Chapter Two: The Deadly Poison of Immortality

The scenery kept shifting; the endless white snow gave way to withered yellow grass, then to stretches of mountainous forests, and the climate grew warmer. As it soared onward, the eagle began to sense something amiss. First came discomfort in its belly, then a piercing pain, which soon filled its abdomen and burned up into its chest, making its whole body feel as if it were aflame.

When they reached a mountain valley, the eagle could no longer endure. It spat out a mouthful of blood and plummeted from the sky.

“This is bad!”

The deity inhabiting Sun Licheng’s body abruptly sat up, ready to unleash divine power—but paused.

“Smash into a meat patty? That’s perfect. That fellow might go mad. If he does, it’ll be the perfect opportunity for me to deal with him. Hmph… anyway, this body can heal itself. It just needs to eat more, that’s all.”

With a vicious tone, the deity lay back to watch Sun Licheng's high-altitude descent.

The truth was, the deity had never given up on invading Sun Licheng’s soul. Yet confronted with the soul of a traveler from another world, all attempts had failed.

If Sun Licheng knew, he’d explain: He came from Earth, a completely different system from this world—like two distinct operating systems: Windows and Linux. Unless a compatible protocol was established, well… it simply wouldn’t work.

As long as Sun Licheng’s consciousness didn’t collapse, not even unconsciousness could grant the deity victory.

In fact, as a mortal, Sun Licheng’s soul was far weaker than the deity’s. Unfortunately, to accommodate its own divine power, the deity had specially reinforced his brain, inadvertently strengthening Sun Licheng’s soul to the point where it became extremely difficult to overcome.

Now, the deity resorted to brute force—abandoning external intrusion, using overwhelming mental pressure to force Sun Licheng’s will to break from within, thereby annihilating his soul—a truly cruel tactic.

A muffled boom sounded as the eagle and Sun Licheng slammed into the ground.

Falling from nearly a thousand meters, the mighty Eberlsoft eagle was reduced to a mangled heap in a cloud of blood. Sun Licheng, cushioned somewhat by the eagle’s body, was still gravely wounded; half his head was gone.

The thick scent of blood drifted through the wilderness, a beacon in the night.

Silence didn’t last long. The sounds of beasts prowling and growling echoed from all directions.

Night had fallen, the darkness impenetrable. Ahead, two pools of blood and flesh—one large, one small—were like magnets, drawing pairs of glowing green and red eyes.

...

When Sun Licheng opened his eyes, a beast resembling a leopard was stumbling away in the distance.

Staring at the leopard, Sun Licheng tried to open his eyes wider for clarity, but found he could only open his left eye. A haze seemed to veil his vision, making everything appear indistinct. Through this mist, the landscape was a muddy gray, and combined with the staggering leopard, it created an uncanny scene.

Before Sun Licheng could adjust to this sight, the leopard suddenly stiffened and collapsed with a thud.

The fallen leopard startled the birds in the trees; they took flight, squawking noisily.

Unable to move his body, Sun Licheng couldn’t see that the area beside the leopard was littered with corpses—including some gigantic beasts.

From a bird’s-eye view, one would see a mass of bodies radiating out from the point where Sun Licheng and the eagle had crashed—like ripples from stones thrown into a calm lake.

Among the many corpses were huge beasts, nimble foxes and wildcats, and flocks of fierce birds. Without exception, every creature dead here was a ferocious carnivore.

More beasts and birds of prey continued to arrive, but the heavy scent of death emanating from the piles of bodies drove them away. When the last brave beast—the leopard—succumbed to poison, none dared approach.

...

Pain—a searing agony—washed over Sun Licheng like waves, invading his mind.

Though he had survived, his injuries were catastrophic. For instance, he now only had his left eye; his right had vanished, and even the skull there was caved in. With his head in such a state, his body’s condition could only be imagined.

Sun Licheng struggled desperately to move, but a fresh surge of pain overwhelmed him and he slipped into unconsciousness.

...

The deity, seeing Sun Licheng unconscious again, grew furious. If one plan failed, he’d try another—this time, a more sinister method.

Soon, he used divine power to heighten Sun Licheng’s sensitivity, greatly amplifying his pain.

“Haha! Let’s see if this doesn’t kill you with agony. If you can’t bear it, your consciousness will collapse!”

After transforming the body, the deity cackled with satisfaction.

...

Upon awakening again, Sun Licheng found he could move his head. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he raised his head and surveyed the scene with his single eye. Beyond the heap of animal corpses lay a dense broadleaf forest on the plateau. The trees stood tall and lush, a far cry from the snowy wasteland he’d first encountered. In the distance, ice peaks and snow mountains rose majestically.

The weather was still cold, but much better than where he had first arrived.

Happiness was fleeting. Soon, Sun Licheng felt the enhanced pain.

Worse yet, along with the torment, the nerves at his wounds sent indescribable itching signals to his brain.

Moreover, to his surprise, despite his gut being ruptured, he felt hunger—a hunger so severe it made life seem unbearable. Did he even have a stomach now?

Pain, itchiness, and hunger assailed Sun Licheng’s nerves mercilessly.

Just as the deity prepared to watch his breakdown, Sun Licheng employed his ultimate countermeasure—unconsciousness.

