I Can Only Cultivate In A Game-Chapter 396: What Is This?!

He then tried to circulate his qi once again.

The flow resisted him, as if every cycle had to pass through layers of invisible friction.

Fortunately, it was better than earlier.

Pain flared behind his eyes as his dantian strained to push energy outward.

The silhouettes moved even closer this time.

Their shapes sharpened turning into elongated limbs with too many joints and eyes that glowed briefly before vanishing again.

Victor forced his breathing into rhythm.

’Focus...’ he mummered internally while trying to reactivate Void Emperor Bloodline.

Space responded reluctantly, like a wounded animal refusing to move.

Victor poured everything he had into a single point.

"Dimensional Warp."

Silver markings exploded outward, incomplete and flickering... but functional.

The moment the silhouettes drew closer, the world tore.

Victor vanished just as clawed shapes passed through where his head had been.

— 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

Air rushed back into his lungs violently.

He collapsed to one knee, coughing, as the oppressive weight vanished instantly.

Color returned. Sound returned. Reality returned.

Victor looked around.

He was standing on solid ground again but this time, at the far end of the Fractured Descent.

The floating platforms lay behind him, quiet now, as if the madness beyond had never existed.

He inhaled deeply.

"...So that’s why," he murmured. "No Man Zone."

That place wasn’t meant for anything that still thought of itself as human.

He stood, steadying himself, and turned forward.

The land ahead changed as the air turned further contaminated.

The ground sloped downward into a vast triangular basin, each side stretching miles into the distance. From above, the region would have looked almost geometrically perfect with three massive ridgelines converging toward a central abyss-like depression.

This was the Corrupt Triangle.

The sky above it was permanently bruised purple, as though something had bled into the heavens and never healed. Clouds moved in slow, unnatural spirals, occasionally flashing with sickly green lightning that never struck the ground... but instead folded inward on itself.

The earth was cracked and blackened with veins of dark crystal running beneath the surface like exposed arteries. Those crystals emitted low blinking glow, synchronizing with something deep below, and every pulse sent ripples of corrupted qi through the land.

Nothing grew here naturally.

What did exist had adapted... or been twisted.

Victor stepped forward cautiously.

The air tasted metallic, laced with bitterness. Every breath carried traces of corrosive qi that tried to seep into his meridians, only to be burned away by his cultivation.

He could feel it clearly now.

This region wasn’t just dangerous.

It was alive.

The Corrupt Triangle earned its name because anything that entered it was slowly rewritten. Beasts grew more violent. Plants turned parasitic. Even cultivators who lingered too long found their qi nature altered—becoming unstable, aggressive, or outright hostile to their own bodies.

And at the heart of this place... was a presence.

Victor stopped upon feeling it.

It pressed outward like a gravitational field, dominating everything around it.

"That’s you," Victor said quietly.

He followed the sensation toward the center of the Triangle.

The terrain dipped sharply, leading to a massive crater-like hollow. At its base stood a spiky spire of black stone which was unnaturally smooth in places and brutally fractured in others, as though it had been grown rather than formed.

Wrapped around that spire was a lair.

Bones, wings, scales....

Remnants of beasts large and small fused together by corrupted qi, formed a grotesque nest that climbed the stone like a living tumor.

And perched atop it...

A spirit beast unfolded its wings.

Victor’s eyes narrowed.

It was enormous.

Easily over sixty feet long from snout to tail, with a wingspan that blotted out what little light penetrated the clouds. Its body was lean but densely muscled, covered in overlapping scales that changed color between obsidian black and sickly emerald depending on how the corrupted qi flowed across them.

Its wings were not membranous like a dragon’s... but feathered.

Feathers made of hardened qi-crystal, each one sharp enough to slice stone. When they rustled, the sound was like grinding glass.

The beast’s head was narrow and angular, crowned with backward-curving horns etched with glowing runes. Its eyes burned an unnatural violet, pupils split vertically like a predator’s.

Purple mist leaked continuously from its nostrils and the joints of its wings.

At its chest, embedded partially into flesh and scale was a crystalline core throbbing violently.

This was no ordinary spirit beast.

This was a Corrupt Winged Sovereign... a being that had survived long enough in the Triangle to become its apex predator, feeding on corrupted qi and evolving beyond its original form.

The lair trembled as its gaze locked onto Victor.

The pressure doubled.

"So," Victor voiced calmly. "You’re actually real."

The winged spirit beast did not roar...

