The young man's footsteps echoed through the tower. In the darkness, they sounded especially clear.

He left the room and locked the door behind him.

Lloyd had seen those paintings. Perhaps he linked Ruan Xing's identity to the Holy Land and filled in the blanks with his imagination. No wonder Ruan Xing didn't even need to alter his memory, and he still followed orders so loyally.

As Ruan Xing walked up the stairs, his hand brushed along the wall. He recalled what it was like when he first received that soul.

It was a small but very tenacious soul.

He held it tightly in his arms and refused to let go for a long time.

"This took a lot of effort to find. Be careful," his teacher had warned. "This soul is still very weak. You'll have to find a way to nurture it."

So, Ruan Xing began studying soul magic.

His teacher's Mage Tower spirit had also been personally captured by him. It was said to be the forcibly extracted soul of a powerful dragon. Using strong creatures' souls as tower spirits was a common practice among mages after all.

It was rare for anyone to use a human soul, let alone the soul of a dead person. They were too weak, and frankly, not worth the cost.

But Ruan Xing refused to give up.

He worked on strengthening himself while also trying to communicate with the soul, even though there was never any feedback, just silence.

The soul had been severely damaged, and much of its energy was worn away.

Still, Ruan Xing carefully guided its spirit, trying to awaken its intelligence.

Day after day, as Ruan Xing trained, his magic continued to improve.

Finally, the tiny glowing soul responded. Ruan Xing was overjoyed. He tried to decipher the message and heard just two words: "Like… like."

A childish voice expressed its affection, making Ruan Xing nearly cry.

That faint voice felt like it could disappear at any moment, but he clung to it like hope.

He constantly fed the soul with powerful materials, nurturing that little light.

No one else understood. All the tower spirits they had seen were mighty and resilient souls. Who would ever feed a dead soul like this? It just burns through resources!

But Ruan Xing didn't care.

He provided it with the rarest materials, guided it patiently, and taught it the most basic knowledge. At the same time, he planned to build the strongest Mage Tower in order to bind that soul to the most powerful vessel.

Nothing was more valuable and enduring than a mage's entire wealth and strength.

Ruan Xing spent centuries gathering resources. Eventually, he completed the tower and embedded the soul within it. Every room, every vein of the tower, became part of its body.

In a way, he had given it eternal life.

But that happiness lasted only a short time.

Ruan Xing's eyes lifted, bloodshot. He asked Fu Gui, "Do you know Fu Zhi's origins?"

Fu Gui nodded. "He was the kid Will picked up twenty years ago. When they found him, he was supposedly barely breathing. The Tower spared no effort to save him. That guy showed amazing combat ability since childhood. By thirteen, he was already completing missions alone, better than many senior members. He officially joined the Investigation Corps at fifteen."

"I remember it was when he turned twenty-one that the Enforcement Division gave him his rank, and it has been that way ever since."

Ruan Xing asked, "Was he barely breathing, or… not breathing at all?"

Fu Gui froze. What does that mean?

Why would Will save… a dead person?

No way.

Fu Gui said, "Of course, he was close to death. Otherwise, how could a dead person be revived—"

Then Fu Gui remembered the first time he met Ruan Xing. At that time, he was barely breathing, too.

No. When Ruan Xing was carried onto the vehicle, he had already stopped breathing, but in one moment, he came back to life again.

Fu Gui thought it was his imagination. But now, maybe it wasn't.

The crow puffed up his chest, eyes wide. "Are you saying Fu Zhi might have come from the same place as you?"

Ruan Xing said nothing. His damp footsteps trailed behind him as he came to a stop.

Even though Fu Zhi never admitted it, and probably had no memory of it either, Ruan Xing just had this feeling. Deep down, he already knew the answer, but he had always been too afraid to believe it.

He quickened his pace.

"He's not in the tower." Yin Zhu's traces had disappeared.

The faint feedback from the Mage Tower told him that Yin Zhu had escaped.

Lloyd shouted from above, "Over here!"

He was pointing to the spot where Yin Zhu had last appeared.

When Ruan Xing entered, he looked around. It was a study. One of the many in the tower meant for apprentices. But he didn't have any students yet.

Lloyd held his chest, pointing naturally at the magic circle on the ground. "The Administrator just teleported away from here."

A clear betrayal with no sense of loyalty as a subordinate.

Ruan Xing raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you afraid that he will come after you?"

Lloyd coughed twice. "It is fine. He never cared about me. He just saw us as tools. I've been sick of him for a long time."

"That guy is just a thief. He could not even open the front door! He is obviously not legit!" Lloyd huffed. "You are the real master here, right? I saw the paintings. Not even the Administrator could destroy them. You must be really powerful!"

Ruan Xing looked at Lloyd's show of loyalty with interest.

This guy probably knew his previous identity was fake and sensed that he wasn't someone to mess with, so he switched sides immediately.

But Ruan Xing didn't care. Whatever Lloyd's motives were, it didn't matter. What mattered now was finding Yin Zhu.

He nodded with a smile. "Don't worry. I'll take care of him."

Lloyd chuckled nervously and shivered. He suddenly felt incredibly lucky that he didn't try anything against this youth. Otherwise, he wouldn't even be alive to hear that line.

Ruan Xing stepped onto the teleportation array. Lloyd's face disappeared as the scene shifted, and he arrived in a new place.

It seemed to be underground. Water dripped from the stone ceiling, the space was dark, and the old black kerosene lamps on the walls barely lit the area.

Fu Gui whispered, "You better be careful. That guy doesn't play fair. He's an old schemer and might ambush you!"

Yin Zhu was like a slippery catfish: dark, agile, and hard to catch unless you stayed sharp.

