Chapter 191
Looking at the Demon Fire Worm run off in two directions, I was suddenly reminded of a joke from Earth .
One boring day in the home of the earthworm family, the little earthworm had an idea to split himself into two for a round of badminton . The mama earthworm found it a great idea and decided to split herself into fours to play mahjong with herself . A while later, the papa earthworm turned himself into minced meat to which the mama earthworm asked, with tears in her metaphorical eyes: “Why are you so dumb, don’t you know that you will die when you split yourself so finely?” The papa worm weakly answered: “…I suddenly wanted to…play soccer…”
‘Soccer? Well, it’s worth a shot . ’
I pointed at the worm which looked half dead by now and signalled for Big 4 to act: “Split it into tens and see what happens . ”
“Understood, Master . ”
Even though he didn’t understand why I wanted to harm the worm even further, he enacted it without question . Realizing that Mo Na might get a little spooked by the sight of us harming little animals…I turned around out of concern and found her actually watching with glee . Perhaps the thought of seeing it split up like that seemed interesting to her .
‘I guess it’s just me overthinking things again, like a devil would get spooked by little animals getting hurt…’
Devils weren’t like humans at all . Simply put, they were a higher existence who possessed an inherited pool of knowledge that saved them a lot of learning time . They were born with an innately strong constitution and the ability to regrow limbs . Once they gained the blessing of an original sin, their fire resistance would rise to a certain degree . Furthermore, it caused their body to evolve from a very basic lifeform to that of a more advanced species .
No matter how one looked at it, devils were clearly stronger than humans and yet they never managed to conquer the human realm…thus humans could not be underestimated as well . Though they were born weak, they possessed infinite potential .
However, all that was a story for another day .
Having been quartered, the Demon Fire Worm lost the ability to crawl . After it was turned into minced meat, it was clearly and beyond any shred of doubt, dead . It was an interesting set of results to be sure but the overall outcome was that it proved how strong their survivability was . Moreover, this trait might just be a common ability of those living in Purgatory .
“There’s no soul?” I asked, clearly shocked . Every living creature had a soul, and this worm shouldn’t be an exception or so I thought . Upon dying however, the expected soul didn’t appear and instead, a husk of a soul could be seen dissipating into the air .
‘Don’t tell me their regeneration ability had something to do with their souls as well?’
In order to figure the whole case of the disappearing soul, I had No . 3 and Big 4 make another trip back to the lava river to catch another worm . Naturally, they were free to catch whatever fascinating lifeform they encountered on the way as well .
It had to be said however, lest I be confused for some sicko, I wasn’t doing this out of sheer boredom, rather it was in order to learn about the environment in Purgatory . Perhaps the two might have sounded unrelated but they were most definitely not .
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In order to adapt to their environment, living creatures would change to meet the challenges they faced . For example, pesticides, when used often and without change, might lead to the pests evolving resistances to said chemicals . Those who couldn’t survive would be wiped out and this would continue till, finally, the pests adapted .
Logically speaking, that should apply here as well, on that worm for example .
It didn’t take long for No . 3 and Big 4 to return, having done the same not too long ago . As expected, they managed to catch another lifeform for me to experiment on . No . 3 had two worms while Big 4 had in one hand, a worm, and in the other, he held a dark red fish and a salamander .
“Master, we caught something new . ” Big 4 raised the fish and salamander as he called out to me: “While we were catching the worms, we so happened to stumble upon this fish chasing after a worm so we caught it . ”
The fish in question was most likely a Fire Devouring Fish . It was roughly half a meter long, had a giant mouth full of teeth that made it look like a piranha from Earth . Unlike those carnivorous fish however, the Fire Devouring Fish had a sturdy set of scales protecting it as if it was wearing a shiny set of armor .
The Fire Devouring Fish were the nemesis of the Demon Fire Worms, and treated them as their staple source of food . Based on their outer appearances alone, I concluded that these fish most likely had a powerful attack of some sort .
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“First, I want a worm quartered . ” That job was handed over to No . 3 because…they truly disgusted me .
No . 3 immediately set about doing his job . Stomping on one of the worms to prevent it from escaping, he then ripped the other worm into quarters .
Just like the previous worm we quartered, it slowly lost its lifeforce and just as it was about to die off, I spotted fragments of its soul dissipating into the air .
‘Was the reason because it was split up into too many sections?’
