1000-year-old Tree Heart

Xue Bai had found Liu Mei in an odd way.

During his playthrough of 'Children of the Plane,' Xue Bai found himself on the Northern Continent while hunting down an enemy of his.

And by fate, his enemy had run away and hid in the Hysteria Forest.

Thinking of the place as a Forbidden Area daunting enough to scare Xue Bai and somewhere he could hide until Xue Bai gave up on pursuing him,

However, Xue Bai by then was already in the Spirit Purification Realm and could ignore the mist, so the man's plan was for naught.

And in a prolonged battle where the two slowly destroyed most of the Hysteria Forest, and they eventually found themselves in the gorge where she lived.

Xue Bai, thankful that a powerhouse of equal strength was nearby, called out for help, and since Xue Bai was much more pleasing to the eye than his enemy, she decided to help him. Then, the two teamed up and killed his enemy.

After that, as if they were kindred spirits born from the same source, Xue Bai and Liu Mei would become friends and travel the Baishen Plane together for the next two hundred-odd years until his death.

So now, looking at her appearance once again, so many years later, Xue Bai couldn't keep his emotions hidden any longer, and his eyes became gentle and familiar.

Seeing this, Liu Mei was beyond confused, but since she didn't truly know how to ask what his eyes meant, she could only cough lightly and bring Xue Bai back to reality.

"Boy, I asked you for your name. It'd be awkward for me to continue calling you boy." Liu Mei said after she saw Xue Bai leave his reminiscing thoughts.

"My name is Xue Bai."

"Xue Bai? A good name." Liu Mei said with an approving nod.

"Alright, Xue Bai, where to next? This cave can't be the place where you plan to build your force." Liu Mei said as she walked over to the cave's entrance.

"No, before that, I need to get something." Xue Bai said as he halted the woman. "You can see my current health is extremely bad right now, so I need to get something inside the gorge."historical

As she heard his words, Liu Mei took the moment to look at the boy once more. And as she did, she couldn't help but nod.

"You do look worse for wear. Thankfully I am the overlord of this area. What do you need? I can bring whoever owns it to us." Liu Mei said, slightly shocking Xue Bai.

But after a second thought, he realized it was true.

Liu Mei was a descendant of a Divine Beast and, therefore, different from most creatures in the Baishen Plane. Therefore, she didn't need Spiritual Qi to cultivate and get stronger but instead only needed time to grow up.

The older Liu Mei was, the stronger she would become. So even if she laid down and did nothing for the next thousand years, she would become invincible in the Baishen Plane.

But currently, she was still extremely young for a demonic beast being less than 100 years old. So instead of going around and possibly endangering herself while looking for treasures to accomplish her goal, Liu Mei planned to stay in this gorge and wait until adulthood when she would reach the Immortal Origin realm before doing so.

However, while her cultivation was not much in the Central Continent, she was unrivaled in the Northern Continent.

So her being an overlord of a tiny Forbidden Area in this backwater continent was nothing surprising.

Thinking that far, Xue Bai had no more qualms and told his companion what he needed, where it was, and who was guarding it.

"Oh, that bat? Alright, give me one second." Lou Mei knew what Xue Bai was talking about.

So she walked up to the cave's entrance and transformed back to her true form. But since she was at the entrance and in a much smaller area, Liu Mei made her form much smaller than the one Xue Bai saw earlier.

However, no matter how small Liu Mei was, she still had a Pseudo Earth-grade bloodline and a Spirit Expansion realm cultivation base, which was more than enough order around a demonic beast living in this gorge.

"Old Bat! Come here now with that wood treasure you've been hoarding! If you aren't here in a minute, I'll pluck you clean and roast you for dinner!" Liu Mei screamed out into the gorge.

"Is that going to work?" Xue Bai asked skeptically. But to his surprise, it did.

And after not even 20 seconds, a 30-meter-long wingspan bat with red skin came into his line of sight.

Landing quietly onto a spike near the hole's entrance, the once skyscraper-sized bat turned into a red radiance before entering his human form.

The bat turned into a tall but lanky middle-aged man in a tall black cloak. But unlike Liu Mei's normal human form, the bat still had his wings visible, showing that he wasn't human.

Once a demonic beast reached the Xiantian Great Realm, it could transform into a human form. However, if their bloodline were too low a grade or diluted, there would be some demonic beast features still visible that would give up their true identity, and if you included the constant Baleful Qi they emitted, it was extremely hard for a demonic beast to try and sneak into human territories even if they had a human form.

