Chapter 317

Chapter 317: Nurturing

“Master, are you okay?”

Fulan looked at Lin Qingliu, who was unexpectedly chuckling quietly, and felt a sense of unease.

“I’m fine. Once your matters are dealt with, we will head out.”

Lin Qingliu shifted his perspective from the floor-cleaning robot back to the outside of Hope City, planning to wait for Fulan to resolve the internal issues of the Holy Fire Meow Meow Cult before taking her to the forest to get some work done.

To his surprise, Fulan shook her head at his words:

“As long as I’m not around, they will definitely mess things up. We can handle those matters when we get back; it’s not urgent.”

Lin Qingliu thought for a few seconds and nodded:

“Alright, let’s go now.”

Leaving behind a group of extraordinary beasts that were free to roam beyond the red line, Lin Qingliu and Fulan began their adventure outside the city.

This was the perfect time to explore outside of Hope City. After just repelling a wave of the beast tide, the forest controlled by mycelium was in a recovery phase, with very few extraordinary beasts in sight.

Under the deliberate restraint of both a human and a cat, their biological field reactions were suppressed to a very low level.

Lin Qingliu grabbed the back of Fulan’s neck and began to use his teleportation ability for rapid movement, quickly arriving at the misty forest’s edge.

They were heading to Lin Qingliu’s first destination on this trip—the open area where thousands of sleep pods lay in slumber.

Lin Qingliu reached out to touch the gray bark surrounding the forest, and his entire arm began to develop dark green-black patterns, as if he were becoming one with the big tree.

These patterns slowly spread up to his chin, making his disguise more deceptive.

At this moment, within the biological field of the trees, Lin Qingliu and Fulan were undeniably considered their own.

As it was afternoon outside, Lin Qingliu and Fulan continuously delved deeper into the forest. The white fog above thickened, but there were no signs of it descending to obscure their vision.

Lin Qingliu could distinctly feel the presence of spores in the air, invisible to the naked eye, drifting along with the airflow.

He silently activated his Sleepless ability, causing these spores to decay into ashes upon contact with him.

Lin Qingliu also created a layer of biological protective suit on Fulan’s skin to prevent his little companion from suddenly rebelling while they walked.

After exploring for a while, Fulan pointed to a High Position on a big tree:

“Look, Master.”

Lin Qingliu looked up and saw a tree that was significantly thicker than normal trees.

Its gray-blue bark was covered with spiraling folds, and at a fold about ten meters off the ground, a bubble glowing with a lightly green glow hung there awkwardly, as if the big tree had been infected by some unknown bacteria.

Lin Qingliu paused to observe for a moment and, using his remarkable eyesight, determined that over time, the green glow fluctuated within a very low brightness range.

Furthermore, the bubble was continuously swelling, clearly indicating that an extraordinary beast was nurturing within.

In other crevices of the tree, glimmers of either green or blue light shimmered, resembling the moments when life is born in a mother’s womb, but still not yet forming into a bubble-like substance.

Although he had seen a similar scene in Fulan’s In Dream a long time ago, this rather peculiar form of reproduction undoubtedly had a strong impact on Lin Qingliu.

For mycelium life forms, gender seemed to be rather superfluous. Perhaps they had already been included in the Iteration list of the will of the mycelium.

If a person from Earth were to witness this scene for a few minutes, they would undoubtedly be convinced that they were not on Earth at all.

Lin Qingliu’s gaze pierced through the translucent membrane nurturing the embryo, revealing a creature somewhat resembling a hedgehog inside.

“This is the Green Cocoon.”

He murmured to himself:

“That description is indeed quite fitting.”

Fulan looked at the Green Cocoon in its High Position, seemingly reminded of a version of herself from long ago.

After a while, she finally asked:

“Master, should we eliminate it?”

Lin Qingliu shook his head:

“Not yet.”

If it were an embryo of a Fourth or Fifth Level extraordinary beast, he would certainly take action.

But the Green Cocoon Extraordinary Beast was weak and abundant; eliminating them one by one would likely ruin Lin Qingliu’s other plans.

Lin Qingliu glanced at the big tree that harbored the cocoon and asked Fulan:

“After walking for so long, this is the only one that can nurture extraordinary beasts. Do you think this tree is special?”

Fulan contemplated for a moment and replied:

“In my perception, within a certain range, this tree is indeed more advanced among the symbiotic systems formed by all organisms related to mycelium. It can draw nutrients to itself, like… like…”

“A tax collector?”

Fulan paused for a moment, then nodded vigorously:

“Yes, yes, that’s the feeling.”

“In other words, a single big tree cannot nurture extraordinary beasts. Whether the mycelium exists normally or through plants in the forest, both are the foundation for generating extraordinary beasts.

“Only by spreading the mycelium and the forest can sufficient nutrients be obtained to create a beast tide.”

As Lin Qingliu spoke, he recalled the distance between himself and Hope City in his mind.

He was currently not much farther from the city walls than the distance from the outer city walls to the spire—only a few dozen kilometers.

Fulan discovered that the neatly stacked sleep pods were less than two hundred kilometers away from their current location.

The rules there were distinctly different from other areas in the forest. Though Fulan was eager to observe closely, she could not do so without disturbing the will of the mycelium.

Thus, that area should be considered the core zone of the mycelium.

Although this distance was an extreme for the humans in Hope City, it was not far from the perspective of the entire planet.

This planet and humanity’s home planet had nearly identical gravitational acceleration. If the physics knowledge from his past life still applied, it could be easily inferred that this planet was roughly the same size.

While he wasn’t entirely clear about the proportions of land and ocean, Lin Qingliu did not believe the mycelium would simply place its core area so close to humanity.

It was called the rear area because it was safer than other places.

The will of the mycelium, while not clever, was not stupid either; its insistence on setting rules around the sleep pods reflected its regard for these things.

Therefore, it had no reason to place such valuable items in a visible area; it was entirely illogical.

Unless there was some unavoidable factor forcing it to do so.

Perhaps… a thought occurred to Lin Qingliu: perhaps the mycelium life appeared as a band rather than being spread fully.

How interesting…