Chapter 106: The Theory of Evolution

Chen Shijin is currently making his way up the middle of the giant mountain.

Though only halfway up, the mountain is so tall and vast that his current position is already enshrouded in mists.

Like all mountains, the paths of this giant mountain became steeper and the mountain body narrower the higher one went, making the distant summit appear like a straight pillar from his vantage point.

He was about to embark on the most perilous path leading to that pillar, a winding and treacherous trail.

This path was extremely narrow, barely a meter wide, and it twisted and turned, with many angles less than fifty degrees.

The entire path to the mountain's summit resembled a giant stone slab twisted and erected vertically, with Chen Shijin standing on its edge.

A misstep on this path could easily lead to a fall.

Not to mention, one could clearly see fierce beasts tearing at each other at intervals along the path.

Crack...click, click...

A small stone, accidentally kicked by Chen Shijin, rolled a few times on the narrow path before falling off.

Chen Shijin leaned over to glance below, where he could see the tumultuous waves of the tsunami and the defeated monsters falling from the mountain into the sea before and behind him.

"Roar—"

A monster with the heads of a lion and a leopard guarded the cliff path ahead, roaring at Chen Shijin.

The monster's twin heads both had eyes of crimson red, struggling, howling, and drooling as they fixed their gaze on Chen Shijin.

The next second, it suddenly pounced!

Chen Shijin sidestepped, dodging the two-headed beast's lunge and one head's attempt to bite, narrowly landing where the monster had stood.

"Roar, roar!"

The two-headed monster, missing its strike, turned without hesitation for another attack, this time blocking Chen Shijin's escape routes. If Chen Shijin stepped left, he would surely fall off the cliff into the sea, and stepping right would deliver him into the beast's maw.

Chen Shijin sneered. Although he hadn't remembered why he came to this world and nearly turned into a fish, he never lost a fight.

He swung his bone knife towards the gaping mouth, aiming to sever one of the heads, lion or leopard.

Crack!

The lion's head and neck bones were quite hard, the bone knife getting stuck in the lion's skull.

As Chen Shijin and the lion head struggled, the leopard head's eyes flashed red, and the monster's body was forcibly torn open by the leopard head, which then coiled and leapt with force, biting towards Chen Shijin's neck.

If bitten, Chen Shijin's path of evolution would end here.

Chen Shijin sneered, loosened his grip on the bone knife, and twisted his body to face the oncoming leopard head, narrowly avoiding its gaping jaws. Then, grabbing the leopard's round ears, he leveraged a forceful jump upwards!

He landed on the neck of the two-headed monster.

"Roar?!"

"Roar, roar, aow?!"

Both the bleeding lion head and the leopard head that missed its bite were stunned at first, then, even more enraged, tried to bite back. The result was the lion head getting fiercely kicked, while the leopard head was restrained with a leather rope around its mouth, rendering it immobile.

"Aow!"

The lion head, already cut and kicked, shook in pain from the blows, its sturdy skull barely enduring the agony.

But the pain didn’t stop there. Before the lion head could recover, Chen Shijin, astride the leopard’s neck, delivered a dozen more kicks.

Chen Shijin, while kicking, used the leather to control the leopard head, steering their body away from falling off the narrow cliff. By the twentieth kick, the lion head let out a wail and was ultimately kicked off by him.

"Roar!!!"

Before dying, the lion head, in a fit of resentment, viciously clawed at the leopard head with its right paw.

It and the leopard had become one due to a battle over an evolutionary heart, originally enemies forced into a reluctant coexistence. Now, why should it die leaving the leopard head behind?!

If death was imminent, they should perish together!

The leopard head was momentarily dazed after the lion head was kicked off. Now with just one head left, did that mean it had won?

Before it could revel in its victory, the leopard head too was fiercely kicked.

A devilish voice echoed above.

"Run forward! Charge!"

With the mountain so high, the path so steep and long, how long would it take him to walk alone?

Wise humans should be adept at using tools, right?

The leopard head, not very keen on obeying but mindful of the lion head's fate, grumbled discontentedly before dashing forward.

As a swift and agile leopard, it raced quickly even on the steep mountain path.

Unfortunately, not even 500 meters ahead, a giant python occupying the entire path appeared.

The python, half a meter wide and tens of meters long, presented a massive form that the leopard could not possibly leap over in a couple of bounds.

If it were just the form of a python, that might be manageable. On such a narrow mountain trail, a round, bulky snake is at a disadvantage. Simply kicking a part of its body or tail forcefully down would cause the rest to follow suit and fall.

But, Chen Shijin's face turned green.

"Is this world a Frankenstein monster?!"

