"She should be fine. Aunt is a Soul Sage and has her Martial Soul Avatar. Even if she can't win, she can escape."
Shui Bing'er shook her head. Though she felt a vague sense of dread, she attributed it to the constant negative energy.
Just then, from a distant valley, a terrifying burst of cold erupted—a blue ice arrow shot across the sky, leaving a deep scar of ice.
The chilling cold made even Shui Bing'er, with her Ice Phoenix spirit, shudder.
"Bing'er, run! Don't look back, there is—!"
A powerful soul force surged, Shui Ming'er's voice echoing from afar.
But in the next instant, her voice was abruptly cut off. At the same time, her soul power vanished—as if snuffed out.
Sensing Shui Ming'er's soul power and life force disappear, Shui Bing'er's pupils contracted in disbelief.
"Aunt!" The disappearance of soul force and life—everyone knew what that meant.
All the Skywater Team members looked shocked. Shui Yue'er wailed in grief, tears streaming down her face.
"Go!" Despite her sorrow, Shui Bing'er held onto her reason.
She grabbed Shui Yue'er, spread her ice wings, and fled at full speed.
The sudden loss left everyone red-eyed with grief, but they didn't lose their heads. Obeying Shui Ming'er's final words, they escaped immediately.
Boom!
Not long after they left, a flaming object streaked down from the sky.
With a roar and explosion, a shockwave blasted a huge crater in the earth.
Scorching flames swept out, melting the ground into boiling magma—a scene of heat and destruction.
Within the smoke and heat, a tall figure shrouded in black gas could be vaguely seen.
Deep in the valley, thick black mist condensed into a pitch-black throne.
Seated on the throne was a white-haired youth, his hand propping up his chin, eyes closed. Pale cheeks were marked with black cracks, giving him a demonic and sinister air—like a demon king from the abyss.
Nearby, a lifelike ice statue stood silently.
Inside the ice, Shui Ming'er's face was frozen in shock and terror, a gaping hole in her chest where her lifeforce had been drained.
Not far away, a pink-haired girl, also shrouded in black mist and marked with black cracks, expressionlessly lowered her bow. As she closed her eyes, the chilling air gradually faded, leaving only deathly silence.
Deeper in the black mist, several blurry figures flickered in the darkness.
At the same time, all kinds of negative energies—murderous intent, resentment, death energy, evil aura, yin energy, demonic energy—rushed from the earth, converging here like a tidal wave.
"How interesting!"
On a mountain peak not far away, Lu Jingming quietly watched the black throne—and the figure that looked exactly like himself—his eyes full of curiosity.
Then, his gaze shifted to the pink-haired girl who had just shot down Shui Ming'er—his expression grew odd.
"So this is what they call 'ten times stronger when darkened'? Even March 7th herself couldn't beat this, right?"
Lu Jingming was sure that if March 7th faced this negative-energy doppelganger, she'd be utterly crushed.
After all, the negative-energy constructs were intimately connected to him; he knew how overwhelmingly strong they were.
"You're right. Planting the World Tree on this planet, letting its branches merge with the earth veins, manifesting all the negative energy accumulated over countless years, then having the soul masters purify it into positive energy—this can indeed accelerate the planet's evolution."
The Greater Lord Rukkhadevata's figure appeared, also watching the black-misted valley with a sigh.
From the planet's perspective, Lu Jingming's actions were highly beneficial.
By drawing out and purifying the planet's long-accumulated negative energy, and transforming it into life force, the planet's growth would be accelerated.
However, for the beings and civilizations living here, this was far from friendly.
After all, this negative energy was produced by the intelligent life of the planet.
Oppressed commoners, hunted soul beasts—all harbored deep resentment, both in life and death.
These negative energies always existed; most people simply couldn't perceive or use them.
Lu Jingming, however, planted the World Tree, turning its branches into veins to draw this energy to the surface.
He did this purely to condense a divine position, with ambitions far beyond even a first-level god.
Take Poseidon, for example—he spent a thousand years gathering faith from the sea to become a first-level god. The Angel God did the same with faith from the continent.
Lu Jingming, however, dismissed first-level divinity—his minimum goal was God King.
So he set his sights on the planet itself.
Herta's research revealed that the God Realm was essentially a gathering of sentient thought, intangible and in another dimension. Faith is a form of sentient thought.
Thus, god positions formed from faith could only reside in the God Realm, since it is compatible with faith.
Because the God Realm is a formless world of thought, it was swept into a black hole by a spatial storm, while the solid planet remained unaffected.
On either version of Douluo Continent, collecting faith was slow and difficult.
Even unifying both continents wouldn't let Lu Jingming condense a God King position quickly—it would take over a century.
He had no patience for such a long wait. Third-level godhood could be achieved faster, but that was far beneath his ambitions.
Finally, with research from Herta and Möbius, he found a shortcut.
Since the planet itself has an awareness, it can provide sentient thought and faith.
While Douluo Star's will is only instinctual, it can still select chosen ones, proving it is a special form of life.
Like the Dragon-Horse Twin Stars' Long Tianyang, which developed intellect and will.
Douluo Star's will was not as powerful, and lacked self-awareness, so it couldn't actively worship a god and provide massive faith.
So Lu Jingming devised a mutually beneficial method.
He helps the planet evolve, and its will instinctively feels gratitude, feeding him sentient thought and luck.
He could then use this to condense his divine position.
In just a few months, through the World Tree manifested by the Stigmata, he had successfully planted it on the planet—this was the root cause of the continent's recent upheavals.
Using the soul masters to clear the planet's negative energy, thereby pushing its evolution, Lu Jingming only needed to wait patiently for the harvest.
It was estimated that once enough negative energy was cleared and converted, Douluo Star would directly evolve, becoming a semi-divine realm. The continent's power ceiling would rise beyond Title Douluo.
By then, the power fed back would be enough to help Lu Jingming condense a God King-level life and wisdom divinity.
He chose this parallel Douluo Star to execute his plan because the gods of this world's God Realm weren't so nosy—none watched a single Douluo Continent closely.
The God Realm governed a vast star system, with many high-level planes like Douluo.
Nobody would bother monitoring Douluo Star all the time.
Even the Former God of Asura and the Sea God who left inheritances only left a trace of divine sense, which only activated for inheritance matters, not for anything else.
So Lu Jingming could act boldly here, stirring up trouble as he pleased.
But in his original Douluo Continent, that wouldn't work—because an idle God King Tang San was always watching!