Chapter 166: New Group Feature

As activity points rapidly accumulated, the chat group unsurprisingly popped up a message.

“Phase goal detected as completed. Opening new group feature…”

Group members all wore expressions of anticipation, speculating about the next feature to be unlocked.

But strangely, even after the task panel updated to the next stage, they received no new prompt.

“What’s going on?”

Group members exchanged puzzled glances.

Only Lin Yu’s expression was strange, his eyes fixed on the message visible only to him.

“Group feature [Invite New Members] unlocked. Welcome all administrators to try it out!”

So the newly unlocked feature was exclusive to administrators?

As Lin Yu pondered this, other members noticed his expression and turned their gazes toward him.

“Big brother, what’s happening?”

“...”

Lin Yu looked up and said softly, “I received a prompt. This time, the unlocked feature is the invitation function—only members at administrator level or higher can use it.”

“Invitation function?”

Group members all looked astonished, exclaiming, “So we won’t have to wait for the chat group to recruit people anymore—we can invite them ourselves?”

Lin Yu paused thoughtfully. “I haven’t studied it yet, but that seems to be the case.”

With that, he activated his intent and tapped the plus sign beside the member list.

Instantly, the familiar interface appeared in his mind.

【New Member Progress: 29/30】

【Eligible Candidates: 2】

【View Candidate List】

Lin Yu opened the candidate list again—but this time, no new names appeared. Instead, a new option emerged: 【Search for New Members】!

So it’s here!

Lin Yu’s eyes lit up. After a moment’s thought, he told the group about the candidate list.

Upon hearing this, the members reacted differently, their expressions varied.

Lin Lie mused, “So before I joined, big brother, you already knew?”

Lin Yu nodded. “Correct.”

He Jingfeng frowned. “From your tone, this feature was updated before I joined. Now it’s been upgraded again in less than two months—doesn’t this progress seem too fast?”

“...”

Lin Yu glanced at the task panel in the group files and nodded. “It does seem too fast.”

At this moment, his phase task panel read:

【Activity: 7100 (40384/80000)】

【Contribution: 76753 (97421/40000)】

Although Lin Yu’s personal contribution was listed as 76,753, the remaining 20,000+ points were largely influenced—directly or indirectly—by him.

A rough calculation showed that over 90% of the nearly 100,000 contribution points were tied to Lin Yu.

Excluding his influence, the members’ contribution values would fall between 5,000 and 10,000—just enough to complete the first phase task.

At this thought, the members exchanged glances.

Xiang Yunye speculated, “If big brother hadn’t joined, we’d probably be stuck in the second phase for a long time. New members each month would likely come from worlds like Qinyu Nian or One Punch Man—not something like Lin Lie’s Marvel universe.”

Su Haoming whispered, “So does that mean a lot of unlucky people missed out on joining?”

Fan Xian sighed. “Fate and timing—miss the opportunity, and it’s up to their own destiny.”

Lin Yu murmured, “In any case, let me study this first.”

The members nodded and hastily ended this underwhelming gathering.

Afterwards, Lin Yu returned to his inner universe with the three members who arrived via the portal. He Jingfeng and Lin Lie stayed at Fan’s residence, deciding to remain in the Qinyu Nian world for three full days—after all, they’d come, so why waste Fan Xian’s invitation and points?

…

…

Back in his inner universe, Lin Yu prepared himself and clicked 【Search for New Members】.

Instantly, the candidate list began spinning, displaying 【Searching…】.

Simultaneously, a mysterious force, imperceptible to ordinary beings, radiated outward from Lin Yu’s inner universe, spreading into the infinite void in all directions.

Sensing this immensely lofty power, Lin Yu’s mind stirred. He immediately directed his core consciousness to follow its trail.

The spacetime rules of the infinite void differed from the material world—here, distance and direction held no meaning; every spacetime was constantly in chaos and flux.

In the past, Lin Yu had dragged his inner universe through the void, enduring endless torment from the labyrinth of spacetime.

He had long sought a way to break free from the void labyrinth, yet found no clue whatsoever.

Only after entering the members’ worlds did he reverse cause and effect—using world coordinates to backtrack and pinpoint locations.

But the chat group clearly worked differently. The mysterious force radiating from his inner universe moved through the void labyrinth in a wildly erratic pattern.

Imagine a person taking half a step forward, then suddenly turning right and stepping three paces, then turning left, returning to the start, then stepping backward…

Multiply that irregular motion by 360 degrees in every direction, then by a hundred millionfold—that was roughly Lin Yu’s experience now!

