The Forest of the Four Seasons (Part 3)
Connecting to the Continental Unified Gallery was possible anytime and anywhere, provided one met a few essential conditions.
The first condition was that the ambient mana in the atmosphere had to be stable. If the atmospheric mana was chaotic or fluctuating, establishing a link to the Gallery became virtually impossible.
The second condition was the ability to manipulate mana at will. This was directly tied to the final condition: knowing the connection formula. The required calculations were elementary enough that even a child could perform them.
Therefore, if the surrounding mana was unstable, if one had never learned how to channel mana, and if one was entirely ignorant of the formula, using the Gallery was an outright impossibility.
Yet a man had materialized on the forum who blatantly ignored every single one of those unbreakable rules.
At first, everyone assumed he was just another dime-a-dozen registered user spinning wild tall tales. But as time wore on, he steadily commanded the rapt attention of the entire Gallery.
One moment he stumbled across an intact stalk of Crescent Moon Spirit Grass; the next, he fought off a pack of Mad Dogs and won, only to get bitten on the ass while asleep. His compass spun aimlessly without pointing north, and eventually, he provided undeniable photographic and physical proof that he was stranded smack in the middle of the Forest of the Four Seasons. Most of his claims were backed by evidence that left zero room for doubt.
The serpent carcass Grylls tossed into the Auction House set off an enormous shockwave. Unlike direct peer-to-peer trades, the Auction House catered to an infinitely broader pool of participants.
While direct private trading was restricted exclusively to registered accounts with fixed handles, the Auction House allowed anyone to list items and place bids. One might wonder if dangerous narcotics or illicit contraband could be traded under such open rules. Fortunately, the forum's murderous commission fees naturally discouraged questionable dealings.
And even if someone tried, the Head Mod wielded the banhammer without mercy, snuffing out infractions with immediate permanent bans.
While Grylls was drowning in misery, the bidding war inside the Auction House burned hotter by the second. Because the listing was structured as an open competitive auction rather than an instant buy-it-now, throngs of interested parties piled on. Given the steep commission, buyers felt compelled to fight aggressively to secure high-value goods.
From Grylls's perspective, he had listed it purely to get rid of a massive hazard as quickly as possible. The hysterical reaction only baffled him. More than that, whether it was a Steel-scale Snake or a sacred dragon meant nothing to him right now.
When his prospects for staying alive tomorrow looked utterly bleak, who cared about auction gold? He felt like bursting into tears.
It was only natural that his mind would shatter. Every scrap of hope he had harbored about finding a way out had evaporated. Getting lost in an ordinary, mundane forest was enough to cost a person their life; this was the Forest of the Four Seasons, universally condemned as a hellscape uninhabitable by mortals. With compasses disabled and spatial coordinates warped into knots, the mathematical odds of surviving were virtually nonexistent.
Whether it was because his sanity had truly detached from reality, Grylls answered every query with earnest diligence—from hailing from an alternate universe to recounting life on that other world. Naturally, the Gallery's denizens didn't believe a word of it, writing him off as an eccentric lunatic spinning an elaborate persona.
To the average user, dismissing him as a committed roleplayer was the most logical conclusion. Whether Grylls had crash-landed into the Forest of the Four Seasons or originated from another cosmos was irrelevant to them; it carried little genuine weight. Right now, what held their undivided fascination was the Steel-scale Snake listed on the Auction House.
No matter how one analyzed it, that description sounded nothing like a fragile civilian. Still, it wasn't completely impossible. In mortal peril, human adrenaline frequently unlocked absurd bursts of hysterical strength. The commenters let the matter slide, accepting it as an extreme fluke.
The monumental carcass of the Steel-scale Snake successfully hammered down at approximately 1,100 gold. It was a staggering sum. Even after deducting the Auction House's ruthless transaction levy, he had netted a small fortune in the blink of an eye.
The authenticity of the merchandise had been irrefutably verified. In tandem with the sale, public trust toward Grylls surged. The consensus regarding his character was swiftly coalescing: a slightly unhinged man who possessed genuine, unvarnished honesty.
While Grylls poured out his tear-soaked lamentations onto the screen, another corner of the continent was descending into an uproar.
Deep within the Central Plains lay the cradle of an entity that had once upturned the entire martial world—a sanctuary for outcasts and pariahs alike. This was the headquarters of the Demonic Cult, a realm monitored with white-knuckled vigilance not only by the martial factions of the Murim, but by the Imperial Court of the Zhongyuan itself.
