Chapter 43 - 43 The Cave on the Summit
What was strange, though, was the mysterious reason that had made them become the sacrifices to Heaven.
On the way to Gourd Mountain, people had died as well, and Lin Shen had already possessed the Sacrifice to Heaven skill, but Sacrifice to Heaven had not been triggered at that time.
Lin Shen pondered deeply, and eventually, his gaze fell upon the wristwatch.
If there was anything different now compared to before, it was that they had all come to this planet, and everyone had an additional wristwatch capable of teleportation.
“Could it be that anyone with a wristwatch counts as one of my teammates? Tian Xin also has a wristwatch; does he count as my teammate?” Lin Shen felt an urge to immediately go back and kill Tian Xin to test this theory.
After thinking it over, Lin Shen suppressed the impulse.
Ignorance was terrifying, so Lin Shen wanted to know more and to understand as much as possible about how this world really was.
Wei Wufu was a window to understanding the world, but the problem was that this window wasn’t big enough and it was somewhat faulty, making it very difficult to open.
The window represented by Tian Xin was sufficiently large, so Lin Shen still needed to learn more from Tian Xin and couldn’t kill him so easily.
The Qi and Wang families had suffered heavy casualties, with almost all of the Steel Level members dead; none could survive such battles at the Steel Level.
The situation wasn’t much better for Mutators at the Alloy Level; if it weren’t for Qi Shuheng and Wang Tian’er, with their Crystal Base Level pets, they would have almost all been wiped out as well.
Lin Shen had no intention of rushing out to help but silently watched the battle unfold.
As cruel as it was, this was the law of survival.
If it hadn’t been for his good fortune in gaining the Fire Seed ability, he might have fallen into the hands of the Qi and Wang families long ago, and his fate would have been worse than death.
The most eye-catching presence in this brutal battle was undoubtedly Goddess Consort Bai Shenfei and those two Dark Birds.
The Goddess Consort fought fiercely against the Giant King; although she couldn’t gain the upper hand, she wasn’t completely suppressed by the Giant King, and the battle was evenly matched.
Lin Shen judged that the Giant King was very likely a Mutated Crystal Base, a being with a strength comparable to that of the Azure Giant Python.
The fact that the Goddess Consort could fight the Giant King to a standstill meant her level wasn’t much different from Tian Xin’s.
The two Dark Birds were equally fierce, circling in the sky and swooping down periodically; the Alloy Giants couldn’t even withstand a single claw strike from them—their heads would be directly crushed.
The Crystal Base Giants were also thrown into disarray in the face of the Dark Birds, dodging and parrying frantically, not daring to meet them head-on.
Just the two Dark Birds were holding back more than ten Crystal Base Giants, while the other four Crystal Base pets were not faring well in one-on-one fights.
“How did these people end up surrounded by giants in such a place?” Lin Shen frowned and surveyed the surroundings.
Logically, with the mountain’s surroundings being so barren, why would so many people leave the easily defensible Steel Forest and come to this barren place?
The fact that so many people could be cornered and surrounded by the giants here was even more abnormal.
“Could it be that they were surrounded when they were trying to climb the mountain? But then, why would they want to climb this lone, isolated peak?” Lin Shen couldn’t help but scrutinize the mountain.
The mountain wasn’t very tall, only a few hundred meters high, and one could see rows of pits on the mountain from afar, many in number.
Lin Shen estimated that it was very likely the giants normally curled up like stones and stayed in those pits.
The Qi and Wang families wanted to climb the mountain, but they failed to see that those were not natural stones, and as a result, they got surrounded.
“What on earth do they want to do by climbing the mountain?” Lin Shen was too far to see what was on top of the mountain.
“Those giants must have all been lured down by them. I’ll go up to the mountain now and take a look, maybe I can get some benefits.” The strength inside Lin Shen’s body kept climbing, surging violently within him, making it rather uncomfortable for him to stay put and do nothing.
No sooner said than done, Lin Shen circled around to the other side of the mountain. After carefully making sure there were no Base Mutation giants, he began to climb up.
In fact, even if there were Base Mutation giants, Lin Shen was not afraid. As long as he didn’t encounter the Giant King, he now didn’t even need to use his Fire Seed abilities; relying solely on his physical strength, he could compete with those giants.
With the boost from the Sacrifice to Heaven, all his attributes had already broken through twenty, approaching thirty, fully qualifying him to battle ordinary Crystal-based creatures.
With the increase of sacrifices, his attributes continued to grow, just not as quickly anymore.
The giants had indeed all been drawn away by the Qi and Wang families’ people. The side of the mountain also had many pits, which must have been the resting places of the giants before.
He climbed all the way to the top and didn’t see a single Steel Giant; however, he did find a cave.
“I was wondering why I didn’t find anything all the way up. So the cave is on this side; you can only see it from the front. Could it be that those people got surrounded by the giants because they wanted to enter this cave?”
Lin Shen thought to himself, “Do they want to hide in the cave, or did they discover something inside it?”
Luckily, Lin Shen didn’t need to be troubled by this question; he just needed to sneak a peek inside the cave.
He glanced down the mountain, where the battle had become even more fierce. There were less than twenty people left from the Qi and Wang families, and countless giants were dead or injured, with corpses of giants scattered all over the place.
The battle between the Giant King and Bai Shenfei was even more intense, leaving no spare effort to pay attention to the top of the mountain.
Lin Shen crawled on the ground and inched closer to the cave; he didn’t want to attract the Giant King.
Luckily, the Giant King really didn’t have the spare capacity to be distracted, and Lin Shen successfully entered the cave.
“Base Mutation Eggs!” The first thing Lin Shen saw upon entering the cave was the Base Mutation Egg in a pool at the very back of the cave.
The cave was quite large, but not deep; you could see the bottom at a glance. To have a hot spring in such a high place, with the spring water emitting steam, was unexpected.
In the middle of the pool, there was a Base Mutation Egg like a black diamond, half a meter high—the largest Base Mutation Egg Lin Shen had ever seen with his own eyes.
From its shape alone, it was clear that this was a Crystal Base Level Base Mutation Egg.
“This thing wouldn’t be the offspring of the Giant King, would it? If so, then I’ve struck it rich.” Lin Shen jumped into the pool, which was not deep and didn’t even submerge his calves.
He grabbed the Base Mutation Egg with both hands, trying to lift it, but his first effort didn’t succeed.
This took Lin Shen by surprise; his strength was at 27 points, and he could casually lift an elephant with one hand to play ball, yet he couldn’t lift this thing—how heavy could it be?
Of course, Lin Shen hadn’t expected it to be so heavy and didn’t use his full strength.
This time Lin Shen took a proper stance, the posture that made it easiest to exert force, and managed to lift the half-meter high, diamond-like Base Mutation Egg.
“It’s really heavy!” Lin Shen felt it was a struggle to carry the Base Mutation Egg out of the pool and placed it on the ground outside.
It was too heavy; he had used all his strength to carry it, and moving it was too slow.
“Good thing the Base Mutation Egg is egg-shaped.” Lin Shen began to push the Base Mutation Egg forward, deciding to roll it out, as there was nothing else in the cave besides this Base Mutation Egg.