The Evil Spirit manifesting before them...

It might be a cultivator, a Demon, a magic treasure, or even an inanimate object, a territory!

To make a simple analogy, the Evil Spirit is like everything undergoing "Possession."

However, this "evil ghost" originated from the "Ghost of The Heavens" of a Withering Realm.

For most cultivators, the extremely bizarre Evil Spirits are difficult to comprehend with common sense, and even harder to easily dispel!

In strange places like the Immortal Mansion Dungeon, which combine "mystery" and "decay," it is more likely than elsewhere to attract the "Residual Resentment of the Withering Realm" to descend and give birth to various Evil Spirits. This was, in fact, perfectly normal.

"Right now, it doesn't much matter when this Evil Spirit came into existence!" Shen Mo continued.

"The priority is to understand the Evil Spirit's characteristics, the threats it poses to us, and to find an escape route as soon as possible."

They were all cultivators of the Divine Bridge Realm, and the Silver-haired Child had even cultivated to the Formless Realm in his previous life. Thus, they all possessed some understanding of the nature of an "Evil Spirit."

Hearing Shen Mo's words, the other three wore thoughtful expressions and began to examine their surroundings.

At this moment, they found themselves in a place resembling a mirage. Yet, the myriad landscapes and creatures were so incredibly realistic that even their five senses couldn't discern truth from illusion. Upon entering this Evil land, they had materialized directly in a vast countryside. People toiled in the fields, while roads and paths teemed with comings and goings. For miles in every direction, countless cities and villages were scattered across the land!

It strongly resembled the Outer Realm—a most ordinary human kingdom.

Except, the humans here—both immortal and mortal—seemed to be amalgams of Flesh and Blood and puppet bodies. Even flying birds and running beasts devoid of Mana, distant demonic beasts, and the Spirit Pets accompanying powerful individuals had many body parts constructed from materials like Gold, Wood, Jade, and Stone. Were they born this way, or transformed afterward?

THUD!

Shen Mo stood on the main road when a little girl, looking about six or seven years old, accidentally bumped into him while running and playing.

With his five senses, dodging her would have been a simple matter of shifting his foot, but Shen Mo did not do so. Instead, he deliberately allowed the little girl to collide with his Dao Body!

"Immortal Master... I'm sorry. Nannan didn't do it on purpose!"

The little girl looked up. Upon seeing Shen Mo's face clearly, she immediately looked terrified, fiddling with the hem of her clothes, utterly at a loss.

Only after Shen Mo smiled and waved did she hurriedly scamper away, constantly glancing back with an expression full of lingering fear and curiosity!

"Fellow Daoist Qingyun, at a time like this, you still have such a childlike interest?" Qin Zhen, controlling Puppet Yama, spoke in a muffled voice, a hint of light teasing in her tone, perhaps due to their growing familiarity. "Even if that little girl is adorable, she's not a living being. Don't even think about taking her as a disciple."

"Her vitality is extremely strong, on par with a cultivator of the Body Tempering Realm, Layer VII!" Shen Mo said calmly, watching the little girl's retreating figure.

The girl who had bumped into him had not a trace of Mana in her body; she was just an ordinary country girl.

But the upper half of her body, aside from her head, was clearly not Flesh and Blood. Instead, it was an intricate mechanism constructed from purple copper, a common material in the world—or, in other words, the body of a low-grade puppet.

Under the scrutiny of Shen Mo's five senses and "Insight into All Beings," her internal organs were also not flesh, but rather exceptionally delicate metal instruments that maintained her various life functions. Bizarrely, from her waist down, she possessed a normal Flesh and Blood body. The upper and lower halves were so perfectly integrated they seemed naturally formed, without the slightest hint of incongruity!

If it were a post-birth transformation, even in the cultivation world, achieving this degree of integration would be incredibly difficult. The subject of such a transformation would need to be at least a Nascent Soul Realm Cultivator. Then, an Immortal Master like Qin Zhen, skilled in making puppets, would have to expend vast resources to craft the upper body. This process, supplemented by numerous elixirs and herbs to sustain life, might offer a chance of success.

But the little girl clearly came from an ordinary family and, moreover, had no cultivation whatsoever. Not to mention whether she could afford the cost of such a transformation, given her level of life, she would likely have died during the process!

Yet now, she was not only alive and well, able to run and jump, but her vitality had also reached the standard of a late-stage Body Tempering Realm cultivator!

This was because even after entering the Evil land, the inexplicable power of the Immortal Mansion Dungeon had not vanished; they could still only exert strength equivalent to the late-stage or peak Golden Core Realm. Furthermore, most of their attention had been focused on sensing the broader environment and observing extraordinary creatures like cultivators, demonic beasts, and Spirit Pets, so they hadn't noticed this detail yet.

Hearing Shen Mo's words, the others immediately grew interested. They began to seek out mundane mortals nearby, employing various methods to test their vitality!

「Soon after.」

They boldly entered the nearest city, capturing cultivators possessing Mana, and ventured into deep mountains and old forests to hunt and kill a large number of ferocious demonic beasts.

「Days later,」

Shen Mo and his three companions came to a shocking conclusion.

The creatures in this region of the Evil Spirit were not transformed after birth; they were born this way!

The weaker the creature, the greater the proportion of Flesh and Blood in their bodies, and the smaller the proportion of mechanical parts. Simultaneously, the Gold, Wood, Jade, and Stone materials constituting these organs and bodies were also more ordinary, being the most common materials found in daily life.

Their cultivation also represented a metamorphosis in their level of life, yet it was vastly different from that of ordinary cultivators.

Through arduous cultivation, they could continuously increase the proportion of their mechanical bodies. The characteristics of the ordinary materials used could also be constantly enhanced, gradually becoming extraordinary and miraculous!

Consequently, the bodies of the most powerful beings here were almost entirely composed of materials like Gold, Wood, Jade, and Stone. These materials were exceptionally refined, making them resemble flawless, humanoid puppets.

Notably, Qin Zhen—whose real body was hidden in a separate small dimension while she controlled Puppet Yama—appeared quite inconspicuous here. Conversely, Shen Mo, the Silver-haired Child, and Kang Haoxiu, being entirely of Flesh and Blood, seemed somewhat out of place among the local creatures!

During this time, Shen Mo also tried offering Spirit Stones to activate "Insight into All Beings," but it never worked. This was sufficient proof that these creatures—half Flesh and Blood, half "puppet"—were not truly living beings but rather a part of the Evil Spirit.

Perhaps it was that in the world from which the "Heavenly Resentment" that formed this Evil land originated, as that world steadily declined towards its end, the intense collective will of its creatures striving for survival influenced the "will of heaven and earth," gradually giving rise to this unique path of cultivation! 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

They cultivated their Flesh and Blood bodies into mechanical forms resembling puppets, hoping to survive and proliferate in an increasingly harsh natural environment...