Ashen Earth: The Shadow Ruins

The Mystic Tribulation shatters worlds, the Heavenly Pass collapses, and the mortal realm is plunged straight into a hell-difficulty wasteland dungeon. Yu Ye is decisive and no bleeding-heart saint. He scrapes by and levels up amid the miasma, with one simple rule: anyone who messes with him gets physically sent to the afterlife. Along the way, he teams up with a strange creature that should be a monster but is surprisingly intelligent. Together they clear rifts, collect soul cores, and get locked in a high-stakes tug-of-war with the Mystic Sects, merchant guilds, and sacrificial cults. Everyone is sharp, and no one acts like an idiot for the plot. They fight tooth and nail through cosmic horror, cracking jokes and trading quips along the way. In this ashen land, where power equals a curse and cultivation makes you lose Sanity, watch the protagonist and his companions pull off the dirtiest fights, crack the cheekiest jokes, expose the Old Gods' conspiracy, and fight their way out of certain doom.