Dismissing the quest’s message, Zamian shifted his focus to the corner of his vision.

  Amidst the waves of essence surrounding him and his dimmed perception, a fuzzy, small white dot still lingered.

  Groaning, he muttered under his tired breath, "Not giving me anything and still sending me quests. Which side are you even on?" Clicking his tongue, he continued. "Doesn't matter. Show me how blighted I am right now.”

  A wall of white text blinked into his vision, that appeared to him despite his current condition.

  PERSONAL INFORMATION

  Name: Zamian Greenfield

  Level: 4 [26%]

  Tier: Mortal

  Main Pathway: Knowledge

  Title: Insightful

  STATS POINTS

  Body: 2634/24000

  Mind: 9200/26000

  Soul: 3200/24000

  Chuckling as he dismissed the text, Zamian turned back to the wooden wall, his Luminous Senses technique still active, and threw a punch.

  The wall trembled, cracks forming where his fist had struck.

  Frowning at the minor damage, Zamian placed both hands on the surface and shook his head.

  Then, kicking off the ground, he retraced the path from his chase with Fern and soon found what he was looking for.

  A section of the root cave bore clear signs of destruction. Of course, he couldn’t see them.

  Tapping the wall, he listened carefully through his mental sound spheres, focusing on the flow of essence around him. It almost looked as if he was searching for something.

  Moments later, a piece of the wall crumbled, dark brown soil mixed with vegetation and splintered wood spilling out.

  Zamian nodded.

  Taking a step back, he funneled more essence into his fist and struck again.

  The root cave trembled once more as a hole, roughly the size of his head, burst open in the wall. Splinters of wood and dirt scattered everywhere.

  Without waiting for the dust to settle, Zamian kept punching.

  Again.

  And again.

  Following his instincts, his pace quickened, his movements subtly adjusting with each strike, refining his technique as he corrected minor flaws on the fly.

  ‘Maybe I was wrong, and my true field of study is digging,’ he jested inwardly, doing his utmost to stay focused on the task at hand.

  He was, of course, in a hurry to leave this place. But there was another reason he focused so much on it.

  The pain was unbearable.

  The left side of his lower back was swollen and purple, his insides practically a red soup, while the rest of his body, except for his face, was riddled with slashes and puncture wounds.

  Not to mention the burnt mark still seared into his shoulder, with small specks of green liquid essence leaking from his wounds as he slowly purged them with the help of Light’s essence.

  At least he had finally recovered from the effects of Fern’s leaves. His instincts no longer gave him a splitting headache, and his control over his essence had returned.

  The fact that his vision still hadn't come back, however, was concerning.

  Checking his body through his Nameless Physique, allowing him to observe himself inside and out, Zamian noticed his essence was fighting to expel a green liquid from his head.

  Dismissing the idea of jabbing his skull with a finger to accelerate the process, he refocused on his main task.

  Digging.

  Bit by bit, the hole expanded in size as he forced his torso inside, his movements not only punching through the dirt beyond the wooden wall but digging through it.

  And he was digging upward.

  Given his strength and control over his body, the fact that it took him nearly ten seconds just to fully enter the soil and pick up speed was proof of how difficult this task would be for an ordinary cultivator.

  Luckily, Zamian was anything but ordinary.

  Like a beast that had spent its life tunneling through the earth, he quickly adapted to the movements, his instincts treating the action with complete seriousness.

  ‘Not needing to breathe is just as weird now as it was before,’ he thought, his eyes glowing faintly with white light. ‘But where should I go?’

  His lack of vision didn’t affect his sense of direction.

  It was just that Zamian would have been lost even if he could see the dirt in front of him.

  Splitting his attention between digging and his remaining senses, he first tried to find a better path using his mental sound spheres.

  But his hearing failed him.

  There was nothing but the muffled sounds of his own movements and the occasional squishing of shifting roots in the direction he had come from.

  Zamian had no idea how far from the surface he truly was.

  Deciding to rely on the waves of essence instead, he watched the white currents flowing from his body, stronger, more concentrated spikes surging through his hands.

