Chapter 307: The Divine Tree of Dreams
“What’s going on?”
Jiang Chen suddenly shook himself awake just before he drifted off to sleep. His strong strength of heart transformed into a bolt of lightning towards his consciousness, cleaving apart his sleepy internal demon.
Wham!
Jiang Chen felt his brain buzz continuously.
He regained clarity in the next moment, his forehead beaded with sweat. He’d almost… almost really fallen asleep just now.
What was going on?
Jiang Chen’s heart palpitated with fright as he sprang up and away like a rabbit.
He had truly been one step away from falling asleep just now.
However, the strength of the heart of an earth spirit realm practitioner was great. How was it possible that he’d almost fallen asleep, with no forewarning at all?
Without a doubt, the problem didn’t lie with him.
Since it wasn’t an issue with him, then it was an issue with the environment. This seemingly placid forest embodied a frightening power to hypnotize people.
Jiang Chen sniffed the air as a thought passed through his mind. “The Divine Tree of Dreams?”
Some memory fragments from his past life jumped out in Jiang Chen’s mind. He looked at the towering tree and compared it to the information regarding the “The Divine Tree of Dreams”. As he continued to compare the two, he felt that the two were a complete match with no differences whatsoever.
“The Divine Tree of Dreams soars hundreds of meters upwards. Its silver white sap seeps continuously from its branches and it doesn’t have any color or fragrance. It can numb the heart and mind and help one sleep… The rhythm of the tree’s swaying will create a wondrous ripple that promotes quick sleep… ”
Information regarding this divine tree all matched against the data in his mind. There wasn’t the slightest bit of aberration.
“Disaster is imminent with every three steps in the Valley of Destruction. It looks like this wasn’t an empty bluster. However, karma makes a full circle, and fortune lies behind every disaster. In the same vein, disaster may lurk behind good luck. The sap of this Divine Tree of Dreams doesn’t have any color or smell, but it possesses an enormous hypnotizing effect. If I can collect this in large quantities, I will be sure to find use for it.”
With just a little bit of time, Jiang Chen immediately thought of many uses for it . He was delighted, “Fortune follows on the heels of disaster alright! The sap of this tree is an absolute treasure. It’s a pity that the tree is too big. It would be something wondrous if I could transplant several of them.”
Jiang Chen sighed, but he didn’t feel too regretful.
He held his breath and he reminded himself not to follow the swaying of the tree with his eyes as he took out his tools and started collecting the sap.
The sap was sticky, but it kept oozing out of the branches and so it wasn’t that difficult to collect.
He had gathered quite a bunch after a while.
“That’s about it. If I continue lingering, despite my ability to hold my breath, it would be a sticky situation if this sap seeped into my consciousness.”
Jiang Chen didn’t get too greedy and he transferred all of the sap into his space ring, leaving swiftly. This patch of divine trees stretched about three to five li into the distance.
He made it out of that area in a short amount of time.
Taking a deep breath in, Jiang Chen had the feeling of being a lucky survivor of a disaster. He’d been this close just now to being thoroughly hypnotized.
“I wonder if the other practitioners have run into the Divine Tree of Dreams? If everyone runs through this patch of forest, then I’m afraid that many will not make it out of the Valley of Destruction alive.”
He’d almost fallen victim, even with his great strength of heart. Those with slightly weaker mental fortitude would’ve fallen asleep almost immediately.
The most frightening part of the forest was that once one fell asleep, if they didn’t wake up in time, it would be an eternal sleep after falling asleep deeply. It’d be difficult to wake the victims up again.
However, Jiang Chen hadn’t studied this tree in particular in his last life and he only knew that this tree would become stronger, the more stronger the opponents it met.
The stronger their would-be victim’s mental strength was, the more sap that the tree would secrete and the stronger the swaying of the branches.
The hypnotizing abilities of the tree would also increase if it met someone with strong strength of heart.
No matter what, Jiang Chen felt quite lucky. He didn’t dare take things lightly now that he’d been taught such a humbling lesson.
The terrain was complicated in the deep valley. Although there were many advantages to Jiang Chen’s God’s Eye, he still wasn’t able to see as clearly into the distance as he could in the outside world.
All sorts of dire and ghastly screams and roars sounded in his ears. The sounds didn’t seem to be of human origin, so they most likely belonged to the violent creatures within the Valley of Destruction.
The fact that eight thousand humans had suddenly rushed into the Valley of Destruction would surely break the peace of the valley.
The strong creatures that lived within the valley would then inevitably attack these unwelcomed guests. After all, no one liked to be disturbed within their own territory.
Jiang Chen didn’t mind this. With his expansive consciousness, he’d be able to more or less judge where the strong creatures were.
He’d just circle around them or hide if they were too strong.
“There will be no problem at all if I just stay where I am for the next ten days. However, this trial of fortune is about gains in the face of risk. What is the point of me entering the valley if I’m not taking any risks?”
Jiang Chen was naturally unwilling to be a coward.
