Chapter 383: Net Positive
Nyxalia had to get as far away from Ashlock as she could. His all-encompassing presence that blanketed the land was all too enticing. It was as if Nightrose City's streets were slathered in sweet honey while she was starving—no, she was absolutely ravenous. It was driving her insane as her Netherwood Wraith body was trying to devour her from within.
It's fine. It's going to be okay. I'm okay. Nyxalia leaned on her other soul in Tartarus to maintain her sanity. If not for it serving as a mental rock, she would have lost control back there. The feeling of harvesting power straight from another—it was intoxicating. It felt like cheating as if her entire life until now had been a lie. All those decades spent hiding away in dark moss-filled caves, meditating while droplets of water trickled down her face as she slowly became one with the darkness now felt like a waste. It had been agonizing, but at the time, the growth in cultivation had been worth it.
But now she could grow in a different way, so to sate her hunger, she had run away toward distant souls. As evening fell, there was a feeling of unease and terror in the wilderness beyond Nightrose City as shadow tendrils struck out relentlessly from a withering mass phasing in and out of reality. Nyxalia feasted on anything and everything that had a heartbeat and, more importantly, a soul. They were all so weak, like little fireflies in the night.
Ashlock was like a blazing sun of power in comparison to these insects. Nyxalia glanced toward the east, where the sea of power converged—Red Vine Peak. She was far enough away to barely resist, but even from out here, she could still see his vast presence dominating a large part of the wilderness. Maybe a tiny taste of Ashlock's soul would be fine... he wouldn't even notice—no, these insects will do. Nyxalia returned to devouring anything she could get her tendrils on. While she referred to these monsters as insects because they might as well have been when compared to her cultivation level, some were tree-sized monsters in the Soul Fire Realm, yet they died all the same.
Hundreds of monsters perished within minutes, and the wilderness, once home to a chorus of howls and sounds of battle, had fallen deathly silent. The only evidence of the one-sided slaughter was a breeze carrying a cloud of soulless dust to sprinkle across the grass in Nyxalias' wake as she moved further west, deeper into the Blood Lotus Sect's territory.
Between each city in the Blood Lotus Sect and other demonic sects were vast, untamed swathes of land known to cultivators as the wilderness. Here, animals were mutated by the ambient Qi into monsters. Cultivators usually had little reason to interact with these monsters. They rarely made it to the Star Core Realm as making it to such a stage required protection from others, something most monsters found hard to come by. Because of this, cultivators could fly over them on guarded airships without wasting their Qi.
I used to be the same. I always dreaded long trips through the wilderness between cities to delve into rifts and sell my wares, as I would have to waste Qi flying on my sword or battling through the endless wilderness. But now... I gain power the more I kill. Yet why am I only getting hungrier the more I devour? Am I losing control over this body?
It was a terrifying thought. After experiencing such a ridiculous way to gather Qi, there was no way she could go back to her old way of gathering Qi as a tree or human. She wanted to continue living as a Netherwood Wraith. So why? Why did she hunger so?
Let's think. Ashlock said he gained power through harvesting the souls of others, yet he never slaughtered everything in his vicinity like I have so far. Nyxalia paused near a calm lake and focused intently on the peaceful water illuminated by streaks of sunlight in a vain attempt to relax her ravenous hunger. Unfortunately, all she could see were the tiny white orbs that were souls belonging to fish in the lake's depths. Wait, tiny white orbs.