Following the only path forward, Ruan Xing heard sounds gradually becoming clearer from the deepest part of the cave. It sounded like people, but not quite. Mixed within were constant rustling noises. Ruan Xing couldn't match it with anything he remembered.

He walked further, and the cave suddenly opened up. A bright light hit him, forcing his pupils to constrict. An instinctive response to sudden exposure.

But what he saw next shocked even Ruan Xing, who had seen many horrors.

In a huge cavern was a deep pit, almost a hundred meters wide and seemingly bottomless. Inside were countless white-haired humans, stacked layer upon layer, packed tightly together.

None of them wore clothes, and their appearances were grotesque. Unlike the normal people Ruan Xing had seen in Mist City, these ones had multiple heads, four arms, or just one eye and one ear.

Most were deformed.

But a few looked normal. These relatively intact bodies were tangled together, engaging in intimate acts, one after another, endlessly. Their faces were flushed and feverish, their mouths letting out sounds that made the heart race.

Even beasts don't act this crazed.

These people were alive, writhing in the pit like pale maggots. Tens of thousands, perhaps even more, crammed into this narrow space.

All around the edges were black, sludge-like substances. Some people climbed on top of others and knelt at the rim of the pit. They shoved unknown material into their mouths, devouring it frantically.

In the distance, white-haired women with swollen bellies gave birth. The red, newborn babies were pulled out like slabs of meat. After each birth, the women's stomachs didn't shrink. They just gave birth to more. The wet babies were tossed aside while the unfazed mothers shoved food into their mouths as the infants wailed.

Not far away, the corpse of a pollutant lay on the ground. Beside it, an open bamboo cage held several crying babies, clearly meant for collection.

Ruan Xing's stomach turned. He nearly vomited.

But Fu Gui didn't have such restraint. After taking one look, he immediately puked over the edge of the pouch.

"Urgh!"

Ruan Xing stared at the grotesque scene. Alongside his disgust, a chill crept up his spine.

These humans clearly looked like locals from the Holy City.

So, this… was how the city's residents were "born"?

Holding back his revulsion, Ruan Xing scanned the area and finally spotted a small path in the distance. But just as he moved to go, danger surged around him.

He dodged a black tendril. Looking up, he saw a black figure curled on the ceiling of the cave.

Yin Zhu had grown larger than before, and his body was visibly expanding.

His tendrils stretched across the top layer of human heads, as if he were controlling them.

The humans rapidly withered, as though their life force had been drained. Wrinkles spread across their skin, movements slowed, and then they died silently, turning into shriveled husks. Their bodies were pushed down by others, forming the base of the pit.

Some people, even while eating, died mid-bite. Their bodies froze in that position, lifeless, and were quickly replaced by others.

"You're really troublesome."

Yin Zhu's hoarse voice came, but this time it no longer sounded old. It had returned to the tone of someone around thirty. His face looked younger, too.

It was his life-absorbing power.

Fu Gui had been right. This guy's ability was monstrous.

"Since you've seen this, I can't let you live."

Yin Zhu let out a twisted laugh. His black limbs extended toward Ruan Xing. "Still alive after a hundred years? Let me see what trick you used!"

He assumed Ruan Xing had lived for over a century and somehow managed to avoid death. In reality, Ruan Xing had only been in this world for a few months.

Ruan Xing leapt lightly and dodged the tendril. It hit the ground and stuck with force that cracked the stone beneath.

"As an Administrator, is this how you treat your city's citizens?"

Ruan Xing threw a fireball at him. Yin Zhu, who had been stiff before, could now dodge thanks to the life energy he had absorbed.

He grabbed one of the humans nearby.

That person only let out a simple "Ahh," like a creature with no sense of self. Less like a human and more like an unsocialized humanoid being.

Yin Zhu laughed. "Citizens? They are just my blood bags."

To him, their only use was providing life energy.

He shoved a black tendril into the human's mouth. Instantly, the white-haired body shriveled up like a drained juice pouch. Nothing more than food for Yin Zhu.

The insane reproduction rate and crazed behavior kept the pit's population shockingly high. Even with constant deaths, whether by exhaustion or being crushed, it didn't matter.

The "normal" ones were picked to be pets while the rest were dumped into this recycling pit for "waste utilization."

Yin Zhu didn't see them as people. Their living conditions were worse than those of livestock. Even livestock owners cared about yield, but these humans were like roaches, left to rot on their own.

Seeing Ruan Xing frown, Yin Zhu sneered. "Impressed by my work?"

Ruan Xing narrowed his eyes, clearly displeased. "Disgusting."

"Disgusting?" Yin Zhu seemed amused, like he had just heard the funniest joke. "What's disgusting about this? It's just another way to survive. Some people would kill for this chance."

Like a spider, he climbed across the cave ceiling, draining the humans below, trying to suck them all dry.

Yin Zhu mocked him. "You're the abnormal one. With all that power, you still have a coward's soul. What good is being a mage if you don't use your strength? You're still just a worthless bug."

"Even with only part of the writings deciphered, it's already overpowered. If we could unlock them all, immortality would no longer be a fantasy."

His eyes grew crazed. He muttered to himself, "If Will knew about you, he would go absolutely mad. His research would skyrocket. Sacrificing you would benefit everyone. I should just capture you now!"

He threw something into the mouth of one of the white-haired humans. The person screamed, black spots spread rapidly across their body, and right before Ruan Xing's eyes, they began to mutate.

Transforming into a spider-like creature in real time.

Fu Gui could not hold back anymore. "You people are f***ing insane! You disgusting freaks deserve to go straight to hell!"

Yin Zhu looked into Fu Gui's pouch and blinked, then suddenly burst out laughing. "Ai Sa, look at you now. Hiding in a human's pocket just to stay alive. Have you forgotten how you used to grovel in front of Will?"

Fu Gui's whole body began to tremble.