  After all, he was reinforcing them.

  Expanding his perception outward, beyond his own body, he saw nothing.

  Or at least, he saw nothing at first glance.

  “Hm?” Still digging, Zamian frowned. “Am I going crazy?” he muttered.

  He didn’t stop. In fact, his pace quickened as he tried to recall how it felt using his Luminous Technique enhanced by the Insightful title back in the White Tower.

  Then, he remembered using it in the cave roots while fighting those Chosen.

  His mind raced, and Zamian blanched as he compared what he had seen back then to what he was perceiving now.

  His digging accelerated.

  “Tone down your speculations,” he muttered under his ragged breath. “In the White Tower, Light’s essence was everywhere, so of course, I only saw white waves.”

  He shook his head, spitting out soil that had slipped into his mouth while he spoke.

  Nonetheless, he kept going.

  “Finding that cocoon open was a pleasant surprise, sure,” he licked his dry lips, “but fighting two Chosen wasn’t exactly the welcome party I was hoping for. It was hard to perceive things correctly!”

  Gritting his teeth, Zamian abruptly shifted his digging direction, veering left but still moving upward, increasing his distance from the root he had come from.

  “I saw everything mostly in white light, with other essences adding color and contrast,” he spoke aloud, his voice sharper. “I still had my vision. I saw the brown roots, the wooden walls of the bark caves, and the green essence from the Chosen, shining brightly.”

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  From his rushed tone, his trembling gaze, and the faint tremor in his body, Zamian’s words sounded less like an explanation and more like an attempt to reassure himself of something.

  Maybe this was why he was speaking out loud with himself.

  “Even after losing my sight, I could still see essence. Fern’s green essence, my own white one. Yes… yes… I even saw when Fern died, when his essence dissipated!” He shouted, not caring as dirt slipped into his mouth.

  “There shouldn’t be any other source of Nature’s essence near me.” He gritted his teeth, his glowing white hands illuminating his shocked expression. “I should be seeing mostly white! So why, after leaving that blighted root, does everything seem bathed in a green hue?”

  Zamian’s six remaining hearts pounded wildly.

  The green veil around him was faint, subtle, almost imperceptible at first.

  But now that he noticed it, there was no denying it.

  It stretched tens of thousands of steps in every direction, a weak, unmoving green hue covering everything.

  He had theories.

  Two of them, he hated so much that he actively forced himself not to think about them.

  So, he did what he thought was best.

  He kept digging, aiming to get as far away from the God’s Roots as possible.

  A God he suspected was just a cultivator.

  An Immortal labeled Level 8 by the system.

  A cultivator of the Nature Pathway, whose body would naturally emit green waves of essence.

  Zamian’s digging pace increased as he pushed more Light’s essence into his body, forcing himself to move faster.

  As a Chosen, Zamian couldn't lose his perception of time. Even as a Zealot, he had already grasped the concept of minutes.

  Now, he felt the passing of each second.

  That only made the fact that he had been digging for hours even more concerning and mind-blowing.

  His vision was slowly recovering, still blurred but no longer completely dark. Most of the green essence liquid in his body had been purged, yet his body remained riddled with wounds.

  His full control allowed him to close most of them, to stabilize himself, but it was only a temporary measure. He needed to cultivate, to rest, to find a way to truly heal.

  But he couldn’t focus on that now.

  Even with his mind being the strongest part of him, at least, according to the stats shown by the White Dot, it was on the verge of breaking.

  Because no matter how much he dug, no matter how far he moved, he kept seeing the green veil.

  It stretched infinitely, swallowing his perception.

  He wished it was a hallucination, a phantom vision, an aftereffect of his battle.

  But he knew the truth.

  'It’s coming from him. But he can’t be so powerful, right?' he thought, digging.

  Alone in this suffocating, mind-numbing task, he could do nothing but dig.

  Dig, think, and argue with himself.

  ‘Maybe it’s just a technique?’

  ‘Oh, maybe he is the tree. Just some big guy, yeah.’