When the giant python noticed them, it fiercely reared up, and then Chen Shijin saw hundreds of centipede-like legs growing from its belly.

Sharing one body with two heads as a lion and a leopard was bad enough, but a snake and centipede fusion too!

With the snake now having legs, kicking it off became impossible, and a python with hundreds of legs moved both quickly and ferociously!

"Aoww!"

The leopard head leaped twice but was immediately ensnared by the giant python's tail, with Chen Shijin, mounted on the leopard head, nearly getting caught as well.

However, as the hybrid leopard was being constricted to the point of breaking by the python, Chen Shijin leaped high, landing on the python's back.

He gauged the python's length and sprinted towards its vulnerable spot.

By then, the python had already thrown the entangled leopard down the mountain, its tail striking at Chen Shijin as if it had eyes.

The python's head also rotated 180 degrees, its crimson eyes and a three-meter-long tongue flicking out, looking utterly fearsome.

"Kill... you... eat... you!"

As Chen Shijin's bone spear pierced fiercely into the python's weak spot, the tail, with the force of a thousand jun, and the terrifying maw charged at him.

The python's head and tail nearly blocked all of Chen Shijin's escape routes, worsened by the bone spear not being sharp enough to penetrate the python's vital area thoroughly.

"Eat you, eat you, eat you—"

Chen Shijin, seeing the gaping maw, rolled his eyes and charged in without hesitation!

"Aow?!"

The python bit its own tail tip tightly, forming a perfect closed loop.

Python: "......"

Something seemed off.

Chen Shijin, holding his breath crazily inside the python's mouth and sneering as he drew his bone knife: "..."

The python, still contemplating whether to spit out the tail tip in its mouth, suddenly started convulsing in pain.

"Squeal—roar—"

Chen Shijin began wreaking havoc inside its mouth, first severing its three-meter-long tongue.

Without its tongue, the python couldn't deal with Chen Shijin, who stubbornly remained in its mouth, not falling into its stomach. It frantically thrashed its entire body, even wildly striking its own head with its tail, trying to get the damnable biped into its stomach.

But the damned biped was too resilient. Despite its mouth bleeding profusely, the human inside hadn’t died or fallen.

"Roar! Roar, roar! Ah, ah ah… come out, come out!! You, get out, out,"

The python twisted madly in place, its beastly roars turning increasingly into human speech.

When Chen Shijin, using two bone spears as tools, slowly made his way down to find a giant red energy stone pulsating alongside the python's heart, the python thrashing against the mountain wall suddenly stiffened.

It screamed in fury, "Stop! Don't steal my energy! Ahhh, stop, stop, stop!! That's my energy stone! That's the foundation of my life!"

Unfortunately, Chen Shijin inside its stomach completely ignored its roars, piercing the giant heart and taking the red energy stone.

"Damned!! Damned, damned, damned, damned! Ahhh, you've killed me! You've killed me!! I won't let you live alone!!"

The mad python, with crimson eyes, roared its last words before letting its body fall from the thousands of meters high cliff.

If it couldn't live, then the one who had defeated and killed it should not live either.

"…Unfortunately, in the end…", he couldn't make it out of this world alive.

As death approached, all of the human memories originally belonging to the python returned.

It turned out he was not a snake; he was supposed to be a human.

Unfortunately, on the path of evolution, he took a wrong turn, devouring too much frenzied energy and the flesh and blood of his kin. The restraint of the flesh, blood, and souls of his kind made him lose his sanity completely, and he could never return.

This damned world.

How could anyone possibly escape.

Without any memories to guide evolution from the beginning, it's impossible for anyone to make it out!

The moment before the python's body was about to crash heavily into the sea, a slit suddenly opened above its vital area, spurting out a massive amount of blood, along with a bloodied person being ejected.

After Chen Shijin could hardly bear bursting out, he plunged into the sea to clean himself, then watched the python's corpse slowly disintegrate from the hundred centipede legs, eventually dissolving into an unrecognizable form.

As another giant wave hit, he quickly raised his body, wiped the seawater from his face, and sneered at the giant mountain he had to climb again.

"Damned nonsense."

He remembered a bit more.

This isn't the real world; he came... to destroy and counter-kill this world.

Also, he was supposed to have the ability to soar sky-high.

"Wings of Wind."

This time, Chen Shijin did not use his evolved arms to fly upward but instead formed a pair of invisible wind wings behind him, gracefully utilizing the power of the wind to ascend.

It took him only half a day to return to that steep, winding mountain path, after which he landed and continued forward step by step.

He could fly directly to the summit now, to see what existence awaits him there.

But feeling the trembling, merged giant energy gem in his backpack, he decided to fight his way up instead.

This time, his speed in battle was much faster.

