Devouring Stars: Master of Evolution

Chapter 212 Opportunity in the Ruins of the Ancient Gods

The ruins of the ancient gods are extremely large, with a diameter of hundreds of billions of kilometers, and a thin, red mist drifts within them. Because of this red mist, they are completely invisible from a distance.

Qin Mu walked on the ground, the earth was bare, with only occasional exposed bones and broken weapons.

brush--

A burly figure appeared beside Qin Mu.

"Iceberg, you should infiltrate the Temple of Immortality first."

Qin Mu gave the order in a calm voice.

"Yes."

Iceberg nodded respectfully, then took out a spaceship from his inner world.

This is a spaceship made by the natives of the Blood Continent, and only geniuses and elites from the Immortal Temple are qualified to use it.

As Qin Mu watched the iceberg disappear into the distance, he began to formulate a plan.

The core of the Blood Continent lies in the Ruins of the Ancient Gods, and the core of the Ruins of the Ancient Gods lies in the Temple of Immortality!

From the memories of many beings who were transformed into world lords by the Zerg, the treasure vault of the Immortal Temple contained countless divine weapons, rare and precious materials, and so on.

The Blood Crystals that Qin Mu desired most were piled up like mountains!

Just think about it, the Blood Continent has tens of millions of worlds, and each world city has tens of millions of lords.

Every lord must fuse with a Blood Crystal to be qualified to assume the role.

The Blood Luo Continent is also filled with strife, with a large number of lords dying every year, and the amount of Blood Luo Crystals required for this is astronomical.

This is only for lords; of course, it's impossible for only lords to fuse with Blood Crystals in each territory.

Moreover, in each world city, there are many ancient families, and many of these families have members who have fused with Blood Crystal.

It can be said that the amount of Blood Crystals consumed by the Blood Continent every year is an astronomical figure!

All the Blood Crystals on the Blood Continent come from the Immortal Temple!

Under such circumstances, how could Qin Mu not be tempted?

If we can find an opportunity to directly intercept a batch of Blood Crystals from the Immortal Temple...

The Blood Crystals required for swarm enhancement and research are equally terrifying; even with a million Blood Crystals collected, it's still a drop in the ocean compared to the massive swarm.

Not only the Blood Crystal, Qin Mu also knew that there were 15 Beast God statues enshrined in the Immortal Temple!

Since no usefulness was found in their research, these statues were merely decorative items in the Temple of Immortality and were not taken seriously at all.

However, Qin Mu knew that Luo Feng would eventually embark on the path of the Beast God, and the Beast God statue played a very important role in this.

Qin Mu wasn't interested in the Path of the Beast God; he was interested in studying divine beasts. However, it was still acceptable to have the Golden Horned Beast in the insect swarm study the Path of the Beast God.

In short, the Temple of Immortality is a vast treasure trove waiting to be explored.

The Zerg swarm has a bug-level creature like the Iceberg Behemoth; it would be a disservice to the Iceberg Behemoth's potential not to explore its potential.

When it's time for me to leave the Blood Luo World, I won't lose out by letting the Iceberg Beast do whatever it wants.

If you're lucky, you might even win big.

One by one, dark figures appeared around Qin Mu. These were none other than Demon Slayers of the seventh rank of Domain Lord level. As soon as they appeared, their bodies emitted faint spatial fluctuations, hiding them in the surroundings.

As the ruler of the swarm, how could Qin Mu allow himself to be alone in an environment like the Ruins of the Ancient Gods?

Not only the Demon Slayers, but also enormous rock giants that sank into the ground as soon as they appeared, wandering through the earth.

Qin Mu had not forgotten that the Ancient God Ruins were a battlefield of gods.

In the memories of many world lords who were transformed by the insectoid race, billions of years ago, the most powerful group of immortal gods on the Blood Continent, all the great beings, joined forces to resist the invasion of extraterrestrial races.

That battle resulted in rivers of blood, turning an area spanning hundreds of billions of kilometers into complete ruins, and even filling these ruins with endless malevolent energy for billions of years!

Whether these legendary memories are real is hard to say, but every fallen god is a treasure!

After that battle...

The Temple of Immortality once went through a period of frantic searching for relics, sweeping through the entire ruins of the ancient gods like a net, collecting a large number of relics and treasures.

Although the Temple of Immortality sent out some immortal gods specifically to collect treasures, the ruins of the ancient gods were simply too vast and the land too deep!

The Blood Continent has a diameter of approximately 9 trillion kilometers, while its depth is nearly 100 billion kilometers. To search through such a deep soil layer...

Even if a group of immortals were to search, there would still be omissions!

