Fish Tongue Louse

The next morning.

After all these years, Shatuo didn't have many true hobbies. Boiling noodles every morning could be considered one of his happiest moments.

The morning air carried a hint of coolness.

The unchanging steps of boiling noodles: adding two chili peppers to the steaming noodles. In the mingling of cold and hot, in the boiling of fire and water, watching the noodles slowly go from raw to cooked, perfectly timed to avoid being overcooked or underdone, he'd serve the noodles in their chewiest state.

A fragrant aroma filled the air, making Shatuo's taste buds involuntarily secrete a large amount of saliva. He looked satisfied.

"Mmm..."

He couldn't help but moan with lingering delight.

Knock, knock, knock!

A familiar knock. His junior disciple arrived punctually as agreed, right at the perfect moment when his noodles were just ready. Everything was so wonderful. Maintaining his excellent mood, Shatuo opened the door.

"Senior Brother, good morning."

As his junior disciple entered, Shatuo frowned slightly at Reilo's thick dark circles under his eyes.

It seemed this junior disciple had stayed up late studying again.

Reilo walked into the room, smelling the fragrance within. The fatigue of the past few days seemed to be swept away, and a happy expression appeared on his face.

Suddenly, he sensed his senior brother's unusual demeanor and asked in confusion, "What's wrong?"

Shatuo frowned. "Junior Brother, you're not in good shape. Did you stay up late again? I think you should rest for a day. Don't overwork yourself."

Reilo paused. Physically, he had indeed been exhausted these past few days. However, his desire for knowledge and his longing for his mentor's approval had made him completely ignore his physical fatigue.

Shaking his head, Reilo dismissed it. "It's fine, I'm not tired!"

After speaking, Reilo went to the dining table and happily savored his senior brother's cooking, praising it incessantly.

Seeing Reilo's persistence, Shatuo could only shake his head and say no more. After a few days of interaction, he knew that this junior disciple, like himself, possessed an unyielding spirit, yearning for his mentor's recognition and praise, striving tirelessly for it, and willing to pay any price.

After breakfast, the two began their new day of introductory studies.

"Junior Brother, our subject today is this little white mouse, one of the most common experimental specimens. As mammals, it shares many commonalities with us humans."

White fur, red eyes.

The little white mouse sniffed in Reilo's hand, its white fur incredibly cute.

Unfortunately, living in a scholar's laboratory was this little mouse's greatest tragedy. After all, in the eyes of scholars researching the profound meaning of evolution, only specimens that could be preserved eternally were truly beautiful.

Squeak.

With almost no pain, Reilo followed Shatuo and skillfully severed the mouse's pain nerves, laying it flat on the dissection table, completely becoming an object of observation under the scholar's scalpel.

"Mammals are generally divided into head, neck, torso, limbs, and tail. Some have wings, some have atrophied tails. They breathe with lungs, have developed brains, are warm-blooded, viviparous, and nurse their young. In modern species, they occupy a dominant position. The common intelligent beings in our Starveil Land are all mammals: humans, elves, dwarves, werewolves, vampires, gnomes..."

The scalpel paused slightly. Shatuo added, "According to the mentor's ancestral cloning and fossil research, in prehistoric times, ancient creatures were incredibly massive. Among the most well-known and widely circulated ancient creatures are the Ancient Dragons, Hydra, Mountain Giants, Undying Firebird, and so on, all of which were oviparous."

Huh?

Reilo was only an introductory scholar. His research was limited to common specimens of flowers, birds, fish, and insects. Legends of ancient creatures were almost equivalent to the theology department researching the myths of gods.

"Oh, right! I heard that the Blood Progeny Demons of the Night's Veil Land form their core embryos in the blood of other creatures, feeding on the emotions of intelligent beings. They are considered a type of elemental creature variant left over from ancient times..."

Under the sharp scalpels of Shatuo and Reilo, the white mouse's skeletal structure and internal organ mysteries were revealed before them.

"Today, we will mainly study the special diaphragm muscle of mammals, their developed excretory system, and their highly developed nervous system, which rapidly responds to external changes to coordinate their internal thermoregulation."

Another day passed, with Shatuo's gentle explanations.