Even as he neared the summit, the crazy, fierce beasts, monsters... the exiles, became more numerous.

Chen Shijin once again plunged his knife into the chest of a six-winged eagle, taking the red energy stone next to its heart amidst its angry and terrified screams.

"Give it back! Return the energy gem to me! I must reach the summit! I must evolve!! Evolve!! Evolve—"

Chen Shijin walked past him, tossing the clamored-for energy stone over his shoulder. The animal skin bag on his back had grown quite large, almost encompassing and exceeding the width of his back.

When the small energy stone was thrown in, the giant energy stone inside the bag seemed to respond, vibrating momentarily before the red energy stones inside merged again, forming an even larger, more perfect, and enchanting ultimate treasure.

"Stay calm, stay alert."

Chen Shijin muttered these words to himself.

He could feel the deadly, immense attraction of the energy constantly emanating from behind him, but the more he was drawn to it, the clearer it became that he should not succumb to its allure.

Evolution is the instinct of life.

But all frenzied evolution leads to only one outcome.

Chen Shijin continued his ascent for three more days.

Countless monsters were slain or repelled, numerous chests were opened.

The backpack behind him had grown larger than his entire body. Upon seeing him, monsters no longer attacked him at first sight but madly rushed towards the giant red energy stone he carried.

In the end, Chen Shijin didn’t even need to lift a finger; those monsters, crazed with the desire to evolve, would come to die by the red energy stone, and then the energy stones within them would be merged and absorbed by the giant red energy stone, growing into a greater power.

When Chen Shijin reached the summit, the giant energy stone had grown tall and large, resembling a three-meter-high chubby bamboo shoot.

Whether by coincidence or not, the summit was extremely flat. Upon this blunt peak, the arrival of the red giant gem seemed as if it were pointing directly up at the sky.

Huff—Inhale—

Chen Shijin suddenly stepped back.

Then, he looked coldly at the giant red energy stone he had carried up.

Huff—Inhale—

The giant red energy stone seemed to have slight fluctuations, as if it were breathing.

Boom!

Suddenly, a fierce and blinding light shot out from within the red energy stone, piercing straight into the sky—breaking through the sky!

When a crack appeared in the sky overhead, Chen Shijin's face displayed an incredulous look, first of surprise then rapidly changing to alarm.

The moment the crack appeared in the sky, the entire giant mountain, even the whole world, seemed to tremble, especially around the red energy stone, causing a terrifying sensation.

A voice inside Chen Shijin's head screamed madly—It must not be allowed to emerge!

Suddenly, a golden scimitar appeared in Chen Shijin's hand, slashing directly at whatever was attempting to break free from the red energy stone.

Clang!

However, this fierce strike was blocked by a giant red figure.

Chen Shijin's heart sank as he staggered three steps back, facing a beast engulfed in flames, with eyes of burning red.

"…Seal of Heavenly Fire."

"Roar—"

Chen Shijin took a deep breath and surged forward, attacking like a tempest.

Bang, bang, bang!

"You idiot! I told you to stay alert!!!"

Bang, bang, bang, bang!

"I told you not to eat the stones!!"

Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!

"You just wouldn't listen!!"

"Had to mess things up and get a good thumping!"

At that earth-shattering moment, Chen Shijin ferociously trampled the Seal of Heavenly Fire underfoot, having remembered most of his memories.

He even successfully found a way to destroy and leave this world, tearing a crack in the sky.

Unfortunately, he also released the most terrifying and formidable enemy—

Emerging from the crimson gemstone was a "person" with an almost perfect form, where every muscle and strand of hair seemed to contain immense power.

But anyone who saw him would know, this was not a human.

He resembled an unsolvable god.

"Thousands... of years."

"My core has been discovered for the first time."

"Or rather, for thousands of years, this world... has evolved countless times, cycles, and yet it's the first time someone has broken the world's seal."

He tilted his head, looking at Chen Shijin.

"Truly clever yet dangerous."

"So, you must die."

Instantly, he appeared beside Chen Shijin without any warning and crushed his neck with his bare hands.

No wonder he was desperately pursued by that frustrated spider; this human indeed posed a problem.

However, in this world where strength reigns supreme, within His domain, He is an invincible god.

For a god, snuffing out a life is far too easy.

"Hmm, how boring."

"Restart the world, ?!"

Pfft.

The soft sound of flesh and blood being pierced echoed in his ears.

The god looked down to see a golden spear piercing through his chest.

He was surprised. Then he heard the damned human's voice from behind:

"Idiot."

"Who are you to decree my death?"

"Kill you today, and I ascend to king!"

The god frowned, turning to see the man holding the spear, unharmed.