Chapter 167: Rot-Claw Whispers, Thorns Guide the Way

The grey-green withering mist was thick as substance, each breath carrying the stinging sweetness of decay, searing Xiang Lingna's fragile lungs. She leaned against a long-dead tree whose bark had peeled away to expose a ghastly-white wooden skeleton, her charred left hand tightly gripping the scalding identity tag. The "07" on its face stood out starkly against the faint milky-white stardust halo. The empty stump of her right arm was covered by a silver membrane formed from the medical nanobots Ling had temporarily implanted, but beneath that membrane, dark-purple energy still writhed like a restless venomous snake, bringing a continuous, icy sting.

Inside her body, that wisp of chaotic energy forcibly activated after destroying the Withered Guardian's shackle node flowed like a feeble stream wandering a dried riverbed—slow and dangerous. Each circulation tore at the barely-healed fragile meridians, bringing piercing agony, yet it also acted like a potent but lethal stimulant, keeping her utterly overdrawn body from collapsing entirely.

"Sister Liyana… where is the New Moon Woodland?" Xiang Lingna gasped softly, her gaze piercing through the churning mist toward the direction jointly indicated by the identity tag's glow and the chaotic energy within—the deeper, darker belly of the forest. The corrupting aura there was denser, the air seemingly congealed, carrying a suffocating deathly stillness. Unlike the "painful struggle" of the Thorn Corridor, what the forest's will transmitted here was a deeper despair and the numbness of total enslavement.

【Bondage… eternity… darkness…】

【Light… faint light… useless…】

【Submission… is the only release…】

Countless fragmented shards of intent, saturated with negative emotion, surged like a cold tide, attempting to flood into her consciousness through her ankles touching the earth. These were the whispers of plant rootlets thoroughly soaked in the Doctor's Rot-Claw power, stripped of all will to resist. Xiang Lingna gritted her teeth, struggling to block these corrosive thoughts, focusing her attention on the stardust halo of the identity tag. That faint warmth was her sole comfort against this dead forest, and the lifeline connecting her to a sliver of hope.

She struggled to her feet, each step like walking on knife-points. Her charred left hand steadied itself against the rough, cold trunk of the dead tree, leaving faint scorch marks. That wisp of chaotic energy within instinctively accelerated its flow amid the agony, bringing a brief surge of strength that let her stagger forward—but what followed was deeper weakness and the warning of meridians tearing.

In the mist, twisted tree shadows resembled man-eating monsters. The ground was carpeted in thick, writhing dark-purple moss that made sickeningly sticky sounds underfoot. Occasionally one could see small animal skeletons thoroughly wrapped in moss, their forms distorted, or rusted, snapped metal fragments—relics of the old world's civilization, now part of the corruption.

After walking for an unknown length of time, the silhouette of the mist ahead seemed to change. No longer just solitary dead trees, low, gnarled dark-purple shrubs appeared, swollen like massive tumors. Their branches twisted and coiled, surfaces slick with viscous dark-green sap and pulsing dark-purple veins, emitting corruption energy fluctuations purer and more heart-pounding than the Withered Guardian's—Rot-Claw Shrubs, one of the surface manifestation nodes of the Doctor's power.

Both the identity tag's glow and the throbbing of the chaotic energy within pointed unmistakably toward the depths of this shrub thicket.

Xiang Lingna's heart sank. Force her way through? In her current state, that was tantamount to suicide. She stopped, leaning against a cold boulder to catch her breath, her charred left hand unconsciously pressing against the damp ground covered in a thin layer of moss.

Hmm…

A thread of intent, extremely faint yet utterly unlike the surrounding numb despair, was caught by her like a candle flame in the wind.

【Pain… so much pain…】

【Save… us…】

【Roots… pierced through… drained…】

This intent was filled with sharp agony and fear, its source directly beneath the Rot-Claw Shrubs ahead! Moreover, woven into it was an extremely thin thread of pure elven natural aura—severely polluted by corruption, but its essence remained! Living elves! Imprisoned beneath these Rot-Claw Shrubs by the Doctor, used as "nutrients"?!

Xiang Lingna's pupils contracted sharply. The Doctor's cruelty exceeded imagination! He not only corrupted the forest, he enslaved and tortured its former guardians! The painful memories of bound rootlets from the Thorn Corridor surged up in her mind, resonating violently with the agony sensed before her.