The Beast God statue that Luo Feng later obtained was a relic discovered by a lucky Realm Lord.

With units like the Rock Giant, who excel at traversing underground and are adept at sensing earth fluctuations, it's certainly a good opportunity to make the most of their advantages.

Not only the Demon Slayer Clan, but also the Rock Giants and other figures appeared around Qin Mu.

These people all held a long spear, and their shapes were all different. They were the experimental subjects that Qin Mu used when he was researching the fusion of Blood Crystal.

There were over a thousand test subjects, each with the strength of a Domain Lord.

Some of them were hatched using Qin Mu's genes, some were powerful humans from the primordial universe, some were fused with the genes of peak-bloodline star beasts, and some were natives from the Blood Luo World.

"Is this the malevolent energy?"

Qin Mu felt an invisible force constantly tempting his mind, while another strange force was penetrating his skin and entering his body.

This strange force cannot be stopped by either primal energy or telekinesis; it penetrates the body and then exits.

Treating the human body as air, freely moving back and forth.

However, during this process, some changes occur in the human body.

"Something's definitely fishy!"

Qin Mu reached out and sensed the malevolent energy in the void. The so-called malevolent energy in the universe is purely spiritual. A person's ferocity and bloodlust can fill their eyes with malevolent energy, and so on.

The malevolent energy in these ancient god ruins is not only spiritual but can also affect the body.

"This malevolent energy is actually trying to modify my body."

As the overlord of the swarm, Qin Mu has an extremely clear perception of his own cells and genes.

"No wonder the natives of the Blood Luo Continent believe that the invasion of evil energy will make it easier to fuse with the Blood Luo Crystal. This evil energy is actually transforming my body at an extremely slow speed."

This transformation is actually an extremely subtle form of beast-godification!

Qin Mu squinted. Over the past two years, he had conducted countless experiments related to Blood Crystals and was very familiar with this kind of modification.

During the research process, Qin Mu had already discovered that the Blood Luo natives were more suitable for the fusion of Blood Luo Crystals than foreign races.

After further research, Qin Mu discovered that even the soil and rainwater of the entire Blood Luo Continent contained extremely subtle Blood Luo power!

It is precisely for this reason that the natives of the Blood Luo World are so powerful. They are nourished by the power of Blood Luo from birth, and they reach the Earth level upon adulthood, and the Sky level with a little cultivation!

The fall of the Beast God altered the ecological environment of the entire Blood Luo Continent.

"The denser the malevolent energy, the faster the transformation!"

"Scatter! Go find a place where the malevolent energy is even stronger."

Qin Mu gave the order.

brush!

The bodies of thousands of experimental subjects around them transformed into streaks of light and scattered in all directions.

Qin Mu also started walking, quickly traversing through the ruins of the ancient god.

The strength of malevolent energy is easy to determine; simply observe whether the red mist in a particular area is dense or light.

In most areas, there was only a thin fog, while in some areas the red fog was thicker. The search speed for the experimental subjects, which were thousands of meters long, and the equally large number of rock giants was very fast.

Especially since Qin Mu also knew that the strongest baleful energy in the ancient god ruins was found in some giant pits, the process would be even faster.

With a deliberate search, Qin Mu quickly found a giant pit with a diameter of ten thousand miles.

What does a diameter of 10,000 li (approximately 5,000 kilometers) mean?

The Earth's diameter is only 1.2 kilometers!

Standing at the edge of this enormous pit, Qin Mu vaguely felt a strange aura emanating from it—a powerful, ancient, and frenzied aura…

"Such a dense aura of malevolence. Just as the intelligence indicated, the aura of malevolence is strongest in the deep pit."

"This feels so good! The genetic modification has started again. Compared to the modification of Blood Crystal, the change in evil energy is too gentle."

This is an excellent experimental site!

Qin Mu felt as if countless water droplets were nourishing every cell in his body. A dense aura of malevolence flowed through his body, and his body underwent a noticeable change.

The feeling was so obvious that Qin Mu could clearly sense the changes in the deepest part of his body's cells, in the most fundamental genes that make up his body.

A transformation akin to a butterfly emerging from its cocoon.

"kill!!!"

An endless killing intent surged into Qin Mu's soul, and due to the slow transformation of his body, a large amount of killing intent began to lurk deep within Qin Mu's body.

As time goes by, these things will become one with the soul, and those with weak willpower may even go insane.

Even a person with a strong will can become a bloodthirsty person.

"What an astonishing killing intent!"

At the edge of the deep pit, Qin Mu remained motionless, letting the endless carnage continuously fill his mind.

"It's roughly comparable to the devastating impact of fusing with the second Blood Crystal, but it's still not enough!"

