Chapter 337

Another great battle has come to an end.

The sinister wind howled across the desolate battlefield, emitting mournful wails.

Bright crimson moonlight pierced the thin black mist, draping the lifeless battlefield in a veil of blood-red gauze.

On the platform of the Xie Yan Gao Ta, the laughter of Di Nian Xie Ling continued.

It slowly raised its right arm, watching the crimson moonlight entwined around its battle armor—not the sickly dark red of the waning moon, but the enchanting red unique to the waxing moon, writhing like a living thing across its surface.

"I've finally waited for this."

Its five fingers clenched sharply, crushing a strand of moonlight.

Countless fragments of memory flashed through Di Nian Xie Ling's mind.

The mockery, oppression, and humiliation from the player clans... undeniably a torturous era.

Had it not later established the Xie Ling Alliance and gained external resource support, it clearly could not have crossed this threshold.

The struggles of the waning moon phase were like a merciless winter.

But now, the air carried a power it was nearly unfamiliar with.

Spreading its arms, Di Nian Xie Ling felt the thick black tide particles, its heart like a thawing river—finally, the spring flood had arrived.

It drew a deep breath, letting black tide particles flood its chest cavity, every inch of muscle resonating and trembling under the energy's wash.

The long-suppressed humiliation now spread across its tongue like sweet poison.

It had finally tasted the reward of its waiting.

Every night of hiding during the waning moon phase, every humiliation and fury endured from being mocked for its defensive tactics, was now doubly compensated by the radiance of the waxing moon.

It suddenly realized that pain could ferment.

The nausea it had forcibly swallowed had, through time's cellar, matured into the richest joy.

Beneath its dark crimson eyes, its mouth silently curled upward.

Like a predator's instinctive delight the moment its prey steps into the trap.

The years bound by the waning moon seemed like a dry, peeling old skin.

He felt reborn.

"Big Boss Di Nian, congratulations. The environment you're in now has the strongest moon phase—next, the plundering wars should center on your node."

"Hah! Finally, hardship ends and fortune begins. The player clans are no longer a threat—it's time to surge forward and begin expansion..."

The voices of Gui Ya and other allied Xie Ling echoed in its mind.

Di Nian Xie Ling nodded with a smile.

After forming the alliance, their expansion strategy prioritized efficiency.

Among these, the moon phase was the most critical indicator—the stronger the moon phase, the greater the boost to the black tide.

Choosing environments with high moon phases to launch plundering operations maximized the efficiency of black tide energy usage.

It also allowed the generation of stronger Xie Sui troops with the same energy cost.

Crimson moonlight poured down like a waterfall; the base of the Xie Yan Gao Ta began to tremble, extending black fangs toward the sky.

The black tide swirling around the tower boiled and surged.

Suddenly, four colossal black beams tore through the heavens, descending via the Xie Xie Yue as a relay, intertwining atop the tower's platform into four imposing Xie Ling projections, standing suspended on either side of Di Nian Xie Ling.

Bing Xue Wen, Gui Ya, Tie Ji, Fu Xin—the four war gods of the player clans' infamous Alliance arrived in unison.

"Big Boss Di Nian, fortune has turned—congratulations again," came Gui Ya's hoarse voice.

"The waxing moon hangs high; the black tide shall rise," Fu Xin nodded with a smile.

"Big Boss Di Nian, your territory must expand," Bing Xue Wen lightly tapped a finger; a crimson fissure sprouted beneath its feet, stretching toward the Xie Xie Yue, activating resource transmission mode.

"From now on, we'll aid your expansion," Tie Ji declared, his voice short and thunderous, like a war hammer striking.

Then all four Xie Ling projections raised their hands simultaneously; behind them, projections of the Xie Yan Gao Ta connected to their bodies, releasing beams that linked to the Xie Xie Yue above.

Black tide energy surged like a raging river of the netherworld, relayed through the Xie Xie Yue, transforming into four black torrents that roared into Di Nian Xie Ling's Gao Ta.

Boom!

The Gao Ta shuddered violently, every rune on its body blazing with blinding crimson light.

The black tide's energy level surged rapidly, its surging power radiating outward in concentric waves of black tide ripples.

Di Nian Xie Ling did not reply; in an instant, its thought turned, and the endless black tide surrounding the Gao Ta surged westward like a runaway beast.

The black tide surged, staining the long night in ink.

Wherever it passed, the earth decayed, the sky darkened.

The earth cried out first.

The once-fertile land, revitalized during the waning moon phase, now retreated like a receding tide, rapidly losing its color.

The fertile black soil faded to pale white; its soft surface hardened instantly, then cracked into countless spiderweb-like fissures.

Thick black mist seeped from the cracks, like the rotting blood flowing from a severed vein in the earth.

