Chapter 197: Mentor Penrose, the evil creature
, returned to the safe passage with his escort knights when it was dark.
All arcanist squads have returned.
The team surrounded the Black Beetle and returned to Sheshou Town along the way they came.
"This is an evil creature." Penrose explained in a serious tone after checking the tiger insect brought back by Duke, "The breath of the ancient evil creature infected the special creature transformed into it, which has a strong conflict with the spiritual arcana. ."
"Teacher, so it is worthless?" Bronk asked.
"It can't be said that there are many kinds of evil creatures. The tiger insect that Duke caught is just the weakest evil creature and has no valuable materials. But this does not mean that other evil creatures will also It's worthless."
"The instructor is right. Based on my observations of fang lichen, this little thing, which is not even an evil creature, can provide a little bit of a 'spiritual blocking agent' effect after grinding. If it is refined repeatedly, , this is the cheapest spirit-blocking agent." Garba said.
The spirit-blocking agent is not a potion, but a special spiritual power. Its function is to fix the spiritual energy and ensure that the spell model is stable and uninterrupted.
Director Vikas praised: "If this is true, this polluted forest will be a stable source of spirit-blocking agents in the future."
Garba added: "There is indeed this potential... but careful experiments are needed to ensure that it is really It can be refined repeatedly to reach the standard of spirit-blocking agent."
"This is the purpose of our investigation here, isn't it." Oriana said with a smile, with a sense of pride in her tone.
"Of course, that's it." Galba responded with a smile.
The ambiguous relationship between the two is no longer so negative now.
Penrose glanced sideways at the two people and said calmly: "I hope that from tomorrow on, everyone can focus on research."
Galba and Oriana turned their heads away embarrassedly.
Penrose continued: "Have a good rest tonight. Tomorrow we will move out of Black Snake Manor and camp in the wild until the end of the research. I hope everyone can make some discoveries and summarize them into papers to increase their academic qualifications." Return to
Snake After the first town, the Black Snake family has prepared a banquet.
Several other airship research teams have not returned. Only Penrose's team has returned, which shows that the Black Snake family is really unpopular.
Introducing Bernoulli's move is really the worst of stinks.
The influence and reputation accumulated by the founder of the family more than 20 years ago, the 3-ring Austrian mage Mubia, was almost destroyed in one fell swoop.
After dinner.
Duke went around town and met Xina from the Broken Sword Mercenary Group, and Sally, the farm's deputy general manager.
After being informed by Duke's entourage, the two of them were waiting at Little Sam Shouka's shop.
"My lord."
"Boss."
"Have you eaten already? Are you anxious?" Duke smiled and greeted the two old acquaintances, and then said to Sally, "Long time no see. Your complexion now is worse than Last year was much better, and the whole person looked more capable."
Zina has been to Villa No. 17 in Beverly Manor several times and meets Duke often.
Sally has been busy at the farm and has not been to Duke's villa. It has been more than five months since she last saw him.
"Boss, you are still as young as last year, but your majestic demeanor no longer makes people dare to approach easily." Sally complimented, "Boss James has been away from the farm, so I can only try to run the farm. It is tiring, but I also got exercise."
"It's good that I got exercise. James and I have great plans for the future of the farm, and I will need you to continue to help me when the time comes." Sally
obeyed: "I will obey all your orders, boss."
Then Duke He also mentioned that Sally's two children were both attending elite boarding schools in Shenjiao City.
Sally was busy thanking her profusely.
For her, career success is far less important than the education of her two children.
"Don't worry about Saf and Sawa. The two children are studying very seriously. They will be able to find a decent job in the future with their knowledge. If they can start Sanhai, they will be trained intensively." "Thank you, boss, for meeting you
. This is really the greatest luck for our family!" Sally's eyes turned red.
Seeing this, Zina smiled and said: "Your Excellency is of course our most noble person. Coming to Snake Head Town to participate in the Cuihai Valley Development War is the most successful decision our Broken Sword has made." "Enough compliments have been said,
Zina Leader, starting from tomorrow, you will lead a team of people to follow me. Once good spiritual materials are researched, you will send people to stockpile them as soon as possible." "Follow
your orders."
