**Title: Bound by the Heavens, Ascending by the Wife**
**Chapter 4: The Smuggler's Tunnel and the Awakening of the Killing Dao**
The transition from the bustling, chaotic underbelly of the Ghost Market to the smuggler's tunnel was as abrupt as stepping from a blazing furnace into a freezing tomb.
The heavy stone archway behind them sealed shut with a grinding thud, instantly cutting off the cacophony of haggling merchants and desperate loose cultivators. In its place, a suffocating, oppressive silence descended, broken only by the rhythmic, echoing *drip... drip... drip...* of stagnant water falling from the low, jagged ceiling into the puddles below.
The tunnel was barely wide enough for three men to walk shoulder-to-shoulder. The walls were carved from rough, black bedrock, slick with moisture and patches of dying, bioluminescent moss that cast a sickly, pale-green hue over the uneven floor. The air was frigid and smelled heavily of ozone, rotting earth, and the faint, coppery tang of old blood. This was not a path meant for the righteous; it was a vein of darkness carved by thieves, murderers, and those who needed to vanish from the mortal city of Cloudfall without a trace.
Han Lin walked with deliberate slowness, his midnight-black cloak billowing slightly as he moved. His hand remained firmly wrapped around Qingxue's delicate, pale wrist. Beneath her wide-brimmed bamboo hat and white veil, he could feel her trembling. It wasn't the cold that frightened her—the ambient spiritual energy coursing through her newly awakened Level One meridians kept her body completely warm. It was the atmosphere. Her beggar's instincts, honed by years of surviving the worst the mortal world had to offer, were screaming at her that this place was a graveyard.
"Husband..." Qingxue whispered, her voice barely a breath, afraid that speaking any louder might awaken whatever demons slumbered in the dark. "Are we... are we being hunted?"
"Yes," Han Lin replied, his voice calm, devoid of any panic or inflection. He didn't bother to look back.
To his newly refined, Level Six Qi Condensation senses, the tunnel behind them was not empty. His five-element pseudo spirit root might be trash for gathering energy, but the sheer, brute-force volume of perfectly purified, neutral Qi that the System had aggressively pumped into his body had forcefully expanded his spiritual perception. It was like possessing an invisible radar that extended thirty feet in every direction.
He could feel them. Five distinct sources of chaotic, bloodthirsty spiritual energy following roughly forty paces behind, taking great care to muffle their footsteps.
Three of them were at the Fourth Level of Qi Condensation—standard muscle, likely desperate rogues who relied on sheer numbers. One was at the Fifth Level, his Qi fluctuating slightly, indicating a recent, unstable breakthrough.
But the last one... the last one was the problem.
The leader of the pack was at the very peak of the Sixth Level of Qi Condensation. His spiritual signature was dense, heavy, and stank of refined malice. He was actively using a low-tier concealment technique to mask his presence, blending his aura with the damp stone of the tunnel. Against an ordinary Level Six cultivator, it would have worked perfectly. But Han Lin's Qi was of a fundamentally higher purity, allowing him to see right through the murky disguise.
"Do not stop walking, Qingxue. Keep your pace completely even," Han Lin instructed softly, his eyes scanning the tunnel ahead. "When I tell you to move, I want you to step behind the large stalagmite on the left and cover your ears. Do not look, and do not make a sound, no matter what you hear. Do you understand?"
Qingxue swallowed hard. The terror was real, but so was her absolute devotion. The man holding her hand had given her life, food, and the Dao. If he told her to walk into a raging fire, she would do so without hesitation.
"I understand, Husband," she whispered resolutely.
They walked for another three minutes, the tunnel winding deeper into the bedrock beneath the city's outer walls. The bioluminescent moss grew sparser, leaving them in near-total darkness.
Suddenly, Han Lin felt a shift in the air pressure ahead of them.
His eyes narrowed. *Ah. An ambush from the front as well.*
He stopped.
"Now," Han Lin commanded.
Qingxue didn't hesitate. She immediately released his hand and darted to the left, wedging her small frame behind a massive, floor-to-ceiling column of black stone. She crouched down, pressing her hands tightly over her ears beneath her veil, squeezing her eyes shut.
The moment she was out of the line of fire, the silence of the tunnel was shattered.
From the darkness ahead, two more figures stepped out, blocking the path. They held glowing, low-grade spirit stones that illuminated the narrow space. They were both Level Five cultivators, armed with heavy, rusted broadswords that hummed with violent spiritual energy.