"My Liege! Setting foot inside the Forest of the Four Seasons is absolute madness!"
"This Lady intends to rescue her benefactor. Who dares stand in my path? It seems you harbor a death wish."
The Heavenly Demon, Yu Sowol, leveled an icy glare at the young strategist kneeling before her. The sheer pressure radiating from her gaze felt heavy enough to rip a man to shreds where he stood. That intent was intensely tangible; it struck the strategist's internal organs like an invisible hammer, not merely churning his stomach, but twisting his meridians into agonizing knots. Fighting off the onset of blackout, he gritted his teeth and forced out his plea.
"It is not that, Cult Leader. It is simply that the Forest of the Four Seasons is an otherworldly demonic labyrinth from which even someone of your sublime stature could not easily extricate herself."
"Mano. You are fully cognizant of the realm This Lady has stepped into, are you not?"
"Of course I am. You have transcended the mortal limits of martial arts; you possess the qualifications to ascend beyond the earthly plane."
From the moment he had entered her presence, Mano had known. Yu Sowol had breached a standard that defied all known martial metrics. Where once she had blazed like the scorching sun hanging in the high heavens, she now felt like the boundless vault of the firmament itself. Even before her breakthrough, she had marched alone into the Imperial Palace and personally severed the reigning Emperor's head. Now that she had ascended past even that peerless pinnacle, no force under the heavens could bar her path.
"And yet, the Forest of the Four Seasons spoken of by Your Liege is not an opponent of flesh and blood, but nature unbound. It is a region where the spiritual veins of the earth have converged to an unnatural density, morphing the entire biome into a living, predatory domain."
"Speak plainly."
"It is best understood as a grand, self-sustaining formation that encompasses the entire region. Even if you were to shatter the formation's array with supreme power, the forest's hyper-accelerated natural regeneration would restore the barrier in an instant, rearranging it into an entirely different matrix."
Once you entered the Forest of the Four Seasons, you never came back out. Mano laid out the undeniable reality: the entire territory was an infinite maze of shifting barriers. Break one layer, and another, more intricate pattern manifested in its place. The whole expanse breathed and regenerated like a living organism. Thus, no matter how omnipotent Yu Sowol's martial prowess was, brute-forcing a path through the forest remained impossible.
"Can even your intellect devise no countermeasure?"
"Tragically, my crude intellect cannot decipher a formation that even the heavens struggle to fathom."
"Hmph."
Yu Sowol retracted her suffocating martial pressure. If Mano, the finest mind and supreme strategist of the Demonic Cult, spoke with such conviction, it meant there truly was no viable path forward. Forcing the issue would yield nothing, and executing her most capable advisor would achieve even less. Wringing his brain for an answer seemed far more practical.
"Very well. In the meantime, launch an exhaustive investigation into everything concerning the Forest of the Four Seasons. My benefactor is trapped within its confines."
"Your will shall be done. If I may ask, My Liege, how do you intend to proceed?"
"I require time to settle the martial insights of my breakthrough, and I must ensure my benefactor manages to survive. Tell me..." Yu Sowol trailed off, almost asking whether he ever accessed the Gallery. But the memory of the mindless, impulsive posts she had unleashed flashed across her mind. The peerless Heavenly Demon knew no shame, but the mortal woman named Yu Sowol certainly did.
Of course, calling them shitposts was perhaps unfair—most were closer to private diary entries intermingled with genuine martial revelations. Even so, exposing that side of herself was unthinkable. Swallowing her initial question, she pivoted smoothly.
"If you possess any counsel regarding wilderness survival, offer it at once."
"First, I recommend advising him never to surrender hope. In the crucible of survival, the sheer will to cling to life is paramount above all else."
"I shall keep that in mind. Do you have anything further?"
"I have nothing more, Cult Leader."
"Then take your leave."
Dismissed, Mano bowed deeply and retreated. Once he cleared the chamber, Yu Sowol was left in solitary silence. She reflexively moved to open the Gallery, only to pause as a fleeting thought caught her attention. Come to think of it, he never once asked who my benefactor was.
She had never intended to disclose Grylls's identity, yet Mano had not inquired in the slightest. It was slightly peculiar. But the curiosity dissolved swiftly, and she brought up the holographic forum window. Overthinking was contrary to her nature anyway; strategic cogitation was what she kept Mano around for. It had served her well thus far.
