As the Parasitic Demonic Qi sped toward us, I grabbed the golden branch tightly and shouted.

  “Elfina, focus only on merging the blessing seed with your life force, and no matter what you hear, don’t get distracted!”

  “Karl, what are you...” she raised her voice as she tried to open her eyes.

  But I cut her off, my voice firm. “This is a gamble with the world on the line. More than just us are at risk here. Focus! NO MATTER WHAT.”

  Her lips quivered as she bit down hard enough to draw blood. With a pained expression, she shut her eyes again and concentrated on her duty.

  I looked up at the encroaching Demonic Qi, its tendrils writhing hungrily.

  “World Tree, please assist her.”

  The branch I held trembled faintly in response, as though acknowledging my words.

  With one hand, I snatched the Recording Crystal from the ground, while my other hand activated [Plundering Qi].

  Crimson waves of Qi crashed toward us like a relentless tide, but they were halted by a single, swirling navy-blue vortex in my palm.

  As the Qi poured into me, power surged through my veins, invigorating every fiber of my being. My muscles, my bones, and even my Qi Core screamed in euphoric delight.

  But that euphoria was nothing more than a cruel illusion. A delusion spun by the sweet poison I was consuming.

  Using Qi in this way was like doping — effective, but devastating. Too much would lead to collapse. The sword I’d used to kill the scholar was proof. One powerful attack, and it had crumbled into dust.

  Now, as the vast amount of Qi flooded my body, it granted me more strength than this body had ever experienced.

  But it was killing me.

  My muscles began to tear apart, rupturing under the strain. My bones cracked and imploded one by one, and my Qi Core fractured, spiderweb fissures spreading through its surface. Like the sword, my body was becoming a vessel unable to contain the rampaging Qi, each moment drawing me closer to destruction.

  *Ding

  [Full body restoration activated]

  It was only thanks to this cheat that I was still alive. Yet, to me, it was nothing but endless torture as my body burst.

  *Ding

  [Full body restoration activated]

  Then got restored.

  Then burst.

  *Ding

  [Full body restoration activated]

  Then got restored.

  Burst.

  And restored.

  Burst and restored. Burst and restored. Burst and restored. Again and again in an endless torturous circle.

  *Ding

  [You have plundered a vast amount of Qi. Level up: Level 16 –> 18]

  [Plundering Qi Level up: Level 5 –> 6]

  Yet, that was just half of the problem.

  I endured the soul-shattering pain, the unbearable sensation of my body breaking down piece by piece. I endured the euphoric rush of power that assaulted my brain, tempting me with its false promises of strength.

  But Demonic Qi wasn’t just energy — it was something far more sinister. Created by pouring selfish desires and negative emotions into Qi through the practice of Demonic Arts, it twisted what should have been a pure, positive force into a ravenous, destructive tool with a single purpose.

  To devour everything.

  The more Demonic Qi I consumed, the more my mind became flooded with thoughts I had buried long ago. Bitterness, rage, and despair clawed their way to the surface of their grave, dragging me back to memories I chose to throw away.

  I was forced to relive the first time I arrived in another world.

  When I woke up, I was lying next to a campfire in the middle of a forest. Nearby, I saw three figures — a human, a Cat Beastkin, and an Orc. At first glance, they looked like a typical fantasy adventurer’s party, dressed in linen clothes and leather armor.

  For a brief, naive moment, I thought I was safe.

  Without knowing anything, I tried to speak to the human who was lying closest to me, but the moment I turned to him, I froze in horror.

  His face had been eaten.

  Instinctively, I scrambled backward, only to knock into the Cat Beastkin. She toppled over, and her half-eaten guts spilled out onto the ground in front of me.

  I vomited, but all that came out was bile, the acrid taste burning my throat.

  The sound I made caught the attention of the Orc. Slowly, he turned toward me. Like the others, he was dressed as an adventurer, a bronze tag dangling from his neck. But his eyes were pitch black, like bottomless pits. Blood dripped from his mouth, and in his hand, he held the sagging, ruined remains of a human face.

  Then, with an unnatural snap, his neck twisted ninety degrees, a grotesque motion straight out of a horror movie.

  As his neck split open, something worm-like began to emerge. It wriggled free, its slimy, black body growing larger and larger until it reached the size of a bull. Yet the part still connected to the Orc’s neck remained as thin as a needle, an eerie tether between the two.

