Chapter 3513: The Equatorial Rainforest

Lin Mu watched as the canopy thickened into a near-solid expanse of dark green, leaves overlapping leaves, vines choking every gap. Sunlight became a rare thing, reduced to faint emerald glimmers filtering through layers of foliage. The world beneath the canopy was dim, humid, and alive in ways that made the skin prickle.

Lin Mu felt it immediately.

The natural energy here was immense. Earth, wood, and water elements intertwined so densely that they formed a living web. It did not feel oppressive, but comforting in a strange way. Like standing inside the breath of the world itself.

"This place..." Meng Bai murmured. "It feels different."

Lin Mu nodded. "It is rich. Old. Untouched."

Three wide rivers cut through the forest, their waters reflecting faint green light from the canopy above. These were the same tributaries they had seen near the city, now revealed in their full scale. They flowed deep into the rainforest, branching again and again into countless streams.

According to the maps Lin Mu had read, there were hundreds of rivers like these in the Equatorial Rainforest. Thousands, if one counted all the smaller waterways. Lakes dotted the land like scattered mirrors, some only a few hundred meters across, others vast enough to resemble inland seas.

Around these lakes, the forest floor was visible.

Clearings formed naturally, the water pushing back the roots and undergrowth. In these areas, aquatic plants flourished in overwhelming abundance.

Lake Engulfing Duckweed blanketed entire surfaces in thick green mats, broken only by ripples where beasts fed beneath. Without constant predation, the plant would have swallowed every lake whole.

Immortal Lake Lotuses bloomed in slow majesty, petals glowing faintly with Immortal qi. Immortal Water Hyacinths drifted lazily, their roots trailing like curtains into the depths. Mud Depths Fox Nut flowers clustered near the shallows, their seeds prized for both cultivation and cuisine.

The water itself teemed with life.

Schools of Azure Scale River Carp flashed beneath the surface, their bodies lined with faint lines of qi. Long-bodied Silver Whisker Eels wove through submerged roots, their whiskers sensing everything around them. Massive Ironjaw Pike lurked near the depths, their jaws strong enough to crush bone and spirit tools alike.

Amphibians were everywhere.

Giant River King Frogs lay hidden beneath lily pads and fallen logs, their bulk dwarfing even Little Shrubby. One surfaced briefly as an Immortal Blue Winged Kingfisher swooped too low, its massive tongue snapping out to swallow the bird whole before it even realized the danger.

The splash echoed through the forest, sending ripples across the lake’s surface.

And then there were the toxic ones.

Toxic Purple Back Salamanders clung to rocks and tree roots near the water’s edge. They were small, barely a few inches long, their vibrant coloration a clear warning. No beast approached them. Even the Tremor Tusk Elephants avoided these areas entirely.

The Tremor Tusk Elephants were impossible to miss.

They moved like walking mountains through the forest, bodies towering over twenty meters tall. Their skin was thick and ridged, colored like weathered stone. Each step sent tremors through the ground, cracking roots and compacting soil. Their tusks, six to seven meters long, curved forward like ancient siege weapons.

Entire herds moved slowly through the forest, stripping trees of leaves and bark with casual ease.

Little Shrubby slowed slightly as they passed one such herd.

"Big," he said appreciatively.

"Yes," Lin Mu replied. "And not something to provoke." he was especially wary of them.

Unlike the immortals in the city, these Tremor Tusk Elephants were no joke. Even the weakest among them were at the Fourth Tribulation Stage of the Immortal realm, and the strongest, who seemed to be the leader, was even a Seventh Tribulation Stage immortal beast.

It was clear that while in the Fifteen Ryze World, Human immortals might not have enough experts with strength, the same could not be said for the beasts who had been living here for far longer than them.

But just their strength wasn’t what made Lin Mu wary, as these were highly intelligent beasts. And while Lin Mu could certainly fight them, he did not want to provoke them for no reason. Thankfully, the elephants ignored them completely, their ancient eyes betraying neither fear nor interest.

As they continued deeper into the rainforest, the sense of scale only grew.

This was not just a forest.

It was a world within a world.

Alive, dangerous, and endlessly abundant.

For nearly a full week, Lin Mu and the others flew without pause through the Equatorial Rainforest.

Day and night blurred together beneath the endless canopy. The forest did not thin, nor did it repeat itself in any simple way. Every stretch of land felt subtly different from the last. The species of trees shifted. The density of vines changed. The balance of beasts tilted between predator and prey.

At first, the journey was uneventful.

Little Shrubby sprinted above the treetops when he could, and when the canopy grew too dense, he ran through it instead, snapping branches thicker than city walls with ease. The forest responded quickly, closing behind them as if they had never passed through at all.

On the third day, that changed.

A massive shadow burst upward from the trees ahead of them, scales glistening like wet jade. It was a Forest Coil Lesser Basilisk, its long serpentine body wrapped in bark-like plates, eyes glowing with dull yellow light.

It did not roar.

It struck.

Its jaws snapped toward Little Shrubby’s neck, fangs dripping with paralytic venom strong enough to immobilize most immortals instantly.

The air split.

Lin Mu’s sword flashed once.

There was no dramatic exchange, no prolonged struggle. The basilisk’s head separated cleanly from its body, momentum carrying it forward another dozen meters before it finally crashed through the canopy below.

The rest of the corpse followed shortly after.

Little Shrubby barely slowed down.

"...That one smelled good," he muttered.

Lin Mu nodded. "We’ll take it."

And they did.

That was the pattern for the next several days, repeating over and over again.

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