Epoch of Twilight

Countless bolts of lightning looked like they were absorbed by the shade of the tree. From afar, the tree was lit up like a giant beam of light. It was a stunning scene to behold. The light continued to spread throughout the tree until it reached the roots. The terrifying energy made the place a horrifying electric field with arcs of static electricity shooting through the air.

Luo Yuan felt like a magnet. His body released galvanic electric energy, not unlike Electro! But, he did not dare stand there a moment longer. He leaped out of the way and, fortunately, he did not land too close to the electric field. He landed at the edge of the roots where the safe zone was a mere two kilometers away. He ran at full force and left the roots of the tree far behind in less than 10 seconds.

However, he did not stop running as he knew he was not in the clear. The giant tree’s roots ran deep into the Earth, and what was on the surface was just the tip of an iceberg. It was a surprise that the roots burrowed deep into the barren land of hills. He ran for more than 10 minutes until he was almost a hundred kilometers away before he felt it was safe to slow down.

Lush greens growing abundantly was his signal that he was at a safe distance. Apparently, the lifeless lands on the surface were caused by the scorching heat from the lightning roots underground. Once he saw a sign of greens, he knew that the place was completely out of the range of the tree of lightning and that he was out of the danger zone. Under the rain, he quickly climbed up to a giant tree and stood on the highest branch to have a better look of his surroundings. Lightning and thunder burst through the storm clouds that darken the sky. Although he was far away, the mind-boggling giant lightning tree looked like it was right in front of him, emitting blinding rays of light in every direction. It was launching beams light into the sky and looked to be also pulsing energy into the ground. Under the gloomy sky, it seemed like the only source of light in the entire land!

Luo Yuan was stunned and his mind wandered into oblivion. Fortunately, the abnormal thunderstorm was gone as quickly as it appeared. Just a few raindrops scattered the surface before it stopped altogether. A few minutes later, the clouds disappeared and the sun was shining through the area.

The Lightning Tree with its giant shadow appeared again. The leaves were shining and there were lights, occasionally bursting out of them. The tree trunk remained a blinding bright white, but it seemed to be getting much dimmer than it was as it was becoming darker and darker. The high temperature of the energy radiating from the tree caused a fog to rise around it. Soon, the entire tree was shrouded in the fog. From afar, it looked like a tree from a fairy tale. It was unreal.

Suddenly, Luo Yuan realized that the system did not update him on any missions related to the giant tree from the start until that very moment. It was shocking!

The system had never announced a mission to him at all. Based on his past experience, he would have probably received a level seven or level eight mission and seeing that he did not receive any, this only meant that this tree was of level nine or above. Any missions that were level nine and above would be cause for worry. For such level nine creatures, it was beyond his imagination and way above his skill set. Although it was just a tree, he dared not underestimate it.

Its ability to absorb lightning alone implied that it harnessed some terrifyingly powerful energy. Moreover, the detection technique showed that it had a sort of spirituality within it. Although he was interested in the physical characteristics of the giant tree, he was afraid of the consequences if he was to touch it. His ability to predict future outcomes was no help to him in this case. The two-second foresight he had could do nothing against an agile creature like this that attacked as fast as lightning. Two seconds was way too short to make a difference against such plant-based mutated creature with its deadly arcs of static electricity.

Perhaps it would not have done anything if he had only retrieve one of its roots in the beginning. But, with its unpredictable temperament, it could change its mind and obliterate him with some murderous attack. By then everything would be too late, mere seconds of an interval. In the time of the cruel apocalypse, he survived by doing what was necessary, sometimes to terrible ends. But, he would never risk his life or endanger anyone who was with him when he encountered a danger he could not handle. For his time in the Ghost Horse, his thoughts were consumed by the Earth’s Pulse.

...

As Luo Yuan was not in a rush to leave, he decided to take a nap on the tree he was in. It was close to the ocean as the rest of his journey would mostly be by the ocean. Aside from some scattered islands on the ocean that he could find, if he were lucky, there would not be many places for him to land and rest. Thus, he had to recuperate completely before he could fly to Borneo at once. Physical strength was easy to recover, but his Will would take a while each time he used it. He sat quietly in the tree and meditated. Perhaps due to the lightning tree, the mutated creatures here seemed tiny. When it was close to noon, Luo Yuan opened his eyes, well rested. It had been some time since he had an undisturbed moment of peace.

By then, his Will that was drained was completely recovered. He gazed at the lightning tree from his perch up high. It looked like a thunderstorm was coming and the tree was once again ready to absorb its meal of lightning! He sighed and took one last look at the tree, watching it pulse menacingly. He took off the plasma band on his forehead and continued his journey.