Towering trees along the path trembled violently; where the black tide touched their bark, the surface withered and curled at visible speed, swallowed whole in an instant. The remaining dead leaves carbonized midair, falling like black snowflakes, dissolving into the black tide.

As its advance accelerated, the black tide soon crossed the former Giantization Domain node.

Soon after, it encountered a mountain blocking its path.

Di Nian Xie Ling upheld the black tide's principle of never detouring, directing the tide to engulf the mountain.

The hard rock face softened like wax upon contact, melting like butter beneath a hot knife, visibly dissolving.

The mountain ridge collapsed first.

Rocks weathered by millions of years crumbled like sandcastles in water, their surfaces peeling rapidly into murky sludge.

Black mist flooded into the mountain's fissures, spreading cracks like a spiderweb.

Midway up the slope, a massive overhanging cliff suddenly slid away as one.

But before it hit the ground, it had already disintegrated in midair into countless fragments of stone, then turned into a cloud of pitch-black dust.

The waterfall in the mountain ravine surged back into the spring source; the water froze the instant it touched the black tide, as if an invisible, greedy giant mouth were devouring the mountain spring.

The originally sharp peak tops were gnawed by an invisible giant mouth, vaporized into black mist, and merged into the surging black tide.

The collapse of the entire mountain was neither a thunderous crash nor a slow subsidence; it was like tossing a sugar cube into boiling water.

Only this process was accelerated a thousandfold; within mere minutes, this once-majestic mountain range was reduced to a vast pit billowing black smoke.

The black tide, controlled by the Earth-Will Evil Spirit, did not halt; it continued advancing toward a farther direction.

When the black tide flooded over the city-states established by the Descending Clan, death began to have a temperature.

The sturdy city walls crumbled like brittle biscuits; the defenders, still holding terrified postures, merged into the black tide the next second.

The divine statues within the city, worshipped day and night, revealed their pitiful essence.

They were merely silent stones, unable to save their believers.

The "God-King Statue" crafted from crystal was the first to vanish in the black tide.

Then came the collapse of the guardian statues.

This colossal statue, polished smooth and shiny by countless believers' touches, even fell in the direction of the fleeing believers when its base cracked.

The benevolence on its face, during the black tide's devouring, briefly twisted into a hideous grimace due to the damage.

The black tide soon reached the War God Statue.

This imposing statue, its entire body pierced with various sacrificial weapons, still offered not a shred of resistance and was swiftly devoured completely.

The priests kneeling before the statues to pray also could not escape death.

The black tide mercilessly flooded over the altar, devouring both the statues and the believers.

No miracles, no redemption; only the physical process of the stones that cast the statues returning to their most primal energy.

The Earth-Will Evil Spirit watched all this indifferently; not a ripple arose in its heart, nor did it care how profound the history of this race had once been.

Nor did it care how much effort they had expended to reach the Monster World.

The black tide under its control would devour everything equally.

It cared nothing for the acts of faith, courage, and sacrifice unfolding within the city-states.

As for their cries and wails, they were no different from the sobbing produced by wind blowing through ruins.

It was like watching a boring performance; neither excited nor repulsed, only indifferent.

Everything else paled compared to the feedback information of black tide energy gains pulsing in its mind.

Just as humans feel no guilt for crushing a fallen leaf.

When the black tide completely covered this city-state, the Earth-Will Evil Spirit's gaze had already turned toward the far distance.

It would not remember what civilization once existed here, nor would it care how many living beings had lived here.

To it, this was merely a scenery along the black tide's advance path, forgotten in the blink of an eye.

The only thing truly capable of making it remember was that bunch of beasts back home.

But now, the Di Zhong Mountain Range was its stage.

If those beast players dare come, they must die.

If those beast insect races dare come, they must also die.

The current Di Zhong Mountain Range is governed by rules set by it.

"Earth-Will, the players have arrived."

Just as the Earth-Will Evil Spirit felt triumphant, the voice of the Evil Eye suddenly rang in its mind.

Its body instinctively shivered.

"I lied; they haven't come. I just wanted to test whether your inner feelings toward players have changed during the waxing moon phase... The facts prove your stress response has not disappeared."

"You damn @#$%&."

At that moment, the Earth-Will Evil Spirit, currently controlling the black tide's advance, felt an impulse to turn around and punch the Evil Eye until it exploded.

This broken eye was utterly reversing the natural order.

The black tide continued surging westward; wherever it passed, all things returned to void.

This gluttonous feast encountered an obstacle two days later.

This was a desolate plain; in the Earth-Will Evil Spirit's perception, a forest of steles stretching to the horizon appeared.

