"Seniors, I'll leave the testing of these new evolutions' physical data to you."
"My head is feeling a bit off, so I won't stay here any longer," Luo Yu added, and the researchers nodded in understanding.
After all, Luo Yu wasn't even a Novice Beast Master yet. There was no way he could endure the cave's chaotic magnetic field for too long.
After going over the essential points, Luo Yu took the little penguin and left.
July was brimming with anticipation now that they could finally head back and try out the new technique. For July, using the earth-vein magnetic field in the Ancient Grotto to strengthen its physique was essentially a way to hone its fishing skills.
Since this was a research site, it wasn't suitable for practicing offensive supernatural abilities. Learning fishing techniques, however, didn't disturb anyone, and it let the penguin stretch, move around, and get a great workout!
"Wuji!"
Just as they stepped out of the grotto, July's eyelids began to droop.
After reading for half a day, drowsiness had crept in.
"Go back to the Beast Taming Space and get some sleep first," Luo Yu chuckled, glancing down at the little penguin waddling behind him.
"Wuji!" Handing its fishing rod over to Luo Yu, the little penguin obediently returned to the Beast Taming Space and quickly drifted off to sleep.
Yet it didn't sleep for long before it woke again.
When it opened its eyes, however, it was no longer inside the Beast Taming Space.
Its surroundings had turned into an apocalyptic wasteland unlike anything it had ever seen.
Billowing volcanic smoke blotted out the heavens. The sun was nowhere to be seen, leaving behind only the dull red glare of fire.
There were no plants, no living creatures—only scorched earth and raging flames.
July froze. Frantically looking around for Luo Yu, it broke into a run across the ash-covered plains.
It couldn't spot a thing; everything had been reduced to ashes.
Along the way, it wasn't that the penguin found no creatures at all—it was just that they were already dead.
Countless leviathans, monsters over ten meters long, lay lifeless among the ruins.
July recognized these creatures; it had seen them in books before.
They were one of the ancient overlords: dinosaurs.
Even without the mutations brought on by the torrential rain, these ancient sovereigns could easily tear apart most modern mutated beasts with their terrifying flesh and bodies weighing dozens of tons.
Yet now, every single one of them was dead.
July stopped in its tracks and put the super-intelligence granted by its ordinary talent, Cleverness, to work.
Knitting its brows, it scratched its head. If nothing was amiss... was it dreaming?!
Since it was just a dream, there was no rush.
With an unhurried swagger, July strutted across the scorched earth in its cockiest penguin waddle.
As it walked, it finally discovered a living creature. Ahead lay a volcanic crater where molten rock continued to flow, bubbling with vivid crimson magma.
A gargantuan dinosaur, clad in what looked like magma armor, glowed with dark crimson light. Unlike the dinosaurs that had perished in the apocalypse, its body appeared to have undergone some sort of mutation. Standing well over fifty meters tall and weighing tens of thousands of tons at the very least, it dragged its colossal frame forward through the lava.
With every step, the earth trembled and flames splashed upward. It looked like the sovereign of the land, an overlord emerging from the magma of hell to descend upon the twilight of this devastated era...
The little penguin stared dumbfounded.
*So imposing?!*
If it had a body that huge, it could go fish for orcas!
July had had quite enough of the little fish and shrimp around the island. Catching them didn't give it any sense of accomplishment at all.
"ROAR!"
The next instant, the colossal magma dinosaur raised its head. A savage glare swept over, its blood-red maw gaping open as it let out a thunderous roar. A scorching, foul gale instantly swallowed July whole—
"Wake up."
Luo Yu had already returned to the research institute. Reaching into the Beast Taming Space, he gently shook July awake as it thrashed about in the throes of a nightmare, shattering the dream.
Snapping awake, the little penguin shook its head in a daze.
"Did you... have a nightmare?" Luo Yu comforted the little creature, lightly stroking its head.
