Asa didn't believe in places like heaven and hell.

  When he was seven or eight years old, he became infatuated with the magical world of old adventurers and thought that heaven and hell, which he often heard about from others, were also of a similar nature - new and wondrous worlds to explore. So when the village's elderly pastor preached, he would ask out of simple curiosity.

  At first, the old pastor was delighted to see a young child show such interest in theology. However, he approached it with an attitude of exploring animal behavior and asked a series of questions that broke the pot and got to the bottom of things, leaving the old pastor speechless. When he asked why God only ate food but didn't poop, why the male and female gods had been in heaven for so long without having more little gods, and whether they were castrated like the pigs at the village entrance, he was chased away by the adults nearby.

  He had never seen any evidence that these two places existed, and no one had ever gone to the vast outside world like the old adventurer and returned to give him a detailed account of heaven and hell. So when he woke up, his first thought was that he wasn't dead yet.

  He pressed his belly, and it was intact. The muscles were still tight against the skin, and the internal organs were all in their proper places, as normal as could be. He even felt that his body had never been so spirited and refreshed.

  Was I dreaming? But the feeling of being knocked flying by that red-robed figure, spewing blood as I crashed into the water, was utterly devoid of any dreamlike quality. Moreover, all my memories from before were seamlessly connected, without a hint of the haziness or confusion that often accompanies dreams.

  Asa got up from the ground. It was a strange place, seemingly a tree hole, yet like a house. Twisted branches and vines gathered together to form the surrounding walls, where the branches themselves grew around to form windows and doors. Vines stretched out on both sides of the wall, entwining in mid-air, like a bed, and several strangely-shaped trees seemed to serve as tables and chairs.

  This should be the residence of the elves. Asa knew this strange house, and before in his hometown, he often heard a lot about the elves from the dwarves.

  Spirits all live in the forests where people rarely set foot, although they are similar to humans in appearance, they cannot be classified as 'subhuman' like those beastmen, they have their own unique culture and way of life just like dwarves.

  It seems that dwarves and elves have some sort of blood relationship, but the dwarves look down on this kin with contempt, often using elves as a metaphor to mock or ridicule others. From their mouths, elves seem like rigid, self-righteous fools, lacking emotions and vitality, just wooden blocks.

  A creaking sound came from outside the wooden house, and two elves walked in.

  There were two elves, a male and a female. The male had black hair, while the female had silver hair. At least from their appearance, they didn't have any wooden or clumsy look to them. Their looks were extremely beautiful and elegant from a human perspective, with tall stature and long ears protruding from their shoulder-length hair, giving off an air of refinement. It was hard to imagine that they were close relatives of those short, stout dwarves.

  The male spirit spoke to Asa in a gentle and calm voice, "Hello, human. First of all, let me introduce myself, I am the elder of the noblest and purest spirit tribe on this continent, and you humans call me Kuran."

  It seems that like dwarves, they can't be judged by their appearance. Asa had seen dwarves who were younger than himself but had a lot of white hair, so this elf who looked like a young man and was the elder of his tribe might be several hundred years old.

  Kelan pointed to the elf girl beside him: "Her name is Luoya." Asa suddenly realized that she was the very elf girl he had seen ****ing in the spring water. Now she was looking at him with a gaze that, logically speaking, an elf shouldn't have - one with a hint of emotionalization.

  Sitting down on the wooden bench, Elder Cran gazed at Asa with a calm and tranquil gaze: "You are the first human to enter this forest in nearly five hundred years. We have never welcomed humans of lower status, but after all, we saw you risk your life to help us deal with that dark servant. And for some other reasons, we brought you to this place where humans were originally not allowed to set foot."

  A Sa listened quietly as he continued to speak, this was a good misunderstanding.

  "Unfortunately, although it was the Dark Servant's doing, you did indeed disrupt one of our most important rituals and allowed the Dark Servant to take a leaf from the World Tree."

  That's indeed a leaf of the World Tree. Fortunately, only one was taken away, which means there are at least two more left, and there's still a chance. Asa remains expressionless, he can now tell that it doesn't seem like something that can be taken away just by asking, it's better not to reveal his intentions yet, let's figure out the situation first. He probes: "How many leaves are left on the World Tree?"

  The elf girl, Rouya, turned her head away. Although there was no expression on her face, this action already expressed sufficient disdain and contempt. Elder Kuran's demeanor and tone did not fluctuate in the slightest, still speaking warmly and calmly: "There is no World Tree. The leaves of the World Tree are not real leaves, they are divine objects left behind by the God of All Things, Mafa."