  Then, out of nowhere, countless red eyes appeared across the creature’s grotesque form. Each eye was bizarrely symmetrical, with three irises staring out from their centers.

  And all of them were locked onto me.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  I wanted to run, to flee as far as I could, but fear shackled my legs to the ground, locking them in place. I couldn’t move a single step. Distress pounded in my chest, each beat hammering like it was trying to rip my heart out.

  Part of me wished it would, for that would have been better than what happened next.

  The black thing crept closer, its grotesque form twisting and expanding. Jagged teeth sprouted from the irises of its countless red eyes, each set of fangs gnashing hungrily.

  Before my mind could even process the impossibility of what I was seeing, my body took over. I turned and ran. But it was futile.

  I barely managed to take one step before something clamped onto my leg.

  A hot, searing pain, sharper and more intense than anything I’d ever felt, shot up through my body. My scream tore out of my throat as I stumbled and fell.

  Desperately, I twisted around, hoping to see what had grabbed me. And maybe, just maybe, kick it away.

  But what I saw froze the air in my lungs.

  The black thing was gnawing on my severed foot like a dog playing with its favorite chew toy.

  My mind went blank as the sickening sounds of flesh tearing and bones crunching filled my ears. Each noise drilled into my skull, more unbearable than the last.

  “No, no, noooooooooo!” I screamed, my voice hoarse with terror. Turning away, I crawled with everything I had, dragging myself across the ground.

  “Please!” I cried, tears streaming down my face. “Somebody help me! I don’t want to die!”

  But no god, no deity, no merciful force answered my desperate prayer.

  A sharp tug on my legs brought me back to the nightmare. The black thing had grabbed hold of me again, its teeth sinking deep.

  And then it chewed.

  Screaming did nothing to stop it. It devoured me slowly, agonizingly, piece by piece. The pain was beyond anything words could describe. It consumed my legs, working its way upward, while I writhed helplessly, begging for it to stop.

  That was the first of many times I was eaten alive.

  I thought death would bring an end to the torment. But I was wrong.

  My soul, untethered and weightless, hovered above the body I had inhabited moments before. The lifeless body of a Dwarf — ‘my’ body.

  As a wandering soul, I was forced to watch. I watched that black thing continue to devour 'me', its grotesque form twitching and writhing with satisfaction.

  I watched as the same nightmare unfolded across the world. The black things spread like a plague, devouring everything in their path. They ate, then multiplied in an endless, unbroken cycle of destruction.

  Until nothing remained.

  Everything — every creature, every plant, every structure — was consumed. The entire world became those black things.

  And even then, they didn’t stop.

  Once everything had turned into those black things, they began devouring each other. But eating each other didn’t let them multiply. Their numbers dwindled, their forms withering, collapsing one by one until the last one starved to death.

  In the end, nothing remained of that world except crumbled dust and half-eaten corpses, scattered like the remnants of a cruel joke.

  And when that world finally died, I was pulled back to the white room.

  I jolted awake, the suddenness of it sending the chair I had been sitting on crashing to the ground. My chest heaved as I hyperventilated, struggling to breathe.

  Sweat drenched my back, cold and clammy against my skin. My head spun. My limbs trembled uncontrollably. I had to grab the edge of the table next to me just to keep myself from collapsing.

  “Look at you. Pathetic.”

  The voice came from directly in front of me. I lifted my head to see another ‘me’ standing there.

  This version of myself was made of swirling blue fog, with a crimson core embedded in its chest, radiating a pulsating light.

  “Don’t you hate it?” it sneered, its voice dripping with contempt. “Don’t you want it to stop?”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but before I could utter a word, that damned black door opened again.

  And once more, it sent me hurtling toward another world.

  The second. Then the third. Then the fourth. Then the fifth.

  Each time, I lived. Each time, I died.

  And every time I died, I became a wandering ghost, doomed to watch a world die after me. Over and over. Endlessly.

  It wasn’t until the ninth world that I learned how to survive for more than a single day. By the twelfth world, The System gave me [Full Body Restoration.]

  From the sixteenth world onward, the starting situation when I first woke up began to improve. But it wasn’t until the thirty-first world that I woke up to a situation where there was no immediate danger.

  Between the sixteenth and the thirty-first worlds, I helped save two worlds. The others? I watched them die, helpless to stop their collapse.

  I hated it.

  I hated how powerless I was.

  I hated this damned white room for stealing my life and throwing me into endless suffering.

  But more than anything, I hated how the innocent suffered for no reason. No matter what world I found myself in.

