Dodder

As noon approached, the two suns were high in the sky, much closer to each other than when Du Ke had last traveled through. This directly caused the temperature to rise continuously, and the water in South Lake was visibly steaming into vapor.

A few bird calls drew Du Ke's attention.

They were two large strange birds, standing on the rocks by the shore of South Lake. They stood tall and straight, like two cylindrical pen holders. Their beaks were sharp and long like drills, their heads were covered in gray feathers, their bodies in white feathers, and their wings were black. Even stranger, they had a pair of large blue feet that looked like duck paws. When they turned their heads to look at Du Ke, they looked like complete idiots.

"These strange birds must be a meter long, right? Maybe they're Magic Beasts too," Du Ke deduced. Apart from the Delicious Rabbits he had directly killed, basically any animal was a Magic Beast—the Delicious Rabbits might have been too, but they hadn't had time to cast magic.

"Squawk!"

"Squawk!"

The two strange birds with blue feet saw Du Ke approaching and started running on the rocks. Their gait was particularly awkward, like they were walking like roly-poly toys, so comically ridiculous. However, when they reached the water's edge, the two strange birds suddenly leaped up, soaring two meters high. Then, spreading their wings like fighter jets, they dived down and plunged into the lake, disappearing without a trace.

After waiting for a full three minutes, Du Ke finally saw two small black dots emerge from the distant lake surface. He activated his telescope and saw that they were the strange birds with blue feet.

But before Du Ke could retract his gaze, he saw the two strange birds with blue feet suddenly fly out of the water with a splash, as if startled. At the same time, waves splashed on the water's surface, and a long, serpentine monster broke through the water, opening its huge mouth to bite at the two strange birds. After the serpentine monster leaped two meters out of the water, a larger body followed. The part that had emerged earlier was clearly its head and neck.

"This... is this a Plesiosaur?" Du Ke was startled by the enormous torso with four fin-like appendages that resembled wings.

RUMBLE!

The Plesiosaur-like monster missed the strange birds with blue feet. It rolled on the water's surface and fell back into the lake, splashing even larger waves. It took a while for the commotion to subside. Du Ke retracted his gaze and couldn't help but retreat a few steps from the lake's edge. He had already been wary of monsters in the lake, but he hadn't expected that the seemingly calm South Lake would hide such a behemoth, at least ten meters long, which would be considered a ruler in Earth's oceans.

"Unreasonable!"

"Unreasonable!"

"South Lake is indeed not small, but it's just the size of a city reservoir. How can it support such a large water monster... This Fantasy World is unreasonable!" he shook his head and sighed.

But if he had to talk about unreasonableness, magic was the most unreasonable thing, so it wasn't surprising that a large water monster would appear in a small reservoir.

After a moment of reflection, and after naming the two monsters South Lake Plesiosaur and Blue-footed Water Bird, Du Ke continued to walk along the shore of South Lake, occasionally looking up at South Lake, hoping to see the spectacular sight of the South Lake Plesiosaur leaping out of the water again. Unfortunately, he saw many small animals in the bushes, but the South Lake Plesiosaur never leaped out of the water again. He had walked from the north shore all the way to the south shore.

The south shore no longer had bushes, but dense blue forests. The most common trees were the Blue Maples, often seen around the Valley of Earthly Crossing, indicating that this area was primarily a Blue Maple forest.

As he was observing an insect that was chirping on a tree trunk, he suddenly felt something pull at his legs, making him lose his balance and fall to the ground, being dragged outward by this thing.

Du Ke frantically twisted his body and looked at what was dragging him.

It wasn't a wild beast at all, but two vines. They were like killer vines from a movie, tightly wrapped around his feet. Du Ke's eyes sharpened, and he materialized a large axe, chopping the vines with a crack. Standing up, he chased after the fleeing vines into the forest. After twenty meters, he finally saw the main body of the vines, a giant plant entwined around several dead Blue Maple trees.

It looked a bit like the Dodder Du Ke had seen frequently as a child. The dense vines had completely choked the surrounding trees, turning them into several bare, dead logs.

As if sensing Du Ke's arrival, this giant Dodder monster tree extended several more vines towards him. Du Ke materialized a submachine gun and unleashed a burst of gunfire, severing the Dodder monster tree's vines. Instantly, the entire Dodder monster tree seemed to tremble, its blue leaves rustling and revealing small white flowers hidden beneath them.

Where these white flowers grew, there were "pouches" woven from vines, inside which rotten animal carcasses could be seen.

"So these are the killer vines!" Du Ke raised his submachine gun and unleashed a barrage of fire at the Dodder monster tree. Finding the submachine gun ineffective, he materialized a chainsaw and swung it like a madman, sawing through the Dodder monster tree's vines with a whoosh.

However, the Dodder monster tree was too large, entwined between several dead trees, making it impossible to find its roots.

After venting his frustration for a while, Du Ke simply gave up. After taking detailed videos and photos, he turned and left. He had already named this plant "Dodder Vine" and took a piece of vine with him to study later.

"The vines have fine thorns. Judging by the force with which it wrapped around me, it's not very strong. A large wild beast could probably break free with a little struggle. However, the animal carcasses in the pouches are quite large, so it can clearly capture large prey." Seeing dark green sap flowing from the broken vine, he quickly deduced, "It might be poisonous, using the thorns on the vines to inject venom into its prey."

Du Ke, protected by his Nano Armor, would naturally not be poisoned, but other prey would not be so lucky.

With that thought, he quickly drew a syringe of dark green sap and began to look for a test subject. There were many small animals in the forest, and they had never seen high-tech like a bird net, so soon a small animal resembling a combination of a lizard and a bird appeared. Or, to put it broadly, it was a dinosaur covered in feathers, with the addition of bird-like wings, quite peculiar.

"Scientists speculate that dinosaurs on Earth might have had feathers. So, could this thing be a dinosaur from the Fantasy World?" Regardless, Du Ke was unwilling to bestow the title of "dinosaur" upon this small creature.

After the small creature was caught and realized it couldn't escape, a green light suddenly surged from its body, transforming into several tiny Wind Blades that cut towards Du Ke.

This was undoubtedly magic, possibly Wind Element Magic. Although the Wind Blades were small, they could cut cracks into his Nano Armor, but that was all they could do; they couldn't harm Du Ke.

But this gave him an idea: "I'll call you Windbird Lizard Beast."

He secured it, ignoring the tiny Wind Blades it released, and made a cut on its body with his dagger. Then, he squeezed a little of the dark green sap from the syringe and applied it to the wound.

He waited for a moment.