Instead, it spoke with a deep, ancient, and layered tone.

"Why have you come here to die, human?"

Victor paused mid-step and then let out a genuinely amused chuckle that felt almost out of place in a land soaked with corruption and death.

"Of course you can talk," Victor voiced while shaking his head lightly. "Spirit beasts at your level would be an embarrassment if you couldn’t."

The beast’s violet eyes narrowed.

Victor continued strolling forward...

Each step crunched over corrupted crystal and bone as if he were inspecting a marketplace stall rather than standing before the apex predator of the Black Zone.

"That’s not my purpose for coming here," Victor added calmly.

The beast’s wings twitched.

Victor stopped a few dozen meters away—well within striking distance—and tilted his head, studying the massive creature from horn to talon.

"You’re impressive," he admitted. "Strong. Stable. You’ve endured long enough in this place to become part of it instead of being eaten by it."

He circled slowly, assessing posture, qi flow, the rhythm of the corrupted core pulsing in its chest.

"You seem worthy enough to become my mount."

The silence that followed was... violent.

Then the spirit beast moved.

Its wings snapped open fully causing hardened feathers to grind against each other as its body rose slightly, swallowing the lair beneath it with its enormous shadow. The corrupted mist around it thickened, responding to its fury.

"How—dare—you."

The words dripped venom.

"I am Qin Lau," the beast thundered. "Sovereign of this Triangle. Apex of the Black Zone. You—" its gaze burned into Victor "—are an early Soul Transformation cultivator."

Its laughter came sharp and cruel.

"Do you know how many have stood where you stand now?"

The ground trembled as Qin Lau took a single step forward.

"Void Tribulation cultivators tried to bind me. Elders whose names rotted into history. They failed."

Its wings beat once.

A shockwave ripped outward, pulverizing crystal spires miles away.

"And you—the weakest among them—dare speak of making me your mount?"

The sky suddenly darkened further as corrupted qi flooded outward, saturating every inch of the Corrupt Triangle.

System notifications exploded into Victor’s vision.

> [WARNING: Domain Expansion Detected]

[Qin Lau has claimed territorial sovereignty]

[Corrupt Triangle status: Absolute Hostility]

[Environmental Authority: Qin Lau – Active]

Qin Lau threw his head back and laughed again.

"I shall snuff you out with a single breath."

He slammed one massive limb into the ground.

The impact was apocalyptic.

The earth fractured outward in concentric rings as a wave of purplish destruction swept forward.

Crystal towers disintegrated. Bones vaporized. The air screamed as space warped under the force.

The wave raced toward Victor, carrying enough murderous intent to annihilate entire sects.

But Victor did not move.

He inhaled.

And then activated his Void Emperor Bloodline.

Arrow-like markings erupted across his skin, glowing with a translucent lunar sheen.

Space suddenly bent around him as Victor raised his head. "Let’s see whose domain is better..."

A pressure far purer, far colder, swept outward.

"Void Emperor Domain."

The world changed as a silver light burst from his being, spreading across the terrain.

The Void Emperor Domain instantly swept across a one-kilometer radius, anchoring every inch to Victor’s will.

The corrupted qi froze mid-flow and the sky dimmed further from subjugation.

Another cascade of notifications appeared.

> [Void Emperor Domain Activated]

[Authority Override: Successful]

[Local Laws of Space-Time: Under User Domination]

Victor’s eyes glowed faintly as he spoke a single word.

"Time Remap."

The purplish wave sweeping outwards, suddenly slowed.

From a roaring annihilation, it turned into something barely crawling...

Each fragment of destruction stretched into elongated streaks and soon completely froze in mid-air like a sculpture of death caught in glass.

Nothing moved at all...

Even the corrupted mist hung suspended as its particles glittered faintly under the Void Emperor’s authority.

Almost instantaneous, the wave of destruction suddenly rescinded... retreating like the hands of time had been rewound.

It dwindled completely in a few moments, returning to the point of impact, which was Qin Lau’s feet.

Qin Lau’s laughter died as his eyes widened in confusion upon spotting the same limb which he had brought down to wreak havoc, hovering slightly above the ground.

’Didn’t I just stomp my limb and...’ It clearly recalled what had just happened a moment ago... only that somehow... it didn’t happen?

"What... is this—"

Victor stepped forward.

Each footstep echoed impossibly loud in the frozen world.

"You made one mistake," Victor said calmly, walking through the rewinded devastation as if strolling through falling snow. "You assumed strength is measured only by realm."