  “Take my hand,” the fog version of me said, his voice smooth, lacing with honey and poison. He extended his hand toward me, his crimson core pulsing with a tempting light.

  “We can destroy it all and save the innocent.”

  I almost laughed at the irony.

  The powerless were always the easiest to corrupt. They were offered a delusion of power. Power that was never theirs to begin with. A sick joke, really.

  When I thought of that, I actually laughed, loud and mocking.

  “You think this is the first time I’ve encountered something that tries to corrupt the mind?”

  The illusion wavered, as though my words struck its core. Cracks spread across the white walls of the room, webbing outward like shattered glass.

  The 'fog-me’s form trembled, its once-confident hand faltering as I stood taller. I wasn’t that powerless man anymore.

  "If I want something, I will take it myself."

  [Four Directional Protectors Arts – Smashing technique – Head of the Black Turtle]

  I stomped hard, the impact reverberating through the space, shattering both the ground and the sky. Chunks of the white void splintered and fell around me like shards of broken glass, cascading in chaotic, glittering fragments.

  The ‘me’ made from fog flickered, its form wavering like a dying candle in the wind.

  “Get the fuck out of my head.”

  With another stomp, I brought my heel down with finality. The force shattered everything — every fragment, every illusion — obliterating it all into nothingness.

  *Ding

  [Plundering Qi Level up: Level 6 –> 7]

  [You can now resist mental corruption from the Demonic Qi you plunder]

  “How unpleasant,” I muttered, shaking my head as my body continued its relentless cycle of breaking down and restoring itself.

  My right hand continued to devour the Parasitic Demonic Qi to prevent it from corrupting the golden sphere. Meanwhile, my left hand clutched the Recording Crystal.

  As the ritual progressed, the golden light emanating from the sphere began to flicker, its brilliance waning as though it were running out of energy. At the same time, Elfina’s complexion grew paler, her life force visibly draining with each passing second.

  I kept [Plundering Qi] active, drawing in the volatile energy to keep the corruption at bay, while my mind once again dived into the Rune Space for answers.

  Scanning the motes and bridges connecting the seed to the Runes, I quickly concluded that tampering with the formation at such a critical juncture would only destabilize the process further. The risk of failure was far too great.

  But I wasn’t out of options. I had prepared for this.

  The idea had come to me earlier, sparked by a memory of Sera’s singing. I remembered how her voice had helped soothe and reduce the symptoms of a sick child in our village. Her Harmony seemed especially attuned to healing and empowerment.

  Clutching the Recording Crystal, I poured Qi into it, activating the stored recording of Sera’s singing.

  Her voice filled the space, bright and velvety as always, carrying the same ethereal quality that had worked wonders before.

  The melody reverberated through the air, blending with the flickering light of the golden sphere, its harmony reaching toward Elfina as though it were a lifeline.

  *Ding

  [Harmony has been enhanced]

  Both Elfina’s and Sera’s voices intertwined, creating a heavenly resonance that filled the space.

  The melody seemed to breathe life into the flickering light of the sphere, strengthening it. The golden glow grew brighter, and I noticed a change in Elfina. Her pale complexion gave way to warmth, her cheeks rosy once more.

  At the crescendo of the Frost Elf’s song, the sphere blazed with radiance, growing brighter and brighter until the light became blinding. I instinctively shielded my eyes, unable to see what was happening.

  When the brilliance finally subsided, I opened my eyes to find the sphere had vanished. Only Elfina remained, standing next to me. The golden branch I had been holding crumbled into dust, and the Demonic Qi that had threatened us was now retreating, sucked back into the dome above.

  I grabbed Elfina’s shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “Ina, Ina. Wake up. We need to get out of here.”

  Her eyes fluttered open, foggy and unfocused. She looked at me and whispered. “Did we succeed?”

  “You tell me.” I pointed at her palm, where something was now shining.

  Confused, she brought her hand up for a better look. The moment she saw it, the shock jolted her fully awake.

  “W-wh-aaaat is happening?!” she shrieked, flailing wildly as a golden sapling’s projection grew from her palm. She swung her arms around as if sheer force would detach the ethereal sapling from her hand.

  Unable to suppress a grin, I reached out… and pinched her cheek.

  She yipped in surprise, then glared at me, rubbing her reddened cheek. “What was that for?”

  “To bring you back to reality,” I said with a smirk. “So, Ina, how does it feel to be the host of a World Tree?”