Simultaneously, the five pursuers from behind dropped their concealment and closed the distance, sealing the tunnel completely. Han Lin was trapped in a classic pincer maneuver.
"Not another step, Daoist Friend," a grating, gravelly voice echoed from behind him.
Han Lin turned slowly, the hood of his black cloak still obscuring his face.
Standing ten paces away was the peak Level Six cultivator. He was a massive, hulking man with a head completely devoid of hair. A hideous, jagged scar ran from his left ear down to his chin, completely ruining his jawline. He wore a set of tarnished, spiked leather armor and held a terrifying, ghost-head broadsword resting casually on his shoulder. The blade was stained a deep, permanent crimson.
This was Scarface Liu, a notorious loose cultivator who made his living by slaughtering those who won big at the Ghost Market.
"A fine cloak, a confident stride, and a heavy purse," Scarface Liu sneered, revealing a row of yellowed, rotting teeth. "I saw you walk out of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion, Daoist Friend. Elder Mo doesn't personally escort people to the door unless they've just dropped a fortune. You reek of fresh spirit stones."
The other six thugs snickered, slowly drawing their weapons—a mix of crude daggers, iron chains, and hooked swords. They fanned out as much as the narrow tunnel allowed, their eyes locked onto Han Lin with the ravenous hunger of starving wolves.
"I have no interest in your life, Daoist friend," Scarface Liu continued, though the murderous intent radiating from his body completely contradicted his words. "Leave the spatial pouches on the ground. Leave the woman, too. That little mortal pet of yours might fetch a dozen stones at the Spring Lotus Brothel. Do that, and you can walk out of this tunnel with your cultivation intact."
Han Lin stood perfectly still in the center of the damp, glowing tunnel. He looked at the thugs in front of him, then at Scarface Liu and his men behind him.
He had never killed a man before.
In his previous life, the most violent thing he had done was yell at a subordinate over a missed spreadsheet deadline. Even during his year in the cultivation world as a Level 2 spiritual farmer, his life had consisted of tilling soil and bowing to stewards. The concept of taking another human life was deeply alien to his modern earth sensibilities.
But as he stood there, feeling the cold, unadulterated malice pressing in on him, looking at the men who wanted to murder him, steal his wealth, and sell his newly bound wife into slavery... something inside Han Lin shifted.
The chaotic, five-element spiritual energy in his dantian, now forcefully subdued and guided by the overwhelming purity of the System's neutral Qi, began to boil. A profound, icy calm washed over his mind.
This was not Earth. The laws of civilization did not apply here. This was the dark forest. If he showed an ounce of mercy, an ounce of hesitation, he would be a corpse rotting in a gutter, and Qingxue would suffer a fate worse than death.
*If I want to ascend,* Han Lin realized, his eyes turning cold and hard as obsidian beneath his hood, *I must leave a mountain of corpses in my wake.*
Han Lin let out a low, echoing chuckle. It was a sound devoid of any humor, sending a sudden, involuntary shiver down the spines of the lower-level thugs.
"You want my spatial pouches?" Han Lin asked, his voice calm, resonating with a strange, heavy pressure. "Come and take them."
Scarface Liu's eyes narrowed. He was a veteran killer, and his instincts flared. The man in front of him wasn't begging, wasn't panicking, and wasn't trying to negotiate. That meant he either possessed a deadly trump card, or he was bluffing.
"Kill him!" Liu roared, not willing to take the risk himself first. "Chop him to meat paste!"
The three Level Four thugs charged instantly, their faces twisted in savage grins. They channeled their meager Qi into their legs, closing the thirty-foot distance in a fraction of a second. Two swung their rusted swords at Han Lin's neck, while the third aimed a vicious thrust at his gut.
Han Lin didn't draw a weapon. He didn't even step back.
Instead, he casually reached into his left sleeve.
During his year as a spiritual farmer, Han Lin had collected hundreds of useless, trash-tier seeds. Among them were the seeds of the Iron-Thorn Weed—a parasitic, invasive plant that plagued the spiritual rice fields. It grew fast, drained soil nutrients, and possessed thorns hard enough to pierce ordinary leather. To a farmer, they were a nightmare to uproot.
Han Lin pulled a handful of these worthless black seeds from his pocket and threw them casually onto the damp stone floor in front of him.