After fighting through the thunderstorm created by the Lightning Tree, he arrived at the ocean 20 minutes later! The coast during the apocalypse was not at all what it used to be. All kinds of plants carpeted the sandy beaches and crept their way into the shallow parts of the ocean. From above, Luo Yuan could see the thick roots of trees burrowed deep in the sea water. It was all green, a forest that was 10 kilometers wide, extending deep into the sea. Many seagulls flew on top of the sea-forest, squawking noisily as he flew by.

Large schools of fishes swam vigorously in the water, creating abnormal waves against the tide of the ocean. Further, in the distance, a gigantic whirlpool had formed in the middle of the sea. A 100 meters long giant beast suddenly emerged out of the whirlpool and let out a loud shriek into the sky. The waves crashed and the roar resonated for miles around.

That was the ocean, a terrifying area in the apocalypse! 99% of living beings on earth thrived under the waters on the ocean. Not long since the apocalypse, it was the first place to fall to mutation. The vast ocean became a breeding ground for the mutated creatures almost instantly. The many different conditions underwater created incredibly unpredictable and dangerous beasts. Nobody could imagine what horrifying water demons lurked under the deep blue sea.

Perhaps to humans, it would forever remain a mystery. Humans could only see some of the mutated creatures’ through satellite imagery, but, the dangerous mutated beast lived a long distance away from human civilization. Therefore they were not a threat to human beings at all.

While Luo Yuan was watching in silence, a giant seagull flying by noticed his presence. It folded its wings and dove down from the sky at Luo Yuan like an arrow. It was so fast that there was a sonic boom as it broke the sound barrier! Its speed was pass had surpassed the speed of sound, but it had not even reached its maximum agility.

Within seconds, the seagull was dangerously close to him.

Luo Yuan frowned. Although he too was insanely fast, aerodynamic and was skilled at high-speed attack maneuvers in the air, he had weaknesses. Apart from the obvious one which was the stopping in mid air, he had problems changing directions too.

He gripped his saber tight with not even the slightest hint of fear in his eyes. The bird was nothing compared to the giant golden bird he saw at the lake earlier. The difference was just so apparent that he did not even break a sweat at all. He grinned as he waited for the bird to come close, as he was already poised to kill it!

But then, he released the death grip he had on his saber, as he saw what would happen next. He was shocked!

The seagull flew right through his body!

There was no collision nor was there any contact at all. He was like a shadow, nothing but an illusion that had enticed the bird. The seagull circled him, puzzled and afraid of what had happened. As it looked upon Luo Yuan, it suddenly backed way and shrilled in fear!

Soon after, it fled the place as fast as it could, as if it had seen a ghost. Luo Yuan looked at the space bubble that surrounded him. Upon further scrutiny, he noticed that there was a gentle breeze flowing inside the bubble. He was stunned. In some context, his ability to move through the fourth dimension meant that he could transport himself through the space-time fabric. The inside of the space-time bubble should be independent of the world outside it where these two spaces had no contact between them. In other words, the inside and outside of the space-time bubble could be considered to be two completely different worlds.

Attacks from outside the space-time bubble could not touch him but at the same time, he could not attack from the inside out. Such functions would allow him to avoid obstacles without having to move a muscle. Luo Yuan felt a sense of freedom from the terrors around him. He felt like he had the world in the palm of his hand!

He did not have to worry about flying in straight lines anymore and, most importantly, he no longer had to worry about crashing into things or attacking mutated beasts as he flew by. He could even fly through a mountain! Nothing could stop him as long as it was not a gravitational-celestial-enhanced-super-being.

As time went by, his confidently flew faster and faster. He flew up to the clouds, where the view of the ocean became that of a deep blue canvas that was filled with curvy threads of waves!

He looked carefully at the scattered islands along the way and matched them with the satellite images he had memorized. Apart from occasionally adjusting his course, he enjoyed the complete freedom of flying.

The journey was much faster than he imagined. In less than an hour, a giant island appeared before him. Before the apocalypse, Borneo was the third largest island in the world with a surface area of 700,000 square kilometers. Although part of its surface had sunk due to the rising sea-level, it still was massive. It was more than 600 kilometers long and more than 400 kilometers wide in the north south side.

The entire island was filled with lush greenery and living organisms. At the same time, that implied the most definite presence of danger. Luo Yuan descended and landed on the shore. The strength of his curvature flight was incredibly small, there was barely a wave made in the air. Although only a tiny ripple was made on the water, there was no guarantee that it would not be noticed by the extraterrestrial civilization. For safety purposes, he chose to land the far edge of the island.