  ‘This amount of essence… How can the White Dot give me hope that I can destroy this fake god?’

  ‘Kurt said that vermin Sultan wasn’t feeling Verdant God’s presence anymore. Is that man senile? Is he blighting blind?’

  At some point, he had given up talking aloud. His mouth couldn't keep up with the speed of his thoughts.

  ‘What does it matter if he’s strong or not? He has to die. If he doesn’t, my life, my father’s life, Bohlo’s, Tulip’s… all of it will always be in the palm of his hand.’

  His eyes were glassy, unfocused.

  It wasn’t the first time he had resolved to kill the Verdant God.

  It wouldn’t be the last.

  But as the green veil remained, never fading, as his hearing picked up nothing but the shifting earth and the steady rhythm of his own blood flow, the debate in his head became a circle.

  A loop with no escape.

  No matter how far he dug.

  No matter how long.

  It always led him back to the same place.

  The same thought.

  ‘It’s coming from him. But he can’t be this powerful, right?’

  He kept digging.

  A full day passed.

  Then, after what felt like an eternity, something changed.

  The green veil, the ever-present indicator of Nature’s essence saturating his perception, began to fade, even if just slightly.

  It was subtle, like stepping past an invisible barrier.

  Before he could even process it, the hue returned, washing over his senses once more.

  Then, it faded again.

  “...”

  Zamian didn’t stop digging.

  His eyes, now fully healed, blinked as he took in the patch of soil in front of him, the glow of his white-essence-coated hands illuminating the dirt.

  He didn’t speak.

  He didn’t think.

  Seeing the changes on the green veil reminded him of something.

  Of the waves of white essence flowing from his body.

  They, too, flickered, shifting between brightness and shadow, layered within themselves.

  Of course, the change in hues was subtle, barely perceptible on his arms.

  But it looked the same, just on a smaller scale.

  Another day passed, and Zamian paused momentarily.

  The green veil, which had been fading little by little, finally vanished.

  Even with his thoughts clogged, his body broken and battered, his hands raw from endless digging, and his concerns weighing heavier than ever, he couldn’t stop his lips from trembling. His vision blurred, not from exhaustion, but from the tears welling up and falling freely down his face.

  This wasn’t relief.

  These were the tears of someone who understood just how far he still had to go.

  Of someone who felt the pain and fear of losing the people he loved in the process of trying to save them.

  Blinking rapidly, wiping his face with the help of a dirt-covered shoulder, Zamian kept digging.

  Another day passed.

  Then, out of nowhere, a sharp pain pierced his skull.

  He spat blood, groaning as an unbearable headache took hold.

  With gritted teeth, he forced himself to deactivate the Luminous Senses.

  His body was too broken, too exhausted to keep the strain from using such a powerful technique.

  Willing the White Dot to show his stats, Zamian pressed forward, one handful of dirt at a time.

  PERSONAL INFORMATION

  Name: Zamian Greenfield

  Level: 4 [16%]

  Tier: Mortal

  Main Pathway: Knowledge

  Title: Insightful

  STATS

  Body: 510/24000

  Mind: 9000/26000

  Soul: 4000/24000

  REWARDS

  Ancient Astral Seal

  Description: A Star Seal guarding your Astral Self.

  Ancient Identify Technique (Passive)

  Description: See the secrets beyond the limitations of time.

  Nameless Physique

  Description: Breaker of the natural order, bearer of perpetual body, an unshackled lifeform.

  QUEST LOG

  Last Quest: Protect Bohlo until he completes his breakthrough

  Reward: 01 Book from White Tower's First Floor

  Status: Completed

  Side Quest: Find the Oasis

  Reward: Ten-Thousand-Year Ginseng Root

  Status: Ongoing (4 days left)

  Main Quest: Bring destruction to a Level 8 Immortal tainted by Godhood

  Reward: Inheritor’s Cave Entrance

  Status: Ongoing (77 days left)

  ‘It could be worse,’ he thought, dismissing the text.

