Parasite

"There's no equipment—just this iron lump and all this meat."

Zhou Changqing heard a player say, sounding somewhat disappointed.

"What the hell do you know? This game is already so realistic. Do you really think it'll let you loot armor from a corpse? Of course it'll only drop materials!"

Another player immediately refuted him.

"Didn't we come here for the ore on its body? Hurry up and dig."

Another player had already begun using the weapon in his hand to separate the flesh from the ore shell, getting to work ahead of everyone else.

Seeing this, the other players scrambled up onto Iron Lizard's corpse and began digging for ore amid the stench of blood and the savory charred smell of the wounds roasted by Trist's Simulated Sunflare.

Zhou Changqing came to the cross-section of the fatal wound. It had been charred by the instantaneous heat. Not only had the flesh been incinerated—even the ore shell had melted into lava and rolled across the ground.

But deeper inside, the flesh had survived. The high-temperature roasting had also triggered a Maillard reaction, producing the rich, smoky aroma of barbecue.

Animals had a high fat content in their internal organs. Iron Lizard in particular usually stayed Motionless, pretending to be a wooden dummy, and had a belly full of fatty intestines. After being roasted at high heat, the aroma made Zhou Changqing salivate.

When he came over and saw all this fragrant, roasted meat, a bold idea suddenly sprang into his mind.

Zhou Changqing picked up his sword and cut off a piece of the slightly blackened roast meat.

The surface of the meat was a pale yellow-black caramel color, while the cut face was slightly lighter. The rich meaty aroma made Zhou Changqing salivate despite it being virtual.

"What are you