Chapter 75: The Silent Onset of the Biochemical Crisis

After shaking off the Thunderclap Wyvern, Su Yi once again opened the Map to pinpoint the target location he had planned earlier.

“Without realizing it, I’ve ended up heading to a spot a little higher in the Rotten Vale,” Su Yi murmured, closing the Hunting Guide and scanning his surroundings.

Although he was now in the upper-mid level, the miasma was still thick all around him. Further above, he could see a massive section of a Great Viper Wyvern’s remains lying atop a rocky platform, its thick ribs propping up the spine like a macabre skeletal roof.

“The bones up there should be easier to collect,” Su Yi said, raising his binoculars and noting several fractures in the rib bones.

Some of the broken ribs were dangling precariously from the skeleton, held in place by vines or chunks of rock, ready to fall at the slightest touch.

“Let’s go! We’re heading for that spinal platform,” Su Yi said, pointing toward it.

The Grimclaw Wyvern deftly leapt and climbed across the remains and rocks, quickly reaching the platform.

The vast ribcage loomed over the area, making it feel as though one had stepped inside the belly of a long-dead beast.

“The miasma is particularly thick today,” Su Yi remarked, peering over the edge of the platform. Down below, the accumulated corpses in the mid-levels were shrouded in dense, swirling haze.

The Grimclaw Wyvern let out a low growl, its attention fixed on a particular spot atop the platform.

Su Yi turned, following the direction his guiding firefly was now indicating, as it hovered insistently toward the place the Grimclaw had noticed.

There was something in the far corner.

“Is that... a Gale Wing Wyvern carcass?” Su Yi approached, finding the half-devoured remains. The body was badly decomposed, and all around it were the picked-clean bones of other creatures.

“It’s like a predator’s larder—prey dragged back to the nest and eaten, leaving heaps of bones. But this is the upper layer of the Rotten Vale. What sort of monster would haul its kills up here?” Su Yi pondered, piecing together clues from his knowledge of the local ecology.

“And the number of carcasses isn’t high—it looks like this pile accumulated only recently.”

Because the remains were so rotten, he couldn’t discern what kind of wounds they bore, making further analysis impossible.

“I found some traces, Rotom, but they seem quite old. The footprints are all blurred,” his phone Rotom reported after circling the area.

Su Yi went to inspect the spot indicated. The prints were indeed faint, their outlines unclear, but from what little he could make out, they didn’t seem to belong to an especially large monster.

“No other traces around?” Su Yi circled the area, but the guiding firefly gave no response. Either there were no more clues, or what remained was too faint for even the firefly to detect.

The Grimclaw Wyvern sniffed around but found nothing. Then, suddenly, it glanced warily toward the area below the platform, as if sensing something uncertain.

“It seems the monster hasn’t returned for some time. Is this just a temporary lair?”

“No matter, let’s get the bones first!” Su Yi summoned his Scavenger Bird and pointed to a precariously dangling section of rib. “Knock it down with a Sturdy Stone Strike!”

The bird quickly unearthed a rock and hurled it at the bone overhead.

Thud! Crack!

The rib crashed to the floor with a heavy thud; though it was only a small segment, it was nearly as long as a person.

Suddenly, the Scavenger Bird shuddered, looking as uneasy as the Grimclaw Wyvern.

Su Yi didn’t notice. He recalled the bird, strode over to the fallen bone, and—with Dewleaf’s help—began cleaning off the mud and tar before stowing it away in his Inventory.

“Task complete, time to head back,” Su Yi said, recalling his partners and opening the Hunting Guide to leave.

[You are in the Domain of Miasma and cannot depart.]

“????” Su Yi froze, then exclaimed, “The Corpse-Eater Dragon?! It’s already here? When did it arrive?”

This notification had only appeared once before—when the Steel Dragon descended upon the Ancient Forest. Now, with this warning and knowing which elder dragon was most likely to appear in the Rotten Vale, there could be no doubt: the Corpse-Eater Dragon had arrived.

He hurriedly released the Grimclaw Wyvern. “Is the Corpse-Eater Dragon nearby?”

The wyvern rushed to the edge of the platform and peered downward. The mid-levels were shrouded in miasma as thick as fog, the yellow haze completely swallowing up the bone piles below.

The Grimclaw Wyvern let out a low, uncertain growl, finally confirming what it sensed.

“I remember that when the Corpse-Eater Dragon appears, it permits monsters like the Savagejaw Wyvern to linger nearby. And it feeds by drawing the life force from living creatures using the miasma—so it needs living things around it as a source of energy. That’s why its elder dragon presence isn’t as overwhelming as others,” Su Yi analyzed.

“And since we’re not too close, the Grimclaw Wyvern probably couldn’t sense it clearly.” Given Grimclaw’s fearless nature, perhaps it was already desensitized to the Corpse-Eater Dragon’s aura.

“I should have suspected something when the miasma became unusually thick,” Su Yi said, chiding himself.

He had meant to grab a bone fragment and leave, but he'd walked right into the Corpse-Eater Dragon’s path as it emerged to clear the miasma. Now, teleportation was impossible—he would have to climb up to the Coral Highlands, just as he’d done last time.

“But…” Su Yi looked upward.

The layer of air above the Rotten Vale, where it met the Coral Highlands, was now choked with the same sickly yellow miasma, so dense you could barely see your hand in front of your face. Su Yi dreaded the thought of the Grimclaw Wyvern missing a foothold and tumbling from the platform or cliff.

“We’d better head back to camp,” Su Yi decided.

The miasma in the Rotten Vale was actually a form of microorganism that consumed oxygen, broke down corpses, and harvested energy. The Corpse-Eater Dragon couldn’t create miasma, but it could gather and control it, using it to drain energy from living things.

When the Rotten Vale’s miasma grew too thick, the dragon would appear to collect and consume it, hunting for life energy in the process.

Although the Corpse-Eater Dragon’s actions were self-serving, they had the side effect of clearing away excess miasma, keeping the oxygen at levels suitable for other life forms. In this way, it protected much of the local ecosystem and maintained the valley’s balance.

The ecology of the Rotten Vale depended on the Corpse-Eater Dragon, just as the dragon depended on this ever-renewing source of miasma.

“Let’s head back to camp,” Su Yi said.

Now all he could do was wait for the Corpse-Eater Dragon to finish feeding and collecting energy.