At the Honey-Water Bee base, Luo Yu put the Coral Flower Squid and the Flower-Plucking Thief bee together. Sure enough, this Honey-Water Bee truly treated the Coral Flower Squid like a flower to be plucked. The moment it laid eyes on the squid, it was like a lecher spotting a beauty, lunging straight in for a kiss—hardly behaving like a decent bee.
"Have you started researching crossbreeding too? But crossbreeding a Honey-Water Bee and a squid... isn't that a bit too bizarre?" Chen Bo, who had just finished his morning workout, admitted he didn't understand, but he was thoroughly shaken.
Could bees and squids even crossbreed?
"This is harvesting nectar," Luo Yu said.
"Harvesting nectar?!"
"You wouldn't get it. This is called bio-honey," Luo Yu said, coining a term on the spot. "Honey-Water Bees produce honey with different flavors depending on the type of nectar and pollen they collect.
"And among the massive Honey-Water Bee population, there's a special kind that can harvest bio-honey—gathering nectar from plant-like Grass-system mutated beasts."
"I never had much schooling—don't fool me." Chen Bo froze. Was there really such a thing? Why had he never heard of it?
"Now that you've joined the Luo Yu Research Institute, you've got plenty to learn. My father, Luo Shui, picked this up at Canglan Ocean University. It counts as advanced knowledge," Luo Yu bluffed, bamboozling Chen Bo into stunned silence.
Looking at the Honey-Water Bee and the Coral Flower Squid, Chen Bo saw that it really didn't look like mating; it was very much a dynamic of gatherer and gathered. He sank into contemplation. Could it actually be true?
"Luo Yu's father... how does he know so much?!" Chen Bo was envious. Ah, someone else's dad... With such a knowledgeable father, no wonder Luo Yu was so outstanding.
"I'm going to record the data." Chen Bo was already a seasoned test subject; not only could he track the changes in his bodily data after getting stung, but he could also compile it into lab reports for Luo Yu to look over.
He was far less trouble than mutated beast test subjects who couldn't write lab reports.
The Flower-Plucking Thief talent was truly perverse. After absorbing the Coral Flower Squid's nutrients, in just a few minutes, the bee excreted the creature's nourishing matter in the form of a peculiar "pink honey."
"The world is vast, and mutated individuals are full of bizarre wonders." It was the first time Luo Yu had seen an individual make honey in such a swift, crude manner. He collected the pink nectar and brought it into the laboratory to test its composition.
The test results plunged Luo Yu into thought.
This pink honey contained an exceptionally high concentration of Water-system nutrients—higher than any Water-system food on the market across Jingyue Island!
What was more...
It also contained the same strengthening factors found in enhancement bee venom!
These strengthening factors were the key to bee venom's ability to enhance a living being's attributes.
In other words, just like a Honey-Water Bee with the Water Element Enhancement talent, this special honey could moderately strengthen the Water-system talent of whoever consumed it.
Once he confirmed it wasn't toxic, Luo Yu tasted it himself. Its sweet fragrance was in a completely different league from ordinary honey.
"The Coral Flower Squid is primarily Grass-system, yet after Flower-Plucking Thief converted its nutrients, it produced honey rich in Water-system nutrition.
"Doesn't that mean Grass-system is merely the prerequisite for it to harvest nutrients, rather than the primary nutrient attribute of the converted honey? Aside from Grass-system, as a marine creature, the Coral Flower Squid has the closest ties to Water-system, so it yields Water-system nutrients...
"Then what if..."
A sudden thought struck Luo Yu.
"What if I find a 'Rock Algae Turtle' for it to harvest from? Could it condense honey packed with Rock-system nutrition?"
The Rock Algae Turtle was a Grass-and-Rock dual-system Mid-tier Species mutated beast. Its shell was not ordinary keratin, but rock-hard, petrified armor, with the crevices overgrown with seaweed. Its primary ability was Entangle, allowing it to extend the seaweed to bind enemies.
If the bee harvested from this turtle to condense Rock-system honey, and then fed that Rock-system honey to mating Honey-Water Bees, wouldn't the chances of them giving birth to offspring with the Rock Element Enhancement talent be higher?
No, wait—if such Rock-system honey could actually be produced, it would already strengthen a creature's Rock-system talent on its own.
Which meant it could completely substitute for an individual with the Rock Element Enhancement talent, becoming the key to mass-producing avian mutated beasts that possessed a certain Rock-system talent!
Luo Yu felt as though he had discovered a new world. Honey-Water Bees truly were treasures through and through.
Though Rock Algae Turtles were rare, high-end restaurants on Jingyue Island kept one or two. The seaweed growing on them was delicious and renewable; harvest a bit, wait for it to grow back, and it could be reused indefinitely, making it a fixture on high-end menus.
"Lin Li, are you free?" Luo Yu rushed to the kitchen to find Lin Li.
