Chapter 555 Blood Epiphyllum

Chapter 555: Blood Epiphyllum

Su Bai first saw the Blood Epiphyllum amidst the ruins of a complete collapse.

Under the eternal night of the Nightmare World, amidst the rubble bathed in crimson moonlight, the remnants of the structure were just visible, outlining the former silhouette of an ancient castle. The weathered and peeling stone bricks, with blood and dust filling their cracks, signified that the civilization to which this structure belonged had long been obliterated in the river of time.

The land here had long since been thoroughly eroded by the power of the red moon. The soil had lost its vitality, becoming damp and dark red, as if every inch was soaked in blood. The air was also thick with a heavy, cloying scent of blood, making one instinctively hold their breath.

Blood-red threads, like vines, crept over the castle's wreckage, entwining the long-dead trees, wrapping them into twisted, crimson sculptures: like the imprints of a nightmare, causing the entire ruin to exude an eerie aura. Logically, such a place should be a favorite haunt for blood ghosts and other Eerie Entities; shadows should have been teeming with restless monsters waiting for prey to step in.

Yet, strangely, Su Bai did not sense any dangerous presence there.

No echoes, no prying gazes—the entire area was eerily quiet, so still it seemed as if time itself had frozen in some distant past.

This, in fact, made Su Bai feel even more on edge at the time.

He knew well that in an area saturated with powerful forces, if not even the lowest-level Eerie Entities appeared, it could only mean one possibility—this was the territory of a powerful Eerie Entity.

And that entity must be deeply territorial.

If it hadn't been a necessary path to his destination, Su Bai would not have ventured there lightly.

But what Su Bai didn't expect was that what appeared in the sandy ruins was a five-meter-tall ghost flower. The petals of the Blood Epiphyllum unfolded layer upon layer, like folds of blood-stained silk. Her stamens gently pulsed, resembling a still-beating heart.

Her vines spread out in all directions, adorned with dark red thorns. Each thorn seemed as translucent as crimson crystal, exuding a dangerous aura.

In stark contrast to the foul-smelling surroundings, the fragrance of the Blood Epiphyllum was, in fact, elegant and distant, carrying a sense of purity that seemed detached from this place, making it hard to believe such a flower grew in such a polluted, forbidden land.

Around her, several blood-red butterflies flitted lightly, their wings also shimmering with a faint red glow.

Faced with such a bizarre yet beautiful scene, Su Bai's gaze sharpened slightly.

He noticed that the blooming Blood Epiphyllum was slowly withering.

The edges of the petals were visibly drying and curling. The ends of the dark red vines were beginning to break, and the once potent blood-red thorns were gradually dimming, crumbling to dust.

Su Bai realized this Blood Epiphyllum was approaching its end.

But why?

By all logic, a ghostly flower growing in a forbidden land saturated with power under the red moon, nourished by eerie forces, should bloom eternally without decaying over the long years.

Why was she withering?

It was only later that Su Bai learned that on that day, the Blood Epiphyllum had just lost the last blade of grass growing in the ruins.

Everything she cherished had vanished. The life she had once tried to protect had ultimately turned to dust under the erosion of time.

She found no further reason to exist.

"If you wither, can I take your poisonous blood and vines?" Standing at a distance, Su Bai gazed at the flower and asked very seriously.

That was his most natural thought then. In his understanding, these things were extremely precious materials, of immeasurable value to him.

The Blood Epiphyllum did not answer immediately.

After a moment, a voice, clear and serene and unlike her appearance, slowly emanated from between the petals—

"Why?"

"To live." Su Bai said these words with a self-deprecating tone at the time.

He looked up at the withering epiphyllum under the red moon, his voice low and measured: "I used to think death wasn't a big deal, and living held nothing for me. But gradually... some stubbornly annoying 'people' appeared around me. No matter what, they insisted I must live."

"Perhaps they saw long ago that I didn't want to die. I just needed a reason to live."

"What reason?" The Blood Epiphyllum's tone even held a hint of curiosity.

"Hard to say. Perhaps for the sake of their stubborn wishes. Or perhaps just to encounter a beautiful flower in ruins like these under the red moon." By then, Su Bai had already sensed that the Blood Epiphyllum before him was somewhat different from what he had imagined.

After a period of silence, the Blood Epiphyllum's voice sounded again—

"If you need my blood, need my vines, then you can take them. But as a condition of exchange, you must also take something else."

From then on, the Blood Epiphyllum became a piece within Su Bai's jigsaw puzzle.

Although she always preferred to stay quietly in the deepest part of the puzzle, as if slumbering in a silent place no one could reach, her petals and poisonous vines no longer withered as they once did. Instead, they displayed unprecedented vitality within the puzzle, like a magnificent blood-red gem embedded deep within the jigsaw—not easily revealing its presence, yet impossible to ignore.

Such an existence would only awaken for one reason—when the master of the puzzle needed her help.

It was also later that Su Bai understood he had inadvertently given the Blood Epiphyllum a reason to continue existing.

...

Now, the blood butterflies fluttering in the darkness were one of the Blood Epiphyllum's abilities.

Outwardly, they were no different from the blood butterflies that inhabited places where blood churned. Initially, these little creatures were just ordinary blood butterflies attracted to the Blood Epiphyllum flower, too weak to be considered Eerie Entities. They only became somewhat unique after being tainted by the Blood Epiphyllum's power.

Unfortunately, the Blood Epiphyllum, born from blood-soaked soil with roots entrenched under the most intense crimson moonlight, never loved decay, gore, or ruin. She favored things that still held life—those stubbornly growing green leaves, those flowers that still bloomed tenaciously in blood-drenched soil, loving all forms of stubborn vitality.

Otherwise, she wouldn't have still chosen to die despite the company of the blood butterflies.

Her very existence was one of the most absurdly beautiful dreams within the Nightmare World.

After all, vitality—that was the rarest and most precious existence the Nightmare World had rapidly lost after the collapse of civilizations time and again.

In any case...

Although blood butterflies rarely appeared inside buildings, they weren't particularly special entities in the Nightmare World. And after Su Bai borrowed the Blood Epiphyllum's power, he could control these little things just as she did.

Moreover, this control wasn't a telepathic connection. After all, even tainted by the Blood Epiphyllum's power, blood butterflies weren't advanced beings. When Su Bai controlled them, it felt more like controlling an extension of his own limbs, allowing him to accomplish more through these little creatures.

After pinpointing each player's location, Su Bai controlled the blood butterflies, having them land on the other players' shoulders. Then, he used the Blood Epiphyllum's power through the butterflies to influence the flow of power within these bewitched players, causing fluctuations in their energy and stirring up the emotions they should have possessed.

"Ah—!"

With sudden, sharp gasps, everyone sharply drew in a breath, as if reclaiming the right to breathe after a prolonged state of suffocation.

Su Bai keenly detected the heartbeats around him beginning to quicken, and the breathing sounds becoming rapid.

In the Nightmare World, perhaps this wasn't a bad thing. It meant the will to survive had returned to their bodies. It meant the vitality within the human body, which ran counter to the Nightmare World, was still stubbornly struggling.