Reilo listened with great interest, his notebook filling up with more and more content. He also became increasingly impressed by Shatuo's vast knowledge. He wondered how many specimens this senior brother had studied. From beginning to end, not a single drop of blood had spilled from the dissection tray, as if he wasn't just learning but displaying his dissection art.

Evening.

Under the sunset's afterglow, with fiery clouds in the sky and willows by the lake showing tender green, pairs of young scholars strolled together, enjoying the beauty of nature's revival and fantasizing about their future travels.

An inconspicuous figure squatted on the stone steps by the lake, holding a net and clumsily trying to catch fish. It was Reilo, attempting to collect a black carp specimen.

"Hahaha, what a big one!"

Reilo excitedly pulled back his fishing net. A large fish was thrashing and struggling in the net.

He carefully transferred the black carp into the prepared water tank. Before a specimen was dissected, even losing a single scale was considered damage. A seemingly insignificant loss could lead to regret decades or even centuries later.

Perhaps it was because Reilo had been collecting specimens all over campus these past few days, picking up some "malevolent energy." Some stray cats and dogs on campus saw Reilo and kept their distance, as if saying, "Oh my god, it's that evil two-legged beast, run!"

"La la la la la..."

Reilo's mood was excellent.

Although the academy didn't explicitly prohibit collecting natural specimens within its grounds, most scholars came from noble backgrounds. With their good upbringing and morals, they preferred to spend a few silver coins to buy common natural specimens from the scholar's street rather than engage in such uncouth behavior.

"Stop!"

Suddenly, a girl with short golden hair shouted at Reilo, interrupting his pleasant mood.

Confused, Reilo looked at the girl, then at the boy next to her, and asked, "Is something wrong?"

The girl with short golden hair was only about 1.5 meters tall, with beautiful, Persian cat-like eyes and a pair of pearl earrings that contrasted sharply with her fiery cherry-red lips. Her fair skin seemed like it could squeeze out milk. With an arrogant posture, she walked up to Reilo and looked into the water tank at the black carp.

"What are you doing?"

Reilo suddenly understood, his eyes darting around as a thought sparked. "Beautiful lady, your skin is truly enviable."

"Huh?"

The girl, who had been furious moments before, was taken aback by Reilo's compliment. A flicker of pride crossed her face as she shyly asked, "Hehe, really?"

A boy nearby responded before Reilo could. "Of course it's true! My dear Nira, I can't even find the right words to praise you."

While praising the girl, the boy shot Reilo a warning glance, clearly mistaking him for a smooth-talking scoundrel.

As the girl preened, Reilo quietly slipped away.

I should try to avoid collecting common specimens within the academy from now on.

Reilo carried his water tank towards his hut.

The next morning.

An unexpected discovery occurred during last night's dissection of the black carp!

Inside the black carp's mouth, Reilo was stunned to find that where its tongue should have been, a bizarre worm had taken its place!

"Huh, a Fish Tongue Louse?"

Shatuo exclaimed in surprise. "I didn't expect the academy to be invaded by this kind of parasite. Although I don't research parasites much, I happen to have some knowledge about the Fish Tongue Louse."

He paused, a thoughtful expression on his face.

"For fish, the Fish Tongue Louse is a rather terrifying parasitic organism. It enters the fish's mouth as a larva, uses its seven pairs of legs to attach itself to the tongue, and sucks blood until the tongue completely atrophies. Then, it takes over the tongue's function, anchoring itself in the mouth to help the host feed, transforming from parasitism to symbiosis."

Shaking his head, Shatuo carefully used tweezers to peel the Fish Tongue Louse off Reilo's black carp specimen.

"Speaking of which, this parasite not only has a strange way of life, but its reproduction process is also astonishing. It constantly changes its sex, yet it's not hermaphroditic and still requires mating between male and female for reproduction. It's quite peculiar. I heard that a great scholar once researched a field of study called 'Evolution's Profound Meaning' based on this, which allows one to parasitize powerful ancient creatures and merge with them."

Although Reilo already had some understanding of parasites, he had never imagined such a terrifying parasitic creature as the Fish Tongue Louse existed!

"Hiss..."

This unexpected find prompted Reilo to quickly prepare the Fish Tongue Louse as a specimen and rapidly record his findings in his Ice Fire Bird Notebook.