"What's up?" asked Lin Li, wearing an apron as she bustled around preparing lunch, two trimmed squids in hand.
"Does your family's restaurant have a Rock Algae Turtle? I need one for research."
"I think so...?" Lin Li thought for a moment, then said, "Leave it to me."
...
That very day, Lin Li had a Rock Algae Turtle transported from her home to the research institute.
After having July knock the Rock Algae Turtle unconscious, Luo Yu released the Flower-Plucking Thief bee to suck its nutrients.
This time, Flower-Plucking Thief produced a crimson honey similar in color to the turtle's shell, clearly rich in Rock-system nutrition.
"Turns out your talent is the strongest of all." Giving the Flower-Plucking Thief bee a word of praise, Luo Yu ran off to the lab.
"Buzzzzz..." The Flower-Plucking Thief bee buzzed, thoroughly unsatisfied and wanting more.
After a battery of tests, sure enough, the crimson honey possessed remarkably high Rock-system nutrition, along with strengthening factors that living organisms could efficiently absorb.
Moreover, compared to enhancement bee venom, this honey seemed to keep for much longer. Of course, the cost was rather steep. That flower squid, for instance, had seemed on the verge of death after being harvested just once, as if completely drained dry. Fortunately, the Rock Algae Turtle was accustomed to being harvested and held up just fine.
Over the days that followed, Luo Yu collected Rock-system honey in large quantities and visited the Ancient Grotto daily. He also kept several Drowned Chickens, feeding them primarily Rock-system honey.
During this time, the Honey-Water Bee with the Water Element Enhancement talent and the one with the Rock Element Affinity talent also produced their first egg.
Originally, once Luo Yu had the Flower-Plucking Thief bee, he hadn't cared much about the pair anymore. After all, relying on them to produce an offspring mutated with the Rock Element Enhancement talent was a total gamble; with bad luck, it might not happen in centuries, whereas feeding Rock-system honey was vastly more reliable.
Yet the two of them turned out to be surprisingly dependable.
The very first egg genuinely fused and mutated its parents' talents.
Of course, it wasn't the Rock Element Enhancement talent—things weren't that fast—but rather...
[Individual Talent]: Hardness Enhancement talent (Ordinary talent: An individual with this talent can enhance the hardness of the area stung on a living organism.)
Luo Yu: ?
Luo Yu stared at the Honey-Water Bee egg with the Hardness Enhancement talent and sank into deep thought.
He suspected this bee was making a dirty joke, but he had no proof. No, wait—was there really any difference between this talent and the Defense Enhancement talent?
"A little, but not much," Luo Yu mused. After all, defense and hardness were not strictly equivalent.
An inkfish was very soft, but precisely because of that softness, its defensive ability against kinetic impact was excellent.
If Defense Enhancement were used on an inkfish, it would enhance its body's ability to absorb impacts.
But if Hardness Enhancement were used on it, then... it would turn into a rock-hard octopus?
"This Hardness Enhancement talent is suited for armored, crustacean-type mutated beasts. But that's not the main point. The main point is that these two bees actually produced an individual with a new enhancement talent."
Or... open a clinic? Luo Yu considered. Since they got off to a good start, he ought to pay close attention to them... and feed them plenty of honey, sparing no resources.
Feeding Rock-system honey to the Drowned Chickens had an enhancing effect on their Rock-system talent, but it was bound to be limited.
If elemental talent levels were categorized as: No Talent (impossible to learn abilities of that attribute), Poor (requires massive resources and effort to possibly learn abilities of that attribute), Average (can master abilities of that attribute with a moderate investment of resources and effort), Advanced (possesses the aptitude to master abilities of that attribute with proficiency), Apex (? ? ?)...
By his conservative estimate, being able to boost a Drowned Chicken's Rock-system talent from "None" to "Poor," or from "Poor" to "Average," would already be quite an achievement. After all, Flower-Plucking Thief was only an advanced talent.
Meanwhile, the evolved Drowned Chicken possessed the Advanced Rock Element Affinity talent, on the same tier as Flower-Plucking Thief. Reaching that level purely through special honey would likely be very difficult.
He didn't know whether a Drowned Chicken with an ordinary Rock-system talent could resonate with the Ancient Evolution Stone, but it was worth a shot...
Therefore, pairing drug-taking with a sting training method utilizing the Rock Element Enhancement talent would undoubtedly be far better.
...
A few days after Luo Yu discovered the effects of the mutated honey:
After days of research and testing with various instruments, the researchers still hadn't figured out the fundamental difference between the Azure Terrorbird and the Drowned Chickens that couldn't evolve.
This was normal. Recessive elemental talents, without obvious manifestations like Chen Bo's Thunderbolt Shrimp autonomously awakening an ability, were generally very hard to detect using ordinary instruments.
Jingyue Island was a small place, after all, and its scientific instruments were relatively basic.
Yet even without definitive test results, people had begun offering guesses.