Honestly, even someone as powerful as Lin Yu had no idea how this worked.

He could only grit his teeth and follow the trail, not knowing how long it took, until finally, in the dark void, he spotted a glimmer of silver.

“... Did we actually find it?!”

Lin Yu widened his eyes, his face lighting up with shock and excitement—emotions he hadn’t felt in a long time.

Yet even so, he didn’t act rashly. He suppressed his excitement and patiently trailed behind the force.

As a former powerful wanderer of the void, Lin Yu knew well: here, a step could be a thousand miles, and a thousand miles could be a step.

If he rushed toward a new world the moment he saw it, the only outcome would be chasing a mountain that never drew nearer.

Soon, Lin Yu followed the mysterious force in a circuit, and after drifting far from the silver orb, he suddenly blinked into its presence.

“Found it!”

Lin Yu’s eyes brightened. No longer hesitating, he surged ahead of the chat group’s search force and entered the world.

Instantly, the entire world trembled. A primordial force, emanating from the world itself, erupted in a brutal, mindless resistance against his intrusion.

Sensing this, Lin Yu winced.

This world lacked a goddess like the one in Furiiren—it had no sentient entity to restrain its resistance. It didn’t care what damage its defiance caused, nor would it yield to Lin Yu.

Damn it—compared to goddess-level beings, children are far more stubborn!

After repeated failed attempts, Lin Yu reluctantly halted his invasion.

He was merely a fragment of consciousness now, without the support of his core universe—he couldn’t possibly oppose a world’s entire force.

Fortunately, he was no longer the same man. Even without his core universe’s status, he possessed vast knowledge from countless worlds.

Especially the dimensional magic and occult knowledge from the Marvel universe—perfect for handling such situations.

After brief thought, Lin Yu devised several methods to bypass the world’s resistance.

But most carried the drawback of Marvel magic: the law of “gain requires sacrifice.”

In other words, they came with side effects—he couldn’t preserve his full power like with the Breakthrough Talisman or Invitation Letter.

But there was no choice. He wouldn’t let this opportunity slip away. He had to try.

With careful probing, Lin Yu soon seeped into the world. Using secret techniques to sense and perceive, he located the being with the highest fate weight in this world—

The world’s destined protagonist.

The protagonist’s fate weight was immense; everything connected to him was profoundly influenced by it.

Based on this principle, Lin Yu could hide within the protagonist’s overwhelming influence, smuggling himself in to avoid expulsion by the world’s force.

Of course, this method only worked on worlds whose consciousness had not formed a personality.

If the world’s consciousness had taken concrete form—or if gods or creators existed within it—this method would fail, and might even make him easier to detect.

From the earlier resistance, Lin Yu had confirmed: this world had no sentient consciousness.

He could safely smuggle himself in, hiding beneath the shadow of the destined protagonist’s fate…

Instantly, a mist-shrouded deep forest appeared before Lin Yu.

Moonlight pierced the canopy, casting eerie glimmers on the sticky spiderwebs.

Beneath the canopy, several human corpses hung from branches, strung by silk. The air reeked of blood and decay—this was no serene forest, but a hell of corpses and slaughter.

“Clang!”

At that moment, the clash of swords rang out from within the forest.

A red-haired boy, clad in a dark green plaid coat, carrying a wooden box bound with iron hoops, and wielding a black Nichirin blade, burst from the trees, barely fending off attacks from behind.

His striking attire immediately revealed his identity to Lin Yu.

“Tanjiro Kamado?”

Lin Yu mused, “So this is the Demon Slayer world…”

A manga world where demons existed. The protagonist was Tanjiro Kamado, a charcoal seller.

He once lived a simple, happy life until one day his family was slaughtered by demons—his mother and four younger siblings all killed. Only his younger sister, Nezuko, survived—but she had turned into a ravenous demon.

Yet for some reason, Nezuko hadn’t lost all reason. She recognized him as her brother.

This gave the despairing Tanjiro new hope.

To avenge his family and restore Nezuko to humanity, Tanjiro, under the recommendation of the current Water Hashira, Giyu Tomioka, became the disciple of Shinobu Kagaya. Through grueling sword training and life-or-death trials, he finally joined the Demon Slayer Corps, becoming a demon hunter—and embarked on his own journey.

As for the dense forest Lin Yu now saw, it must be the Spider Mountain arc from the second half of Season One!

(End of Chapter)