“Bleed the other worm dry, I want to see if it will die . ”
It went without saying that it would die in the end; that wasn’t the point of the experiment however . The moment the last drop of its blood left its body, the worm died as expected and an intact soul popped out of its body .
Looking at the intact mass, I roughly had an idea of what was going on here . However, just to be sure, (18)I had No . 3 continue the experiments . No . 3 fetched the last surviving worm from Big 4 and then I had them bifurcate it before bleeding it dry .
Upon dying, the worm produced two souls . Unlike the first soul, they were slightly smaller in size and significantly weaker . Judging by their faintness, any further damage to them would most likely result in dissipation .
‘So that’s how it worked, their soul split along with their body and that soul can only support one splitting before dissipating because of its weakness . ’
With that, the worm experiments came to an end and all that was left was that fish . Being an offensive oriented creature, what was most likely a Two-stars Fire Devouring Fish, immediately started off by baring its teeth at me as if it was threatening me .
“Big 4, I want you to see how hard are its outer scales . ”
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“Mhm…help me hold this . ” Big 4 handed over the salamander who had never once given up on struggling before grabbing the Fire Devouring Fish’s tail with his left hand . Using his right, he clawed its scales directly . Immediately, the sparkling scales shattered under his razor sharp claws, revealing a pinkish layer of meat along with crimson-red blood .
With its scales broken, the Fire Devouring Fish started wiggling about violently in a desperate bid to bite the devil who injured it . Unfortunately for it, that was all for naught . It didn’t even take the Four-stars Big 4 much effort to dodge all its clumsy attacks .
“Master, the strength of its scales are about the same as your shields . ” Big 4 answered as he fingered some of the torn off scales .
The results of that hardness test was shocking, to say the least . ‘Its strength was actually comparable to my exquisitely crafted shields?!’
“Place that piece of scale you got in your hand into its mouth and see if it bites . ”
Acknowledging the order, Big 4 did just that and the brainless fish bit down as I had expected, without any hesitation whatsoever .
Upon contact, the first bite left a serious scratch on the scale . After a few more bites, it actually broke the scale in half!
‘These fishes truly had a strong set of choppers! Those scales of theirs aren’t too shabby either . ’
In conclusion, my experiments had shown that Demon Fire Worms had regenerative abilities and were able to split themselves . Their attack power wasn’t high but they were great at running away . The Fire Devouring Fish possessed an astonishing bite strength and sturdy set of scales, making them the perfect nemesis for the Demon Fire Worms .
The worm’s splitting and regenerative abilities were most likely a result of the Fire Devouring Fishes hunting them down . One bite from those deadly teeth would most likely kill them . Thus, in order to survive, they adapted those two defensive abilities where one half would stay behind to distract the enemy while the other half ran away and recovered .
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Truly, this was a case of survival of the fittest: unless one adapted, one died .
“Kill that fish . ”
Big 4 immediately stabbed his right hand into the fish’s belly and ripped out its innards . However, even after such a grievous wound, the fish refused to die and instead it bit down viciously on Big 4’s hand . Unfortunately for that struggling fish, there was no way it could ever win in the first place .
Five seconds later, the fish was officially dead and its soul popped out in response .
“Mo Na, you can have these souls . ” Rubbing the little scamp’s noggin, I smiled at her gently and continued: “That’s if you still have room for them of course . ”
“Mo Na still can eat some more!” With a free meal placed right in front of her, it would be remiss of her to reject it and thus she happily gulped down the souls with a grin on her face . Having finished the meal, her eyes closed slightly, a look of pure satisfaction written all over her face . “Mama, those things were really tasty . ”
“As long as you like them, there will be more to come . ”
“Then can I eat this as well?” Asked the ever curious little scamp as she pointed at the corpse of the fish discarded by Big 4 . “That looks tasty . ”
“You’ll have to pass on the meat, the souls are meant for us . ” ‘Raw fish? My baby girl, aren’t you disgusted by it at all?’
“Kay . ”
We came to this foreign land known as Purgatory by accident instead of our true destination, Abaddon . Till now, we still weren’t familiar with this new environment; it wouldn’t be a stretch to call us blind at all . Furthermore, there were no signs of devils nearby and the harvesting rate of Red Lotuses weren’t ideal either . That meant that in the long term we would have to establish relations with the local powers in this place . Thus, this day of experimentation came about . Knowledge was the key to victories after all .