“Damn it! I’ve heightened his senses, why doesn’t this bastard’s will collapse?”

The deity roared in Sun Licheng’s mind.

Sun Licheng felt as if he’d entered purgatory, waking and fainting in cycles, each time enduring endless suffering.

When he finally awoke again, it was the early hours of the next day.

The temperature here was low; nights were frightfully cold.

Now, Sun Licheng fully experienced what it was like to lie naked in the bitter cold, especially with his senses cruelly amplified by that unscrupulous deity—it was an agony beyond human imagination.

He recalled how, in his youth, he’d watched certain films from distant islands, seeing actresses frolic nude in the snow. Only now did he realize the true cost of such scenes.

At this moment, Sun Licheng thought death would be a relief. To endure such repeated torment, he must have sinned greatly in a past life, condemned not to hell but to suffer in this foreign world. Ripping pain, bone-deep itching, nearly numbing cold, and finally, the relentless hunger—a taste beyond words.

“I want to go home! I want to see my wife and child!”

In this hell, Sun Licheng clenched his fists, rallying his spirit.

He was depressed, and the deity in his mind was even more so.

Each time he saw hope, the deity grew excited, but Sun Licheng’s mind refused to collapse!

Now, His Majesty no longer lay in bed but paced about, cursing Sun Licheng, unable to comprehend how a mortal’s will could be so stubborn.

“Perhaps this is the fate bestowed upon me by the wheel of destiny,” the deity said sorrowfully.

...

Sun Licheng finally managed to move, and his first act was to eat!

He was so famished it felt as if his heart were trapped between two burning irons, longing to devour an entire snow mountain. As for food poisoning, he gave it a brief thought and then dismissed it entirely.

“Whatever happens, I’d rather die with a full belly!”

He shouted inwardly.

His body was still badly damaged, but he had a bit of strength. Gritting his teeth, enduring inhuman pain, he crawled toward the nearest corpse.

Each movement felt like rolling across a bed of knives. Still, he was determined, nearly cracking his teeth, ignoring the pain. As a man—indeed, a man in his forties—Sun Licheng possessed not only courage but a tenacity few peers could imagine.

After an indeterminate period, he finally reached the carcass.

It looked much like a fox from Earth, except it had three tails. This three-tailed fox was the first to arrive and the quickest to die; its body had been torn apart by other beasts and was in a sorry state.

Facing the fox, Sun Licheng felt a surge of strength and lunged forward.

The cold had frozen the animal corpses into blocks of ice, hard as stone. Yet Sun Licheng gripped the carcass and, with a fierce yank, tore off the fox’s front leg.

He was stunned—how could a body less than one meter sixty possess such brute force? The carcass was frozen solid, harder than rock; his strength was abnormal.

The torn animal leg exposed pale bone, twisted sinews like writhing worms, and blood mixed with impurities, frozen by the cold—an ugly sight.

But hunger had nearly robbed Sun Licheng of reason; he didn’t hesitate, stuffed the leg into his mouth, and with a crunch, bit off a chunk of the frozen limb and swallowed.

As the fox meat entered his stomach, a warm current surged to his mind, making him want to cheer. Fur, bone, even tainted blood caused no discomfort.

Soon the leg was gone, and Sun Licheng ravenously consumed other parts of the fox.

With the influx of food, his body’s recovery accelerated, and the itching eased.

“Man is iron, food is steel. The ancients did not deceive me!” Sun Licheng sighed.

Deep in Sun Licheng’s consciousness, the deity’s expression turned grim. Another miscalculation. But then, a new idea struck him, and he laughed. “Eat, eat. Soon you’ll taste the torment of burning flesh, and know what it means to wish for death. Haha…”

Unaware of the danger, Sun Licheng continued his feast. After devouring nearly a quarter of the carcasses, his hunger eased and his body clearly improved.

...

“So this is a magic crystal,” Sun Licheng murmured, holding a red crystal to the sunlight. The rays passed through, not casting a simple red, but forming a rainbow dominated by red. On close inspection, dazzling liquid seemed to swirl inside, its radiance shifting in the sun—most beautiful.

Having eaten so many carcasses, Sun Licheng noticed curious patterns. Some meats had greater restorative effects, unrelated to the animals’ size.

Upon investigation, all the meats with strong restorative properties were rich in energy, and in their brains he found wondrous crystals. Instinct told him these were the magic crystals of web novels, and the creatures, magical beasts.

He collected crystals of various sizes, shapes, and colors—though they were rare. Among nearly two hundred bodies, he found only four: two red, one yellow, one blue. The smallest was no larger than a fingernail; the largest surpassed a date.

The largest came from the eagle, whose meat was the tastiest and most energizing. Ironically, Sun Licheng had been the eagle’s prey, but the eagle ended up in his stomach—a twist of fate, and he mourned it briefly.

He tried biting the crystals. Though his teeth were now unnaturally strong, able to crush any bone, the crystals’ hardness exceeded all expectation; he nearly broke a tooth.

He needed no guess—they were treasures. Without knowing how to use them yet, he dug a small pit under a rock to stash them away, believing that one day he would unlock their secrets.