Balza said that fang lichen can be refined From the beginning of using the spirit-blocking agent, Duke understood that this ancient evil infection incident was both a crisis and an opportunity.
He also uses spirit-blocking potions, which are not cheap on the market.
If the Fang Lichen can be refined, it will be worthy of the Broken Sword Mercenary Group to search and hoard it around the Cuihai Valley. Duke added: "
When we return to the camp in the evening, don't forget to ask about the research results of other arcane mages."
What she's good at."
As a pseudo-level 1 card warrior, Xina's own combat effectiveness is not strong.
After the death of former Captain Raymond, she was able to stand out among the great knights and master the Broken Sword, all by relying on her own ability to win over people.
If she didn't have excellent skills, she wouldn't be able to do the arcane card business.
A 3-ring arcane card is basically the biggest trump card of a mercenary group, and it cannot be easily left to others to repair.
After talking about business, we talked for a while about the interesting things that happened in Sheshou Town.
Duke then left Little Sam's card repair shop. This card repair shop went round and round and returned to Duke's hands, but Duke no longer cared much about it.
Leave it to Broken Sword to take care of it casually, and use it as a base for Broken Sword to recover spirit cards.
Almost all the store names in the surrounding stores have been changed. The pioneering war had a huge impact on Sheshou Town, and it was difficult for ordinary people to resist the invasion of outsiders.
"There's no familiar feeling anymore." Duke sighed.
Growing up here, traveling here, and living here, he has special feelings for Sheshou Town, which is like his roots.
It is similar to the anchor point of the heart behind the door of the Ring of Distortion in the spiritual sea.
It is the anchor point for him to set sail in this world. No matter the distance or time, Snake Head Town will always affect his life.
Unknowingly, we arrived at Third Street.
Duke looked up and saw a shop with a familiar sign not far from the mercenary mission center.
"You's Clothing Company?"
Mulali, who was accompanying her, said with a smile: "Sir, it's the shop opened by my aunt and uncle. You's Clothing is very durable and very popular among mercenaries. I heard my aunt say this. The revenue of this store is several times that of other stores.”
"I see." Duke nodded, "Being a mercenary does cost a lot of money, so you have to wear thicker leather."
Just as he was talking, the door of a shop with a sign of "Tender Land" opened in front of him and he walked out. A Duke looked familiar.
"Dilenko?" Duke raised an eyebrow.
Diranko didn't notice Duke, and seemed to have a guilty conscience. After walking out of the gate, he turned directly into the small alley next to him.
"Sir, is that an acquaintance of yours?"
"Yes, a former Xiuka teacher." Duke responded calmly.
After finishing shopping on Third Street, Duke lost interest in continuing his shopping and took Mulali back to Black Snake Manor.
The next day, Penrose continued to lead the team.
This time, the team was no longer followed by one black beetle car, but by three black beetle cars, which were the special cars of Penrose Mage Tower.
One is a laboratory vehicle, one is a delivery truck, and one is a wash vehicle.
The delivery truck contains everyone's daily necessities, and the wash truck is used for daily washing. Even if the arcane mages go to camp in the wild, they must be able to take a comfortable bath and brush their teeth every day.
There is also a large shuttle in the team.
This is the nanny car prepared by the Nu Tao family for Kilia.
Originally, Kiriya didn't want to be so high-profile and get special treatment, but after experiencing the explosion of a mutated konjac flower yesterday and being covered in mucus, the airship of the Furious Waves family dropped this large shuttle over that night.
"A large shuttle is worth tens of thousands of gold dragons. The more money you have, the better." Duke visited the large shuttle.
It's extremely luxurious inside.
Constant temperature adjustment, automatic water purification, leather sofa, wine bar, independent bathroom... this is a portable apartment.
Of course Duke is envious, but he won't be sour because he will have these things sooner or later.
Just a matter of time.
After all, he is only seventeen years old and has only traveled through time for more than two years. He is very satisfied with his struggle to reach this point and will continue to work hard for the rest.
Without Shanfeisi's presence, the team was a little dull.
After setting up camp at the location selected by Penrose, Duke led the escort knights and Broken Sword mercenaries step by step and walked into the forest.