Just as he landed, a mutated crab with froth oozing from its mouth darted his way and attacked him. It resembled a crab but was housed in a flat metal-like shell with eight strong claws, instead of two. It came at him very quickly, and with its claws in the air, it looked like a top with a blur of razor sharp blades, dancing in the air.

Luo Yuan pulled out his saber and leaped more than 10 meters into the air, out of the reach of the whirlwind of claws. He landed in front of it, aimed at its shell and split it in half. An invisible space wave slashed straight between its eyes. The three-storey tall creature was cut clean into half!

A few other crabs that were watching on, plotting their ambush, ran for their lives immediately. They disappeared into the jungle in the blink of an eye.

...

It was the boundary line of the ocean and the land. Most of the mutated creatures here had the marine animal characteristics. There was a lobster-like mutated beast that looked like an armor lying on a hill of sea shells. There was a new amphibian hybrid that was from a fish family. Not only were the creatures huge, they were very peculiar too. It stunned Luo Yuan who had only encountered land-based mutated beasts this whole time.

He did not dare to stay for long. He fled the place with his Zhanmadao held high before him. There were lesser marine creatures after he had passed more than 10 kilometers in land.

The buildings occupied by the extraterrestrial civilization were located at the bottom of a valley in the middle of the Borneo mainland. It was approximately 300 kilometers from where he was. With his speed, Luo Yuan estimated he could reach the place before dark.

Before the apocalypse, the population of the Borneo lands was low. Now it looked like it was in full bloom, with plants entangled along most parts of the dark forest. The was no military presences in the country and it was one of the areas that fell first when the apocalypse happened. By far, it was the most dangerous area that he had ever been to, compared to all the rest. As he was walking, there were already three missions sent from the system.

Knowing that the extraterrestrial civilization was near, he ignored all the missions that came his way. He needed his undivided attention for the mission ahead, everything else could wait. He did not stop walking until it was almost 5 pm in the evening, he slowed down and exercised more caution as he noticed a building in the valley, right in front of him!

He walked for another few minutes and stopped as he passed through the front of the valley. He found a cave to rest safely, undetected by the extraterrestrial civilization just outside. The sky was not dark yet, so he decided he would wait a little while longer for complete darkness. He needed the element of surprise against his enemies.

Whether being in the darkness or not, he had a feeling that it would not affect the advanced extraterrestrial technology, but no matter what, even the machines needed to rest and the chance for error on their part was present.

Luo Yuan did not know if the extraterrestrial civilization was the same as mankind as he knew it, where they worked in the morning and rest at night or if they were some intelligence that feared the light, making them the complete opposite to human beings. No matter what, before he could confirm anything, he felt more comfortable to investigate at night.

The cave was small, it could only fit one person comfortably. Luo Yuan felt a little hungry and looked around the cave. There was a movement just a few feet from him. With his incredibly fast reflexes, he shot out his hand and held down a half-meter long mutated beast carefully with his hand. No matter how much it struggled, it could move with his hand at its neck. Then, the sharp sound of bones cracking echoed through the cave. The back of the animals head had caved in, crushed under the force of his grip.

The night was quiet and filled with unpredictable dangers. He needed to be alert at all times and be prepared for an attack at all times. He tore off the skin on the mutated beast’s neck with his fingers. He then bit open at thick exposed artery and swallowed its blood. The disgusting taste made him gag a few times, but he managed to swallow in the end. Soon the mutated beast was sucked dry, and he ditched its carcass outside of the cave.

He could not light a fire as it would attract unwanted attention. It might have been no harm at all, but he could not risk it. The extraterrestrial civilization was far more dangerous than a level eight creature. If he was discovered, death or even more terrifying consequences, awaited him.

He took a deep breath and smiled. His blood-stained teeth made him look like a ruthless vampire!

The sky was getting dark, and it was pitch black in the cave. Luo Yuan sat quietly and waited patiently. He took a nap to restore his energy while waiting for the night to come. Time passed by, Luo Yuan remained seated and motionless like a statue.

It was 2 a.m. in the dead of the night. He opened his eyes and looked at his watch.

He stood up quietly and left the cave. He was like a black phantom approaching the valley in silence.

It was his first time here. However, the terrain had been analyzed countless times by the military through satellite imagery. Even if it was an insignificant slope or a pile of rock, they knew it like the back of their hands.

As he was approached the building, Luo Yuan was all fours, crawling forward on the ground. After half an hour, he peered through the bushes to study the building.

There was no moonlight at all that night, and darkness swallowed the entire forest. His pupils were large to catch at illumination that came his way, and they were like black holes in his eyes. In the bushes, a dark-gray crescent shaped building appeared before him.