146: Chapter 146: The Unkillable Monster

"'Fiend' is the collective term we in the Immortal-Mortal Realm use for a type of terrifying creature from beyond the heavens."

Sect Leader Lu Yun's voice was very low, carrying a trace of uncontrollable trembling. He seemed to have fallen into some extremely unpleasant memory, his eyes becoming somewhat vacant.

"We don't know what they actually are or where they come from. There are no records of them in the sect's ancient texts; they just... appeared out of thin air."

"They are like a mobile, black plague."

Jiang Ning listened quietly without interrupting.

Sect Leader Lu Yun continued, "They have no fixed form. Sometimes they are like a flowing liquid, sometimes like a mass of black mist, and sometimes they condense into the shapes of various demonic beasts. But they share one common characteristic: devouring. They devour everything that contains spiritual energy—spirit stones, spirit herbs, demonic beasts, and even... cultivators."

"Everything they devour becomes a part of them, making them even stronger. A 'Fiend' only the size of a fist can grow to be as large as a mountain, as long as it is given enough time and spiritual energy."

"Hundreds of years ago, when they first appeared, it was only in some remote territories of the demonic sects. At the time, the major righteous sects didn't pay them any mind. Some even took pleasure in their misfortune, thinking the demonic cultivators were suffering divine retribution for their many evils."

"However, their speed of expansion was too fast. It was faster than anyone could have imagined. By the time we reacted, half of the Immortal-Mortal Realm had already been 'eaten' by them."

A look of agony appeared on Sect Leader Lu Yun's face.

"All the spirit veins were sucked dry by them. All living things were devoured. The places they swept through would only leave behind a deathly, black wasteland. Not a single shred of spiritual energy would remain on that land; it would completely become what mortals call a 'forbidden land'."

"We... we couldn't defeat them."

Sect Leader Lu Yun's voice carried a desperate tremor.

"They cannot be killed. Even if you use a Dharma treasure to slice them into pieces, those pieces won't die. Instead, they turn into new, smaller 'Fiends' and continue to devour everything around them. The more you kill, the more their numbers grow."

"Furthermore, all our spells are significantly less effective against them. Whether it's fire, frost, or lightning, as long as the attack contains spiritual energy, most of the energy is directly absorbed by them. They seem to be able to... absorb the spiritual energy within our spells."

"The elders in the sect, those Nascent Soul Stage ancestors, once joined forces to suppress a relatively large 'Fiend'. They used the sect's guardian treasures, fighting until the heavens collapsed and the earth split, but in the end... they still failed." Deep fear surfaced in Sect Leader Lu Yun's eyes. "I heard that three Nascent Soul ancestors fell in that battle. As for that 'Fiend', it was only dispersed. Before long, it reformed and became even stronger than before."

"Later, the sect elders speculated that they might be a type of higher-dimensional 'Law Creature' that feeds on spiritual energy."

"Law Creature?" Jiang Ning spoke for the first time, interested in the term.

"Yes." Sect Leader Lu Yun nodded. "It's just a guess. It means their life form might be completely different from ours. Devouring spiritual energy, reproducing by splitting, and being immune to spiritual energy attacks might just be the 'laws' of their existence. Just as humans must breathe and fish must live in water, it's simply the way of things for them."

"We cultivators who rely on spiritual energy to fight are, in front of them, like... like a group of children trying to put out a fire with water guns."

Sect Leader Lu Yun's metaphor, though not quite what Jiang Ning had asked for, was exceptionally apt.

Using water to extinguish a fire, only for the fire to treat the water as fuel. One could imagine the despair.

Hearing this, Jiang Ning's brow furrowed even deeper.

A Law Creature that feeds on spiritual energy, is immune to spiritual energy attacks, and can split infinitely?

Why did this sound so much like...

A universe-level 'antivirus software' specifically designed to purge 'spiritual energy civilizations'?

Or rather, a 'civilization filter'. When a civilization begins to utilize high-level energy like psionic power on a large scale, this 'filter' appears to erase the civilization and prevent it from developing to a higher level.

This was just her hypothesis, but it set off alarm bells in her heart.

If that were truly the case, then Earth's future might...

Right then.

"Wooo— Wooo— Wooo—"

Throughout the underground base, the piercing, highest-level red alert suddenly blared!

The alarm was sharp and urgent, as if it wanted to pierce through one's eardrums.

All the lights in the room instantly turned red, signifying extreme danger.

A cold, emotionless synthesized electronic voice echoed throughout the base.

"Alert! Alert! Ultra-high energy spatial reaction detected above Donghai City!"

"The spatial barrier is being forcibly torn!"

"Warning! Large-scale invasion by unidentified objects in progress!"

Jiang Ning's expression changed abruptly.

Beside her, upon hearing the words 'spatial barrier being torn' and 'large-scale invasion', Sect Leader Lu Yun felt as if he had been struck by lightning, his face instantly turning as pale as paper.

He thought of the most terrifying possibility.

"It's them! They're here!" he screamed out, his voice filled with endless terror.

Jiang Ning ignored him.

Her figure flickered, and she vanished from the spot instantly.

The next second, she appeared on the surface of Kunlun Academy.

She looked up toward the sky.

There, in that azure sky over Donghai City that Sect Leader Lu Yun had once torn open.

At this moment, it looked like a mirror that had been violently smashed by a hammer.

It was covered with hundreds upon thousands of hideous, black cracks!

Those cracks were like scars on the sky, continuing to expand as an ominous black aura seeped from them.

Countless bizarre, black, liquid-like monsters emitting an ominous aura were frantically pouring out from those cracks!

They were like drops of thick ink dripping into clear water, rapidly falling toward the city below.