Anger, like a cold flame, temporarily overpowered the body's agony. She carefully lowered herself, using the shadows of boulders and dead trees as cover, and like a wounded raccoon dog, soundlessly approached those Rot-Claw Shrubs. Every step was extraordinarily cautious, avoiding the vines and moss on the ground that clearly carried the corrupting aura.

When she had closed enough distance, she saw a hair-raising scene.

At the roots of the largest, most violently pulsing Rot-Claw Shrubs, the ground had been forcibly dug open, forming deep pits. The pit walls were coated in viscous dark-purple fungal mats, and at the bottom of each pit was a "cage" woven from thick, writhing dark-purple rootlets. In every cage, an elf was imprisoned!

These elves were a far cry from their former grace. Their bodies were withered, skin a sickly grey-green, covered in fine dark-purple lines like parasitic vines. Their pointed ears drooped weakly, and what had once been lively eyes now held only hollow agony and numbness. Their limbs were tightly bound and pierced by writhing rootlets, which—like IV tubes—continuously drew life force and residual natural energy from their bodies, channeling it up to the Rot-Claw Shrubs above. Some elves' bodies had even begun to lignify, fusing with the cage's rootlets.

【Pain… Mother… Moon Goddess…】

【Kill me… please…】

【That… pale humanoid… demon…】

The shards of agonizing intent stabbed into Xiang Lingna's consciousness like needle-points. She saw tools scattered beside the cages—twisted metal pliers, syringes with dark-purple residual fluid, and several dark-purple crystals inscribed with complex runes. This was a live experimentation site! The Doctor was using the elves for some kind of research into corruption and life energy conversion!

Just then, the chaotic energy within Xiang Lingna shuddered violently! Not a throbbing, but a fierce rejection and wariness! A cold, viscous pressure, carrying an absolute surveillance will, spread like an invisible tide from the depths of the shrub thicket ahead.

Xiang Lingna instantly held her breath, pressing her body flat against the cold boulder behind her, even her thoughts seeming to freeze. She sensed that, at the core of the largest Rot-Claw Shrubs, within a "tumor-like mass" coiled from countless pulsing rootlets, a vertical eye composed of pure dark-purple energy, pupil-less, was slowly opening!

Rot-Claw Root-Tumor Guardian! The Doctor's eye left here to monitor the experimental node and its "nutrients"!

The vertical eye slowly rotated, coldly scanning the entire experimental area, lingering for a moment on the several elf cages as if confirming the stability of the "nutrients." When that gaze swept past the boulder where Xiang Lingna hid, she felt her soul about to freeze, her heart nearly stopping. She desperately suppressed the restless chaotic energy and the aura of the jade fragment within, entrusting her entire spirit to the faint stardust halo of the identity tag, hoping it could shield her existence.

Fortunately, the vertical eye's scan did not seem to detect the dying "little bug" behind that boulder. After several seconds, the vertical eye slowly closed, and that terrifying pressure weakened accordingly.

Xiang Lingna collapsed on the ground, drenched in cold sweat, gasping for breath, her lungs burning painfully. Fear coiled around her like cold vines. Force her way in to save them? Against the Rot-Claw Root-Tumor Guardian and other corrupted creatures that might exist, she had no chance. Leave? The elves' despairing, agonized intent lingered in her mind, impossible to shake off.

The identity tag's glow flickered faintly once more, pointing even more insistently toward the depths of the Rot-Claw Shrub thicket, as if urging her forward. And that wisp of chaotic energy within, after the vertical eye's pressure vanished, became active again, transmitting a vague sense of being drawn toward a deeper power.

Xiang Lingna looked at the elves silently enduring agony in their cages, then toward the mist-shrouded, peril-filled depths. A bold, desperate thought took root in her heart: penetrating the core area of the Rot-Claw Root-Tumor might yield a way to destroy this node—or at least temporarily paralyze the guardian? Or perhaps there lay a more powerful Wang Ting fragment that could grant her strength?

She tightened her grip on the identity tag, her charred left hand sending tearing-like pain from the effort. A flash of resolve crossed her eyes. She skirted this horrifying experimental area, using the twisted shadows of the Rot-Claw Shrubs and jagged strange rocks as cover, and like a shadow melting into darkness, continued to infiltrate toward the deeper corruption core jointly indicated by stardust and chaos. Each step felt like walking on the edge of an abyss.