Inside, several newcomers were having a great time catching the experiment subject when suddenly the lights in the entire laboratory went black.
Several people’s movements stopped at once.
“What—what’s wrong?”
“Power outage?”
Cold sweat gradually soaked from their foreheads, and they subconsciously thought of the previous scene in their minds. They stood up, looking a bit nervous.
“What’s with the sudden power outage?”
“I don’t know…”
“Maybe the electrical switch is loose. I’ll check it out.”
“Then I’ll go too.”
Several people hurriedly got up and wanted to leave the laboratory. The researcher, who had done the most excessive before, was also a little panicked when he saw them disperse so quickly. “Hey, are you guys just going to leave me here alone?”
“You–you guys wait for me.”
He panicked, got up, and immediately ran with the other, but the laboratory was too dark. He couldn’t see anything. He suddenly tripped over something under his feet and fell hard, delaying him from catching up with the other, who had already run out of the laboratory. The footsteps gradually faded away, and the rustling sound behind him made the back of the researcher’s head numb. He didn’t even dare to see what tripped him and ran towards the exit.
After the last person also left, Tang Xiao waited for five minutes without seeing anyone return before stepping out from the hidden corner.
The laboratory was dark, the same as when he had entered 428’s cell before.
To be honest, if he had a choice, Tang Xiao couldn’t wait to turn around and leave, but he knew that if he didn’t do something now, everything he had done before would be in vain.
Waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, Tang Xiao took a deep breath, archived the file, and walked into the danger zone with tense nerves.
Upon walking in, something grabbed his ankle, pulling Tang Xiao to the ground and toward the innermost part of the room.
“428!” Tang Xiao exclaimed in surprise and clenched the weapon in his hand. Yet the next moment, he raised his head and met the plural orange-yellow vertical pupils.
The polymer of the mycelium was constantly gathering and scattering, just like the undulating chest. The orange-yellow vertical pupils stared at Tang Xiao, filled with hostility. The mycelium that had originally gathered into a small mass was scattered, and almost instantly spread all over the room, completely inconsistent with the weakness 428 had just revealed.
Tang Xiao could even hear the sound of his ankle bones being pinched and cracked.
Therefore, he realized almost instantly. It was pretending to be weak just now, and the reason was… probably to lower those people’s guard against it.
If so, then 428’s wisdom was far beyond everyone’s imagination.
Of course, it was reasonable to hold grudges and anger.
“Listen to me. I’m not in the same league as them!” Tang Xiao hurriedly spoke, “Remember, we’re partners. I’m here to help you!”
As he spoke, he found that the monster’s eyes did not waver in the slightest, but instead the emotions within were fading, closing in on the time of when it consumed him several times before.
It’s over.
Tang Xiao felt a chill in his heart. He knew that he was gradually losing the trust of this monster.
Something had to be done to redeem it.
‘I will protect you, I will cultivate you.’
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Lie.
428 ibbxfv ja atf byagerlnf ktlaf mbja bc Kjcu Wljb jcv atbeuta. Lbk mjc la obgufa atja tf lr bcf bo atbrf qfbqif?
Ktf ugbeq bo ktlaf mbjar lcpfmafv mbecaifrr vgeur lcab la, vlv jii xlcvr bo ragjcuf fzqfglwfcar, jcv mea lar ybvs jujlc jcv jujlc klat rtjgq rmjiqfir.
Lbkfnfg, lo atja kjr jii la kjr, la kjr yjgfis yfjgjyif. 428 tjv jiwbra cb qjlc cfgnfr jcv ribkis uba erfv ab la.
Besides the instinctive desire to survive, 428’s greatest longing, born from the genetic level, was to evolve.
However, it didn’t know what to do, only what was described in the mouths of those white coats might fit a little of its imagination of evolution. For that reason, it endured experiment after experiment from the researchers. Yet, the researchers who had marveled at it as the Creator’s masterpiece admired the uniqueness of its life forms, and claimed that it was going to be the new greatness, were gone.
After a few months, their attention began to shift. They started to tinker with it more and more, grew frustrated, swore, and eventually walked away. They considered it a failure, a piece of junk, a waste.
It thought he would be different.