Simultaneously, he activated the skill he had just acquired from Qingxue's System return.
*Skill: Perfected Plant Catalysis.*
Han Lin stomped his right foot onto the bedrock. He channeled a massive surge of his pure, overwhelmingly dense Wood Qi directly into the stone, directing it straight into the scattered seeds.
What happened next defied all logic of the natural world.
The Iron-Thorn weed seeds didn't just sprout; they detonated.
Fueled by the terrifying purity of a System-granted, mid-stage Qi Condensation aura, combined with a 'Perfected' mastery over plant life that normally took centuries to achieve, the seeds instantly bypassed their natural growth cycle.
*CRACK-BOOM!*
The solid bedrock of the tunnel floor shattered upward like an exploding geyser.
Six massive, writhing tentacles of dark-green plant matter erupted from the stone. They were not weeds. They were terrifying, monstrous vines as thick as tree trunks, covered head-to-toe in jagged, metallic black thorns the size of daggers.
The three charging Level Four thugs didn't even have time to scream.
Two of the massive, thorny vines lashed out with the speed of a striking viper. They didn't just hit the thugs; they skewered them. The foot-long black thorns pierced cleanly through their crude leather armor, through their ribs, and exploded out of their backs in a shower of blood and bone fragments.
The third thug tried to skid to a halt, his eyes wide with absolute terror, but a third vine wrapped around his waist, hoisting him ten feet into the air. With a sickening, wet *crunch*, the vine violently constricted. The thug was instantly bisected, his top half falling to the stone floor in a gruesome spray of crimson.
In less than a single breath, three cultivators were dead. Not just dead, but annihilated with terrifying, casual brutality.
The tunnel fell dead silent, save for the wet sound of blood dripping from the massive, writhing vines that now formed a protective wall in front of Han Lin.
The remaining four thugs, including Scarface Liu, froze in their tracks. The arrogance and bloodlust had been completely wiped from their faces, replaced by the pale, trembling mask of absolute horror.
"W-Wood magic..." one of the Level Five thugs stammered, his sword shaking uncontrollably in his hands. "Impossible! Such speed and power without chanting... is he... is he a Foundation Establishment Senior?!"
Scarface Liu took a step back, cold sweat pouring down his ruined face. He realized instantly that he had kicked a massive, impenetrable iron plate. The sheer density of the Wood Qi required to instantly grow Iron-Thorn weeds to such monstrous proportions was something he had never witnessed in his entire life as a loose cultivator.
"Senior! A misunderstanding!" Scarface Liu suddenly yelled, throwing his ghost-head broadsword onto the ground. He dropped to his knees, ignoring the blood pooling on the floor. "This junior was blind! We mistook you for someone else! Please, spare our dog lives!"
The other three thugs quickly followed suit, dropping their weapons and kowtowing frantically.
Han Lin watched them from behind his wall of writhing, thorny vines. The smell of fresh blood was overpowering in the confined space. His heart was beating fast, but his mind was crystal clear. The initial shock of taking a life had passed, replaced by a cold, calculating pragmatism.
They were begging now, but if he had been weaker, they would have butchered him without a second thought. If he let them go, they would spread rumors of a terrifying Wood-attribute cultivator in the Ghost Market, potentially drawing the attention of the Azure Cloud Sect.
"A misunderstanding?" Han Lin's voice echoed through the tunnel, cold and utterly devoid of mercy. "Yes. You misunderstood who was the hunter, and who was the prey."
Han Lin raised his right hand, his fingers forming a sharp, cutting gesture.
He didn't use the vines. He wanted to test the full capacity of his newly expanded meridians. He channeled the pure, neutral Qi in his dantian, converting it instantly into the Wind attribute—one of his five chaotic roots that was now forcefully empowered by the system.
*Basic Spell: Wind Blade.*
For a Level Two cultivator, a Wind Blade was a pale green crescent of compressed air that could leave a gouge in a brick wall.
For Han Lin, currently at Level Six, fueled by Qi ten times purer than anything found in the mortal realm, the spell transformed into a nightmare.
A massive, three-foot-long crescent of hyper-compressed, shrieking wind materialized in front of him. It glowed with a terrifying, luminescent silver light. The air pressure in the tunnel dropped so drastically that the surviving thugs felt their ears pop.
