A Chaotic World 291 Collection of Poison Entities

The chamber was shaped like a cube and was rather small, with each side of the wall being around twenty metres in length.
In the centre of the chamber, a talon statue reached out from the ground just like the chamber with the blue orb. Only that this time, instead of holding the blue orb, the talon statue was holding onto some sort of stone bowl.
After stepping through the wall to enter the chamber, Lu Tianzi realised that there was actually no exit whatsoever.
Closed in by the four walls, it felt just like they were trapped within a prison.
Lu Tianzi looked around the chamber, and his eyes lit up in astonishment.
It had not been obvious at first sight, but engraved on the walls were pictures of various plants and animals.
Unlike the engravings of the Four Symbols on the pillars earlier, the engravings on the walls of this chamber were relatively small, each taking up the space of a square no more than five centimetres wide.
However, what they were lacking in size, they made up in numbers.
There were tens, if not hundreds of thousands of them, each depicting a unique entity.
These numerous engravings completely filled up the walls of the chamber, leaving not a single square inch empty.
This resulted in a vast collection of poisonous plants and creatures, some of which even Lu Tianzi had absolutely no idea what they were!
"Go ahead, I will just be resting at one corner," Nanlan Qianxue shrugged.
She understood by now that there should be yet another test that was waiting for them in this chamber.
Lu Tianzi took more than three days to clear the earlier test, so who knew how long it would take this time?
She would not be surprised even if he ended up taking a week or so.
Since that was the case, she might as well put the time to good using, using it to cultivate.
Lu Tianzi nodded before focusing his attention on the talon statue. It was the most eye catching feature in the chamber, so he naturally decided to start with it.
However, he found nothing even after carefully examining the talon statue. Sinking his perception into the stone bowl had no effect either.
Helpless, he could only leave it for the time being, turning back to the engravings on the wall.
It was indeed fascinating to see these pictures, but just what was he supposed to do here?
Unlike the Four Symbols from before, many of these engravings were of plants, and most of the creatures seemed to be relatively weak in terms of battle strength as well.
Surely he was not supposed to battle them?
A silvery light flashed across his eyes, revealing the energy flow behind the walls of the chamber to be similar to that of the four pillars from before.
Lu Tianzi felt the corner of his lips twitch.
Could it be that he was really supposed to battle them?
He set his gaze upon the first engraving, which depicted a double-headed scorpion. Letting out a helpless sigh, Lu Tianzi sank his perception into the engraving.

