Three and a half days later.
Tinwood was placed in the hastily repaired Laboratory No. 3, secured inside a massive glass container.
The container was filled with Nutrient Solution. Tinwood floated quietly within it, bobbing up and down as he slowly grew.
Compared to before, this time, Tinwood's recovery from the tree-heart state to the tree state was somewhat different. The process was slower and more complicated.
Tinwood explained that this was because he had suffered two consecutive devastating blows, and his core source power had been severely affected. In other words, he might no longer be able to maintain the level of a Long-Lived Species, a High-Level Lifeform.
To prevent that from happening, he needed to spend some time consolidating his core source before regrowing. That way, he could make his trunk harder, absorb more energy from the void, and better stabilize energy fluctuations.
In short, he had been beaten too badly before—wiped out twice. This time, he had learned his lesson and intended to lie low and build himself back up before doing anything else.
As for whether his purpose in lying low was to work better or to pursue some other aim, that was impossible to say.
Richard could not be bothered to guess whether he was sincere. He simply told Tinwood in all seriousness that he had only been given one chance at forgiveness, and he had used it not long ago. So either he focused on his work and tried to reduce his sentence so he could regain his freedom sooner, or he continued harboring ulterior motives. If Richard discovered them, Tinwood would be completely destroyed without hesitation.
After warning Tinwood, Richard finished dealing with all the remaining trivial matters and finally had some rare free time.
He lavishly gave himself half a day off,