Mutated Cactus

When Da Zhuang returned, Jiang You was staring blankly at the cactus in a pot on the balcony.

"Meow~"

Da Zhuang, with a frantically struggling calico rat in his mouth, entered the room and dominantly placed the rat at Jiang You's feet.

The rat was plump, appearing to be at least two pounds, with interwoven black, white, and yellow fur. Its eyes were red, like gemstones.

Jiang You found herself appreciating the rat's surprisingly delicate features.

Seeing her staring at the rat, Da Zhuang proudly flicked his tail.

Indeed, no one could refuse a plump calico rat!

In the cat world, calico cats were the most beautiful.

Therefore, Da Zhuang believed calico rats were the most beautiful rats in the rodent world.

Jiang You stared at the rat for a few moments before looking away.

It was a rat!

No matter how delicate its features, it was still a rat!!

While Jiang You was touched by Da Zhuang's persistent desire to treat her to a "meal," she felt it was entirely unnecessary.

Shaking her head, she said, "I really don't eat rats. You can eat it yourself."

"Meow~"

He's just waiting for me to leave so he can steal it, and now he's denying it.

Hmph.

Da Zhuang dropped the calico rat into the bathtub, waiting for Jiang You to secretly eat it. Then, he tiptoed onto Jiang You's lap and stared intently at the cactus in her hand.

He looked at her with some confusion.

What is this?

It smells good!

He hesitated for a second, then opened his mouth wide and took a bite.

He let out a sharp yowl as the cactus spines pricked him, but he didn't stop chewing.

He chewed and swallowed the piece of cactus, spines and all.

Then, he looked back at the remaining cactus in Jiang You's hand, clearly wanting more.

Jiang You, meanwhile, was staring at the bite mark on the cactus and suddenly noticed something.

A large chunk of the thick cactus leaf had been bitten off, revealing the transparent flesh within. In the center of the flesh was a tiny, tiny transparent crystal.

The crystal was green, about the size of a sesame seed, but it stood out prominently between the transparent flesh.

If Da Zhuang hadn't bitten off that piece of cactus, Jiang You would never have discovered this thing.

She reached out and pried the crystal free, placing it in her palm.

She gave the rest of the cactus to Da Zhuang. "Eat it if you want. This stuff clears heat."

Da Zhuang unceremoniously bit off and ate the remaining cactus, crunching loudly. Although his mouth was full of prickles, he was in pain and happy.

Jiang You, however, examined the rice-grain-sized green transparent object in her palm.

"Is this... a crystal core?"

So, this cactus was a mutated plant!

It was just that this mutated plant was too weak, which was why she hadn't associated it with mutated plants at all.

Jiang You felt like she had discovered what made this cactus different from other plants.

It was a mutated plant, so her blood could help it grow and evolve.

Normal plants couldn't.

Animals couldn't either.

This meant that perhaps only the gene sequence of mutated plants could absorb her blood, and perhaps not even all mutated plants, but only specific ones.

Jiang You suddenly recalled the blood lines that surged from her fingertip when she had cut it.

Where had she seen those blood lines before?

She remembered that once, when the Doctor's experiments were too frequent, her body's repair capabilities couldn't keep up. Her wounds didn't heal as they used to; instead, they festered.

She was on the verge of death, and the rotting flesh on her body smelled so bad that the lab was planning to throw her into the sea around Forbidden Island to feed the fish.

At that time, a mysterious research object was sent to the lab by the secret department. It was said that this object had caused the annihilation of a large base with millions of inhabitants overnight.

Tens of thousands of ability users, including many high-level ones, had perished without a trace.

The process of obtaining it was almost entirely paved with blood.

She had overheard the researchers chatting about how they used three large bases as bait, sacrificing countless survivors, to successfully put the thing into dormancy.

When Jiang You had seen that thing, it was a withered plant root. She didn't know what kind of plant it was.

The doctor later divided the plant's roots and stems into ten portions, using them on ten experimental subjects for research.

Jiang You was one of the experimental subjects.

She watched as the doctor extracted something from that thing and then injected it into the ten experimental subjects.

He also locked them together, observing them closely.

All ten experimental subjects were high-level ability users of A3 rank, but in the end, except for her, the remaining nine all died.

When one of the corpses was dragged away, Jiang You saw red blood threads drilling out from the surface of his skin.

However, there were too many strange things on Forbidden Island, so she didn't pay much attention to it.

But later, she inexplicably got better, and assumed the experiment had failed.

However, thinking back now, it was from that point on that Jiang You's regenerative ability grew stronger and stronger...

Those fine blood threads would often appear at her wounds, but as the blood threads churned, her wounds would heal very quickly.

She stared at her palm.

She felt she had been thinking about it the wrong way.

The doctor's perfect stem cell experiment had not succeeded; she was merely parasitized by some unknown entity.

And with her rebirth, that parasite had also returned.

She could even make a bolder guess.

Was her rebirth... related to the blood threads in her body?

It wasn't that she was reborn with the blood threads.

Rather, this thing didn't want to die, so it brought her, the host, back to life.

But what kind of powerful entity could possess the power to reverse time?

The more Jiang You thought about it, the more chilling it became, and goosebumps rose all over her back.

She quickly jumped up from the sofa and slapped herself twice.

"Stop thinking nonsense!"

Anyway, regardless of the reason, for now, she was the one benefiting.

Her powerful regenerative ability allowed her to recover quickly even from severe injuries, and even regenerate severed limbs.

Not to mention the head start gained from rebirth, reclaiming Space, and stockpiling supplies.

She was the beneficiary of all these things.

Why think so much about it?

Overthinking was useless!

However, to confirm whether her blood was only effective on mutated plants, Jiang You decided to find more mutated plants to experiment with.

But due to the high temperatures, many plants had withered and died. Plants were already scarce, so mutated plants were likely even harder to find.

If you find this book good, remember to add it to your bookshelf to avoid losing it next time.