Gray-white stone steles stood like Lin Li, each displaying a rough texture eroded by time.

Some steles leaned, others were already broken, yet all stubbornly took root in the cracked soil.

The stele surfaces were carved with unfamiliar characters; within the carvings settled stains of different colors.

No wind blew across the plain, yet faint sobbing echoed between the stele forest.

As the perception swept over, a blurred silhouette was curled inside each tombstone, each with a different form.

The deeper one went, the more bizarre the stele forms became.

Some steles were entwined with rusted iron chains, their links hung with broken teeth.

Some tombstones were covered with scratch marks from fingernails; the deepest one had nearly split the stele in half.

Others had strange Ji Pin piled upon their bases.

The perception viewpoint swept rapidly, arriving at the very center of the stele forest.

Here stood seven massive Shi Zhu, each pillar densely carved with characters.

A hunched figure sat cross-legged at the center of the stele forest, holding a bone lantern in the left hand; inside, faces of living beings from various races flickered.

"Rule aura?!"

The Earth-Will Evil Spirit's gaze focused on the lantern held by the old figure, asking in confusion.

"Correct, it is a rule. Based on the environment and the information radiating from the tombstones, this is a rule power possessing the trait of devouring other civilizations. It seems a certain special method was used to bury that civilization, achieving a rule logic; that civilization will appear in the stele forest in the form of tombstones, transforming into a trait capable of providing it with power."

After speaking, the Evil Eye activated an even more refined analysis.

Invisible waves of perception spread out from the Black Tide as the starting point, sweeping over the entire forest of steles like ripples.

Instantly, dense energy veins appeared on the surface of all the steles; every tombstone was an energy node.

Those stains settled in the carvings were actually the dregs of civilization condensed from rules.

Dark red was the killing intent tempered by war, dark green was the decay of natural extinction, and deep brown was the madness nurtured within destruction.

The structure inside the stele bodies was fully materialized in the mind of the Earth-Will Evil Spirit.

Layer upon layer of memory lattices compressed the civilization information of different eras like a thousand-layer cake.

The entire stele forest was like a massive formation, with the seven giant pillars at the center as the formation eyes, and spiderweb-like energy conduits extending from the bottom, converging into a huge consciousness aggregate three hundred meters underground.

But this was not a living creature; it was more like a grotesque fusion of the dying wills of countless civilizations.

And this special creature was connected to the Rule Lantern held in the hand of the withered figure.

The scene revealed by the analysis made the Earth-Will Evil Spirit think of the Beast Player Clan.

They also possessed similar abilities.

By contacting Meng Yuan Chu monsters, they could acquire the power characteristics of Meng Yuan Chu monsters.

The one before his eyes, however, was one that contained destroyed civilizations to acquire the power those civilizations once possessed.

But this faction was clearly not comparable to the Beast Player Clan.

Since many pieces of information were interfered with by rules, the Evil Eye could only roughly judge the characteristics of this faction.

Its combat method should be to use the tombstones as rule nodes, awakening the refined power of civilizations once destroyed to fight.

This mode was invincible in other worlds; as the rules swallowed more and more embers of civilizations, it could summon the forces of the departed civilizations to fight with a mere wave of its hand through the tombstones.

But in the Monster World, the importance of mechanisms and potential far exceeded the number of troops fighting.

No matter how many cannon fodder it contained, they were still just cannon fodder.

In the eyes of the Earth-Will Evil Spirit, this faction was simply natural nourishment for the Black Tide.

Unable to investigate the combat strength of this faction in detail, it decided to directly engage in a tentative contact.

In an instant, evil spirits rapidly formed within the black mist and fell upon the stele forest like raindrops.

Boom!

When the tentacles of the Black Tide touched the edge of the stele forest, the entire plain suddenly trembled violently.

The hunched, withered figure sitting cross-legged at the center of the stele forest slowly raised his head, then lifted the lantern in his left hand.

In an instant, the carvings on the surface of all tombstones lit up simultaneously, and the stains turned into viscous liquid and began to flow.

The rule energy dormant within the stele bodies was activated.

Crack!

The first tombstone exploded, and the fragments fused in mid-air into a figure made of bronze and fire; with every step it took through the air, it left burning footprints like lava behind.

Its head was a bronze mirror covered in inscriptions, and the mirror surface reflected the remnant shadow of a civilization long extinct.

Immediately after, the second tombstone exploded; a mechanical giant composed of gears and steam was generated after fusing with the shattered remains of the broken stele body. Thirty-six interlocking brass gears turned within its chest, and countless miniature factory phantoms floated in the steam it exhaled.

The third tombstone, covered in claw marks, cracked immediately after; flying gravel restructured and gradually condensed into a figure in the shape of a priest clad in feathered robes.