Chapter 134 - 46: [Rusted Copper Forest and the Copper Evil Spirit]

Chapter 134: Chapter 46: [Rusted Copper Forest and the Copper Evil Spirit]

Thousands of strange, bluish-green trees stood before them, casting a forest of shadows. Their bark was charred, rough, and dotted with eerie, cyan rust-like spots that faintly gleamed with a grayish-green metallic luster. The roots and branches were sickly and deformed, resembling wildly proliferating tentacles. The leaves on the branches were small, dense, and tough, with serrated edges. From a distance, they didn’t look like leaves at all, but rather like dense, cyan mold spots on the monstrous hands of a giant’s corpse.

The strange trees in the woodland were scattered at gloomy angles, casting countless claw-like shadows of branches under the dim daylight. A faint white mist permeated the area, cold and damp. The fog felt like long, clammy tongues, silently licking every living creature.

A layer of fine, broken, dead leaves covered the ground, interspersed with sparse, unknown shade-loving plants. Scattered bones littered the earth, but due to the suppressive aura of a certain High-Level Undead, no movements from any Undead Constructs could be heard.

"We’ve entered the Demon Realm territory on the outskirts of the Heart of the Remains. Summon the Magical Beast servants," Old Duke said as he jumped down from the carriage. He directed the Exiles to set up camp and prepare to gather materials. "Make sure to leave Magical Beast sentries on the perimeter. If any adventurers approach, camouflage yourselves immediately."

The Demon Race Exiles stretched their bodies and spread their arms throughout the woodland, beginning to summon and command the Magical Beasts hidden within the natural environment around the outskirts of the Heart of the Remains.

Next to the tangled, twisted roots of a Rusted Copper Tree, a large gray stone was pushed aside, revealing a tunnel and an opening dense with rootlets below. Seven or eight hard-skinned taros with wooden horns on their heads used their root-like claws and feet to kick aside the stone at the tunnel entrance. They wriggled out of the dirt hole and unsteadily stood at attention before the Demon Race Exiles.

Like regular plants, Rot Root Balls were found all over the world, possessing different appearances and habits depending on the environment and vegetation. The long-legged taros before them were a Rot Root Ball subspecies native to the Hai Xin Plain’s Rusted Copper Forest, known by the locals as "Horned Taro Monsters." The hard wooden horn on their heads was a vestigial evolution of the stem connecting the taro tuber to the plant.

The soil in seven or eight other spots within the woodland also churned. Fat, slug-like Rotting Soil Roarers and Shield Beetles carrying thick, heavy carapaces shook off their dirt camouflage and crawled out of the earth.

"Why summon these? Do you expect fat slugs to pitch your tents and carry your things?" Old Duke scolded a young Exile. "Swap them out, swap them out! Absolutely gross!"

Talia looked around, a faint spectral blue light flashing in her eyes.

A dozen weird, six-limbed creatures that looked like skinless monkeys answered her summons, emerging from the shadows between the canopies and branches. As scrawny as stick insects with wrinkled, charred black skin, they clung to the trunks with slender, human-like claws. They camouflaged themselves like branches among the intersecting shadows of the Rusted Copper Trees. With ugly, round, wide mouths resembling chainsaws and pitch-black eyes, they looked like strange aliens.

"There are Tree Ghost Monkeys here too, a common Magical Beast in forest environments. Though the subspecies in the Heart of the Remains looks much uglier than normal Tree Ghost Monkeys," Talia said in a low voice, directing the troop of monkeys to help unload cargo from the Exiles’ carriages and set up tents.

The taro-shaped Rot Root Balls balanced cargo on their heads, wobbling and trotting all over the ground to transport items to their designated spots. The Tree Ghost Monkeys hopped bizarrely between the carriages like dancing stick insects. Using their slender, nimble claws, they grabbed long poles and tarpaulins to erect temporary tents. It looked just like a Wizard in a Disney movie summoning servants to sing and dance.

Normal horses would feel uneasy in such an eerie environment, but the Dwarf Horses, which had been modified into Magical Beast chimeras, showed little panic. They stood peacefully, opening their mouths to reveal the inner-toothed tongues in their throats, rooting around the ground to gnaw on Demonized Plants.

Amidst this bizarre scene of bustling Magical Beasts, Samael thoughtfully pressed his hand against the Rusted Copper Tree beside him.

[Scanner activated.]

[Industrial Ecological Plant Type 1, Copper-Specialized.]

[Capable of accumulating underground copper elements.]

"Strange," he murmured, slowly raising his helmet to gaze at the massive forest before him. "Is there a massive amount of copper underground here?"

[Nether Copper Generator activated.]

Accompanied by a low hum, spiderweb-like cracks slowly appeared on the Rusted Copper Tree, spreading outward from where Samael’s palm touched the bark. A substance glowing with a cyan-blue hue gathered into his palm along the fissures.

[Replenishing Nether Copper...]

[Nether Copper reserves full.]

CRACK! The entire Rusted Copper Tree shattered instantly. The section in the middle, having been drained of its copper elements, turned into flying sawdust. The fibers mixed with the wood powder gave off a strong metallic scent. The upper half of the Rusted Copper Tree snapped and collapsed forward.

"Whoa!" Samael frantically grabbed the snapped top half of the trunk. Relying on the immense strength of the Undead, he managed to catch and firmly hold the heavy log just before it hit the ground.

Hearing the loud crack of the bursting trunk, the Exiles stopped their work. They looked up to see him hugging half a Rusted Copper Tree trunk, looking as though he had just uprooted a giant willow with his bare hands.

"...My apologies." Samael awkwardly and gently set the heavy trunk down.

"You can just snap a Rusted Copper Tree in half?" Yaki stared at him. "The hardness of these things is terrifying. The adventurer stronghold, Gold-digging City, is quite close to this woodland. They use these logs to build their houses. Just chop them down, trim the bark, and they’re ready to be used as building materials. They don’t need any maintenance for decades."

"There’s a lot of copper in them, so it’s no wonder they’re that hard..." Samael replied absentmindedly. Suddenly, he realized something important. "Gold-digging City regularly uses Rusted Copper logs to build houses?"