Chapter 9: 9: Mass Production! Flame Demon Stirring!

"Don't these need to be buried underground?"

"I'm not a plant…"

Do the people in this world still not distinguish between fungi and plants?

The Pujis have already transported all the fragments of the fire mosquitos and their larvae back to the mushroom garden.

Fire mosquitos, being monsters that rely on agility and evasion, have low physical resilience; after being hit by mushroom cannons or crushed by armored Pujis, they rarely leave intact corpses.

Now they are evenly spread across the cultivation zones, and the first batch brought back has already begun sprouting mycelium.

After decomposition, these monster corpses simultaneously provide Lin Jun with skill proficiency and mana; each fire mosquito contains little mana, but the sheer quantity makes up for it.

Lin Jun will channel all this mana into producing new Pujis.

The mushroom garden's natural mana absorption can currently sustain about 300 Pujis, of which 100 are logistics units needed to maintain daily operations, leaving the rest as combat Pujis.

This time, Lin Jun plans to exceed the limit and instantly produce 400 combat Pujis, then deploy them all into the upcoming hunt for earthworms.

If any survive after the operation, he can always cull them later—ensuring success is the priority.

There's no second fire mosquito nest nearby that can so easily supply him with this much nourishment; if this fails, he won't be able to organize a second wave for who knows how long.

"Lin Jun, look—I think I've gained a new talent!"

Inanna had somehow cast the Water Serpent spell beside him; Lin Jun had seen her use this skill in battle—it wasn't exactly unstoppable, but at least it could be called utterly useless.

Not only was its range short and power weak, but even a direct hit couldn't kill a fire mosquito in one strike; its only advantage was limited post-launch control, which under Inanna's abysmal skill became a liability.

Compared to Ice Blade, it was utterly crushed.

Inanna probably realized this herself—after casting it twice, she never used it again.

But now, the Water Serpent she cast was coiling flexibly around her like a tiny guardian azure dragon.

This was certainly not Inanna's normal level—Lin Jun immediately pulled up her panel.

Sure enough, her level had risen to LV30; even a small fraction of the experience from hundreds of fire mosquitos had let her leap two levels.

A new fixed effect appeared: 【Favor of the Elemental Spirit: Elemental Spirits assist the caster in controlling spells】.

"Try attacking that rock with Ice Blade."

The target Lin Jun gave her was 100 meters away—a distance a Pujis wouldn't miss.

"Huh? Let me try."

The instant Ice Blade launched, Lin Jun knew she'd aimed wildly—but the blade miraculously adjusted mid-flight and finally clipped the corner of the rock.

"I… I actually hit it!"

Inanna herself looked stunned.

In reality, if her launch angle hadn't been so off, Ice Blade would've struck dead center; that it still grazed the target despite such a wild shot—Elemental Spirits really are impressive.

Lin Jun also noticed that while Inanna used Ice Blade, the Water Serpent swirling around her wasn't canceled.

So is this like an AI-assisted control ability?

Here, the Elemental Spirit replaces AI's function.

Come to think of it, this world actually has Elemental Spirits as a mechanic—I thought magic was just pure magic.

Also, Lin Jun now understood: humans, like himself, naturally gain a fixed effect or skill every ten levels, just like his Mushroom Cannon and Mycelium Net.

Inanna calls them talents.

So this isn't unique to him—humans have it, and probably other races and monsters do too.

But there are slight differences; perhaps because she can't see her panel, Inanna's talent was granted automatically, while he gets a three-choice selection.

Lin Jun glanced at his own LV44 level—still far from his next talent selection.

————

In the following time, Lin Jun plunged headfirst into the massive project of mass-producing Pujis.

The good news was that his long-stagnant Mental Integration skill finally reached LV6; otherwise, he couldn't have controlled so many Pujis at once.

Even so, he had no time to chat with Inanna.

But Inanna didn't mind—she'd recently become obsessed with exploring her new talent.

The Elemental Spirit not only helped her adjust trajectories for auto-aim, but also made Light Spell follow her automatically and allowed Water Mirror to provide 360° automatic defense—far smoother than she could manage herself.

But spells like Purification and Mud Pit showed no change—the Elemental Spirit didn't enhance the spells' raw power.

Days passed, and everything seemed ready—when a powerful mana fluctuation erupted outside the mushroom garden.

"Lin Jun, what's happening? Why do I suddenly feel so oppressive?"

Like the aftershock of an eighth-degree earthquake from afar, even Inanna, without any mana-perception skill, sensed something was wrong; Lin Jun directly observed mana waves crashing over him like tidal surges, making him nauseous.

Lin Jun checked his external monitors; these scattered small mushroom clusters couldn't grant him vision, but they could detect surrounding mana fluctuations.

Soon, he identified the source—the direction of the Flame Demon's nest.

Since he now knew it was from the Flame Demon's direction, Lin Jun relaxed; he gently soothed the startled Inanna and returned to finishing his mass-production work.

It wasn't that Lin Jun wasn't afraid of the Flame Demon—quite the opposite; as the strongest monster discovered so far, he'd always been vigilant about its movements.

If the Flame Demon ever started moving toward the mushroom garden, he'd flee immediately.

Fortunately, that had never happened.

In fact, after observing it, Lin Jun concluded the Flame Demon was basically a hermit.

Unlike himself, rooted to the ground and immobile, the Flame Demon simply couldn't be bothered to move—seemingly content just soaking in magma to satisfy most of its needs.

But being a hermit didn't mean it never left; monitoring so far recorded three instances of the Flame Demon venturing out.

Each time, it triggered mana fluctuations nearby, just like today—Lin Jun suspected it was going to fight.

But who it fought, and where exactly, remained unknown; the part Lin Jun had explored was still minuscule compared to the entire depths.

Lin Jun's original smuggling plan was to slip through the Flame Demon's nest during its absence and reach the upper layers.

But the plan was still risky—the biggest problem was he had no idea when the Flame Demon would return.

The shortest of the three records was merely a few hours; the longest was estimated to be three or four days.

The smuggling plan was truly a gamble with one's life, so it was replaced by the tunneling plan.

He did not know how long it would take for the Flame Demon to return home; he only hoped it would not cause any disturbances that might interfere with his hunting of the earthworms.

(End of this chapter)