Reborn with Steve Stand

Chapter 726: First Spine

Looking at the towering flame giant in front of him, as immense as a mountain, and the thorny golem reaching into the clouds, Summon finally gave up.

Yet, despite this, Fang Mo still felt relentless.

"Summon, summon, look."

As everyone walked through a thicket, Fang Mo suddenly drew a sword and thrust it into the ground. Immediately, the sword boiled like a living shadow and then transformed into a massive, amorphous black gel: "This is the lower dark elf, Therman."

"Squeak!"

The Shoggoth on the ground let out a coordinated cry.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah."

Summon, walking ahead, nodded numbly: "You're right, okay?"

"Hey, why do you always look so skeptical?" Fang Mo, dissatisfied with this perfunctory attitude, drew another sword and thrust it into the ground, saying, "Then I'll summon Revos to show you."

In front of them appeared a light orb emitting a cold aura.

"There."

Fang Mo pointed: "Revos."

"You…"

Summon couldn't hold it in anymore. Honestly, she wasn't sure what this thing was, but it was clearly not a lower light elf. She raised her hand to her forehead, ready to say something.

But just then, several shadows leaped out of the distant flower bushes.

"Master, be careful!"

Seeing this, Lakius the Dragonoid rushed forward, lifting his steel fork to block the attackers.

Under the influence of the Ring of Dominance, the summoned beasts were indeed very diligent. Seeing their master attacked, they all moved into action.

The quickest to react was the Light Castellan.

With a palm turned into a blade, it directly cut a lunging figure in half, followed closely by the Heaven Expeller, who stabbed another enemy.

By this time, they realized what their enemies were.

These were strangely shaped creatures, somewhat like hybrids of humans and beasts, with muscular bodies, running on all fours, covered in spikes on their backs and arms, looking utterly irrational, like terrifying demons.

Despite their ferocious appearance, the summoned beasts were not intimidated and began to attack.

The Gold Platoni raised its fist, Master Dogrie started casting petrification magic, and Sieghart flew into the sky to summon lightning.

But before their attacks could be completed, a towering white beam of destruction shot out.

This beam was like a massive tsunami of light, with near-apocalyptic pressure, instantly engulfing the monsters ahead, piercing through the entire forest, accompanied by deafening explosions.

Flowers exploded, flames burned, trees and temples collapsed.

But that was not the end.

The white beam continued, straight towards a mountain.

Before their disbelieving eyes, a temple at the mountain's base exploded, the entire mountain melted and evaporated, and a temple at the top disappeared in an instant.

After evaporating the mountain, the beam shot upwards, grazing the back of the Skyveil Beast, then plunged into the Sea of Sky, tearing it apart with a massive hole, revealing a faint golden light — clearly sunlight from the heavens.

"Roar!"

Even the Skyveil Beast seemed terrified, diving suddenly and causing everything around to almost float. Fortunately, Fang Mo stabilized everything with a gravity field.

"This…"

Summon and her beasts were stunned.

Especially the Light Castellan, Sieghart, who looked at the light orb in confusion, speechless.

…Is this really Revos?

"Ahem, calm down."

Fang Mo pretended to be calm: "Revos's power is like this…"

"Brother, please stop showing off."

Summon rubbed her temples in frustration: "I know I can't argue with you, but don't overdo it. Forget Revos, even the upper light elf, Aurora Grelin, can't do this…"

"Nonsense! Are you a summoner? Do you understand summoning?"

Fang Mo immediately retorted: "Revos is the embodiment of light, a blue and white light orb. How does this summoned thing not look like Revos?"

"You…"

Summon looked up at the thing, realizing it was indeed a light orb, but enormously large, about dozens of meters in diameter. It was more like a second sun, its brilliance almost blinding.

Under her gaze, the light orb suddenly sprouted pale light tentacles, writhing like the flares of a star, wild and meaningless.

"Hmm?"

Summon was stunned, feeling her sanity slipping.

"Alright, stop bullying her."

Finally, Xiao Yao's voice rang out: "Using Ego as Revos is too mean, isn't it?"

"Ahem, it's to broaden her horizons…"

Fang Mo, respectful of his Xiao Yao, stopped teasing Summon: "Since my wife has spoken, I'll stop summoning other things. We'll push forward with Ao, Dark, Fire, and Light."

"Lower elves, my foot."

Summon facepalmed: "I'd believe you if you said these could destroy the world…"

This little episode quickly passed.

Afterwards, they followed the ravine Ego created.

Notably, Ego, once summoned, behaved unexpectedly docile. After being hacked numerous times by Fang Mo's sword, it seemed genuinely dim-witted, its intelligence on par with Revos.

The flame giant, Surtr, silently observed Ego.

Fang Mo didn't know if the flame giant recognized this ancient deity, but Surtr's increasingly respectful demeanor suggested he did and preferred not to end up as a fool. Hence, he was exceptionally obedient, even tiptoeing as he walked.