In the laboratory, when 428 first saw that unique young man, he just regarded him as food and prey because of some wonderful attraction. However, in that dark kitchen, in that laboratory, the young man looked at him with a completely different look than others.
But now it seems to prove that those words are nothing more than lies. He is only bluffing to stay alive.
………
He is a liar.
At the moment when the young man walked in again, 428 no longer suppressed the desire in the depths of his soul, using mycelium to entangle the young man’s ankle and dragging him into its mouth as if he were capturing prey for the first time. The young man’s clothes were disheveled in the struggle, revealing a pale back of his neck.
Almost instantaneously, the mycelium was attracted. Almost all mammals’ weaknesses were in the neck, which 428 had noticed through countless hunts. It subconsciously wrapped the mycelium around there.
However, almost instantly, it felt the body of its prey beneath stiffen and then slowly relax.
“…Okay.” The captured prey did not struggle anymore, but raised his eyes. Those dark, amorous peach blossom eyes looked at it helplessly. “Eat.”
What did… he say?
The young man straightened up and spread his arms. Under 428’s blank gaze, he took the initiative to offer the most vulnerable place to the hunter. “I know you are uneasy.”
“In your eyes, I’m also human. One of those who used you for experiments.”
“I’m no different from those people, I admit it. My purpose is to see you evolve into a supreme being.”
“The only difference is that I will never give up on you.”
The young man gently rubbed the monster’s blood-colored mycelium with his palm and whispered, “Sorry, I’m late.”
“As compensation.”
Tang Xiao pulled open the white coat with his fingers, revealing his white collarbone underneath. “You can devour me, right here, and become stronger.”
“……”
428’s neurons, at this moment, were sending out the wrong signal.
Unable to understand.
This was the first time that the prey had taken the initiative to approach the hunter’s claws and teeth. The fragile neck was delivered to the hunter’s hand voluntarily.
This action, which completely defied common sense, confused the immature mind of 428, whose intelligence had only recently been born. It was far from being able to comprehend such a complex creature as a human being.
The prey did not resist in the slightest, and it should have been happy to carry out the process of devouring.
But at this moment, 428 felt a sense of emptiness in his heart.
No, no, don’t forget he’s a liar.
The mycelium paused in place for a long time but still wrapped around the young man’s body. The soft mycelium carefully bypassed the fragile fabric, poking into the skin and the interlayer of the cloth. The tips pierced into the white skin.
Tang Xiao’s expression didn’t change. He had already turned on his pain shielding because it wasn’t the fusion of that strange tree, but rather something similar to the first disintegration and devouring. There wasn’t even any horrifying numbness or itchiness. It was just the odd sensation of watching one’s flesh and blood turn gray and then shrink.
428’s process of devouring was similar to decomposition in nature. It was just a super-accelerated version of what was generally experienced after a person’s death. It was quite interesting for Tang Xiao to experience it two or three times while he was still alive.
He didn’t even bleed as the veins were sucked by the mycelium as well, leaving an inconspicuous scar on his previously cut wrist. A few strands of mycelium rubbed against it with lingering fondness, and then gradually crawled towards his chest.
Just when the mycelium wanted to pierce in, Tang Xiao raised his hand to grab it.
“Don’t rush into the organs and limbs,” Tang Xiao whispered, pulling the mycelium into the abdomen as it twitched dissatisfiedly. “This place is more nutritious. You see, I’m not resisting now. You can continue until you are satisfied.”
Thus, the mycelium was tamed and slowly moved from the palm to the skin of the abdomen.
The process of putting a leash on a ferocious beast required a lot of care and attention.
Give it food, give it warmth, let it vent its inner turmoil.
In this way, he could catch it at its most defenseless moment.
Tang Xiao’s gaze swept over 428’s mycelium, which became more and more vivid after absorbing nutrients. The magnificent color was beyond the scope of blood vessels, more like a kind of authentic red gem, occasionally refracting brilliant fire color.
Originally, 428 was in a state that resembled an animal and a plant, but he didn’t know if it was an illusion or not. He always felt that it was moving closer to a human being.
Tang Xiao’s mind couldn’t help but remember the information about that suspended project he had checked out earlier in his mind.
