Chapter 332: Primitive Ancient Forest, Red-Scaled Tyrannosaurus Rex

Two months later, in the towering Primitive Ancient Forest.

The night was deep, but this ancient forest was far from quiet — a foul wind stirred the dense foliage with a rustling sound, fierce beasts and venomous insects roamed freely, and all manner of terrifying sounds rose and fell beneath the dark curtain of night.

"Hiss~"

At that moment, a faint sound of leaves being stepped on rang out, mingled with a faint whiff of blood.

On an ancient tree, a squirrel with a fluffy tail opened its eyes, glanced over with a drowsy yet wary look, and upon spotting that familiar figure, closed them again.

Looking closely, the source of the disturbance was a tiger/cat over five meters in length, its body grey tinged with white, a horn growing from its forehead, its entire frame muscular and powerful, every muscle clearly defined — strikingly conspicuous even beneath the night.

It padded past carrying in its jaws a wolf-like fierce beast with six legs and a body over three meters long, and soon vanished beneath that enormously tall ancient tree.

Drawing closer, one would discover that beneath that towering ancient tree there was actually an enormous tree hollow — this was the den currently inhabited by that tiger/cat, Baichuan.

Now, he was no longer in the Desert region.

Even Baichuan himself had no clear idea where he was.

This was two months after that last time he was hunted and nearly devoured by the Camel Dragon.

He vaguely remembered that day — as the Hunting Ship kept harrying the Camel Dragon, that incomparably powerful wild beast was finally enraged and revealed an entirely different posture: beneath the night, countless mysterious glowing patterns lit up, the entire tortoise shell that had formed the oasis blazed brilliantly, and then a tremendous storm swept up from the Desert.

In the final moment, he could only curl himself up as tightly as possible and spread out the ribbon-like appendages on his back resembling wings, and was hurled by that terrifying shockwave into the unknown.

When he awoke, he found himself lying near a small hillside, and before him was a little squirrel, its face showing anxious worry, carefully holding a leaf filled with water to give him a drink.

It had to be said, his luck was remarkably good.

Even after encountering such a perilous situation, he still ran into an exceptionally clever and adorable little creature willing to help him.

Thinking of this, Baichuan couldn't help but glance upward, a knowing smile rising in his heart.

From that day on, his body covered in wounds, he temporarily stayed in the vicinity.

Both to recover and to repay the kindness by protecting that little fellow brimming with spirituality.

Now, this was his sixtieth day in this Primitive Ancient Forest.

His wounds had finally healed for the most part.

Unfortunately, even though his injuries had healed and his body now exceeded five meters in length, in this Primitive Ancient Forest that was like a land of giants, he could not stir up much trouble at present — at most, like other fierce beasts carrying faint wild beast bloodlines, he could occupy a small patch of territory and act as its Banzhu.

But creatures as powerful as him were everywhere; if he tried to throw his weight around carelessly, he would easily be beaten down and devoured by those terrifying Fierce Beasts passing through.

This was also why he had previously preferred to hunt at night.

The reason was simple — the forest during the day was far too dangerous, too many accidents could happen, and he had still been in an injured state at the time.

During these two months, he had once seen the sky suddenly darken as an enormous black cloud drifted in from the horizon, from within which came a bird cry that pierced metal and split stone, as if about to tear the sky apart, followed by a giant bird whose wings blotted out the sky flying past, its length unknowable in meters; he had also seen a giant ape, its entire body covered in metallic scales, as tall as the surrounding trees, pass by, its terrifying aura spilling out and pressing every raptor and Fierce Beast into silence, the surroundings deathly still; and there was a golden scorpion, its whole body as if cast in gold, trailing a stinking green poisonous mist as it crawled…

And without exception, all of these powerful beings possessed the bloodline of some powerful wild beast — or were wild beasts themselves!

At present, what he needed to be most wary of were these creatures; he had not forgotten the reason he had ended up here.

The Lord of the Desert Camel Dragon's craving!

This was a realm of wild beasts, where all manner of creatures bearing wild beast bloodlines fought and slaughtered among themselves until they stood out, growing ever stronger and becoming rulers of their own domain.

Likewise, this place was also a blessed land for him — as long as he could kill and devour the other wild species (creatures bearing wild beast bloodlines), he would be able to obtain vast amounts of energy in a short time, thereby unlocking the Core ability of his Gold Finger.

When that time came, he would be able to obtain LV5 (Planet)-level essence overnight, and by leveraging the ability 【Environment Assimilation】, he could rapidly grow stronger, truly explore this world, and uncover the truth.

