Death

[Spirituality of Virtue: Obtained permission to communicate with the Seat of Guidance]

[Status: Divine Descent]

Before Lin Jun could look closely, faint black mist began to permeate from all directions.

The information on the status panel became distorted and blurry little by little, ultimately disappearing completely.

Good news: the reason for the panel's failure was found.

Bad news... the opponent was a god!

Am I actually going to make an enemy of an Evil God?

As a hero, Lin Jun naturally wouldn't shrink back!

Unfortunately, the Sword Saint beat him to the punch.

Even if the opponent was an Evil God, Lin Jun couldn't commit such an unfair and unjust act like bullying the few with numbers.

Thinking this way, Lin Jun controlled the Lizardman puppet and the crowd of Puchis, silently retreating backward.

Retreating very naturally and appropriately, as if making room for the upside-down dangling Sword Saint to display his skills.

Mm, just like this, leave it to the Sword Saint.

However, outside was also a patch of pitch black; the darkness had enveloped the entire area at some unknown time.

A Puchi tried to charge into the darkness, and then unsurprisingly melted away.

Most crucially, that small lump of soul shattered along with it.

Lin Jun thought about it again and felt he couldn't let the Sword Saint fight alone with his mushroom body. This was team spirit, comradeship, a quality that any qualified leader should possess.

Darkness that could directly harm the soul—this was Lin Jun's first time seeing such a thing. Was this the power of a god?

The disappointing Sword Saint had already gone limp. Based on the abilities the opponent displayed, this remaining bit of combat power was probably completely insufficient in the opponent's eyes.

However, Lin Jun didn't panic either.

Even if the opponent could harm the soul, the amount of Lin Jun's soul trapped here wasn't much. If it got crushed, at worst he'd just take a few more breaths and recover. With a thick health pool, he feared nothing.

The only relatively perilous one was probably the Sword Saint. He didn't know if the Sword Saint's soul was wiped out, whether [Pinnacle of the Sword] would be directly returned to the Mushroom Lord's ownership, or if it would be buried along with the Sword Saint?

At the thought that the [Pinnacle of the Sword] he had obtained with such difficulty might disappear, Lin Jun felt as if his heart was being twisted by a knife.

Should I... apologize?

Sorry, if I knew you were this strong and could even perform a Divine Descent, I wouldn't have slaughtered all your underlings?

Just as Lin Jun was seriously considering whether having the Puchis kneel and stack into a mushroom tower, accompanied by a sincere apology, could exchange for the weak chicken Sword Saint's little life, a telepathic thought appeared in the mycelial network.

"There is no need to be nervous. I bear no hostility."

That voice, or rather that telepathy, carried a bizarre sense of familiarity.

As soon as the voice fell, that giant tentacle in the darkness let go.

The Sword Saint fell from midair, mushroom cap facing down, smashing onto the ground with a splat, bouncing twice, and finally paralyzed there crookedly.

Useless Sword Saint.

"Are you... the one from the mist?"

Lin Jun remembered.

Back when he and Old Dylan encountered that patch of mist on the sea, the instant they left, a thought softly said "Good luck" in the mycelial network.

At the time, he even thought he had encountered something unclean.

"Yes, we finally meet." The young girl parted the darkness and walked over, casually picking up a Puchi. "Back then, only in the border areas where rules were blurred did I have the chance to converse with you. Unfortunately... you left too quickly."

The young girl continued: "However, even without my help, you did very well."

"Truly, very well."

"Huh?" Lin Jun was utterly confused, trying to ask, "So... you are the deity who summoned me to this world?"

The young girl nodded: "It was I who placed you into the world."

Setting aside the possibility that this deity before him was shamelessly lying and deceiving a brave and ignorant little mushroom, let's assume what She said was true.

In this way, it seemed to make sense why the murlocs, who similarly worshipped the God of Death, were so obedient to him.

Did that old murloc know something all along? He actually held it in and never said anything!

Lin Jun recorded a mark in his heart.

However...

"Why a mushroom?" Lin Jun had wanted to ask this question since his first day here.

The young girl's head tilted slightly to the side.

