Wang Fugui was sitting in one of the trucks and looking anxiously at the stronghold in front of him. He saw the stronghold was really covered in countless vines just like the rumors had said. Furthermore, anyone that tried to approach it would immediately get attacked by the creeper vines’ feelers.
The Wang Consortium’s troops that had arrived together with Wang Fugui were discussing how to solve the problem before them. But they did not really have any good ideas.
In the end, someone said, “Since there’s unlikely to be any survivors left inside the stronghold, why don’t we just burn the stronghold down? No matter how powerful this creeper vine might be, it should still be afraid of fire.”
This time, it was all thanks to Wang Fugui that the Wang Consortium troops arrived ahead of time.
Before this, the troops had assembled and made a spontaneous decision to set off. However, some of their military vehicles were still outside and unable to return. As such, Wang Fugui volunteered his trucks to transport the soldiers after the goods were unloaded at the military base. This way, the Wang Consortium troops would not have to keep waiting around.
Hence, the officer of Stronghold 62’s garrison troops who were the first to arrive at Stronghold 61 was very grateful to Wang Fugui. He even started addressing Wang Fugui as “bro,” praising him repeatedly for being so understanding and calling him a good man.
Wang Fugui could only laugh wryly. It was not that he was understanding, but that he had a family member who was probably inside Stronghold 61 right now. Therefore, he also hoped the troops could get here as soon as possible so they might be able to save his family.
When Wang Fugui heard the commanding officer of the Wang Consortium troops say they should burn down Stronghold 61, he immediately turned anxious. “Sir, my family’s still inside. Y’all must not set fire to the place.”
The officer, Wang Linlan, said with a wry smile, “Bro, even if your kin is really inside, they couldn’t possibly have survived. I’ve just received new orders from our higher-ups. The satellite photo shows the entire stronghold has already been covered in vines. No one will have survived this disaster.”
“That can’t be!” Wang Fugui could feel his ears ringing. Then he shouted, “He’s different! He definitely survived! He managed to survive even in such difficult situations, so he’s definitely…” Wang Fugui wanted to rush into the stronghold. However, Jiang Wu suddenly pulled him back.
Wang Fugui turned around and asked blankly, “Ms. Jiang, you think that Xiaosu died too?”
“No,” Jiang Wu shook her head. “You stay here. I’ll go and look for him.”
While they were arguing, someone shouted, “Look! Why are the creeper vines at the stronghold gate starting to wither?”
Everyone turned their gaze to the stronghold gate and was surprised to see that it was really the case. The originally lush green creeper vines had really started withering!
“What’s happening?”
“Did someone on the inside manage to kill it?”
Wang Linlan frowned as he watched all this. No one could tell what was exactly going on in there. They were unable to verify if something had happened to the creeper vine itself or if someone inside the stronghold had killed it.
However, he suspected that no one in the world could possibly kill such a terrifying lifeform.
…
One would experience many springs, summers, falls, and winters throughout their lives. All living things blossomed in spring, grew lush in summer, yellowed in fall, and frosted over with snow in winter.
But at this moment, the dense and sinister-looking green vines in Stronghold 61 were withering rapidly and turning into brown twigs.
It was as though time had sped up, going from spring to winter in the blink of an eye. It was like someone had wiped off this oil painting with their hand as the colors started fading away bit by bit.
Ren Xiaosu was shocked when he saw what was happening around him.
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As the area covered by the vines was humongous, this huge change was taking place throughout the vast stronghold. This made people feel like it was more the power of nature that was causing it.
This creeper vine was growing normally at the beginning. So it was until the battle that broke out between the Pyro Company and the Anjing House inside the stronghold that resulted in superhuman blood getting spilled onto its branches.
Afterwards, it began consuming the rats that scuttled in the sewers. After that, it started eating domesticated cats and dogs before finally devouring humans.
At first, it would only stealthily catch and eat people. Perhaps it was also worried about being discovered by humans. Although it was a low intelligence lifeform, that did not mean it had no wisdom. Actually, this creeper vine’s behavior was more like that of a child. Since there was no one to teach it how to live in this world, it developed in its own selfish way.
Were humans born good or evil? Ren Xiaosu felt that these two definitions were not in line with his thinking. He felt that humans were born selfish, and there was no right or wrong about this.
And even later, when people from the stronghold realized there was something fishy about the creeper vine, they had tried to use flamethrowers to end its life. Naturally, the creeper vine was unwilling to get destroyed by humans just like that. Moreover, it was clearly much stronger than them. So it decided to bury the entire stronghold in its rage.
But none of that was important. What mattered more was that it had absorbed the life force of several hundred thousand people that lived in the stronghold. There were even supernatural beings among those killed!
Actually, it would take an extremely large amount of energy for the creeper vine to cover the entire stronghold. The reason it was able to grow so large so quickly was that the several hundred thousand lives in the stronghold had provided it with enough nutrients to do so.
It could be said that it had sacrificed an entire stronghold to complete its own growth.
But now, all the energy gained from that sacrifice was converging on Zhou Yingxue!
After the vines withered and broke off, Ren Xiaosu watched Zhou Yingxue stand quietly on top of the creeper vine’s roots with her eyes closed.
Her hand was placed over the creeper vine’s main branch next to her. After she controlled its roots, the creeper vine was at Zhou Yingxue’s mercy.
Countless green energy particles were drawn out through the vines and flowed into Zhou Yingxue’s body through her fingers.
Ren Xiaosu wondered if Zhou Yingxue was drawing out all the energy from the creeper vine and causing it to die?
But what kind of a supernatural being would she become considering this power came at the cost of a stronghold?
Zhou Yingxue was probably the first person to experience something like this in human history.
Although his maid used to play a very good supporting role, she really lacked combat power. But what would happen after this?
That maidservant who especially enjoyed munching on melon seeds and did not have much of an image to speak of in front of Ren Xiaosu had now seemingly become a goddess in the stronghold who could control the fate of everyone in it.
A moment later, when all of the vines finally withered away, Zhou Yingxue fell unconscious.
Ren Xiaosu went to check on Zhou Yingxue and discovered her breathing and pulse were still normal. Perhaps she had absorbed so much energy she couldn’t handle it.
Ren Xiaosu did not have any prior experience of such things, so he did not know what to do in this situation either.
Then Zhou Yingxue’s body suddenly turned hot and cold while her expression kept changing. Ren Xiaosu hesitated for a moment before finally picking her up from the ground.
But in that instant, Ren Xiaosu noticed that everything around him had been enveloped by a golden glow. He snapped his head around and saw Luo Lan get off the ground while manifesting a golden glow around him.
Ren Xiaosu was stunned. “You’ve awakened?”