"That nearly killed me. A walking catastrophe, honestly," Mano muttered, coughing up a trickle of blood as he leaned against the corridor wall. The internal shockwave had rattled his organs thoroughly. Wiping the crimson from his chin, he swallowed a medicinal pill, letting the cool qi soothe his battered meridians.
No one exists who can rein in the Heavenly Demon now.
She had grown incomprehensibly stronger. As if her previous monstrosity hadn't been enough, she had now achieved complete physical and spiritual enlightenment. Within the boundaries of Zhongyuan, she was without equal. Their long-cherished ambitions were finally within arm's reach. Not yet, though. There are far too many internal loose ends to tie up.
The Demonic Cult was an asylum for outcasts and zealots, which inherently meant factional discord ran deep beneath the surface. Only by enforcing ironclad internal discipline could they project their authority outward. For now, laying low was the wisest course.
We must also keep a vigilant watch on the Western Realm.
Managing the Central Plains was hard enough, but foreign empires in the west demanded equal caution. The moment the Demonic Cult raised its banners in open conquest, the entire continent would destabilize, inviting foreign intervention. History proved that civil strife always acted as a beacon for outside interference; corrupt madmen frequently invited foreign armies just to preserve their pathetic grips on power.
The real dilemma is how to pacify that monster...
Mano glanced around, ensuring the corridor was utterly deserted, and stared into the empty air before him. A shimmering, familiar holographic window materialized. It was the exact same Continental Unified Gallery that Yu Sowol frequented. By 'benefactor,' she definitely means Wild Grylls, doesn't she?
In truth, Mano had known for quite some time that his supreme leader browsed the Gallery—and that her registered forum handle was 'Heavenly Demon.' His own tenure on the forum far eclipsed hers; it would have been stranger if he hadn't noticed. The reason he feigned ignorance was simple.
"......"
Some humiliating truths were best buried forever. Rather than laughter, a heavy sigh escaped Mano's lips. If the world discovered that the universally revered Heavenly Demon was an avid forum troll, even beggars on the street would smash their alms bowls in disbelief. He hadn't believed it at first either; Yu Sowol had ascended to the apex of existence purely through martial supremacy. The notion of her wasting time online was anathema.
Yet as her closest confidant and a man of sharp deductive intellect, the clues had been impossible to miss. The most definitive incident had been the assassination of the Emperor. When she had stormed off unprompted and returned with the monarch's head under her arm, the corresponding forum threads made everything crystal clear. While the Imperial Court scrambled to suppress the truth by framing it as a succession coup, Mano knew the bloody reality.
What on earth possesses her to write things like this...?
An even greater headache was her habit of posting raw martial insights without a second thought. Thankfully, because her tone sounded archaic and bombastic, other users routinely mocked her as an out-of-touch boomer roleplaying an ancient grandmaster. But if those identical sentences had been transcribed into a secret martial manual rather than the Gallery, the entire Central Plains would have drowned in blood over the inheritance. It was fundamentally no different from someone casually sharing peerless philosophical literature on an anonymous message board.
This is a secret I must take to the grave.
Regardless of his leader's online habits, Mano was an accomplished shitposter in his own right. The overwhelming majority of his posts consisted of roasting his tyrannical boss; if she ever discovered his handle, his head would part company with his shoulders before he could finish an apology. Yet quitting the Gallery was entirely out of the question.
As if he could ever quit. A dog would stop eating scraps before Mano abandoned the Gallery. He chuckled softly to himself; after burning so many mental calories managing cult affairs, emptying his mind online was incomparably refreshing.
Still, browsing wasn't entirely mindless recreation. There was one particular registered user who had been causing massive ripples across the entire forum lately.
For now, I should keep a close eye on Grylls...
He had no intention of intervening directly. Yu Sowol chose not to think deeply, but she was by no means unobservant. Maintaining a facade of ignorance while monitoring Grylls's actions was the prudent course, especially when Yu Sowol herself was watching the man intently. Even with all the chatter about the Forest of the Four Seasons, Mano reserved judgment. He would calibrate his final assessment of Grylls once more irrefutable proof surfaced.
"......"
Mano stared at the screen, a twinge of pity stirring in his chest. He really does look pathetic. Should I lend a hand?
God, he truly was pitiable.