Afraid that if he raised his voice a little, it might irritate Fang Mo and he'd end up getting a sword right away.

Unlike the in-game map.

The real Forest of Tree Spirits was even larger than they had anticipated.

Fortunately, a ravine paved the way, and the group followed it straight ahead, saving them a lot of detours. After about half an hour, they successfully exited the Forest of Tree Spirits.

During this time.

Fang Mo captured several Tree Spirits and Tree Demons for research purposes.

He even sealed the Elder Tree Spirit guarding the area with his Ender Ring.

His little partner, however, was puzzled by this, thinking these small creatures were useless.

So Fang Mo explained briefly.

He mentioned the hybrid traits of the forestry module, how these plant lifeforms could be crossbred. For instance, the Spiky Bully from Guardians of the Galaxy was a hybrid of Groot and a Twilight Thorn Rose.

The offspring would inherit the strengths of both parents.

The Spiky Bully, for example, had the characteristics of both Groot and the Twilight Thorn Rose.

Fang Mo also had several miraculous plants, like the distant orchid from Plant Magic, which seemed to produce magic by consuming food.

Additionally, he had three sacred saplings from the Twilight Forest: the Sorting Tree, the Time Tree, and the Ore Tree. The Time Tree, when made into a sword, could even stop time, allowing Fang Mo to manipulate others within the time stop—a truly extraordinary ability.

Not to mention the enchanted holy rubber sapling, a game-breaking artifact.

"I see..."

After hearing Fang Mo's explanation, Xiao Yao quickly understood: "You're trying to create an ultimate hybrid plant, aren't you?"

"Yes."

Fang Mo nodded: "Just the Time Tree from Twilight alone, made into a weapon, has this bug-level time-stopping ability. I can't even imagine what kind of monster we'd get if all the plants pollinated together... It'd be as powerful as the Doom Starfruit in Plants vs. Zombies."

"The Doom Starfruit? Wait, did you just say time stop?"

"Ahem, you heard wrong."

Before Xiao Yao could think further, Fang Mo changed the subject: "If I unlock a moe conversion module, hehe, I could turn this thing into a Little Green Goddess."

"...What?"

"Little Green Goddess."

Fang Mo looked at her curiously: "Come on, you've never played Genshin Impact? Nahida is so adorable. I just regret not getting the Book of Time from Genshin Impact, or I'd have wiped out the Sumeru Akademiya..."

"No."

Xiao Yao facepalmed: "Hold on."

"Uh... are you jealous?"

Fang Mo sensed something was off and asked.

"Let's not talk about this now." Xiao Yao rubbed her temples in frustration: "Do you mean the Little Grass Goddess..."

"Damn! I got it mixed up!"

Fang Mo slapped his thigh.

"You scared me." Xiao Yao sighed in relief: "I thought you liked Little Chrysanthemum..."

"I got it wrong, I got it wrong."

Fang Mo felt like slapping himself: "Sorry, I only remembered Nahida's name, knew she was a nature character. My mistake, my mistake, I'll apologize to her if I get the chance..."

"You'd better not seal her into a sword too."

Xiao Yao sighed: "I remember the Little Grass Goddess has mind-reading abilities."

"Hehe, let her read." Fang Mo grinned mischievously: "I'm curious how fast she could run after reading my mind..."

They chatted as they walked.

Soon they reached another area of the Behemoth.

According to the in-game map, passing through the Forest of Tree Spirits, they should arrive at Purgatory and Eternal Day, the darkest and brightest places on the Behemoth's back.

However, Fang Mo looked up and froze.

"Uh, why is it..."

Following his gaze, they saw a completely collapsed temple.

Though it was a scorched ruin, they could still feel a cold, dark aura emanating from it. In the distance, Yudi saw a bewildered Cernik wandering around, seemingly confused about where his home had gone.

"Purgatory?"

Xiao Yao glanced up: "Well, it seems it can't be refined now..."

"Sigh, it's my fault for summoning Revos too strong."

Fang Mo sighed: "Forget it, let's skip Purgatory and go to Eternal Day. The music there was nice."

"I remember Eternal Day is on top of a mountain."

Xiao Yao asked knowingly: "So where's the mountain..."

"Emmm..."

Fang Mo pondered for a moment.

Then he continued forward as if nothing had happened: "In that case, let's head to the First Vertebra."

"Sure."

Xiao Yao rolled her eyes but followed.

Fortunately, the earlier beam was angled, so after evaporating a mountain, it left the Behemoth's range. After walking a bit further, they finally found a relatively intact temple.

But just as they reached the entrance.

Fang Mo noticed a completely black octopus.

This octopus was much larger than the others, as big as a car, with tattered cloth hanging from it, a strange golden key in its tentacles, and jewels sticking to its body, crawling out of the temple.

"Oh my! A thief!"

Fang Mo's eyes lit up: "And it's black-skinned!"