Chapter 111: The Man-Eating Wicked Tree

Using the World Essence and Darkness Essence, he constructed a three-layered defensive framework.

Gunie felt slightly relieved.

He carefully looked around, confirming there was no danger.

Gunie sat cross-legged and began to communicate with the other half of his body, using the source power from the Blood Sea and the Demon Source Pool to transform his flesh and soul.

“Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle…”

Energy surged in.

Gunie’s flesh began to recover rapidly.

“Fortunately, I didn’t rely solely on the source power from the Demon Source Pool; otherwise, in this eerie environment, the source power within me would be greatly restricted, and recovery would be difficult.”

“Good thing I have enough Blood Sea energy.”

While Gunie was cultivating in seclusion to restore his strength,

in the darkness, around the area where Gunie was, the long-immobile old trees with withered branches and rotten bark, their trunks dried by the wind, seemed as if they had completely died.

After Gunie settled down in this area,

these dead old trees seemed to come alive, beginning to squirm slightly, as if moving their roots step by step, slowly advancing toward Gunie’s location.

The entire process was silent.

Unbeknownst to him, Gunie had been cultivating for over ten minutes, and his strength had recovered to over ninety percent.

“I found him, he’s over there! He’s over there!”

A shriek pierced the darkness.

Gunie immediately stood up.

About a thousand meters away, the human-faced lantern had indeed tenaciously chased after him again.

Gunie’s eyes twitched slightly.

“Won’t it stop until it catches me?”

Just as Gunie was about to rise, he was startled.

He carefully scanned the surroundings, his expression growing more solemn.

Earlier, Gunie was certain that the gravel pile he was on, spanning fifty to sixty meters, had no trees.

But now,

at the edge of the gravel pile, the edge, that is, about twenty meters from Gunie,

rows of dead old trees, densely packed together, had almost formed a wall.

Even a few closer ones were only fifteen or sixteen meters away from Gunie.

Yet Gunie had been vigilant all along, but he hadn’t noticed the trees approaching at all.

“Young man, you can’t escape.”

Suddenly, a voice sounded in the darkness.

Gunie was startled and quickly locked onto the source of the voice.

It was a human face on a dead tree, its form blurred and barely discernible, but one could vaguely make out the wrinkled face of an alien old man, seemingly quite old.

“Who are you?” Gunie asked cautiously.

The tree-human face ignored Gunie.

It spoke to itself: “The Long Night Lantern has its eye on you. It will chase you until you die.”

“No matter where you flee, it will slowly catch up and eat you when you’re not paying attention.”

“Long Night Lantern?”

“Eat you, eat you, eat you… haha… eat you, tender and delicious, I’m so hungry.”

The tree-human face seemed excited by its own words, shrieking repeatedly, its tone growing fervent and mad.

After a moment, the tree-human face seemed to return to normal.

“Instead of wasting time running and then being eaten by those damned Long Night Lanterns, it’s better to be eaten by me. They’re too noisy. After I eat you, I can tell you stories. I have many, many stories, all kinds, guaranteed not to bore you.”

“When you’re tired, you can sleep, unlike those Long Night Lanterns that never stop chattering.”

“How wonderful!”

“Let me eat you, eat you… eat you… I’m starving, let me eat you, eat you.”

The tree-human face’s voice grew from urgent to frantic, finally roaring with rage, its expression ferocious and visible.

The sound echoed through the darkness.

At this moment, the human-faced lantern, more accurately called the Long Night Lantern, was already close to Gunie.

“Hurry, speed up, that human face is about to be eaten by the Wicked Tree old man.”

“Don’t believe the Wicked Tree old man’s lies. He’ll imprison you, slice off pieces of your flesh one by one, and enjoy them slowly. He’ll torment you while eating your flesh and telling ghost stories.”

“That’s right… that’s right…”

“Let us eat you. We’ll only take small bites… no, big bites, and make you part of us.”

“Hehe… that’s right, we can fly too. See how happy we are, unlike that Wicked Tree old man, who’s as good as dead.”

“That Wicked Tree old man died long ago.”

“No, when someone comes near, they come alive. If that human face gets eaten by the Wicked Tree old man, he’ll truly come back to life.”

The dozens of human faces of the arriving Long Night Lanterns chattered noisily.

This made Gunie even more wary of the strange Darkwood Lantern Island.

“Go!”

With a leap, Gunie quickly vanished into the air.

Then he opened his Eye of Fate and flew toward a deep blue direction.

“Damn, the human face ran again.”

“It’s all your fault. I said we should sneak up and scare him.”

“Quick, chase, chase, speed seventy miles per hour!”

“…”

As Gunie vanished into the air again, his speed was now about four times faster than before.

Compared to Gunie’s peak speed, this was like a snail’s pace.

But for now, it was already quite good.

Even if the human-faced lanterns surrounded him from all sides, Gunie could break out of their encirclement with speed.

As he accelerated, the noisy chatter was left behind.

While flying, Gunie pondered.

“That Wicked Tree old man said the Long Night Lantern would keep chasing me until I die.”

“It shouldn’t be that exaggerated. If I really fight for my life, the Long Night Lantern might not be able to trade one for one with me.”

“But at least, in this affected area, the Long Night Lantern will probably keep chasing me.”

“If that’s the case, it’s going to be troublesome.”

Gunie rubbed his brow.

“I entered Darkwood Lantern Island to use it as a springboard to reach Mount Ermoco.”

“But now, this damned thing is chasing me relentlessly, and on this island, there are those eerie trees that can move silently and eat people. This is no place to stay long.”

“If I can’t find a suitable place to survive here in a few days, I’ll have to reincarnate and leave, looking for another way into Mount Ermoco.”

“I’ll search carefully first. If not, I’ll just die and go back.”

With this plan in mind, Gunie was about to open his Eye of Fate again to find his way,

when suddenly,

“Whoosh…”

A violent surge of energy.

Far behind Gunie, a patch of blazing white flames rose and spread.

For a moment, the darkness in the entire area was dispelled.

The scorching firelight was as dazzling as the sun, making Gunie squint.

“Hmm?”

Gunie quickly turned to look at the place where the white-hot flames erupted.

There, in the flames,

the Long Night Lantern that had been chasing him turned to ashes in the scorching fire, and around the flames, several figures stood in the air.

“Someone?”

Gunie’s heart stirred.