One by one, the Demon Slayers beside Qin Mu rushed into the deep pit to check for any potential dangers.

"boom--"

A loud bang suddenly came from the bottom of the pit, and the sound echoed continuously.

Qin Mu frowned, but then relaxed.

There are countless powerful individuals on the Blood Luo Continent, so he was certainly not the only one who came here.

It's not surprising to encounter people in a place as sinister as a giant pit.

"Just a cosmic-level being."

Sensing that the Demon Slayer Clan had instantly subdued his opponent, Qin Mu immediately jumped into the deep pit and began to fall rapidly downwards.

After descending for thousands of kilometers, there is a raised platform on the steep rock face. The platform is not large, only a hundred meters wide, and there is an excavated cave further inside.

On the platform, a member of the Demon Slayer Clan held down a young man with long, blood-red hair, preventing him from moving.

It was obvious that this young man was cultivating in seclusion here, but unfortunately he ran into Qin Mu.

At this moment, the young man with blood-red hair was filled with fear, because in this small cave, there were actually more than ten domain-level experts!

These powerful figures immediately took action and subdued him upon arrival. How could he not be terrified?

"Spare me! I am an elite disciple of the Immortal Temple! I was just cultivating in seclusion here. Please forgive me if I have offended you in any way!"

The red-haired youth saw another person flying down from the sky, and the powerful figures around him were clearly led by him, so he immediately shouted.

"The Immortal Temple?"

Qin Mu raised an eyebrow, not expecting that the first person he encountered would be from the Immortal Temple.

Without a word, a powerful spiritual invasion struck, and the red-haired youth's face turned pale, his eyes becoming dazed.

The next moment, the red-haired youth's eyes turned fanatical, and he knelt on one knee.

"Lu Ao greets Your Majesty!"

Qin Mu directly accessed his memories through the soul network.

"It turns out that he is an elite genius cultivated by the Immortal Temple. He must fuse with three Blood Crystals in order to return to the temple."

"Hmm? There are a thousand geniuses in this batch?"

"There are strange images at the bottom of this pit? Images resembling giant lizards? And these images even contain profound laws!"

After flipping through it briefly, Qin Mu's eyes lit up immediately. This was indeed a treasure trove!

"You should have a way to contact your companions, right?"

Qin Mu asked the young man with long red hair.

"Yes, we can communicate via communicator."

The red-haired youth, Lü Ao, respectfully replied.

"Very good. Contact them. These Demon Slayers will assist you in capturing as many as possible. I'll help you fuse the Blood Crystal!"

A smile appeared on Qin Mu's face. What excellent experimental material!

"yes!"

This was an idea he had before coming to the ruins of the ancient gods.

After the Zerg transformed many World Lords, he actually had a fairly clear understanding of the Immortal Temple.

The Immortal Temple will collect and nurture geniuses throughout the Blood Luo Continent, hoping that some truly powerful individuals will emerge from among them.

This is essentially no different from how the Virtual Universe Company trains them; the only difference is that the Immortal Temple doesn't have the same methods as the Virtual Universe Company, so it can only cast a wide net and try its luck in finding geniuses.

After a period of training, these geniuses often go to the ruins of the ancient gods to use the evil energy there to fuse with the Blood Crystal.

This is exactly the situation facing Lü Ao.

These geniuses are all quite talented; they can not only be used for experiments, but also support Iceberg after returning to the Temple of Immortality.

Once more geniuses return, we might be able to establish a small organization within the Temple of Immortality.

After sending Lü Ao away to hunt down other geniuses of his generation, Qin Mu flew back down to the bottom of the pit.

"According to Lü Ao's memory, there is a huge vortex of evil energy in this deep pit, and the closer you get to the vortex, the thicker the concentration of evil energy!"

I have already fused 50 Blood Crystals. Ordinary evil energy modifications are too weak for me. I'm afraid only the core can help me.

As for the image of the giant lizard, it's likely a remnant from the legendary battle between the Golden and Sky Gods. We'll investigate that further later!

Following Lü Ao's memory, Qin Mu flew onward, and sure enough, the deeper he went, the thicker the concentration became!

He didn't stay close to the edge of the mountain wall, but flew towards the center of the pit, because that was the center of the evil energy vortex!

"It's getting stronger and stronger. This level of malevolent energy is already having a significant impact on my body. I made the right choice coming here."

As they approached the center, the concentration of malevolent energy increased dramatically, and the killing intent that surged into their consciousness grew stronger and more terrifying.

It was as if countless demons of slaughter were howling, their howls either forceful or intangible, constantly tempting and seducing Qin Mu's will.