A whole day passed, and Duke did not collect any valuable samples except for a large number of fang lichens.
Not even a single evil creature was caught.
According to Instructor Penrose, the shedding of the ancient evil creature has been solved by the arcane mage from Runwu City. Only some residual breath leaked, so it is not serious, and there will not be many evil creatures infected.
However, Duke always felt that it was not that simple. The residual aura of the shedding of an evil creature could cause such a large area of pollution.
How strong is the evil thing that sheds its shell, and how strong is the ancient evil thing?
Even the shed shell requires powerful arcane mages from Runwu City to be eliminated. Doesn't it mean that a complete ancient evil thing is enough to destroy the world?
However, this information was blocked and Penrose could not access or explain it.
Naturally, Duke could only imagine, but could not get an accurate answer, and he could only make vague guesses about ancient evil objects.
"No matter how strong it is, since it is an evil creature from ancient times, it means that it has been dead for tens of thousands of years... It is the last word whether we can gather some wool now." After he returned to the camp, he brought Xina, obtained from communicating with other arcane mages.
I want to see if other arcane mages have found anything valuable.
"A strange infected plant. I can't analyze what kind of plant it was before it was infected." Assistant Lidman brought back a sample.
It is a round ball that looks like a pineapple or jackfruit and is covered with gray protrusions. It is a parasitic plant on the roots of trees.
The most bizarre thing, and the most speechless thing, is that there is a crack in its spherical shell, revealing the pink pulp inside.
It looks like some kind of female organ.
Duke studied this plant with great interest and tried to inject spiritual energy into the plant. He found that it was easy to infuse spiritual energy, and it was a bit too easy.
"This..."
"You also discovered it." Assistant Lidman maintained his usual seriousness and strong spirit of exploration. "It has a strong psychic affinity effect. I think it will be an excellent material for making card materials. , I will take Wanwan to study it in the evening."
"I also think it will be a good material. Tutor, give it a name." "There will
be a unified name in the future, but for the time being, it will be referred to as 'ball cracking fruit'. "Lidman gave it a casual title.
Duke discussed briefly for a while, then stood up and left.
She said to Zina who was following her: "Make a note of the appearance of the cracked fruit. You can stock up on a batch of this stuff first. Based on my experience, it will be a good source of card material." "I have already remembered it."
Zina He responded and whispered softly, "But it looks too unsightly." "It's too
good-looking to be eaten, but it is very likely to become a golden dragon. If you think about it this way, wouldn't you find it more pleasing to the eye?"
" Actually not, but at least I feel better."
Finally, Duke went to see Mentor Penrose to inquire about the research results, but Penrose didn't find anything: "I was mainly observing the smell of evil things shedding their shells. How to infect plants and evil creatures."
"How do you think the infection occurs?" "
This requires more time to observe, and I can't answer you yet." "
I understand, mentor." Duke was polite Farewell.
Today's harvest is not much, but the discovery of a ball-cracking fruit is enough for the Broken Sword Mercenary Group to get a head start on business opportunities.
In the evening, Duke finished washing up in the wash car, went for a walk in the experimental car, and then returned to his tent.
The tent was built by Vivian and others. The tents of several high knights were clustered around it. The tents of the Broken Sword Mercenary Group surrounded the high knights in a circle.
"It's getting late, it's time to practice Little Chicken." Duke called Little Chicken out of the air sea.
Then he decisively merged with the chicken and entered the elf form. Then he hugged the dozing Kabuto and started blood refining.
Combining training has become an unbreakable habit of his.
at this time.
The Dou Qi holographic screen in his field of vision had rapidly expanded from a circular area with a radius of five hundred meters to a circular area with a radius of three kilometers.
With the help of the chicken, Duke in the elf form can breathe and resonate with plants to an area of three kilometers. Within one kilometer, every clue can be controlled, and even an ant crawling across a leaf can sense it.
Qihai Cultivation may not have substantial combat effectiveness, but when it comes to danger perception, it has a lot to offer.
"Plants are my eyes!"
Duke stared at the Dou Qi holographic screen and saw a 2-ring spiritual plant not far from him.