"No! Wait—!" Scarface Liu screamed, realizing the begging had failed. He desperately tried to summon his Qi to form a protective barrier.
Han Lin swung his arm forward.
The silver Wind Blade shot down the tunnel with the sound of a tearing silk sheet. It was so fast it was barely a blur.
It bypassed the writhing vines entirely and slammed into the two kneeling Level Five thugs in front of Scarface Liu. The basic Qi shields they managed to erect shattered like thin glass. The massive blade of wind cleaved horizontally through their necks, decapitating them instantly.
The blade didn't stop. It continued its deadly trajectory, slamming into Scarface Liu's hastily erected, blood-red Qi barrier.
*BOOM!*
The collision generated a violent shockwave that cracked the walls of the tunnel. Liu's barrier held for exactly half a second before shattering. The kinetic force of the Wind Blade slammed into his chest, throwing his massive, hulking body backward like a broken doll. He hit the stone wall with bone-shattering force, a deep, bleeding gash carved completely across his spiked leather armor, exposing the ribs beneath.
The last remaining thug—the one blocking the tunnel entrance behind them—didn't even try to fight. He turned and sprinted back toward the Ghost Market, screaming in terror.
Han Lin flicked his wrist. One of the massive Iron-Thorn vines extended like a spear, shooting down the tunnel. The heavy black thorn pierced the fleeing thug straight through the back of his skull, killing him instantly before he could take another five steps.
Only Scarface Liu remained.
The peak Level Six killer coughed up a massive mouthful of dark blood, slumping against the wall. His chest was laid open, his organs visibly failing. He looked up at Han Lin, who was slowly walking toward him, the massive vines parting like the Red Sea to let him pass.
"Monster..." Liu wheezed, blood bubbling past his lips. "You... you are no loose cultivator... you are a devil from the great sects..."
Han Lin stopped a few feet away from the dying man. He looked down at him with an emotionless expression.
"You chose this path, Scarface," Han Lin said softly. "In the next life, be sure to open your eyes wider."
Han Lin raised his hand, pointing a single finger at Liu's forehead. A tiny, needle-thin spike of pure Wood Qi shot forward, piercing the man's brain and extinguishing his life instantly.
The battle was over. Six loose cultivators, including a peak Level Six expert, annihilated in less than two minutes.
Han Lin stood amidst the carnage. He waved his hand, cutting off the flow of Qi to the Iron-Thorn vines. Without his terrifying spiritual energy to sustain them, the massive, monstrous plants withered and dissolved into gray ash in a matter of seconds, leaving only the shattered bedrock and the mutilated corpses behind.
He took a deep breath, forcing his raging spiritual energy to calm and return to his dantian. The adrenaline was fading, leaving behind a profound sense of clarity.
He had the power to protect what was his.
Han Lin walked methodically among the corpses. He didn't feel disgusted by the blood or the gore; the System's physical and mental enhancements seemed to have fundamentally rewired his tolerance for violence. He crouched down and began looting.
Loose cultivators were notoriously poor, but they carried their entire net worth on their persons. From the five lower-level thugs, he acquired a handful of chipped spirit stones, some low-grade healing salves, and a few trash-tier weapons that he didn't even bother picking up.
But Scarface Liu was different.
Tied to the inside of the dead leader's leather armor was a small, blood-stained spatial pouch. Han Lin tore it free and injected a sliver of Qi into it to erase the dead man's imprint.
He scanned the contents. His eyes lit up slightly.
Inside were three hundred low-grade spirit stones—a massive fortune for a rogue. There was also a jade slip containing the *Blood-Ghost Cleaver* manual, the mid-tier martial art Liu had likely used. But more importantly, there were two small, sealed porcelain bottles containing *Qi Gathering Pills*. These were genuine, sect-quality alchemical products used to accelerate cultivation at the mid-to-late Qi Condensation stages. They were incredibly expensive on the black market.
"Not a bad harvest," Han Lin muttered, tying the pouch to his own belt.
He turned around and walked back to the large stalagmite where Qingxue was hiding.
"Qingxue," he called out softly. "It's over. You can come out now."
Slowly, hesitantly, the small figure in the white dress peeked out from behind the black stone. She still had her hands clamped over her ears. She lowered them, looking at Han Lin.
Then, her eyes drifted past him.
