A cold, sticky sensation on his face jolted Benjamin awake.
He reflexively reached up and touched it. In his palm lay a fist-sized fragment, still faintly writhing, semi-transparent and gelatinous, with chaotic glimmers vaguely flowing within it.
As he stared at the mass of material resembling a high-grade slime, Benjamin's heart began to race uncontrollably.
A blazing thought instantly seized his mind!
His "Nest"—that comprehensive cannon-fodder unit whose design philosophy was ahead of its time, yet had never achieved its ideal performance due to limitations in materials and technology!
If he could thoroughly study the Fungus Lord's near-perfect mechanisms of biological aggregation, evolution, adaptive defense, and regeneration, then transplant their essence into the "Nest"—
Then wouldn't his ultimate creation truly be able to escape its current awkward state of being neither fish nor fowl, becoming a terrifying war machine capable of self-evolution and endless proliferation?!
This idea had already taken root in his heart like weeds when he first heard intelligence about the Fungus Lord, but back then, it had been nothing more than an unreachable fantasy.
But now, the Fungus Lord's remains had fallen straight onto his face like a gift from heaven!
Letting this slip away would be an outrage against heaven and earth!
Benjamin was not the only one. Nearly every wizard around him realized just how precious these scattered, falling Fungus Lord fragments were as research material.
With great delight, they employed every method at their disposal—sealing them in specialized containers, binding them with energy force fields—as they frantically gathered these remains containing the mysteries of an eighth-level lifeform.
The battlefield was filled with the ecstatic joy of harvest.
Yet amid all this celebration, Benjamin suddenly felt an inexplicable palpitation.
An indescribable unease coiled around his soul like an icy snake.
This feeling—was familiar!
The last