Fang Yuan withdrew his hand from the altar, the emerald glow reflecting in his cold, calculating eyes. He didn't strike the Village Head. Killing him now would trigger an alarm he wasn't ready for. Instead, he allowed his dark Qi to recede, slipping back into the mask of the wounded traveler.
"I was merely checking if the seal could withstand the next wave of rot, Elder," Fang Yuan said, his voice as smooth as silk. The old man hesitated, his wooden staff trembling, but the sheer pressure of Fang Yuan's Rank 5 World Breaker presence—even suppressed—made his survival instinct override his suspicion.
Fang Yuan walked out of the altar room, not toward his hut, but toward the outskirts of the village. He needed to see the "Wither-Rot" with his own eyes.
[System, initiate Long-Range Environmental Analysis. Map the decay gradient of this world.]
As he walked, the System projected a holographic overlay across his vision. The village was an oasis, but a fragile one. Beyond the Emerald Falls, the trees weren't just dying; they were being re-coded. The black fungus of the rot was pulsing in a rhythmic pattern, mimicking a heartbeat.
"It's not a plague," Fang Yuan whispered, touching a leaf that crumbled into black soot. "It's a harvest. The Azure Sect isn't just killing this world; they are fermenting it."
The System confirmed his theory:
ANALYSIS COMPLETE:
PHENOMENON: Bio-Molecular Assimilation.
SOURCE: Higher-Realm Satellites.
PURPOSE: Converting the planet's biological mass into "Void-Grade Fertilizer."
REMAINING TIME: 4 months until "The Final Liquidation."
Fang Yuan looked at the villagers—the children playing with gray, ashen dolls, the elders coughing up the history of their clan. They weren't people to him; they were walking batteries of bio-energy, waiting to be collected by the Cloud Sovereigns.
"If I take the Life-Seed now," Fang Yuan thought, "I heal my core but destroy the farm. But if I wait... if I let the rot reach its peak, I can devour the 'Fertilizer' and the 'Seed' together."
He noticed something strange in the village square. A massive stone pillar, covered in vines, that didn't match the herbalist architecture. It was made of Neutronium-Iron, a material only found in Rank 4 worlds or higher.
"A beacon," he realized. "The Azure Sect isn't just watching. They have a representative here."