Despite the dim lighting, the carnage was impossible to miss. The torn bodies, the massive pools of dark blood reflecting the faint luminescent moss, the smell of death—it was a literal slaughterhouse.
Qingxue froze. Her obsidian eyes widened behind her veil. Her breath hitched in her throat, her small chest heaving rapidly.
Han Lin watched her carefully. He didn't try to hide the bodies or shield her eyes. This was the most crucial test. If she broke down, if she became a pacifist terrified of his power, she would become a liability in the future. He needed a Dao Companion who could stand beside him in a world built on bones.
"Look at them, Qingxue," Han Lin said, his voice firm but not unkind. He stepped aside, forcing her to take in the full, gruesome reality of the scene. "Do you see this? This is the truth of the cultivation world."
Qingxue trembled violently. She had seen people beaten to death in the mortal slums over a scrap of food. She had seen cruelty. But she had never seen such casual, absolute destruction wrought in the blink of an eye.
"They wanted to kill me," Han Lin continued, walking toward her. "They wanted to take my wealth. And when they were done with me, they were going to strip you naked, put a collar around your neck, and sell you to a brothel to be used until you died of disease or starvation."
Qingxue flinched as if struck. The reality of his words pierced through her shock, striking a deeply buried chord of primal terror she had carried since she was a child in the gutters.
"I protected you," Han Lin said, stopping directly in front of her. "I killed them so they couldn't touch you. But I cannot always be looking in every direction. The path of immortality is not a fairy tale. It is a war against the heavens, and a war against every other cultivator who wants what you have. If you want to survive, if you want to stand by my side, you must discard your mortal weakness. You must understand that mercy to an enemy is cruelty to yourself."
He looked deeply into her eyes through the thin white veil.
"Do you fear me, Qingxue? Do you despise these bloodstained hands?"
Qingxue stood frozen for a long moment. The smell of blood filled her nose. The sight of the severed bodies burned into her mind.
But then, she looked up at Han Lin. She looked at the man who had bought her a feast, who had given her a bed of silk, who had spoken to her with respect, and who had just effortlessly annihilated six men to protect her from a fate worse than death.
The trembling stopped.
The fear in her obsidian eyes slowly, irrevocably vanished. It was replaced by a profound, chilling clarity. A spark of absolute, unyielding resolve ignited in the depths of her soul.
She reached up with both hands and pushed the wide-brimmed bamboo hat off her head, letting it fall to the damp stone floor. Her stunning, pale face was completely exposed to the dim light.
She took a step forward, closing the distance between them, and gently took Han Lin's right hand—the same hand that had just launched the spell that decapitated two men. She raised it to her cheek, pressing her soft, warm skin against his calloused palm.
"I do not fear you, Husband," Qingxue whispered, her voice steady, possessing a terrifyingly calm resonance that belied her young age. "I only fear losing you. I only fear returning to the dirt."
She turned her head slightly, looking at the mutilated corpse of Scarface Liu. There was no pity in her gaze. Only cold disdain.
"You dirtied your hands for me today," Qingxue said, her grip on his hand tightening. "I am weak now. I could only hide behind a rock while you fought for my life. But I swear to the heavens, Husband... this will be the last time."
She looked back up at him, her obsidian eyes burning with a dark, terrifying devotion.
"I will cultivate. I will grow strong. I will become your sword. Whoever looks at you with greed, I will blind them. Whoever raises a hand against you, I will sever it. Your enemies will be my prey, and I will slaughter them so your hands can remain clean."
It wasn't just a promise. It was an oath sworn on her very soul. In that damp, blood-soaked tunnel, the innocent beggar girl died, and a terrifying future empress forged her core philosophy.
Han Lin felt a shiver run down his spine, not of fear, but of profound awe. He had wanted her to understand survival; he hadn't expected her to formulate an absolute doctrine of slaughter for his sake.
Suddenly, the System panel violently shattered his vision, flashing a blinding, pure white light—a color he had never seen it display before.
*Ding!*
[ **Dao Companion Su Qingxue has experienced a profound psychological epiphany.** ]
[ **Dao Heart Formed: The Asura's Devotion (Killing Dao).** ]
[ **Aptitude Multiplier applied (Heavenly Root).** ]
[ **Mental State / Dao Comprehension triggers a unique System interaction.** ]
[ **Base EXP generated: 1000 Soul Force units.** ]
[ **Tenfold Return triggered!** ]
[ **Host receives: 10,000 Pure Soul Force units!** ]
[ **Warning: Massive influx of spiritual/mental energy detected. Initiating forced breakthrough of the Divine Sense.** ]
"What—?"