"It's a large shuttle. Kylia, the darling girl of heaven, is really valued by the family. Not only is the nanny car provided, but there are also two rings of spiritual plants in the nanny car to sort out the aura!" This kind of treatment is really enviable
.
"Xiaoyi, stop hanging up "Rainfall Breathing Technique"." Duke gave the order.
After Xiaoyi stopped hanging up, he personally performed the "Rainfall Breathing Technique" and felt everything within a three-kilometer radius.
When he focused his attention on the 2-ring spiritual plant in the large shuttle.
Unexpectedly, I vaguely sensed that there was a person meditating seriously next to this spiritual plant.
"It's Kylia." Duke said with a surge of energy.
Then using the 2nd Ring Spiritual Plant as a relay, the power of nature continues to radiate outward, stir and resonate, and then it is like his third eye.
Watch Kylia.
Gradually, as he observed and as the resonance of his breath accumulated, the outline of Kylia gradually became clearer in his perception.
Although you can't see clearly the facial features and the color of the clothes on your body, every move is as if you are seeing it with your own eyes.
However, when Kiriya got up to take a bath, this perception became blurred after she was a little farther away from the second-ring spiritual plant.
I can only perceive a general situation.
The vague appearance made Duke's breathing gradually quicken, and then he quickly fell from this special state of perception.
"Phew!"
Duke recalled his feelings just now and sighed: "The power of plants should not be underestimated, silently..."
A tearing feeling came over him, and Duke gritted his teeth and held on.
Then he saw a large green tadpole condensing in front of him. It was a chicken that had completed its integration.
The chicken gave Duke an "old-fashioned" look, plunged into Duke's belly, and went to the sea of air to recuperate.
Kabuto yawned and woke up from his sleep.
This concludes the evening practice session.
Duke picked up the tea cup on the bedside and took a sip of herbal tea. He sat on the bed and meditated silently for a while before lying down to sleep.
In his dream that night, Kiriya's vague appearance while taking a shower haunted him all night long.
...
"Formation!"
Deep in the forest, the guard knights were fighting a 2-ring spirit beast.
Duke whistled happily and directed several mercenaries to dig up a 1-ring spiritual plant - Lantern Fruit and wrap it up.
There are always surprises on the way to research, and right now, I got a 1-ring spiritual plant.
"The lantern fruit is growing vigorously. The price on the market is 150 gold dragons per plant, which is comparable to the income I earn from cultivating a 3-ring arcane card." Waiting for the mercenaries to dig
up the lantern fruit.
The guard knights also killed the 2-ring spirit beasts and handed them to the mercenaries to tie them up and transport them back for processing and exchange them for money.
Suddenly.
On the Dou Qi holographic screen, a red light spot began to beat, and a prompt appeared: "Suspected third-ring spirit beast interference signal." The
spiritual power of the spirit beast itself can interfere with the force of nature, which is reflected in the perception of breath resonance. .
Duke was immediately eager to try: "Go, five hundred meters ahead, there is a third-ring spirit beast. Let's hunt it!" "
Sir, be careful." Vivian reminded, "Please let us clear the way."
Third-ring spirit beast , it is no longer easy to hunt them, most mercenary groups will not kill the third-level spirit beasts.
But what everyone didn't expect was that this third-ring spirit beast didn't need to be hunted at all.
It was lying on the edge of a bush, its wings flapping, but it couldn't stand up, let alone have the strength to fly again.
"It's a human-footed owl, sir." Zina quickly recognized the identity of this spiritual beast. "In the past, when we encountered a human-footed owl, we ran away directly, but this human-footed owl seems to have been poisoned..." The human-footed
owl It is a three-ringed spirit beast that resembles an owl. It is named because its feet are very similar to human feet. It is best at running on the ground and branches. As for flying, it can only fly short distances, so it is considered a free-roaming chicken.
However, the free-range chicken's natural solidified arcana has many types and powerful powers, and its strength is among the best among third-ring spirit beasts.
Vivian led the escort knights and quickly stepped forward to check the condition of the human-footed owl.
Then he said: "Sir, the human-footed owl seems to be infected. Its feathers are covered with fungi like fang lichen." The
human-footed owl is not big, only half a person tall.