The movement was extremely slight, so slight it was almost imperceptible, if not for Lin Jun staring fixedly at her.

Then her head straightened back.

"It is all the choice of fate." Her voice still had no fluctuation.

Lin Jun: "..."

If it were someone else, Lin Jun would have taken action to personally find the answer from their brain. But since it was a deity, if She said yes, then it was.

"Then, you summoned me here, what do you want me to do?" Seeing that the God of Death was relatively easy to talk to, Lin Jun continued asking.

"Save this decaying world; you are already doing it, aren't you?"

Hm?

Lin Jun's mushroom cap tilted slightly.

That's not right, is it?

He indeed shouted about saving the world every day... They were slogans anyway; shouting them didn't cost money.

But looking at practical actions, spreading the fungal mat across the world and turning everything into the power of the Mushroom Garden—this should be somewhat different from "saving the world" in the usual sense, right?

But the God of Death said he "was already doing it."

Thinking about it, maybe a god actually didn't care about the form of the world?

As long as the world was still there, no matter what it turned into, it counted as "being saved"?

While Lin Jun was thinking, the darkness flowed past the feet of the Puchis, spreading to the corpse of Gini not far away.

That patch of thick darkness rolled gently, swallowing that corpse.

"A good child who works hard should get candy." The God of Death's tone seemed like she was truly giving some kind of reward.

Lin Jun couldn't understand, but still pointed at the Lizardman puppet: "Then what about this one? Oh right, there's also a Cat-person outside."

"It does not matter." The young girl's gaze swept over the puppet, then fell toward the direction of the Cat-person Priestess far away. "You have already fulfilled their wishes, even though they themselves are not clear on it."

"What do you mean?"

What wishes of theirs did I fulfill?

Becoming a puppet, or falling in love and killing each other with a best friend?

Unfortunately, the God of Death obviously didn't intend to continue explaining.

"Those who sacrifice others shall fall eternally into the abyss; those who sacrifice themselves shall gain new life."

"Continue working hard. I will also provide you with assistance."

As her words fell, the surrounding water-like darkness began to slowly gather back.

Not only this space, but the darkness outside that had trapped Lin Jun for a long time also receded simultaneously.

With the retreat path clear, Lin Jun truly believed that this deity before him indeed bore him no hostility.

The darkness turned into a pitch-black stone in the God of Death's palm. Without any special fluctuations, it looked just like an ordinary black stone.

The God of Death placed the stone on the body of the Sword Saint Puchi beside her. Black mist surged from the stone, wrapping the Sword Saint and dyeing him into a black Puchi.

It wasn't a simple dyeing. In Lin Jun's perception, apart from direct visual perception, any other perception skills failed against the black Puchi.

Even the status panel was no exception; the power of the God of Death had shielded the panel as well.

A true Assassin Puchi!

The darkness was exhausted, and those giant tentacles disappeared along with it. The previously obscured status panel also reappeared.

[Divine Descent] on the young girl's panel was slowly fading.

"Good luck, little mushroom."

"Wait! What about the mist? If you truly want to help me, at least tell me how to deal with the mist!"

"The mist... is not important."

Just at this moment, a shadow carrying moonlight flashed between the Puchis and the young girl. The Sword Saint's pitch-black tentacle blade pierced through the young girl's heart in an instant.

Lin Jun: "What are you doing?!"

Sword Saint: "Hm?"

Only then did Lin Jun remember that the previous communication with the God of Death was all one-on-one telepathic communication. The Sword Saint was completely out of the loop!

Should I... parasitize her?

Although he still harbored wariness toward that God of Death, no matter how you put it, the other party had just handed over good stuff. Turning around and slaughtering their mouthpiece was somewhat inhumane—or rather, "in-mushroom."

But with the heart pierced, it was probably...

However, the young girl ignored the approaching Puchis, nor did she counterattack the Sword Saint who attacked her.

She merely leaned against the wall, left the hideout bit by bit, and finally walked out under the sunlight, collapsing onto the fungal mat.

Feeling the mycelium automatically attaching to her dying body, Mira peacefully closed her eyes.

[Acquired: Spirituality of Virtue]

(End of Chapter)