Chapter 986: The Price Of Evolution (1)

Li Xiaofei took out the book and opened it. After reading it carefully for a while, he felt somewhat disappointed. It turned out to be a divine scripture resembling a religious text.

The contents were a mixture of theology and history, offering little research value and written in an obscure, difficult-to-understand manner. Li Xiaofei lost interest after reading it for a short while.

He rummaged through the crab-headed mage’s pouch again. Finally, he found another book. This one was a journal-like booklet. Its contents were exactly the kind of information Li Xiaofei was interested in.

"Alena’s evolution encountered problems. The fire elemental power within her began to spiral out of control. The Grand Elder went to save her..."

"The flame beasts in the Sea of Divinity have been acting abnormally lately."

"One of the Nine High Priests went mad and began proclaiming to the outside world that we have strayed onto a false path of evolution and angered the gods..."

"Yesterday, more than thirty deaths occurred in the city due to uncontrolled elemental forces."

"The favor of the God of Evolution is slipping away from us."

"The Grand Elder traveled to the deepest part of the Divine Lake, seeking the Soul of Elements in an attempt to mend the flaws in our evolution."

"The Grand Elder went to pay respects to the Ancestor of Wisdom."

"The Grand Elder is dead. He died on the return journey due to elemental overload..."

"The Ancestor Court has ruled that our evolutionary path is a failure."

"We have failed."

"I have become the seven hundred and twenty-sixth Grand Elder of the Near Elemental Clan, but everything already seems beyond salvation..."

"The backlash has arrived. Oblivion has found us..."

"We must flee. We must escape from here."

"I have decided to lead our people to the Ancestor Court. The all-knowing Ancestor of Wisdom will surely be able to resolve all our troubles..."

"It has arrived. Oblivion has come. There is no more time."

"Even if I die, I must send my people away..."

"We have failed."

"Under the chieftain’s lead, we retreated into the Elemental Prison."

"There are too many. The number of Oblivion entities is overwhelming. We simply cannot hold them off..."

"Many of our people have died..."

"Our evolution has failed."

"The Elemental Gate has been opened. Is there still time?"

"Can we still escape from the Evolution Temple?"

By the time he reached the final page, Li Xiaofei had already grasped the general idea of what had happened.

This location had once belonged to a branch of the Wisdom Faction known as the Near Elemental Clan. They had built temples and cities, and had long pursued evolution by harnessing the energy between heaven and earth.

Unlike the current Reaper faction, this ancient King-ranked lineage had not relied on conquest and slaughter to evolve, but rather through a form of cultivation. Unfortunately, their path of evolution had ultimately ended in failure. If Li Xiaofei had understood correctly, the consequence of their failed evolution was annihilation at the hands of an enemy known as Oblivion.

Thus, when Oblivion appeared, the Near Elemental Clan had faced extinction. They had made many efforts and tried various remedies, but in the end, it had all been in vain. The one who had recorded this history was most likely the six-armed, crab-headed mage.

In the end, they had made their last stand within this Elemental Prison, using the Elemental Gate in an attempt to escape from this place... Whether they had succeeded or failed remained unknown. Perhaps a small number of their people had managed to flee.

But for a top-tier King-ranked clan, the losses were so severe that it was no different from complete annihilation. Evolution. This was the word mentioned most often in the journal.

The Reapers’ obsession with evolution seemed to be innate. Yet the price of failed evolution described here felt rather strange. What exactly was Oblivion? Was it those strange, revivable monsters? Among all the entries in this journal, the final sentence caught Li Xiaofei’s attention.

Can we still escape from the Evolution Temple?

He spoke of escaping from the Evolution Temple?

Li Xiaofei stared at that sentence and began to ponder. He closed his eyes tightly as his mind raced at full speed. After more than ten minutes, Li Xiaofei suddenly opened his eyes.

"I understand now." His gaze had grown clear. He had finally figured something out.

The Evolution Temple was not a temple, nor was it a hall. It was this entire space. It was this black wasteland. The Evolution Temple he had been searching for all along had been right before his eyes.

"Senior Lin Beichen could not have been wrong."

"He said he would send me into the Evolution Temple."

"That means, once I reached the end of that cave passage, I had already entered the Evolution Temple."

"I am already within the Evolution Temple. Those monsters that suddenly appeared, then vanished into the earth after death, were actually the driving force of evolution."

