Ignore Defense

The sounds of flesh being torn and chewed echoed continuously through the palace.

As biological energy was converted, streams of warmth spread throughout the giant ape's body. Its already enormous frame began growing at a visible rate.

But the Black Armor Giant Ape soon discovered that for the same ten centimeters of growth, it now required several times more biological energy than before.

Its evolved body was of higher quality, and the energy required for cell division and the growth of flesh and blood had increased roughly fourfold. As flesh and bones grew, the scales covering its body were also forming and thickening.

A great deal of energy was consumed there as well.

There was also that faint golden energy flowing through its blood. With sufficient biological energy, it absorbed vitality and blood to transform them, accumulating itself. This consumed another portion of energy.

Taken together, the giant ape's growth expenditure after reaching the Fourth Order was roughly six times what it had been at the Third Order.

Especially that faint golden energy which had appeared after evolution. It was powerful, but like "spiritual power," every bit used was a bit gone.

Based on the consumption from its earlier battle and testing, the golden energy would probably be exhausted after ten all-out punches.

Not bad. The energy requirement after evolution hadn't increased tenfold, only sixfold. The Black Armor Giant Ape grabbed a ferocious beast's corpse, tore off a huge chunk of flesh, and swallowed it in great mouthfuls.

The smallest of the five ferocious beasts was over ten meters long. Even though the evolved giant ape had better teeth and ate much faster, it still took nearly half a day to finish them all.

The abundant energy caused the giant ape's body to grow from twelve meters to thirteen meters. It became even more massive, and even the black scales on its surface appeared thicker.

Only then did the giant ape have time to summon the Attribute Page and inspect the detailed changes from this evolution.

Name: Jiang Hou

Level: Second Order, Mid Stage

Strength: 151→213 Agility: 72→102 Defense: 39→175 Inheritance Seal: Behemoth Form

Bloodline: Black Armor Gibbon Ape, Epic Behemoth; evolved once; current size: 13.1 meters

Bloodline Awakening: World-Shaking Overlord Power—vitality and blood transformed from the intangible into the tangible, containing the intent to shatter. When applied to the fists, it possessed ultimate destructive power capable of crushing energy defenses.

Talent: Furious Berserk—rage ignited the blood, drawing out the power hidden in the bloodline and tripling strength without affecting rationality.

Violent Ape Divine Armor—consumed bloodline power and fused it into the scales across the body, greatly increasing defense. For a short time, it became indestructible, as though clad in divine armor.

Extraordinary Element: Spike, 2 units. An essence extracted from the flesh of extraordinary creatures. Integrating this element during evolution gave a certain chance of obtaining a thorn-type talent.

Unique Talent: Devouring Evolution

Evolution Points: 49/2000

This evolution, along with the growth gained from devouring those Spiked Wolf Ferocious Beasts, had pushed its base strength past two hundred. Its defense had surged by more than a hundred in one go.

Still, those base attributes were a little lower than the Black Armor Giant Ape had expected. It had originally thought its humanoid form's strength would rise by seventy or eighty points.

But the Fourth Order truly was a dividing line.

The evolved Black Armor Giant Ape's power was terrifying. It felt as though every gesture carried the tyrannical force to sweep aside everything in its path.

It had also awakened a bloodline power that ignored energy defenses. In battle, it could deliver a killing blow at critical moments.

The talent that had once filled its mind with rage had also changed into Furious Berserk. Its strength was still tripled, but the word "current" was gone, indicating that it had become a fixed value.

And it no longer affected rationality, which was extremely important.

Combined with its newly awakened defensive talent, the Black Giant Ape had become even more powerful in close combat. For a short time, it could ignore enemy attacks and clash head-on.

As for the Extraordinary Element Spike, it had clearly come from that Wolf King ferocious beast.

But compared to the Black Centipede Ferocious Beast, which had provided eight extraordinary units, that one-horned ferocious beast was clearly much worse. Its strength had also been far inferior.

Trash. The Black Armor Giant Ape sneered inwardly once more, then left the palace in satisfaction and dismissed its Behemoth Form.