“I now have the Bewitching Lotus of Fire and Ice and am currently at the earth spirit realm. With the magnetic golden mountain and all sorts of other trump cards, I will still be able to put up a fight even if I meet a spirit rank creature. Not to mention, I also have the ultimate ace of the Goldbiter Rats.”
Jiang Chen had great courage due to his superior abilities, and he began adventuring through the Valley of Destruction.
All their gains within the Valley of Destruction were theirs alone. This was a free chance to make it big, and, thus, Jiang Chen would naturally not let it go.
He wouldn’t hesitate even in the face of great risk.
He bumped into a few candidates along the way, but he always avoided them adroitly.
Jiang Chen didn’t wish to meet anyone face on.
Everyone was a competitor here. Even if he didn’t possess the desire to harm others, that didn’t imply that others wouldn’t harm him.
Jiang Chen had to evade them them because he didn’t want to be tailed. If any idiot sought to do anything to him, he’d have to deal with a whole slew of irritating matters.
Therefore, he purposefully avoided the crowds along the way and attempted to go where fewer people were.
However, eight thousand people had indeed surged into the valley after all. It would be a bit unrealistic to be able to completely evade everyone and play to his heart’s content by himself.
He was still able to bypass a lot of unnecessary trouble though.
Jiang Chen had seen many of his peers battle and kill each other over the past day. There were various reasons, such as fighting over a paltry spirit medicine, or killing each other over a dead spirit animal. There were also fights for no reason at all, killing each other purely for the reason of doing away with the competition.
Jiang Chen witnessed all sorts of ugly situations over the past day.
“Are these idiots worried that they’re not stirring up enough trouble? Kicking up such a fuss for such small matters, do they think that the Valley of Destruction is their own backyard?”
Jiang Chen shook his head with a wry smile. Even if these disturbances didn’t result in great trouble, small irritations were sure to follow. He didn’t want to become mixed up with these people.
Before long, he’d arrived to the precipice of a cliff and gazed out towards the mountain face in the distance.
He’d been attracted here by a strong sense of the fire attribute. Standing on top of a jutting rock almost completely in the empty air, he shaded his eyes and looked out.
A flower bloomed with fiery flames in the midst of the clouds, unfurling proudly on the mountain face.
“To emanate such a strong sense of fire spirit power from such a distance, the level of this flower certainly won’t be low. It must be a heavenly treasure.”
Jiang Chen looked out, but even the God’s Eye couldn’t determine what kind of flower it was.
The mountain face on the other side was three thousand meters away. There was no way that he’d be able to pick the flower if he couldn’t fly through the air.
However, if he could make it to the bottom of the mountain face and climb upwards, there might be a trace of hope there.
“What a pity, if I could’ve brought the Goldwing Swordbirds and flown through the air, I would’ve been able to obtain it with extreme ease.” Jiang Chen sighed in his heart and then thought of the Rat King.
However, Jiang Chen didn’t want to alert his enemies beforehand.
The Rat King was at the spirit rank level, and if he accidentally ran afoul with the stronger local spirit creatures, then he’d be in great trouble.
Therefore, Jiang Chen didn’t want to bring out the Rat King unless he had no other choice.
As he was thinking, Jiang Chen suddenly arched an eyebrow and looked towards the mountain face. There were actually two figures at the bottom that were slowly crawling their way up towards the fiery flower.
Good items had a huge attraction, and others had clearly also been attracted by the flower’s abundant spirit power.
And, looking at those people, they were in a noticeably better position than Jiang Chen- right below the flower. He, on the other hand, was watching from across the great divide, and couldn’t do anything unless he grew wings and flew.
“What a pity that someone’s beaten me to the draw.” Jiang Chen was sighing when his expression suddenly froze, and an uneasy feeling surged to the fore.
Two balls of flame flew out at this time on the mountain face. Upon closer inspection, they were actually two fire ravens, shooting towards the two climbers like two red streaks of lightning.
The fire ravens opened their mouth and sent a gout of flame forth, which transformed into a cloud of fire and spewed towards the two.
The two on the wall didn’t even have time to react before they were struck by the flames. When the flames hit them, it was like a hot fire touching kindling as they immediately started burning up.
“Ah!!! AH!!!!”
Ghastly screams rang out through the entire valley, echoing amongst themselves.
Two burnt corpses disengaged from the mountain wall in the next moment, landing with two dull thuds.
No other sounds could be heard from them.
Jiang Chen had watched the rapid action with unblinking eyes, and had only come back to himself when the two fell into the valley.
“Right, the spirit lifeforms beneath the heavens will not exist by themselves on a mountain wall. It’s said that nothing is solitary, and everything is connected. This wondrous flower must have its own protectors, and it might be the companion to another stronger lifeform, even.”
Jiang Chen looked at the noble and pure flower, feeling a few more traces of desire grow in his heart.
Even the Lotus within his body was stirred to action, obviously determined to obtain this flower.