By then, even guiding his main body's arrival might not be a difficult matter.

After all, the stronger his power, the more he would understand about this world, and the weaker the obstruction of that starry-sky water wave blocking him would become — until his main body together with his planet-sized form could completely enter it; faced with his planet-sized body, that black shadow within the world would not be able to stop him.

One day, he would descend upon this world in an invincible posture!

It had been a long time since he had been forced into such a sorry state.

That little tiger-turtle — he, Baichuan, would kill it for certain; not even Jesus could save it!

Unfortunately, this world was far too vast; even though his main body had sent down numerous energy resource packages, very few could actually fall into this world, and even those that succeeded would find it hard to appear right before him.

It seemed that for now, he still had to rely on himself.

Thinking of this, Baichuan also began to consider his first target.

During these two months, he had not been idle — especially after his wounds had mostly healed, with abundant energy he had returned to a stage of extraordinary perception.

Relying on special sound waves similar to those of bats, through repeated scanning he had thoroughly mapped out which wild species were in the surroundings — three in total.

The first was a crocodile-like creature occupying the stream, which he named the Stream Horned Crocodile; the second was the leader of the six-legged original wolves he had previously hunted, a scale-armored Lycaon Wolf; the third was a bipedal creature extremely similar to a Tyrannosaurus Rex, which he directly named the Red-Scaled Tyrannosaurus Rex.

After much deliberation, he finally locked onto the Red-Scaled Tyrannosaurus Rex.

After all, with his extreme agility, wasn't he the natural counter to the inherently clumsy and heavy Tyrannosaurus Rex?

This choice was in every way better than him, who currently wasn't suited for water, facing the Stream Horned Crocodile, or taking on packs of Lycaon Wolves and original wolves.

Having made up his mind, Baichuan also sped up his gnawing — compared to the LV5 (Planet) enhancement that required a full three hundred thousand energy, the energy brought in by these small fellows was still far too little; thinking of this, Baichuan glanced at his panel.

【Name: Baichuan】

【Energy: 300】

【Core: Environment Assimilation (Locked)】

【Abilities: Dianci Caozuo LV4 (Limit), Agility LV3 (Banzhu), Judahua LV3 (Banzhu), Qiangzhuang LV3 (Banzhu), Nerve Reflex LV3 (Banzhu), Regeneration LV2, Ultrasonic LV2, Ultrasonic Positioning LV2.】

This was his harvest during this period — now he finally had a relatively powerful ability, 【Dianci Caozuo】, derived from the power of the Thunder Bird, and one of the few abilities Baichuan was confident would not cause any accidents during enhancement.

It had cost a total of ten thousand energy points.

If the original wolves hadn't provided fairly generous energy during this period, he might not have been able to enhance it successfully.

Beneath the night, waves of hair-raising gnawing sounds rang out continuously.

An hour later, as the night deepened further, the pale moonlight filtered through the mottled tree shadows and scattered across the ground, when all creatures were growing drowsy.

Baichuan crawled out of the ancient tree hollow once more.

At this moment, his gaze was bright and piercing; he moved soundlessly through the deep forest, occasionally appearing under the moonlight like a nimble ghost-shadow.

Half an hour later, Baichuan appeared atop the treetops, his eyes fixed intently on what lay below.

Cats naturally know how to climb trees — that was perfectly normal.

"Hoo——hoo——"

Deafening snores rang out without pause.

Looking closely, it was a massive beast lying in a nest built from piles of withered grass. Its body was over ten meters long, its entire form covered in a layer of extremely fine, dense red scales that made it look like a blazing ball of fire. Its huge, powerful hind legs ended in claws of extraordinary sharpness.

The most eye-catching feature was still that astonishingly huge mouth — one could say almost the entire head existed for the sake of that maw.

Slender, razor-sharp teeth faintly gleamed with a metallic sheen beneath the night. Anyone who saw them could sense the terrifying killing power within. As the beast breathed, that great mouth occasionally spat out one or two sparks mingled with a red-tinged breath.

The ferocious aura it gave off even in sleep was enough to keep every poisonous bug, mosquito, and ant in the surrounding area from daring to appear.

This was Baichuan's target for tonight — the Tyrannosaurus Rex!

While thinking, Baichuan climbed down from the treetop step by step.

He did not choose to pounce from midair. Don't be fooled by the big oaf's appearance of sleeping soundly with no vigilance — to assume it had no wariness whatsoever would be a grave mistake.

Countless covert observations and the analysis compiled from the beast's behavior told him that it was a creature that was crude on the surface yet shrewd within, and cunning beyond measure.