Today, Qin Siyu had not knocked on his door. Jiang Hou, who had returned at nearly six, slept until the sunlight shone into his eyes before waking up in a daze.

"...What time is it?" Jiang Hou raised a hand to block the sunlight, finding it somewhat blinding. Then he immediately came to his senses. "Damn, it's already so late."

Jiang Hou hurriedly flipped out of bed and changed his clothes in a few quick movements.

But when Jiang Hou opened the door, he saw Qin Siyu crouching in front of a cardboard box in the living room, softly calling, "Good little one, come out."

"Be good, come out..."

At the same time, a middle-aged man with a square face, graying temples, and a height of around 1.8 meters stood beside Qin Siyu.

When he saw Jiang Hou emerge, the middle-aged man broke into a hearty smile. "Little Hou, you're up."

"...Uncle, you're back."

Jiang Hou froze for a moment, then realized why Qin Siyu had not knocked on his door. It was Saturday.

As he spoke, Jiang Hou walked over curiously. "Uncle, what is Siyu doing?"

"She's trying to call the kitten inside out. Unfortunately, the little thing is afraid of strangers. She's been calling for ages, but it hasn't paid her any attention."

Jiang Hou scratched a few strands of hair sticking up from his head. "Uncle, why did you bring home a cat?"

Both he and Qin Siyu had school during the day, and now he had other things to do at night as well. How would they have time to look after little animals like cats and dogs?

"I didn't buy it."

Qin Buyi explained, "A few nights ago, the back mountain forest behind the mine was in an uproar. Many pheasants, wild rabbits, and even some wild boars rushed out of the forest."

"At first, we thought there had been an earthquake, so we immediately evacuated everyone from the mine. But in the end, nothing happened."

"When dawn came the next morning, I took two men to inspect the back mountain. Then guess what we saw?"

Jiang Hou played along and asked curiously, "Uncle, what did you see?"

"We saw corpses all over the ground." Qin Buyi's tone was grave.

"Wild boars, king cobras, yellow weasels, white foxes, goats, martens, lynxes. In particular, these animals were all twice the size of ordinary members of their species."

"For some unknown reason, these animals had slaughtered one another. Some had their legs bitten off, yet before dying, they still clamped down on their opponents' throats. It was extremely brutal."

"That scene gave all of us quite a fright."

Qin Buyi continued, "Later, when we were moving the animal corpses for inspection, we discovered a burrow beneath a fox. There was a kitten hiding inside."

"That kitten was very cute. I thought you two would like it, so I brought it back to the dormitory and raised it for two days."

"But the little thing is afraid of strangers. No one can hold it. Only when it gets desperately hungry does it crawl out of the box to eat and drink."

Qin Buyi chuckled. "Now that I've brought it back, I'll leave the rest to you two."

"...We don't have any experience with this either." Jiang Hou felt a headache coming on.

At that moment, Qin Siyu, who had been crouching there, looked up suspiciously. "Dad, are you sure there's a cat inside? Why hasn't it come out after I've been calling for so long?"

"Didn't I tell you? It's timid. Why not let Little Hou try?"

"Alright, Jiang Hou, you try."

"...Me? Fine." Seeing Qin Siyu stand and move aside, Jiang Hou could only nod and step forward, crouching in front of the cardboard box.

The cardboard box was about half a meter wide, with a hole cut into one side.

But unlike Qin Siyu's gentle girlish voice, Jiang Hou's imitation of a cat's cry was heavier, carrying a faint low-frequency hum that ordinary people could not hear.

Rustle, rustle, rustle! Jiang Hou had barely called out once when the cardboard box shook slightly. Then, a white little head cautiously poked out from the opening.

Its head resembled that of a ragdoll cat, though its cheeks were narrower. Its fur was snow-white and clean, while the edges of its ears were red, with tufts of long red fur at their tips.

Its pair of red eyes were like jewels, large and round. Together with the red fur at its ear tips fluttering slightly, it looked ethereal.

It really was beautiful.