A flesh and blood processing plant that transcended the laws of biological evolution was the secret of the most dangerous King of Mushroom in the Mushroom Kingdom.
This was also why there were so many strange-looking creatures in the wild, all of which were the work of the King of Mushroom, who had accelerated the evolution of species in unknown ways. It even made ordinary animals evolve in the direction of alien beasts and controlled them through parasitism.
This secret was now being attempted to be mastered by mankind.
It was a pity… This plan failed early on because 428 did not show the ability to freely screen genes. The spores of the King of Mushroom could freely absorb the genes of plants and animals for their own use, but it was unable to do so, which led to the current 428 growing into this strange appearance.
It hadn’t evolved the ability to control other mushrooms that humans could only dream of.
But it seems different now.
Because of the closeness, Tang Xiao even observed that behind those mycelia, something similar to an organ had grown. If he looked closely, those orange-yellow pupils were lessening. A structure of vocal cords had grown on the neck-like part.
That’s right.
It was evolving at a rapid pace in a quick time.
Tang Xiao never thought that he would witness this process, and could barely take his eyes off of it. Originally thought to have cooled down, his love for those abnormal creatures was once again revived, and he couldn’t help but open his eyes to witness this growth that defied the laws of nature.
The warm flesh and blood gradually soothed the panic in 428’s heart. His body felt lazy, as if he was soaking in the warm, damp, and dark soil.
The orange-yellow vertical pupils were still staring into the young man’s dark eyes. However, it detected no fear or sharpness in the other person’s gaze. Instead, it saw a strange sense of obsession, similar to what it used to observe in the eyes of researchers. This time, the feeling was not alarming, but rather brought a sense of relief.
However, the emptiness in its heart had not been smoothed.
In those dark eyes that could almost paralyze, it became more and more dominant.
Even suppressing its instinct for a while.
The mycelium’s movement was getting slower and slower.
At this moment, a human voice suddenly came from outside.
“Hey, where did those people go?”
The mycelium’s movements paused. 428’s somewhat dull brain finally regained consciousness for a moment. He looked up and stared out the glass window.
The darkness could not block its vision. The little monster saw a white coat walking outside, heading this way with an obvious goal in mind.
It’s too late.
428 subconsciously looked at Tang Xiao, but found that the young man still showed no signs of struggling for help, only calmly looking at him. There were even a few hints of urgency in his eyes.
“……”
428’s sanity prevailed. It knew that soon the white coat would turn on the lights, and many white coats would come over. Once someone died here, it would soon be disposed of.
Most importantly, there was no way for it to devour Tang Xiao here, and maybe he might never see it again.
Slowly, somewhat reluctantly, the mycelium let go of its prey.
Tang Xiao lay on the ground with his head hung down as if he didn’t react. So the mycelium urged, wrapping him up and sending him to the exit.
At this time, the young man finally reacted and subconsciously took a step forward without obstruction.
Tang Xiao’s eyes twitched under his bangs. A faint smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
In the dark, he held the communicator tightly in his palm. There was a text message page where the recipient was none other than Lodge.
It seemed that this time; it was still him who won the bet.
Tang Xiao took two more steps, getting closer and closer to the exit, but just as he was about to go out, there was resistance from behind. The mycelium grabbed his ankle.
Tang Xiao’s originally relieved heart lifted again.
Turning around, he saw the horrible blood-colored mycelium aggregated, surprisingly vague in the darkness, revealing the outline of a human being.
The blood-colored humanoid cracked an opening from its chin, revealing its newly evolved mouth.
It grew its mouth and kept opening and closing, like a mute using its vocal cords for the first time.
“Xi… xi…ao…”
“Xi…ao… Xiao”
Xiaoxiao.
Tang Xiao’s pupils slowly shrank. The expression on his face finally showed unplanned dismay at this moment.
IT used its voice for the first time, trying to call his name.
Previously, when being bullied by those people, it was also used with its not fully evolved throat.
Ask him for help.
Wah the evolution is happening! Thanks for the chapter :))
Change is rapid…hello Xiaoxiao…lol. Thanks for the update 🤣❤️
Thank you for the chapter 😍 ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️
bros a cutie 😭😭😭
ooh it’s happening it’s happening~ thank you for the update!