Han Lin didn't even have time to brace himself.
This time, the energy didn't flood his dantian or his meridians. It struck his mind directly.
It felt as though an invisible, colossal hammer had smashed into his forehead. Han Lin staggered backward, clutching his head with both hands, a cry of genuine agony tearing from his throat.
"Husband!" Qingxue screamed, lunging forward to catch him as he fell to his knees on the damp stone.
The pain in Han Lin's skull was apocalyptic. His brain felt like it was expanding, pushing against his skull, forced to accommodate a volume of mental energy that a Qi Condensation cultivator was biologically incapable of possessing.
In the cultivation world, 'Divine Sense'—the ability to project one's consciousness out of the body to scan the environment, detect lies, and manipulate distant objects—was an ability strictly reserved for Core Formation experts. Qi Condensation and Foundation Establishment cultivators only possessed basic, heightened instincts.
But the System cared nothing for the rules of the world.
Driven by the tenfold return of Qingxue's terrifyingly pure Dao Heart formation, ten thousand units of pure, unadulterated Soul Force aggressively violently carved out a massive 'Sea of Consciousness' within Han Lin's mind.
For thirty agonizing seconds, Han Lin convulsed on the floor, his eyes rolled entirely into the back of his head, glowing with a blinding, ethereal silver light. Blood began to drip from his nose.
"Husband! Please! Wake up!" Qingxue sobbed, holding his head in her lap, completely ignoring the blood staining her white silk dress. She thought he had been poisoned, or suffered a delayed internal injury from the fight.
Suddenly, the convulsions stopped.
The silver light faded from Han Lin's eyes. He lay there, panting heavily, his chest heaving.
He slowly opened his eyes.
The world... had fundamentally shifted.
He didn't just see the tunnel anymore. He *felt* it. Without moving his head, his mind instantly projected an invisible, spherical domain that extended exactly three hundred feet in every direction.
He could 'see' the corpses in perfect, microscopic detail—the exact rate at which their blood was cooling, the lingering traces of chaotic Qi dissipating from their meridians. He could 'see' Qingxue holding him, perfectly perceiving the flawless, vibrant flow of the Level One Wood Qi inside her body, down to the exact shape of her newly awakened dantian.
He could see through the solid stone walls of the tunnel, sensing the roots of massive ancient trees growing on the surface above them, and the scurrying of rats in the hidden crevices of the bedrock.
He possessed Divine Sense.
At the Sixth Level of Qi Condensation, Han Lin had just acquired the signature, terrifying mental domain of a Core Formation Ancestor.
Han Lin let out a shaky, disbelieving laugh, pushing himself up into a sitting position. He wiped the blood from his nose with the back of his hand.
"I'm fine, Qingxue," Han Lin said, his voice raspy, but echoing with an unnatural, terrifying mental weight that made the air in the tunnel vibrate. "I am more than fine."
He looked at the girl kneeling in front of him, her face stained with his blood and her own tears. Because of his new Divine Sense, he could literally *feel* the purity of her devotion—a bright, burning, uncompromising flame in her soul directed entirely at him.
He reached out and gently brushed a strand of hair from her face.
"Your vow has been witnessed by the heavens, Wife," Han Lin said softly, his eyes burning with intense ambition. "And they have rewarded us immensely for it."
He stood up, pulling her to her feet with him. He picked up her bamboo hat and placed it back on her head, carefully arranging the veil to hide her stunning, dangerous beauty once more.
"Come," Han Lin said, turning his gaze down the dark tunnel toward the exit. "We are leaving this city. It is time we returned to the Azure Cloud Sect. We have wealth to spend, and a very large piece of land to claim."
They walked past the mutilated corpses of the loose cultivators, stepping out of the blood and into the darkness.
In a single day, Han Lin had gone from a miserable, destitute spiritual farmer to a Level Six expert possessing the wealth of a rogue leader, a Perfected plant manipulation skill, the terrifying Divine Sense of an Ancestor, and a bound wife harboring the supreme talent of a Heavenly Root and the ruthless mindset of an Asura.
The dark forest of the cultivation world was vast and terrifying, but Han Lin was no longer prey.
He had become a predator. And he was very, very hungry.