147: Chapter 147: The Value of Mimicry

Morgan stood in place, the Soul fire in his eye sockets flickering.

Having just asked that question,

he had thought his captain would provide a hidden hiding spot or an escape route that bypassed the core area.

Rayne did not look at him.

The captain of this Time Demon Race squad turned around and raised his blade-like arm, pointing straight ahead.

At the end of their line of sight, the Central Basin stretched across the land.

In the center of the basin, the Demon Tree, massive enough to blot out the sky, stood tall and majestic.

"The reason is simple," Rayne said. "My purpose in bringing you here is to enter the enemy's territory."

Rayne's finger did not deviate by even a fraction of an inch.

"To go onto that Demon Tree."

Morgan was stunned.

Two seconds later, Morgan took a step back.

His heavy feet crushed the rocks on the ground.

"Captain, you're crazy!" Morgan's voice suddenly rose.

He shook his head frantically, waving his arms in front of his chest.

"We are still a hundred thousand miles away from the Central Basin! And it's filled with these monsters!"

Morgan pointed at the gold-and-black ocean at the periphery of the basin. "Millions of Tyrant Demons! And they start at Peak Gold Tier!"

Morgan's breathing became rapid.

"We couldn't even handle a swarm of bugs on the outskirts!"

"Gangku was crushed by the Liquid Metal Crab, and Ayla was torn to shreds by the swarm of bugs!"

"I even had to surrender my Phylactery just to barely escape with my life!"

"We can't even beat our own kind on the periphery here, and now you want to take me to provoke the overlords of this place?"

Morgan backed up repeatedly, shaking his head.

"I'm not going! Absolutely not! This is simply suicide!"

Rayne stood in place.

The black-gold wings behind his back hung down naturally, his pitch-black metallic body swallowing the surrounding light.

He did not interrupt Morgan's roaring, letting him vent the fear in his heart.

Only when Morgan had backed away dozens of meters and his voice gradually weakened did Rayne slowly turn his head.

"Are you finished?" Rayne's tone was flat.

Morgan shut his mouth, the Soul fire in his eye sockets flickering erratically.

"If you're finished, stand up straight." Rayne's voice suddenly turned cold, exuding the authority of a captain.

He took a step forward and walked toward Morgan.

Rayne's current size was far less massive than Morgan's, but with every step he took, the surrounding space trembled.

"Look at yourself now." Rayne stopped in front of Morgan, looking up at this dark-gold behemoth.

"Your current behavior is like a rat scared out of its wits by a stray cat, only knowing how to scurry around in the sewers."

Morgan clenched his fists, highly defiant.

"Remember your own identity," Rayne's voice rose.

Every word was like a knife, stabbing directly into Morgan's Soul.

"You are a Necromancer! You are a powerhouse who has stepped into the Diamond Rank!"

"You are an elite of the Time Demon Race who fought your way up by stepping on the bones of countless lower-plane creatures!"

Rayne raised his hand, pointing his blade at Morgan's chest plate.

"We have wandered the starry sky for hundreds of years, plundered the Spiritual Veins of Cultivators, and slaughtered the dragons of magic worlds."

"What kind of scene have we not witnessed?"

"Now, just because we've changed environments and dropped slightly in Realm, you've completely thrown away the pride of the Time Demon Race?"

Rayne's questioning caused Morgan's breath to catch.

"Put away that cowardly look. The more afraid you are, the faster you will die."

"In this divine domain, weakness won't buy you any sympathy; it will only turn you into a pile of dregs sucked dry by tree roots."

Morgan fell silent.

Rayne's words tore through his inner defenses.

He recalled the scenes of himself calling the wind and summoning the rain in countless divine domains.

He recalled the glory of commanding his undead army to trample cities.

He lowered his head, looking at his own dark-gold body that contained explosive power.

Violent Titan power surged through his veins.

This body possessed the power to easily tear apart mountains, yet he was using this power to tremble.

It was too unsightly.