The moment he chose to pounce from midair, the faint sound of air breaking caused by his body would instantly wake it, and it would open that lethal maw to deliver him a vicious bite.

Therefore, he could only rely on his own trait of moving in silence to deliver a vicious strike to it quietly.

Under the cover of night, the enormous snoring was a natural screen in itself.

Just like that, Baichuan closed the distance to it step by step.

Fifty meters… forty meters…

The beast's nest drew ever closer.

Thirty meters… ten meters!

Baichuan reached the beast's nest.

Now!

"Roar!"

In the night, a flash of firelight suddenly appeared, revealing a great maw bristling with fine metallic teeth lunging forward — it was the Tyrannosaurus Rex launching a sudden attack!

In the darkness, the Tyrannosaurus Rex, which had been sleeping peacefully, awoke with extreme abruptness the instant an outsider drew near, and swung its great maw to bite down!

At that instant, Baichuan smiled.

I've been waiting for exactly this strike.

He murmured this inwardly.

The nest with one corner torn apart by brute force, the clumps of earth slowly falling through midair, the neck and great maw abruptly bulging with twisting muscles, the air visibly warping from the violent disturbance, and in the darkness those small eyes glinting with triumph at the success of its ruse…

Every one of these scenes appeared before Baichuan's eyes almost frame by frame!

This was the power of his enhanced 【Neural Reflex LV3】 — a reaction speed possessed only by mountain-range behemoths.

A reaction ability sufficient to keep a mountain-range behemoth's responses from slowing in the slightest, when packed into a small body of barely a few meters like his, was no different from turning the world in his eyes into something close to Time standing still!

This beast's habit of launching sudden night attacks was nothing new in Baichuan's prior scanning observations. He had once seen a creature that could nearly merge with shadows launch an assault, only to be bitten clean in two at the waist by it; the scream echoed through nearly the entire night, striking terror into every beast in the surroundings.

But why did he still present himself as a target for its attack?

Because he was waiting for exactly this behavior!

If it came at him in a form he currently couldn't match, he'd have no way to deal with it.

But at the same level, with not much difference between them —

As long as he was given Time, he could, based on all the beast's observed behaviors and movements, use the formidable computing power from his main body to calculate and build a model, thoroughly analyze the beast down to the last detail, and then turn it back against it.

In other words, from the instant he finished gathering all its behaviors and movements and established the model, the beast had already been seen through by him completely.

As long as it held nothing in reserve, then in his eyes it had no secrets left!

This was one of the aids his main body could provide him.

In an instant, watching the great maw lunge at him, Baichuan twisted his whole body with preternatural flexibility, as if he had foreseen it, barely dodging and leaving it only a few hairs to bite. Then he raised his right claw — a right claw that had already been fully metallized.

The jet-black, blade-like claw, in that faint firelight, radiated a chill that seemed to seep into the very bone.

In the end, before the beast could react, he raked across its immensely thick left leg!

"Slish!"

"Boom!"

Amid a heavy crash, a massive body thundered to the ground, and a pained shriek rang out right after.

Thick fresh blood gushed from the beast's stout thigh like a fountain.

Baichuan, pressing his advantage without mercy, leapt his tiger frame forward, his sharp claws raking again and again across the already unbalanced, fallen Tyrannosaurus Rex.

A few breaths later, his gaze hardened, and his lithe limbs sprang him up in a single bound.

At that moment, the cornered Tyrannosaurus Rex, fighting with its back to the wall, desperately twisted its great maw to bite down once more — only to miss again.

The exhausted great maw slammed into the ground with another thunderous crash.

'Time to end this.'

Thinking this inwardly, he saw an invisible magnetic field begin to slowly rotate around Baichuan's metallized right claw.

"Whooo——"

A gale sprang up out of thin air, whipping the fallen leaves and weeds around him.

"Crackle…"

In the black of night, faint wisps of blue-white electric light began to dance across Baichuan's right claw, radiating a deadly allure within the darkness.

The electric light flashed faster and faster, growing ever brighter.

The wind grew ever stronger.

In the blink of an eye, a startling current of electricity visibly coursed around the jet-black claw.

The next moment, the great tiger, its right claw wreathed in astonishing current, swung — and three claw-glows formed purely of electricity flew out.

"Fshh fshh fshh…"

Three consecutive sounds like tearing cloth rang out.

The struggling crimson giant beast went completely rigid, its breath gone.

Until death, this powerful wild species never got to use its own terrifying great maw, and perished in bewilderment.

……

(End of this chapter)