Facing Director Yu Lei, who had been inspecting frequently of late, marine ecology researcher Yu Zhifeng ventured a hypothesis: "Could it be related to attributes?
"Generally speaking, mutated beasts that evolve through special environments have attributes corresponding to those environments.
"For example, the evolutionary phenomenon between Ice Sea Lions and Never-Melting Ice involves an Ice-system mutated beast and a special Ice environment...
"This Ancient Evolution Stone should count as a rock-type special environment. However, neither the Drowned Chicken itself nor its evolved form is Rock-system. Could it be that it possesses a fairly strong hidden rock-type talent?"
"I agree with that view. We reached that conclusion several days ago, but verifying whether it has a rock-type talent seems rather difficult—we still haven't been able to confirm it," Researcher Lin Hai said.
Rock was not a mainstream attribute nowadays. Thus, Jingyue Island had established methods and channels to help mutated beasts develop mainstream abilities like Water, Ice, and Wind—much like how Luo Yu had helped Mi Xiaoyu's Coiling Wind Worm awaken Ice abilities—but methods to help pet beasts develop niche talents like Rock or Ground were exceedingly rare.
After all, across all of Jingyue Island, one could hardly find a handful of people contracted with Rock-system mutated beasts, so naturally no one had researched the relevant nurturing methods.
"A pity. I haven't heard of any island that has Rock-system avian pet beasts either, or we could just import some to test," said Bai Dong, the Hybrid Granny.
Of the mutated beasts that had survived to the present day, 99.99% had mutated toward the Water system. The primary attribute of many terrestrial and aerial creatures was Water; an anomaly like the Ground Penguin evolving a Ground attribute was an extreme outlier.
In short, only sea beasts that could already survive underwater possessed the leeway to mutate other attributes and survive in this era.
Take the Thunderbolt Shrimp: it could live in water naturally, so it could mutate an Electric system...
"No matter. So long as they possess a Rock-system talent, the day will come when it gets excavated. By the way, where is Luo Yu?" Director Yu Lei asked upon noticing Luo Yu's absence.
Researcher Chen Zhuo chuckled. "That kid has been obsessed with studying the Drowned Chickens and the evolution stone these past few days. I told him you were coming for an inspection, but he said to wait a bit because he couldn't step away. He's probably still in Grotto No. 4 messing with the Drowned Chickens he's raising."
"Luo Yu truly is dedicated to research." The director smiled. Still, if Luo Yu wanted to participate in the Jingyue Festival, shouldn't he be concentrating on training that penguin? The boy certainly had boundless energy...
"You all need to step up. You started research on the ancient grottoes more than two months ahead of Luo Yu. If he beats you to a breakthrough, you old folks won't have a shred of face left," the director teased, shaking his head.
"That's completely impossible..." Chen Zhuo chuckled. "If he really overtakes us, we might as well disband the research institute and go work for him..."
Before the words were fully out of his mouth, the sound of hurried footsteps echoed in. From far away, Luo Yu shouted at the top of his lungs, "Holy crap, it evolved! Several of my Drowned Chickens evolved! I found the key factor for evolution!!"
Everyone: ?
Everyone watched as Luo Yu came sprinting over, dragging a featherless, muscular powerhouse of a chicken that looked ninety percent identical to an Azure Terrorbird!!!!
[Species]: Water Terror Chicken
[Attribute]: Water
[Species Rank]: Lower Common Species
[Life Level]: Level 1
[Species Ability]: Splash
[Individual Talent]: Dragon Claws (Advanced talent...)
After several days of being fed Rock-system honey, the Drowned Chicken had finally evolved!
However, upon inspecting it with the Data Eye, he realized the evolutionary leap seemed rather weak. It remained a Lower-tier Species, its ability hadn't upgraded, and it wasn't an Azure Terrorbird, but a Water Terror Chicken. Aside from greater physical strength, not much had changed. Luo Yu guessed that the Rock-system talent fostered by the Rock-system honey was too weak, leading to an underwhelming evolution. Thank goodness he had tested it on subjects first instead of having July jump straight in, or that potential would have been squandered.
Nevertheless, an evolution was an evolution—it was still tremendous progress. The evolutionary pathway was clear now; from here on, he just needed to find ways to further elevate the Rock-system talent.
Rock-system talent + dinosaur descent + Ancient Evolution Stone = evolution!
And what determined the magnitude of the evolution was the grade of that Rock-system talent!
July's evolutionary path was open!
The Ground Penguin race was saved!
"You..." The crowd stared blankly at Luo Yu.
Wait, what?
How did you actually crack the method for evolution?! You've only been here a few days?!
"What a monster," Director Yu Lei blurted out, unable to hold back a curse at the sheer absurdity of it all.
He turned to look at Chen Zhuo, whose face had completely frozen.
"???" Chen Zhuo stood frozen. He had only been joking when he said they'd disband the institute—the director wouldn't take that seriously, right?
Chapter 44