Morgan took a deep breath.

He forcibly suppressed the fear churning in his heart, refocusing his scattered Soul fire.

His dark-gold body stopped trembling, and he stood straight.

"Captain, I understand," Morgan's voice regained its deep tone. "I was too impetuous and cowardly just now."

He looked straight into Rayne's eyes.

"What is your plan?"

Seeing Morgan regain his sanity, Rayne nodded slightly.

He turned around, looking once more toward the distant Central Basin.

"Based on my observations over the past two days, this overlord race is completely different from those bugs on the outskirts," Rayne began to explain his deductions.

"The Zerg live at the bottom; they have to face harsh environments and fight natural enemies."

"So they evolved a tight mental network, uniting as one to turn their entire population into a precise war machine."

Rayne pointed at the Tyrant Demons who were fighting frantically in the basin.

"But they don't need to."

"They were born as the rulers of this divine domain."

"They occupy the core area with the richest Spiritual Qi, and no external enemies dare to invade this place."

"When a species loses external pressure, what do they do?"

Morgan looked along Rayne's line of sight.

Thousands of Tyrant Demons were rolling in the dirt, fists hitting flesh, biting each other.

"Internal strife," Morgan spat out two words.

"To be precise, it's raising Gu," Rayne corrected.

"They are arrogant and worship ultimate individual martial strength."

"They have divided the entire Central Basin into countless ring-shaped zones."

Rayne drew concentric circles in midair.

"The outermost ring is the battlefield of Peak Gold Tier. The victors absorb the energy of the losers and step into the next tier."

"Further in is the territory of the Platinum Rank. And so on."

"Each layer represents a higher concentration of Spiritual Qi, more core resources, and an absolute hierarchy of strength."

Morgan's eyes lit up as he began to understand Rayne's train of thought.

"And what about the antidote?" Morgan asked the most crucial question.

"The Demon Tree," Rayne's gaze locked onto the trunk that pierced the clouds.

"Those small dark-red trees on the outskirts are all companion offspring of this Demon Tree."

"The violent Spiritual Qi in this divine domain, the substances that cause our clansmen to mutate, all originate from it."

Rayne's tone was firm.

"Where venomous snakes lurk, an antidote is always found within seven paces. This is the most fundamental Law of ecological balance in the Universe."

"Since the mutation originates from the Demon Tree, the original substance capable of stabilizing gene sequences and suppressing mutations must exist on the body of the Demon Tree itself."

"As long as we reach it, the antidote will definitely appear."

Morgan's heart began to beat wildly uncontrollably.

The logic was perfectly closed.

But he still had concerns.

"Captain, even if they aren't united, even if they are divided into tiers..."

"...the core members inside must have absolutely terrifying strength. Can we defeat them?"

Rayne let out a cold laugh.

"I have sensed them carefully. The strongest of this overlord race's core is only at the Diamond Rank; no creature has broken through to the extraordinary."

Rayne extended his blade and made a mock slash in the air.

"The Demon Tree has no intelligence; it won't attack on its own."

"The Violent Demon Race worships one-on-one duels and deeply despises ganging up on others. As long as we abide by their rules, we won't face a collective siege."

"We only need to do one thing."

Rayne turned to look at Morgan, ambition and killing intent flashing in his eyes.

"Fight our way up, layer by layer."

"Use the martial strength they are most proud of to crush their skulls."

"Absorb their energy and promote ourselves to the core layer of this species."

"By then, we will not only get the antidote, but we can also monopolize the most core resources of this divine domain."

Rayne spread his arms.

"It kills two birds with one stone."

Morgan's breathing grew heavy.

Rayne's words painted a clear path for him to break the deadlock.

If it really was as the captain said,

and they didn't have to face a gang attack from hundreds of thousands of monsters, but only one-on-one duels,

then what was he afraid of?

He was once a high-stage Diamond Rank Necromancer.