  That tree is a species of Fama, with very powerful leaves. Asa recalled Chris's expert-level translation and curled up his mouth, punching her face in his imagination.

  "Can you tell me about the cause and effect of this matter?" Now that things have come to this point, Asa also wants to understand everything clearly.

  Klan Elder fell silent. The calm and gentle face of Gu Jing was still the same, but he looked at Asa with an undisguised gaze that was not out of caution due to their relationship, but rather hesitation, as if a noble lord was considering whether or not to show his family tree to a monkey. Fortunately, he finally spoke up.

  "Our tribe of spirits has lived in this forest since ancient times, is the origin of all spirit tribes on the continent, and is the messenger who guards the light. For tens of thousands of years, we have protected the two divine objects left by the god Mafa, the three leaves of the world tree and the sun well. According to our inherited divine prophecy, in the distant southwestern edge of the continent, there is an evil object that was left when the gods created the world. When the world begins to fall into chaos, it will be opened and sealed, everything will perish. Only the divine power of the sun well and the life force of the world tree leaves combined can destroy that evil object."

  "Although we never contact with the outside world, other spirits from the outside have been reporting to us. We know that now the whole world has begun to fall into chaos, and our original harmony between elves, beastmen and nature has completely lost balance. This is all because of you humans, who have forgotten your faith in gods and reverence for nature, even building cities near this sacred forest. You also destroyed the peaceful life of the beastmen, and now those remaining wild beasts are about to go crazy with the whole world. Most importantly, there are already humans completely absorbed by darkness, surrounding that evil object has generated a dark power of death."

  "We took advantage of the once-in-a-century appearance of the Golden Ring in the sky above this forest to hold a ceremony. At that time, the originally constant power of the Sun Well would be readjusted and fluctuate, and we would send the most talented people in our tribe to receive this power, preparing for future use with the leaves of the World Tree to counter the darkness. Unfortunately, it was also at that time that the Sun Well lost its power to protect this forest. We don't know why the servant of darkness also knew about this matter. He took advantage of the opportunity to disrupt our ceremony."

  "You also know the final result, the dark servant took away a leaf of the World Tree. And just as our ritual was about to be completed, you, who were seriously injured, fell into the Sun Well, and the power in the well automatically flowed into your dying body. Since the water was overflowing with the life energy of the World Tree's leaves, that power transformed and healed your injuries."

  "That power was originally supposed to flow into my body." The girl, Luya, said with a tone of regret and anger, as if she had been fed pearls to pigs.

  If it wasn't for me falling in, the red-robed man would have pulled you out, and most likely treated you just like that fat pig of a local official. Asa gazed at her for a moment. Recalling how she stood in the well, he suddenly found it hard to imagine how something so beautiful could become an ugly corpse.

  "Although the ritual was disrupted, it's not entirely irreparable. The power of the Sun Well should still be intact and lingering within your body. That sacred power cannot be utilized by your human bodies tainted with impurities; only those of us who possess the noble bloodline that inherited divine power can merge with it. We must find a way to extract this power, then combine it with the remaining two leaves of the World Tree - our sole hope in resisting darkness."

  The old man's tone and demeanor were calm and steady from start to finish, but it seemed that only the dwarves' self-proclaimed elegance gave him a kind of courtesy that was not discerning. His words did not conceal his contempt for Asa's human identity. "Before that, you must stay here. Resisting darkness and death is also your responsibility as a person given life by the sun. And as a lowly human, you should feel honored to be able to participate in this sacred plan."

  A Sa still didn't make a sound, but in his mind he made a rude gesture at the spirit who thought it was superior to him. Do you think you're that great?

  This magnificent speech had no impact on his original thought structure in his mind. It was as if he was just listening to a storyteller's tale.

  He never thought that he had anything to do with the peace between the world of light and darkness, it was too far away from his real life. Just like those miners in his hometown who were indulged in cheap wine and prostitutes, when they heard others talking about national events, morality, culture and so on, they didn't even care whether what you said was true or not, all they could feel was the speaker's self-superiority, spit a mouthful of saliva, none of my business.

  It seems that it's not easy to deal with after all. Since it's a divine object, they definitely won't give it to a human who is considered lowly in their eyes. The only way is to slowly figure out the situation and plan for the future. Asa asked: "So how long will it take for you to extract that power from my body?" If they just deal with it in two or three moves and then immediately kick him out, that would be a bit troublesome.

  "I don't know, we'll have to slowly search for a method from the ancient books. We've never encountered this kind of thing before." Elder Kuran stood up, hinting that the conversation was over. "Although human lifespan is short, don't worry, we will find a way before you grow old and die."

  Asa shook his head and replied slowly: "I'm not worried at all."