However, Liu Mei was an exception as she was the descendant of a Divine Beast, and her human form neither emitted Baleful Qi nor had a visible demonic beast feature. Something Xue Bai planned to take advantage of.

"Yes, your Holiness." The bat humbly spoke as he knelt down in Liu Mei's presence.

The bat was so humble he didn't even question Xue Bai's presence.

"Your Holiness?" Xue Bai asked Liu Mei with a raised eyebrow.

Since Liu Mei left right after she and Xue Bai met, he didn't know about the odd title that the demonic beast who lived in the gorge called her.

"These insects don't deserve to know my name. And your Majesty reminds me of some bad things. So this was the next best thing." Liu Mei replied casually.

Xue Bai was about to question the second half of her sentence, but before he could, she started to speak again.

"Give me that 1000-year-old Tree Heart you've been saving. My friend needs it." Liu Mei said as she pointed at Xue Bai.

1000-year-old Tree Heart was the very wood-type nourishing natural treasure that Xue Bai needed to heal his shriveled-up Martial Veins.

It was a natural treasure that could only be harvested from the death of a Tree Demon in the Xiantian Great Realm, who was at least 1000 years old.

And this bat was the person who guarded it.

Xue Bai's original plan was to anger a nearby demonic beast and lure it into the bat's domain. This way, he could start a fight between the two and stealthily steal the 1000-year-old Tree Heart.

However, now that he had the powerhouse known as Liu Mei at his call, why not just force the bat to hand it over? Not only would it save time, but also it could stop him from possibly endangering his life while trying to follow through with his plan.

"But your Holiness. I have been saving that for my breakthrough to the Spirit Severing realm." The bat couldn't help but say.

"I don't care. Choose which you'd like to keep. Your life or the 1000-year-old Tree Heart." Liu Mei said coldly.

She didn't care at all about the plight of the bat. He was weaker and, therefore, in her mind, could only yield to her commands.

The bat could easily sense Liu Mei's rising impatience from her words and the annoyance in her eyes. So without a moment of hesitation, he gritted his teeth and handed it over.

And in a way that Xue Bai will never understand, he went into the coat that was just manifested by his transformation and pulled out a large head-sized green orb.

'Didn't he just get that coat? How the hell is it in there?' Xue Bai couldn't help but think. But since such a question would only make him look stupid, he kept it inside him.

And from Xue Bai's silence and indifferent look, the bat didn't know his thoughts. The only thing he did know was that Liu Mei would kill him if he didn't hand it over. And while he didn't know who Xue Bai was, he could sense that the boy wasn't someone he could mess with.

Xue Bai hadn't undone his bloodline, and his 9 tails were still out in all of their glory. However, he suppressed its aura, making the bat unable to sense its rank.

But no matter how much Xue Bai suppressed it, there was still the innate suppression effect that pressured the bat from doing anything toward him.

No matter how much he suppressed it, Xue Bai's bloodline was at the peak of the cultivation world, Immortal or Mortal. And a random bat in the Xiantian Great Realm couldn't challenge its sovereignty.

"You may leave, bat." Liu Mei said as she waved the demonic beast off.

"Yes, your Holiness." And after giving his treasure one last look, he left.

There wasn't anything he could do.

Liu Mei was too strong, and Xue Bai was too scary.

"Xue Bai, is there anything else you'd like to get from this forest? We won't come back here for a while." Liu Mei said as she handed the 1000-year-old Tree Heart to Xue Bai.

Thinking for a moment, Xue Bai eventually remembered Feng Fei.

"I don't want you to get it, but instead, just prepare it. Have a demonic beast stay at the edge of the gorge with a Profound Gold Divine Fruit. In anywhere from a week to a month's time, a person from the Gen Empire will come and retrieve it." Xue Bai said.

Though he wasn't sure if Feng Fei would choose the metal element Martial Veins, he knew that the Burning Steel Mountains were much more dangerous than the Hysteria Forest. So unless Feng Fei was feeling confident or rather reckless, she would most likely choose the metal element natural treasure here in the Hysteria Forest.

Liu Mei didn't know Xue Bai's inner ramblings, but since he made such a simple request, she called out for another beast to come.

Though the bat was close, Liu Mei knew she was pissed that guy off, so asking him for a favor wouldn't bode so well. And since Liu Mei had no plans to stay here any longer, she could guess that the bat wouldn't obey her request after she left.

And soon enough, a blue sparrow arrived.

"Tell her what you want, and we can go."