Defiance of the Fall

Zac only felt comfort as he stood atop a branch , looking at the four suns drowning the sky with golden radiance . His Cosmic Energy was full , yet large amounts of Divine Energy burrowed into his body . For most , this would be an impossible-to-block attack . For Zac , it was nourishment . The golden vortices in his cells greedily swallowed whatever they could while Purity of the Void] removed any impurities .

Cultivating his Body Tempering Method in this kind of environment would be significantly more effective than in his cave back home . That wasn’t why he’d come here today . Zac hid his presence and aura as he continued deeper into the jungle . Even then , he was constantly attacked , and he left a trail of shredded plants and emaciated carcasses in his wake .

The zone’s mission was to find a Five-Life Fruits , a local specialty that could only appear when all five suns stood high in the sky . Being showered by the Life from the quintuple suns could force certain trees down a road of no return . They couldn’t withstand the energy storm , so they focused on the next generation .

The trees used the surge and their spirituality to form a single fruit , dying in the process . The great accumulation of Life and a hint of Death resulted in a Peak-quality Longevity Treasure . Every single one awarded 950 Mana , one of the highest rewards Zac had seen for individual items . When the fifth sun finally joined the others , Zac understood why .

There was only a short window of opportunity every ten days , and few trees managed to form a Five-Life Fruit . Even with Forester’s Constitution] and his Lucky Beads] , Zac barely found one just before one of the suns dipped beneath the horizon . As a huge snake gobbled it down after slaughtering dozens of enemies for the prize .

Two clouds of Life and Death shrouded the wounded beast just as it was about to slither away , and it didn’t even get to release a hiss before its huge head flew into the sky . Zac flashed over and extracted the fruit after some gory digging . It was covered in blood and bile , but it counted according to Null . It was a nice little bonus that would pay for the outing , but Zac was more interested in the real prize . Thanks to Valsa he already knew what he was looking for , and it wasn’t far away .

Two days later , Zac panted in the middle of an enormous clearing , his body seemingly as small as an ant before the severed tree . Its size was an aberration in this huge jungle of death and rebirth , clearly indicating it had some secret . Said tree had been Zac’s target since day one , and it hadn’t been difficult to track down . The only reason it was allowed to remain standing was that it exuded an incredibly deadly aura .

The tree stockpiled vast amounts of Life every surge and then transformed into a protective domain that kept even Late-stage Beast Kings at bay . Even Zac’s Void Vajra Constitution wasn’t enough to withstand that much weaponized Life , and he had been forced to activate Void Zone] to get close . Valsa had guessed the tree contained a Supreme Life treasure and had even planned to leak its details to Zac to lure him over . The events in the Stand of Saeward had preempted those plans , and they’d turned into an opportunity for him instead .

A throng of corpses were strewn around him , most impaled by still-slithering roots . Activating Primal Edict] in a Life-attuned region had worked wonders , and the skill even killed the Middle-stage leader while Zac dealt with the others . The killed beasts had six legs with skin flaps between , looking a bit like supersized flying squirrels .

The squirrels were the only ones who could withstand the old tree’s domain , having formed a symbiotic relationship . Yet even they were covered in soul-chilling growths and tumors , unable to fully endure the tree’s natural aura . Yet they desperately defended their home when the domain failed to repel Zac . He was essentially a homewrecker , but he didn’t feel bad . These little bastards had been harassing him for days , launching deadly sneak attacks and disappearing into the dense tree crowns above .

Zac jumped onto the trunk , and splinters flew in every direction as he dug toward its center . The tree contained immense life force even after being felled and the broken wood mended before his very eyes . The tree branches were digging into the ground to create a new root system . The reason the tree had such a stubborn life force was soon made apparent .

In its center was a single strand of hair , shimmering with monstrous amounts of Life . It was almost as thick as Zac’s pinky finger but no more than half a meter long . Zac didn’t know what kind of beast it once belonged to , but something had transformed it into a Supreme Treasure of Pure Life . It was even covered in dense markings that made Zac think of the Stele of Conflict .