Chapter 221: Provenance Fruit
They immediately began to search for Doctor Wang after leaving Wellington, this was something that the United Nations placed great importance on as well. Undoubtedly, this Doctor Wang was a complete demonic genius in the eyes of many people. The location that Bai Yi’s team was heading to right now was one of the 121 research facilities.
“Let’s go, we’ll go to the no. 43 research facility now.” Bai Yi said to everybody after looking at the map. On this map, all of the 121 research facilities were numbered from 1 to 121, so they didn’t have to remember the specific names.
“Wasn’t no. 43 already searched long ago?” Although there were 121 research facilities, most of them had already been searched by the United Nations.
“They checked it a few years ago, right? Do you think that the Doctor Wang wouldn’t think of moving to the place after the search party left?” Bai Yi said.
“Honestly, I can’t understand what that guy is thinking.”
“If you could understand his thoughts, then he wouldn’t be known as a demonic genius anymore.” Ulisses teased Woolf as they ran through the treetops.
“You’re saying that as if I’m very stupid!”
“Hahaha, Woolf your image is already well-established!” Bellamy laughed.
“Tch! I think that....” Before Woolf could say anything, the branch below his feet broke with a ‘kachi!’ and his heavy body fell toward the bushes below. Bellamy immediately stretched out her hand grabbed hold of Woolf’s thick and short tail. However, Woolf’s body was too heavy for her to keep her balance on the tree branch, so Bellamy got dragged to the ground after Woolf.
Everybody stopped, and Bai Yi looked at the sky. They could afford to rest for a while.
“Let’s take a break.” Bai Yi said.
“Somehow I feel like I’m dragging people down after entering LV2....” Woolf grumbled.
“Nah, that’s not it. You are just too big. Most of the branches can’t support your weight and it’s also easy for you to run into other branches.” Bellamy hung upside down from one of the tree branches before gracefully doing a backflip in the air and landing on the ground.
Since entering LV2, they could freely control their bodies’ special energy and this brought about a lot of convenience to them. If used properly, it was possible to use their energy to stick to surfaces, so Bai Yi and his team could run along trees and inclined surfaces as if they were flat ground like in animes. Yet, it still wasn’t possible to stand on water because water was always in motion. They could only control the special energy up to a thin area beyond their bodies, once it exceeds the transmission range of their absolute life field they wouldn’t be unable to control it anymore.
Woolf had decent control over his special energy since he had undergone a perfect metamorphosis. It was just that his body was too big, so he seemed to be dragging them down while traveling.
“Let’s move. We should reach no. 43 research facility before dark and we’ll stay there for the night.” Bai Yi said to everybody after resting for a while and eating something.
None of them had any objections; they could rest in the open as well, but who wouldn’t prefer the comfort of a clean and tidy research facility?
Following the map, they very quickly arrived at no. 43 research facility. If not for the detailed and precise map, they would have definitely been unable to find the place because it had long been covered in dense vegetation. After clearing away all the soil and various plants, they finally opened the door to this research facility with the password and method provided by the United Nations. Things inside were very neat, but there wasn’t a single person inside at all. Of course, this was to be expected. Bai Yi and his team never expected to find Doctor Wang so easily here and even the signs outside showed that there wasn’t anybody living here.
Luckily, the research facility had a passageway suitable for large-sized experimental subjects, so Woolf could enter as well. After touring the research facility, Bai Yi connected Yeye to the intranet of the research facility and let her see if there were any hidden sections in this place.
“There are no hidden sections here. There’s a small prison below with 31 experimental subjects inside, but they are all dead now. You guys take a look yourself while I go charge my battery.” Yeye jumped out and said to Bai Yi. Yeye had undergone improvements as well, now possessing a reserve battery that could last Yeye for one day on a full charge. Furthermore, through the wireless signal between the laptop and Yeye’s main computer, she could even pop up on the laptop from time to time.
“En, we’ll go take a look ourselves.” Bai Yi finished speaking and brought a few others to the prison in the lower level. Yeye had already opened all the doors so they could just walk through.
When Bai Yi and the rest came to this small prison, their eyes immediately became slightly downcast. Dead. These 31 experimental subjects had all died. After more than five years without anybody coming to supply food, these five experimental subjects would of course be unable to continue living.
Suddenly, an ear-piercing alarm rang!
They instantly went on guard, but the alarm stopped after a few seconds and Yeye’s voice came from the speakers. “Bai Yi, you guys be careful. Signs of life were detected from prison cell 22.”
