted.

Who?

"

No answer came.

But deep in the void, an extremely faint aura was approaching.

That aura was unlike any of the previous enemies.

Not cold, not hot, not kind, not evil.

Like a pool of Dead Water without ripples.

Sun Wukong gripped the Iron Staff tightly.