"The Evolution Temple spawned monsters to apply external pressure, thus accelerating biological evolution. That is why I was able to rapidly increase my combat strength in such a short time, with my cultivation realm rising again and again—because... I am evolving!"

"The evolution of the human race is different from that of the Reapers. Is human evolution faster and easier? If a Reaper fails in its evolution, the result is total extinction."

Li Xiaofei, having figured it all out, felt as if the fog in his mind had finally cleared. But soon after, his sword-like brows furrowed slightly again. Since the Evolution Temple was not actually a temple, but this vast wasteland, then how was he supposed to search for Si Kongxue and his daughter?

A desolate expanse filled with endless monsters. Finding two people here would be like searching for a needle in a haystack. Li Xiaofei felt a headache coming on. After a brief moment of contemplation, a plan formed in his heart.

"No matter what, I must search for them. Even if I have to traverse thousands of mountains and rivers, even if I must tread every ancient road among the stars, I will find them.

"For the sake of the greater good, the Reaper Ancestor Court made a great show of sending Si Kongxue and my daughter into the Evolution Temple, which surely meant there was a hidden scheme behind it. It must be stopped."

"And for personal reasons, they are my wife and daughter. Even if it costs me my entire life’s effort, I will find them."

Li Xiaofei made up his mind. He searched the body of the crab-headed giant mage but he found no other clues. However, the weapons gripped in its six hands appeared to be of excellent quality. After a moment’s thought, Li Xiaofei removed them and stored them away.

Afterward, he searched the nine rat-headed mages beneath the Red Wax Altar. He was in luck as he actually found several maps.

"These still look usable," said Li Xiaofei as let out a breath of relief.

According to the markings on the maps, there were several other Reaper evolution outposts in the surrounding area. Although many years had passed and it was unclear whether any Reapers still survived within those evolution outposts, it was still worth investigating.

If he could locate a functioning Reaper outpost, he might be able to extract some information, and perhaps even clues regarding Si Kongxue and his daughter. Li Xiaofei breathed another sigh of relief. He then conducted a thorough search of the underground prison. Unfortunately, he found no additional clues.

Moreover, his repeated actions seemed to have triggered more lightning. As expected, all the surrounding corpses suddenly 'came back to life', accompanied by countless fine lightning bolts descending from above.

They surged toward Li Xiaofei and the undead bone dragon in a frenzied tide. Another slaughter unfolded. It took half a day, but Li Xiaofei eventually managed to kill all the resurrected monsters, including the crab-headed mage.

Combat continuously enhanced Li Xiaofei’s strength. As for the undead bone dragon, Ao Ying, he was pleased to collect several dozen satisfactory bones, which he embedded into his body. His tiny, chick-like wings finally grew a little more.

Then, man and bone dragon left the underground prison behind. Li Xiaofei wandered the black wasteland of the Evolution Temple like a ghost for the next month. He quickly lost track of how many monsters he had slain.

He only knew that his swordplay, blade arts, and spear techniques had advanced wildly, and his combat power had soared. The Heart of Guardianship had also undergone a tremendous upgrade in quality. It had become more refined and its compatibility with Li Xiaofei had grown immensely.

The undead bone dragon finally obtained a large, flashy pair of wings as he had hoped. However, they did not seem to suit his body. He was unable to change their size according to his will.

Still, he stubbornly kept the wings. After all, he had gone to great lengths to collect the bones. They were his... precious bones, and even if it brought tears to his eyes, he still jammed them into his body.

On the thirty-sixth day. Li Xiaofei found one of the evolution outposts marked on the rat-headed mage’s map. It was a palace complex atop a hill. Its scale was slightly smaller than that of the previous island palace group, but it was still remarkably magnificent.

At its peak, this place had housed at least several thousand inhabitants. Unfortunately, it too had fallen into ruin and destruction. The tragedy that had once struck the Near Elemental Clan on the island palace complex had repeated itself here among the Mountain Reaper Clan without the slightest deviation.

They had been attacked by evolutionary monsters. They had resisted desperately, fought bitterly, and tried to flee... But in the end, their entire clan had been wiped out.

Li Xiaofei found the burial ground of the Mountain Clan within the mountain’s core beneath the palace complex, where countless Mountain Reaper warriors had been laid to rest. Their desiccated corpses, still intact, had been 'resurrected' by some mysterious power of lightning. Then, Li Xiaofei slew them all.

As with the previous site, the deity statue worshipped by this ancient Mountain Clan had also been utterly shattered, reduced to fragments scattered across the ground.