  This was his first coherent thought in a while.

  Feeling the headache recede, Zamian kept digging.

  If before he could at least hear the sound of his blood flowing, his heart pounding, and his forced, shallow breaths, now all that accompanied him was the shifting earth, parting under his glowing hands.

  ‘Is my birthday close, or has it already passed?’ Another thought struck him, as his instincts urged him to keep going.

  ‘If someone with a normal human body tried to flee like this, they’d be dead.’ A fleeting realization.

  ‘How sad would it be if I’ve just been digging my own grave for days?’

  ‘Maybe the Luminous Senses technique numbed my mind, making it impossible to focus on anything else?’

  ‘I know I’m digging upwards, but now that I can’t see essence, what if I just pop up in the middle of Warlords having a nice meal? Would they offer me some food or bury me back in the ground?’

  Amidst his spiraling thoughts, Zamian felt a shift beneath his hands.

  The damp soil, which had been giving way with deep, muffled crunches, suddenly turned dry. Loose yellow sand spilled onto his head.

  His instincts screamed.

  White light flashed across his body as he flooded himself with Light’s essence, reinforcing his limbs.

  Not only was he desperate to get out, but something told him digging through sand would be far worse than digging through soil.

  That’s why he pushed through with more force, sending essence to his feet, mimicking the explosive bursts he had seen Fern use to propel himself.

  The problem was, he had underestimated the sheer power behind it.

  With an ear-splitting crack, he launched out of the sand dune, his body shooting upward. Only his inhuman control allowed him to adjust in time, shifting his movements and redirecting his essence before he lost himself to the sky.

  Tumbling back down, he rolled across the cold sand before finally skidding to a stop.

  Flat on his back, breathless, covered in dirt, blood, and sweat, Zamian stared upward.

  He blinked the sand and dirt away from his eyes, and for the first time in his life, he saw the true sky.

  It was darker than he had hoped, yet brighter than he had imagined.

  A vast black canvas, endless and deep, speckled with glowing multicolored dots, shifting slightly as if they were alive.

  Zamian laughed.

  He had seen images, read descriptions in books, and understood that these moving specks of light were stars, their movements far slower than what it should be.

  But right now, he didn’t care to analyze any of that.

  He was out of the Sanctuary.

  He was above ground.

  He was alive!

  Even smeared with blood, his bones cracked, his hearts ruptured, and his body having endured days without sight, he was still alive.

  Shakily, he pushed himself upright, sand spilling from his shoulder-length black hair as he swept more from his face.

  Then, he turned.

  His breath caught.

  The largest tree he had ever seen towered before him, so impossibly vast that it defied reason. Its glowing white leaves stretched toward the heavens, blotting out the stars above them.

  Its colossal roots spread outward, devouring the desert landscape, rising even taller than the Colossal Trees.

  And yet, all of this... was expected.

  Kurt had told him about it.

  Seeing it in person sent chills down his spine, its sheer grandeur overwhelming.

  But it was still expected.

  Zamian had even prepared himself to see a green line hovering above the tree, labeling it as Verdant God’s body, marking it as a Level 8 Cultivator of the Creation Pathway.

  He had braced himself for that.

  What he hadn’t expected, what made his breath hitch, his pupils shrink, his body stumble back until he collapsed onto the sand, were the three burning orange stars glowing beside the enormous tree, four times bigger than the others he was seeing.

  Even the God’s Tree, with all its luminous majesty, could not overpower the blazing intensity of those stars.

  It also couldn’t hide the orange lines hovering above them.

  Lines that Zamian had only ever seen above cultivators.

  His remaining hearts pounded as the lines shifted, just like they did when he looked at a cultivator from far away, zooming in, sharpening, bringing the text into focus.

  Zamian read the orange texts.

  [LEVEL 9 - STAR TIER - EVERCHANGING PATHWAY]

  [LEVEL 9 - STAR TIER - EVERCHANGING PATHWAY]

  [LEVEL 9 - STAR TIER - EVERCHANGING PATHWAY]