Even if his Realm had dropped now, his understanding of Laws and control over the rhythm of battle

were far superior to these indigenous creatures who only knew how to fight by instinct.

As long as he wasn't ganged up on, he had a hundred ways to play his same-level opponents to death.

But...

Morgan's gaze turned once again toward that gold-and-black ocean.

The tragic defeat he had just experienced still lingered in his mind.

The Zerg's pervasive mental network had caused him to suffer a severe crisis of trust in "Mimicry," their racial talent.

What if the Tyrant Demons also had similar countermeasures?

What if, the moment he stepped into the basin, he was attacked by tens of thousands of Tyrant Demons all at once?

This instinctive fear of the unknown environment kept him from taking the first step.

Rayne saw Morgan's hesitation.

Verbal instigation was, after all, limited.

For a wanderer who had just experienced a life-and-death catastrophe,

only the bloody truth could truly dispel his doubts.

"Watch closely."

Rayne dropped those two words.

The black-gold wings behind his back unfolded.

Rayne's figure instantly vanished from where he stood.

Morgan widened his eyes, looking toward the outermost edge of the basin.

Several kilometers away,

a battle circle composed of dozens of Peak Gold Tier Tyrant Demons was in a chaotic melee.

Soil flew everywhere, and dark-gold blood splashed in all directions.

The Void Realm suddenly tore open a crack.

Rayne's figure appeared right in the center of the battle circle.

He did not cast any magic, nor did he use the Origin power of the Time Demon Race.

Relying entirely on the Physical Body of this Shadow Abyssal Demon, he intervened in the battle.

An eight-meter-tall Tyrant Demon noticed the uninvited guest.

With a roar, it swung both arms, smashing toward Rayne's head.

Rayne turned slightly, his right arm turning into an afterimage as it sliced into the gap in the opponent's arm defense.

Pfft!

The sound of a sharp blade entering flesh was heard.

Rayne's black blade directly pierced through the dark-gold Tyrant Demon's chest.

That Tyrant Demon's movements froze.

Rayne twisted his wrist.

Crack!

Accompanied by the crisp sound of shattering bones, Rayne brutally crushed the opponent's heart.

He withdrew his arm, bringing out a large spray of scalding, dark-gold blood.

The dark-gold Tyrant Demon's massive body collapsed with a loud crash.

An instant kill.

Pure physical suppression.

Rayne stood by the corpse, letting the blood spray all over him.

He threw his head back, wearing an expression of enjoyment.

Having done all this, Rayne raised his head and looked around.

Morgan's heart leaped into his throat.

He was terrified that they would swarm and attack him in the next second.

However, the anticipated siege did not happen.

The surrounding Tyrant Demons stopped their movements.

Their vertical pupils looked at Rayne, then at the corpse on the ground, and finally at the powerful aura emanating from Rayne.

Several Tyrant Demons closest to Rayne voluntarily took two steps back, clearing a path leading deeper into the basin.

They acknowledged Rayne's strength.

The victors advance, the losers turn to dust. This was the iron Law of the Violent Demon Race.

Rayne ignored these Gold Tier cannon fodder.

He stepped over the corpse and strode toward the next zone of the basin.

Morgan watched the entire process from afar.

His body trembled once again.

Only this time, it was not out of fear, but out of excitement.

It really worked.

No mental network scanning, no alarms, no ganging up.

These Tyrant Demons judged their own kind entirely based on aura and pure martial strength.

As long as one possessed the same gene sequence and could display sufficiently powerful strength, they could run rampant within this race.

Morgan looked down at his hands.

The previously omnipotent racial talent of Mimicry of the Time Demon Race had been thwarted everywhere by the Zerg, once plunging him into despair.

But now, in this territory belonging to the overlords, the function of Mimicry once again proved its value.

Perfect integration, perfect stealth.

They could openly plunder the most core resources of this divine domain!

The fire of hope ignited in Morgan's chest.

To hell with the bugs, to hell with fear.

I am a dignified Starry Sky Raider!