It couldn’t be. There were still signs of life?
All of them were stunned for a moment before going over to check things out cautiously. However, no matter how they looked at it, the creature in the prison cell had dried up long ago. After a long while, they finally discovered a spider climbing out from the eye socket of the long dried up corpse in the prison cell.
It was a black spider roughly the size of a thumb with some slight bright-red lines on its abdomen: a black widow spider.
“It’s this black widow?”
“Right, it’s this black widow spider. The experimental subject probably carried a spider egg on him in the beginning. Although the experimental subject died, this spider managed to survive by feeding on his body. Since this place was completely isolated, the spider hasn’t seemed to come into contact with any other genes and retained its original appearance.” Yeye explained.
At this time, this black widow spider slowly crawled across the floor and up to the transparent glass window. Its little eyes observed Bai Yi and the rest outside.
Momo stuck her face close to the window, making eye contact with the little spider through the glass window.
“Daddy, let’s release it.” Momo suddenly turned around and said.
“En.” Bai Yi muttered. “Yeye, open the door.”
“Understood.”
After the door opened, the black widow spider instantly jumped to the floor and crawled toward the door. Even Bai Yi found it hard to believe that such a small spider could also grow to become so intelligent. After the black widow crawled out of the door, it immediately jumped off the ground, landing toward Momo’s body.
Bai Yi and Alodia tensed, but Momo just stretched out her right hand.
Momo let the black widow spider land on her right hand and smiled before turning her head, “Daddy, I’ll send her outside.”
“En.” Bai Yi nodded. He was really getting more and more confused. That was a black widow spider! Even without fusing with any other genes, the poison of the black widow spider was already incredibly potent. If it was Bai Yi or Alodia, their first reaction upon seeing this black widow would definitely be to be on guard. Only Momo would let the spider land on her hand like that.
All of them returned to the research facility’s upper levels. Their sleeping quarters had already been tidied up. Everybody else saw the black widow on Momo’s hand and were stunned for a moment, but after a while they just let it be since they were all desensitized to Momo doing such things.
“Little spider, why not just follow us?” Momo said gently when she was about to release the black widow. Bai Yi heard Momo’s words and the corner of his lips couldn’t help but twitch. Momo do you know the danger of a black widow spider?
Fortunately, the black widow only paused for a while on Momo’s hand before crawling towards the outside without turning back.
It was just a small interlude in their journey and it didn’t have any effect on them. After returning to the research facility, all of them closed their doors and prepared to rest. As usual, Bai Yi let Momo enter deep level sleep, and after she fell asleep her seemingly calm body immediately began to change.
They had discovered long ago that the body would automatically go through a form of self-adjustment when entering a state of deep level sleep or even higher levels of rest. Due to the resonance of the absolute life field, everybody changed in a unique way during the Metamorphose Stage. This kind of transformation happened gradually but would speed up when in a stage of deep level sleep or above. Even so, the speed wouldn’t be to the point of ridiculously fast under normal circumstances, because the body couldn’t handle it!
The slow transformation of the Metamorphose Stage was a gradual change, and every part of the person had to keep up with this transformation at the same time.
Physical body, soul, energy, awareness, absolute life field!
The most fundamental limiting factor was the replenishment of external physical elements.
For example, Bai Yi’s body harmonized more with his own energy every time he entered deep level sleep, but it wouldn’t change by too much. This was because his body couldn’t allow it. The various basic components of a human body were fixed and it wasn’t possible to suddenly create a lot of the necessary components that the body needed out of nowhere. If the body changed too much in one go, it would just result in the body breaking down.
However, this time, Momo’s transformation was very fast. She absorbed the nutrients in the fruit very rapidly, and not just in her physical body but in other areas as well like her soul, special energy, awareness, and absolute life field were also changing at the same pace. Furthermore, this kind of changes seemed to be influenced by that fruit and created a bias and inclination towards a particular direction of change.
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Provenance Fruit – A fruit that grows in a special environment. Its form varies and it may not be in a form of a plant or fruit, but its effects are generally the same. Due to the different characteristics of the fruit, it can let the physical body, energy, and soul of an evolved lifeform change in a fixed direction.
The earlier the fruit is consumed in the Metamorphose Stage, the better the effects are. If the fruit is consumed in the later stages, there can be side effects if the nature of the fruit clash with the original energy inclination of the body, such as dropping dead.