"Chirp! Chirp! Chirp? Chirp! Wuji! Guga! Roar!" As it gradually calmed down and recovered, the little penguin began flailing its flippers, vividly reenacting the bizarre dream for Luo Yu.
"A dinosaur...?" Luo Yu was taken aback. July had actually dreamed of a dinosaur?
And from the sound of it, it seemed to be the apocalyptic era after the asteroid struck Earth, when volcanoes erupted non-stop.
The penguin had seen pictures of dinosaurs, so dreaming about them wasn't entirely unheard of, but...
A dinosaur clad in magma armor emerging from a volcano—what kind of bizarre thing was that? A fantasy creature spun up by a dream?
That was normal enough. Dreams were always strange and absurd. He had once dreamed of Ultraman fighting Godzilla, too—and that was a battle of the reproductive kind in bed.
"Why would you suddenly dream about dinosaurs? Didn't you always dream about fishing before?" Luo Yu murmured.
Its good dreams involved catching giant fish to grill and eat.
Its nightmares involved pulling up a swarm of Honey-Water Bees that stung it all over.
"Whatever. It might have something to do with the geomagnetic field."
Certain powerful magnetic fields could stimulate the brain, altering dream content, enhancing dream recall, or even triggering hallucinations and bizarre dreams.
The Ancient Grotto was an area with an abnormally chaotic earth-vein magnetic field. After staying there for so long, it made sense that the penguin would suddenly have a strange dream.
Besides, the earth-vein memories here bore the imprint of the dinosaur era. Perhaps the magnetic field had induced it.
"As for why it dreamed of a dinosaur wielding the power of magma... is it because it possesses that talent itself, and as a direct descendant of dinosaurs, it was imagining what it would look like after evolving...?"
***
Having returned to the research institute, Luo Yu began a new round of breeding.
After the high-talent offspring of the two Breeding Exemplars hatched, Luo Yu had raised them for several days. By now, they had all leveled up and matured physically.
Without hesitation, Luo Yu took a third-generation male Breeding Exemplar and paired it up with the Command specimen he had fattened up.
"A month at most."
"Then a whole batch of Command specimens will be born."
"When the time comes, pairing more Command individuals with more Breeding Exemplars will produce more and more specimens qualified to evolve into Water Demon Beasts."
"I'm going to strike it rich..."
Back then, inbreeding the two Exemplars had yielded six Exemplar offspring. One had gone to the Command specimen to breed more Water Demon Beast cores, but Luo Yu chose not to inbreed the remaining five a second time. Instead, he separated them and introduced external genes first, lest the quality of future offspring degrade.
For these five Breeding Exemplars, Luo Yu chose to mate the first with a Spirit Overload inkfish. He planned to eventually sell Yuwan an inkfish that was basically a Doctor Octopus proficient in psychic powers; after all, the research institute's security guards couldn't be too weak.
The second was paired with an Eight-Blade Style specimen. The Eight-Blade Style talent allowed an inkfish to nimbly manipulate eight tools or supernatural abilities. Luo Yu felt this was also a fitting talent for a Water Demon Beast, as it would perfectly leverage the racial trait of having eight tentacles.
The remaining three were all paired with inkfish that carried the ordinary talent Calculus.
[Individual Talent]: Calculus (Ordinary talent. An individual with this talent undergoes a Rock-attribute mutation in its mouth, developing a petrified beak and gaining increased bite force.)
Out of several thousand inkfish, this was the only ordinary talent related to rocks.
Luo Yu needed them to breed an exceptional offspring with the Rock Element Affinity talent. After all, among so many inkfish, not a single one possessed an advanced Rock talent yet. To evolve a Rock Demon Beast, this talent was an absolute necessity.
As for the Water Demon Beast that might become July's retainer, Luo Yu already had a preliminary concept for its talents, though he would make adjustments later depending on how things developed.