But what happened next caught him by surprise.
The legs of the scorpion moved ever so slightly, and its claws trembled.
Lu Tianzi watched in amazement as the originally simple depiction of the double-headed scorpion slowly took form.
Its body materialised out from within the wall and grew in size untill it reached the size of a human torso. Colours filled its body, and a light of vitality entered each of its many eyes.
Its thin legs tapped the wall hesitantly. Then as though defying the concepts of life and gravity, it started walking around the chamber by sticking onto the walls.
Lu Tianzi let out a deep breath.
This time, rather than him being brought into a virtual world like before, the engraving was actually the one that was brought into the real world instead!
No, to be exact, the original engraving was still there.
Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the spirit of the engraving had materialised into this world then?
"How fascinating," Lu Tianzi smiled.
"What is?" Nanlan Qianxue asked without opening her eyes.
"That," Lu Tianzi gestured towards the double-headed scorpion that was crawling around the wall.
Nanlan Qianxue opened her eyes and took a look before flashing a smile. "Yeah, they do seem quite fascinating."
Lu Tianzi looked at Nanlan Qianxue, and realised that her gaze was actually wandering around the walls instead of focusing on the double-headed scorpion.
"Do you not see it?" Lu Tianzi asked.
"Hmm?" Nanlan Qianxue revealed a look of surprise. "Weren't you referring to the engravings on the wall?"
"I was referring to the scorpion though," Lu Tianzi watched her reaction closely.
"Yeah, the scorpions are exquisitely done as well. They all look pretty life-like," Nanlan Qianxue agreed.
"All of them, eh?" Lu Tianzi raised an eyebrow.
"What's wrong?" Nanlan Qianxue asked.
"No, it's nothing," Lu Tianzi shook his head. "I shan't disturb your meditation any further."
"Mm," Nanlan Qianxue nodded before closing her eyes once more, returning to a state of meditation.
Lu Tianzi's gaze shifted from Nanlan Qianxue and landed back onto the double-headed scorpion.
That was certainly not the reaction that he had expected from Nanlan Qianxue, but it seemed that Nanlan Qianxue was unable to see the materialised double-headed scorpion.
Well, that mattered not.
She was not the one undertaking the test after all.
The important thing was that he could see it.
Come to think of it, there were hundreds of thousands of engravings in the chamber. If Lu Tianzi wanted to clear this test anytime soon, he really should start picking up the pace!
With a wave of his hand, Origin Force gathered upon the double-headed scorpion, crushing it under the weight of its pressure.
Splatter-!
Under the heavy pressure of Lu Tianzi's Origin Force, the frail body of the double-headed scorpion was simply incapable of resisting. The entire scorpion burst apart instantly, sending its remains flying in all directions.
That was easy…
Lu Tianzi smirked.
He had expected as much.
The double-headed scorpion was nothing like the Four Symbols from before. He would actually be quite shocked if he had failed to defeat it at least this easily.
But what he felt the next moment caused Lu Tianzi to frown.
Unlike when he cleared the test of the blue orb or any one of the Four Symbols, Lu Tianzi did not notice any change whatsoever after killing the double-headed scorpion.
He looked over at the remains that lay splattered around the ground, then turned back to the engraving on the wall.
Was there even any meaning to killing the double-headed scorpion?
Just to be sure, he sank his perception into the engraving of the double-headed scorpion once more.
The crackling of a scorpion's body sounded out as yet another double-headed scorpion emerged from the engraving, and started crawling all over the room just like its predecessor had done.
This time, Lu Tianzi chose not to kill the double-headed scorpion.
Instead, he sank his perception into that same engraving for the third time.
When he did, a third double-headed scorpion actually emerged from the same engraving. Excluding the first one that Lu Tianzi had mercilessly crushed, there were still two such scorpions crawling around the walls right now.
"Just as I thought…" Lu Tianzi thought out loud while rubbing his chin in contemplation.
Killing the double-headed scorpion was pointless after all.
But if that was the case, just what was it that he should do here?
He knew that it probably had something to do with the talon statue as well, but what exactly was it?
Since he had no idea, he could only move on for now.
The next picture was that of a plant.
When Lu Tianzi sank his perception within, the plant emerged from the picture as though it was growing out of the wall.
Its flower bloomed beautifully, looking just like a black lily. A viscous black liquid trickled down its stalk from the flower, and Lu Tianzi immediately recognised it.
This was a plant that had been used in the Healers' Meet earlier, and the black liquid released from its flower was an extremely potent poison!
With his Origin Force, Lu Tianzi severed the plant at its base without hesitation.
The severed plant fell to the ground harmlessly, and Lu Tianzi immediately sank his perception into the engraving again.
The same plant grew out, and the black lily bloomed beautifully once more.
It seemed that the same rule applied be it a plant or a beast.
Still without a clue as to what he should do, Lu Tianzi could only continue on to the next picture, and then the next.
The same thing happened for the next couple dozen engravings.
No matter what picture it was, plant or beast, the actual thing would always materialise whenever Lu Tianzi sank his perception within.
Before he knew it, the inside of the chamber had completely transformed into one that was rather strange to say the least.
All sorts of poisonous creatures were walking around aimlessly on the walls of the chamber, weaving in and out between plants of various types that swayed with their touch.
There were scorpions, vipers, insects, as well as other larger creatures that resembled large cats, bears, birds. They were just moving around in a random manner, at times either brushing against each other or the larger ones knocking the smaller ones over in a collision.
It was a strange sight, but this strange sight was also what gave Lu Tianzi a fairly good idea of what was going on.
These plants and creatures might not be doing anything meaningful, but it was clear by now that they were perfectly capable of interacting with one another.
Sometimes, a larger beast would slowly grow weaker and weaker after bumping into a smaller beast, eventually collapsing just like that.
Lu Tianzi was rather surprised the first time it happened, but he slowly got used to seeing it happen.
In fact, at times a beast would just fall over even without ever having come into contact with any other beasts!
But after having observed the situation for a while, Lu Tianzi was finally able to understand what was going on.
It was the effect of poison.
Every single entity engraved on the walls, be it plant or beast, contained some sort of poison within their body.
When some of these beasts seemed to have collapsed for no reason, they had actually been afflicted by poison from the other beasts. In cases where they colleapsed without having come into contact with another beast, it would be the poisonous plants that had taken their lives.
At the same time, each entity had its corresponding weaknesses and strengths.
There were beasts that were relatively resistant, or even immune, to the poison from some others, and there were also plants that died from the poison from the beasts.
It was almost like a game of rock paper scissors, except the fact that there were hundreds of thousands of different choices, all of them with unique interactions with every other entity.
Lu Tianzi turned his attention back to the talon statue in the centre of the chamber, and felt the corner of his lips twitch.
In his head, he could only think of two possibilities right now for him to pass the test in this chamber.
The first was to concoct an antidote that could resolve the poison from every single entity on the walls.
And the second was to concoct a poison that was effective against every single one of these entities.
If he was right, then either way, this test would seem to be bordering upon the very edges of impossibility.
After all, there were at least hundreds of thousands of poison entities on the walls of this chamber!
Just how was he supposed to come up with something that could affect them all?
Even if he really managed to do so in the end, who knew how much time would have passed by then?
If he was unlucky enough, he might just end up taking this test for years!

Chapter end

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