NOVGO.NET Chapter 471 - Taming the Gold 3 Ring
Chapter 471: Chapter 471 – Taming the Gold 3 Ring
Zhao noticed movement.
At first he thought they were shadows cast by the massive trunks, but soon he realized that the dark shapes sliding between the branches were something much more alive.
“The former predators,” he murmured, watching how a large feline creature moved gracefully through the bark of one of the giant trees.
The creature he was now studying had been, in previous rings, one of the dominant predators. A Royal Shadow Cat of Gold 3 Rank. But now, in this transformed ecosystem, it had become something very different.
“They adapted.”
It was apparently thinner than its relatives from lesser rings, or at least had much less fluffy fur, its muscles redesigned for climbing. Its claws had developed specialized hooks that allowed it to adhere to the smooth bark of the giant trees, and its eyes had evolved bigger to detect the mana fluctuations that indicated when a “fruit” was ripe for harvest.
The adaptation was remarkable to observe.
“Thieves,” Zhao realized. “They became mana thieves.”
The observation was fascinating. These predators, unable to grow at the same rate as their prey, had developed a completely new strategy: stealing the mana accumulation organs that the trees used to continue their evolution.
The Shadow Cat he was observing approached by stealthily climbing to one of the golden fruits, its movements slow and precise. Zhao could see how the creature evaluated the maturity of the organ by moving its nose and whiskers.
The process was methodical. The cat seemed to listen to subtle vibrations.
It seemed to be ready… The creature bristled its back and raised its ears, waiting for the perfect moment to attack.
When it finally lunged, it did so with a speed that barely registered in Zhao’s enhanced vision. Its claws sank into the fruit’s surface, piercing the hard shell that protected it. The liquid mana inside spurted out like golden blood, and the cat drank avidly before the tree could react.
But they were delusions of a creature intoxicated to excess…
The tree did react.
The roar that erupted from the massive trunk made the ground vibrate under Zhao’s feet and he felt the paralyzing effect wash over him.
“Damn!” Zhao threw himself to the ground instinctively, his Camouflage Raptor struggling to maintain active camouflage.
The sensation was overwhelming, a combination of infrasonic waves and mana displacement that seemed designed to freeze the thieves in place. Zhao’s enhanced senses made the effect even more pronounced, his nervous system flooded with signals that screamed from every direction.
The “branches” (appendages) of the giant tree moved with speed that belied their size, long pincers that cut through the air where the Shadow Cat had been seconds before. The feline creature jumped and twisted, using its enhanced agility to dodge the attacks, but Zhao could see that the exchange was far from one-sided.
The cat’s movements had become more erratic, less precise. The stolen mana was affecting its coordination, making it drunk on power it couldn’t properly process.
“The trees learned to hunt,” he murmured, fascinated by the battle unfolding above his head.
The tree wasn’t just defending itself; it was also using its fruits as bait. Once trapped, other Royal Golden Noses joined the network to tear their prey apart.
The coordination was terrifying to witness. What had appeared to be individual ’trees’ revealed themselves as part of a vast, interconnected society.
Zhao watched as one of the mana organs from another ’tree’ deliberately swelled, pulsing with more intense light to attract the attention of another thief.
The strategy was diabolical in its simplicity. Create irresistible temptation, wait for the inevitable attempt at theft, then coordinate a response that would eliminate the threat while providing fresh nutrients for the collective.
“An ecosystem of constant predation,” Zhao realized.
This place was much more dangerous than he had anticipated.
♢♢♢♢
While Zhao remembered his journey in Gold Ring 3, a group was experiencing the same level of mana in a completely different place.
The ascent through the abyssal depths had been brutal, but not in the way Hagen had expected.
“Still can’t believe how much you’ve changed,” he muttered, watching Bloodwyn move through the tunnels with grace that made even the darkness seem to recoil.
Bloodwyn’s transformation was insane, the enhanced corruption flowing through him like liquid gold. His movements had gained an otherworldly fluidity, as if he were walking through a world that bent to accommodate his presence.
The massive enhancement potion had done more than increase his power; it seemed to have fundamentally altered his relationship with the abyss itself.
“Power has its own momentum,” Bloodwyn replied, his voice carrying harmonics that seemed to resonate through the stone itself. “You adapt or you break.”
The journey upward had tested that principle repeatedly.
At the Gold Ring 3 level depth, they had encountered something that they had thought to have found before: a True Deep Leviathan Worm.
The creature had emerged from the tunnel walls like a living avalanche of flesh, its segmented body stretching beyond the reach of their eyes. Each segment was larger than a house, covered in chitinous plates that gleamed with accumulated mana crystals of high density.
Hagen had felt his heart stop when the monster’s roar shook him from the ceiling, a sound that seemed to originate from the depths of the earth itself.
“This is it,” he had whispered, preparing for the kind of death that would leave nothing behind to remember him by.
But Bloodwyn had smiled.
The fusion that followed was unlike anything Hagen had witnessed. Three of Bloodwyn’s absorption beasts merged with him simultaneously, creating something that could only be described as a true vampire made manifest.
His form had elongated and darkened, sprouting additional limbs that ended in crystalline red claws designed for piercing and draining.
The battle, if it could be called that, had lasted less than two minutes.
Bloodwyn had moved like liquid shadow, directing the leviathan’s crushing attacks with supernatural grace while his claws found purchase in the gaps between its armored segments. Each touch had drained massive amounts of the creature’s vitality and mana, the stolen energy flowing into Bloodwyn with visible streams of light.
The enormous beast had fought desperately, its death throes shaking the entire tunnel system. But its struggles had only accelerated the draining process, each movement pumping more of its life force into Bloodwyn’s waiting claws.
In the end, only the carcass remained, a hollow shell that would feed the smaller scavengers that manage to climb the new abyss for months to come.
“Tasty,” Bloodwyn had commented, his voice carrying a resonance that made Hagen’s skin crawl.
Now, as they finally emerged from the depths, Hagen couldn’t shake the feeling that he was traveling with something that had transcended normal classifications of humans.