It was lying on the ground, struggling feebly to flap its wings. As Vivian and others used knight spears to hold it up, it became even more unable to move.
Duke then got closer to check its condition, and soon found a wound wrapped in fang lichen on its abdomen.
"The laceration was probably caused during a hunting fight, and was later infected by the fang lichen." Duke quickly gave the order, "Tie it up and take it back. This should be a good experimental specimen, just in time to observe its Infection process."
Even 3-ring spirit beasts can be infected. The shedding pollution power of this ancient evil thing is simply ridiculously strong.
With the human-footed owl, today's research was not in vain.
On the way back, the human-footed owl was carried by two mercenaries, and Duke walked beside him, always observing the human-footed owl's condition.
The human-footed owl never died, but its infection by fanged lichen was getting worse and worse.
The hair on his body fell out from time to time, and his eyes were red.
"It looks more and more like the muntjac I killed a few days ago." Duke asked Xiaoyi to play the virtual image of the muntjac in the spiritual sea.
He was distracted by two things: while rushing on the road, he looked inside the spiritual sea.
Comparing the status of muntjacs and human-footed owls, the commonalities between the two become more and more over time.
And there's another frightening change.
"Sir, don't you think this human-footed owl's feet are getting thinner and thinner?" Zina walked over and said curiously.
Duke's expression was serious: "No, not only that, almost all of its body has changed."
"Ah?"
"It is... degenerating."
"Degenerate?" Zina exclaimed, not understanding the profound meaning. .
Duke did not stop talking, but silently followed the team back, silently observing the changes in the human-footed owl.
When it got dark, the team rushed back to the new camp.
Assistant Vikas was inspecting the entire camp. When he saw Duke and his party, he came over and said, "Thank you for your hard work, Duke. You brought back another owl. Is it an owl infected by evil spirits? Maybe this can be used against the instructor." Appetite."
"Director Vikas, take a closer look. Is it just an owl?" Duke said.
"What do you mean?" Assistant Vikas took a closer look and said, "It seems to be a little different. This owl is much larger and its claws are a bit strange."
"It's a human-footed owl."
"A human-footed owl?" Vikas frowned, "I have seen a real human-footed owl. The human-footed owl does not look like this, and its spiritual power is weak. It is obviously just Ordinary level 0 or level 1 spirit beasts can never be level 3." "
This is the seriousness of the problem. When I caught it, it was indeed a level 3 spirit beast - a human-footed owl. "
Duke motioned to the mercenary to put down the Man-footed Owl. He directly picked up the Man-footed Owl and followed Vikas to the Black Beetle.
"How is this possible?" Vikas asked.
"So I'm going to ask my mentor." Duke entered the Black Beetle and found Mentor Penrose who was dissecting a rabbit. "Mentor, I brought you a 3-ring spirit beast - the human-footed owl, but it seems to have degenerated now. It has become an ordinary owl."
Penrose turned his head, took a serious look at the owl, and then handed the work in his hand to Vikas: "You continue to dissect and find the parts of its body that are different from ordinary hares. , don’t miss any detail.”
“Uh, okay.” Vikas took over the work reluctantly.
He only planned to be a dawdling tutor, and did not want to personally study any evil pollution. Anyway, there was no room for improvement in cultivation.
Instructor Penrose took the human-footed owl and said calmly: "It is indeed degenerating. This degeneration is due to the erosion of spiritual power, resulting in the decline of blood. The rabbit before was also a 2-ring spirit beast - Long Tusk. Pika, I saw it degenerate into a hare with my own eyes."
"This kind of erosion is terrible, mentor, if humans are infected, will they also degenerate?" Duke asked quickly.
"I don't know, I'm analyzing it." Penrose paused and said with relief, "You and I are both ordinary people's bloodline, how can we decline... But those noble bloodlines, maybe we can find a few big knights to come over and give them some help. Doing research."
"Uh..." Duke didn't answer.
Human experimentation, like soul experimentation, has a strict application process. You can't just find a few people and start experiments.
Penrose only mentioned it and quickly devoted himself to the study of human-footed owls.
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(End of this chapter)