Under the shade of a coconut palm, Reilo took out his dissection kit without even catching his breath.
Graaah...
The turtle-shelled creature shrieked wildly. Reilo coolly jabbed it with a large dose of anesthetic, silencing it completely.
"Heh heh!"
Unable to resist rubbing his hands together, Reilo licked his lips as he studied the now-quiet behemoth and considered the best order in which to dissect it. The turtle-shelled creature was simply enormous—far too large to fit in the Space Box Shatuo had given him.
So Reilo planned to dissect it right there, preserving only the key structures as specimens—in other words, the biological structure of its compressed water projectile.
"There are people over there!"
Lulu suddenly called out.
"Hm?"
Beneath the shade of the coconut palm, Reilo had been about to dissect the mutated creature on the spot. He looked up. The sudden appearance of several figures in the distance interrupted his research plans, and Reilo, who was eager to analyze the specimen as soon as possible, grew a little agitated.
He stood and gazed into the distance.
"Are they running this way?"
At first, he assumed he was their target. But after watching more closely for a while, Reilo realized, to his astonishment, that three people were chasing someone who was fleeing in their direction.
Seeing their scholar's robes, and unwilling to give up this precious mutated specimen, Reilo signaled to Uncle Luo Ji and Lulu to stay on guard and protect it.
"I'm Bai Xing, from Class Eleven, Year One, at the Grand Natural Academy! Those behind me are from the Xilan Duchy. Please, I need your help!"
Her cry for help reached them before she did. Luo Ji tensed.
People from the Xilan Duchy?
The centuries-long war between the two countries had made hostility between them a matter of course. Uncle Luo Ji instinctively glanced at Reilo.
"Bai Xing?"
Frowning, Reilo murmured her name, then explained to Luo Ji and Lulu, "She's my classmate."
Unwilling to let things turn into a conflict, Reilo took out his iron sword and assumed a stance. He lowered his voice. "Let's see how things play out. Try not to provoke them."
Pant, pant.
Bai Xing wore a sky-blue scholar's robe. A little blood seeped from her shoulder, and her hair was disheveled. After she reached the three of them, gasping for breath, she naturally looked at Reilo, who was also wearing a scholar's robe, then stared at him in surprise.
"It's you?"
Bai Xing had clearly forgotten Reilo's name.
With no time to feel awkward, she glanced at the three scholars from the Xilan Duchy pursuing her and said urgently, "I found a rare specimen, and those three students from the Xilan Duchy saw it. They're trying to take it by force!"
"What kind of specimen?"
Reilo asked curiously without thinking.
Bai Xing gritted her teeth. Seeing the three in the distance closing in, she took a palm-sized green turtle from her Space Box. The strange thing was that a closed red flower bud grew from the top of its shell!
"Uh... what is that?"
Reilo stared in astonishment. It was another rare creature without any information from the Star Core.
That made sense. Many creatures from ancient times had gone extinct as the geological environment changed, while new species had multiplied like stars in the vast sky. As time passed, fewer and fewer of the biological specimens recorded in the Star Core survived. It was unrealistic to expect the Star Core to identify every specimen.
"I don't know either, but those people from the Xilan Duchy seem to recognize it. They called it a Sacrificial Spirit Turtle."
Bai Xing put the specimen away again and gritted her teeth. "Those three may be a little stronger, but they're only first-year students at the Xilan Natural Sciences Academy. If the four of us team up, we might be able to beat them! If you help me this time, I'll pay you one gold coin and give you this ancient conch fossil!"
As she spoke, Bai Xing took out a gleaming gold coin and a dark, glossy ancient conch fossil.
The fossil seemed to have partly crystallized, likely because of its age and the volcanic activity in the area.
When he saw the gold coin, Uncle Luo Ji and Lulu's eyes lit up. Unlike Lulu, Luo Ji, who had spent years taking mercenary jobs, knew something about mages. Though powerful mages could summon wind and rain and were difficult to defeat, apprentices still in school were just little tricksters—like the young mage beside him.
But Reilo froze when he saw the ancient conch fossil.
Notice: 0.5 grams of Ice Wasteland discovered.
Ice Wasteland?
What was that?
Drawn in by this unfamiliar material, Reilo knew that since the Star Core had recognized it, it had to be a Magic Material considered valuable by the ancient Witchers. Seeing that Luo Ji and Lulu looked tempted too, Reilo abruptly set aside his hesitation, straightened his expression, and declared righteously, "We're all classmates in Class Eleven. How could I just stand by and do nothing?"
Though he said that, Reilo's hand didn't hesitate. After accepting the gold coin, he took out enough silver coins for two people and divided them evenly between Luo Ji and Lulu.
As for the ancient conch fossil, neither of them needed it, so Reilo kept it for himself.
"Hee hee, I've made another thirty-three silver coins! With my commission and my own silver coins, I'm one step closer to my goal of ten gold coins!"
Lulu cheered happily, not at all worried about the fight that might break out.
Seeing this, Qiu Hei wagged his tail nonstop. Uncle Luo Ji said nothing, but quietly put away his silver coins.
"This is my classmate. We're all from the Grand Duchy. It's our duty to stand up to these foreign enemies who dared to invade our duchy's territory and seize things by force. I'll leave them to you two!"
Watching Reilo's righteous expression, Uncle Luo Ji spoke up this time. "I'll do my best!"
Luo Ji seemed to harbor a deep-seated hatred for people from the Xilan Duchy. Unexpectedly, he took the initiative, his voice filled with anger.
Seeing this, Bai Xing finally breathed a sigh of relief. Who would've thought that the guy who's always with that sleazy fatso would be so reliable?
Bai Xing couldn't help seeing Reilo in a new light. She had gained a fresh impression of him.
Meanwhile, Reilo was secretly groaning inwardly.
Since those three students from the Xilan Duchy had dared to try to steal Bai Xing's specimen, there was no guarantee they wouldn't take an interest in the specimen he had just acquired and try to steal that too.
But he couldn't run away with it the way Bai Xing had!
What about abandoning the specimen?
Now that he understood what this specimen's biological structure could do, Reilo was a hundred times too reluctant to give it up.
So it was no wonder Reilo was acting so righteous. Even without the Ice Wasteland in the conch fossil, he would have had to stand up and join forces with Bai Xing to face their common enemy for the sake of his own specimen.
He had long heard that, because of the brutal slave system in the Xilan Duchy, its people were violent and unruly. Even during their early education, they had to fight in the arena multiple times. Talented people emerged in droves. He hadn't expected to run into them so soon.
Although the Grand and Xilan Natural Sciences Academies stood side by side among the human nations,
there was no doubt that, in the eyes of most people, after countless trials of iron and blood, the Xilan Natural Sciences Academy was the undisputed top academy of natural sciences among the human nations!