1. Command: This seemed to be an indispensable core talent, completely non-negotiable.
2. A Rock-type talent: July would need this to boost its Rock affinity and resonate with the Ancient Evolution Stone in the Ancient Grotto.
3. Eight-Blade Style talent: When a Bloodline Lord drew upon the power of a retainer, it required the retainer's cooperation. Usually during these times, the retainer couldn't fight on its own.
Luo Yu felt that contracting a tool retainer merely to serve as a foil was a bit of a waste.
If the retainer could multitask—providing July with power on one hand while fighting on its own on the other—that would naturally be ideal. The Eight-Blade Style talent was perfect for that.
Furthermore, Luo Yu had already confirmed that a Monarch Species should be able to possess at least four talents.
Over the past few days, he had seen the Island Lord's great beluga flying through the sky again. Looking closely this time, he had discovered that it possessed one advanced talent and three ordinary talents—four in total!
Therefore, for the fourth talent, Luo Yu was leaning toward Ice Element Affinity.
The combat method of converting earth-vein energy into scorching heat placed a heavy burden on the little penguin's body. It was still flesh and blood, after all. Right now, every time it used that supernatural ability, it had to dash over to a pond to cool down.
If its retainer possessed frost power, July could use that frost power to cool itself during battle and prevent heat overload. While there were other methods—such as an inkfish with a Heat Resistance talent or a Fire Element Affinity talent that could absorb heat for July—he also had to consider the compatibility between the talent itself and the inkfish.
The retainer was a combat unit in its own right, effectively serving as the Beast Master's secondary pet beast.
A Fire-type Water Demon Beast... sounded far less promising than an Ice-type one.
As his thoughts reached this point, Luo Yu paused.
Eight-Blade Style plus Ice Element... wasn't that the Frost Eight-Blade Style inkfish from Yuwan's divination?
*Damn, she really is a divination prodigy!*
Just how far ahead had those eyes of hers seen?
***
"Could you do another divination for me?" Luo Yu sought out Yuwan again, now far more convinced of her divinatory gifts.
"?" Yuwan looked at him.
"What for? Want to check on your love life?" she asked, eyeing him suspiciously.
"I want to know if July can evolve into a giant dinosaur in the future. It had a dream about dinosaurs today. Could it be a prophetic dream?"
Luo Yu described the dream to Yuwan.
"A magma dinosaur?"
Yuwan hesitated, then said, "Why does that sound familiar? Where did I read about that before...?"
"Even that rings a bell?" Luo Yu was stunned.
"A few months ago, right after the grotto was discovered, my uncle had me look up ancient records, and I came across a report," Yuwan recalled.
"An archaeologist claimed that since the evolution of Earth's organisms was entirely triggered by cosmic viruses brought down by the torrential rain... then who could guarantee that the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs hadn't carried some cosmic power as well?"
"That archaeologist argued that an extraordinary, transcendent era existed in ancient times. While most dinosaurs died from the meteorite impact, a small fraction underwent mutations. He even said that if any existed, they would likely be giant magma beasts capable of adapting to the harsh environment of that era!"
"Of course, that archaeologist's view was never accepted by mainstream academia."
"Looking at it now, though, maybe it really is possible? After all, Jingyue Island has already excavated an Ancient Grotto containing extraordinary power... My uncle even told me to contact that archaeologist to invite him to Jingyue Island for an inspection, but I haven't been able to get in touch with him."
"..." Luo Yu pondered. It actually sounded plausible. Perhaps a hidden, extraordinary ancient era truly had existed.
In that case, had July had that dream because the chaotic geomagnetic field caused its brain to resonate with the memories of the earth vein? After all, it possessed a top-tier Earth Vein Resonance talent... and the earth recorded everything that had ever transpired in this world.
"Are you still trying to contact that archaeologist?" Luo Yu asked. That person might know something he hadn't revealed in the interview.
When he formed a ship crew in the future, he definitely had to recruit an archaeologist.
Chapter 46