"It's at least eight times the concentration of malevolent energy in Lü Ao's cultivation cave!"

"We've reached the core of the vortex."

Qin Mu's smile grew even wider.

woohoo~~~

The malevolent aura before them was as red as blood, and it was swirling in a vortex that was visible to the naked eye!

Qin Mu spotted the core of the vortex of malevolent energy dozens of kilometers away at a glance. The malevolent energy at the core was so dense that it made one's heart tremble, like a red sun!

At the same time, the core of the vortex was emanating an ancient and eternal aura, and even an invisible temptation was penetrating into Qin Mu's mind.

"bring it on!"

"bring it on!"

Come to me!

That invisible call permeated Qin Mu's consciousness.

"A mere baleful aura dares to try and shake the will of the insect swarm!"

Feeling an impact comparable to the tenth island of the Illusionary Sea, Qin Mu snorted coldly and continued flying forward.

Whoosh~~ The malevolent aura was as thick as fresh blood, and the huge vortex of malevolent aura also faintly exuded an ancient and eternal aura. That aura naturally tempted people's minds, but it was all shattered by the will of the insect swarm.

50 meters, 40 meters, 30 meters, 20 meters, 10 meters...

The red sphere is right in front of you.

It is the core of this enormous vortex of malevolent energy.

"Boom!"

The moment he approached the core, an ancient and invisible aura emanated from it, causing Qin Mu's heart to clench, as if he were being targeted by some terrifying hunter.

"A mere inanimate object! It thinks it can influence me?!"

Qin Mu snorted coldly. So what if he was born a beast god?!

Instead of retreating, his body advanced, surging forward into the core of the malevolent energy vortex—the red sphere of light.

"The will to kill has weakened!"

"It seems that the killing intent is strongest when approaching the sphere of light. After entering the sphere of light... the killing intent gradually weakens."

puff!

As Qin Mu pierced through the outer layer of the red sphere of light, he witnessed an astonishing scene.

"Ang, Mo, Da..."

A voice that pierced directly into one's soul echoed continuously in Qin Mu's consciousness. These ancient notes, devoid of any rhyme or reason, each contained a supreme, endless, and ancient aura. At the same time, Qin Mu stared in shock at the scene before him... The inside of this red sphere of light was hollow.

There was not a trace of red malevolent energy.

However, it has huge golden runes, each as thick as an arm. Each golden rune is incredibly complex, and there are a total of 8 golden runes, each nearly a thousand meters long, intertwined and swirling in this space.

An aura that made people's hearts tremble and submit was emanating from these eight golden runes.

At the same time, the 8 enormous golden runes emitted golden light, enveloping the area.

Golden light flowed slowly, making the surroundings seem like a sacred realm.

The flowing golden light continuously revealed two images: a monster resembling a giant lizard and a long spear tearing through space, traversing with unparalleled momentum.

The giant lizard-like monster lowered its head and roared, its sharp horns flashing with golden light as it charged forward.

The two images appear and disappear at times.

"Secret runes of laws, these are secret runes of laws."

Looking at the eight enormous golden runes, Qin Mu was overjoyed. He hadn't expected that the core of this baleful energy would actually contain law runes!

"These are secret runes of the laws of space!"

Based on his analysis of the spatial essence of the first three diagrams of the Cosmic Chaos Monument, Qin Mu instantly understood.

But it was precisely because of his understanding that Qin Mu was shocked, because he had never seen the law patterns so clearly before, even the law patterns that appeared outside Chaos City were very small and simple!

The eight enormous secret runes before us, each as thick as an arm, may seem like just eight simple runes, but each one is intertwined with tiny secret runes the size of a needle tip.

"It's too complicated! The profound mysteries contained in this huge golden rune are at least comparable to the sixth or even the seventh diagram of the Cosmic Chaos Stele."

"As this golden light shines, every cell deep within my body is undergoing earth-shattering changes, and my genes are rapidly transforming!"

This is a treasure trove!

If the changes in body cells under the invasion of evil energy are very slight and slow.

But at this moment, it is accelerating a hundredfold or a thousandfold.

If discovering the golden runes and the phantom of the beast god excited him, this genetic transformation filled him with ecstasy!

This is a crucial opportunity to advance the Zerg swarm's genetics to a new level!

Without rushing to investigate, thousands of Zerg warriors appeared around him, spreading throughout the entire crater to thoroughly search the area and ensure there were no accidents.

"Swarm! Seal off this area! Anyone who approaches will be killed without mercy!"

"In addition, continue searching for other deep pits to confirm the existence of similar malevolent vortexes."

(End of this chapter)