The Blightmist descends, and humanity survives by awakening Divine Trees.
Others grow Bread Trees, Ironbark Firs, and Clear Spring Trees. What sprouts from Shen Ye's palm, however, is just a dead branch. No light, no leaves, no fruit.
His teammates call him a useless seed and throw him into the grey mist to die. Only when he is on the brink of death do the dead branch's roots plunge into the mist and begin devouring it frantically. A mutated rat charges at him, and the roots coil around it, sucking it dry. The more he fights, the stronger he gets. The more he absorbs, the fiercer he becomes. Later, the people who abandoned him discover that the dead branch has grown into something everyone can only look up to.
