Resonance Substance

Safehouse.

Liu Sishan sat cross-legged on the floor, meditating.

Many people probably associated meditation with mystical martial arts manuals the moment they saw the word.

But meditation in this world was actually much the same as meditation on Earth; it did not have so many miraculous effects.

On Earth, people had to bustle about for their daily meals, and most found it difficult to calm their minds enough to enter a meditative state. Awakened in this world, on the other hand, had powerful Mental Strength, making it easier for them to achieve that state.

Meditation could reduce stress, depression, and anxiety; improve focus, memory, and creativity; improve sleep; ease physical pain; strengthen immunity; and more.

As a result, quite a few Awakened in Mingzhu City meditated while standing watch.

Suddenly, Liu Sishan opened her eyes. To her surprise, a translucent status panel had appeared before her, displaying Zuo Xiangming's attributes.

Not long after she finished reading Zuo Xiangming's attributes, Feng Laixian's status panel appeared as well.

"Zhang Ping?" she called tentatively.

But Zhang Ping inside her body did not respond. That meant his consciousness should still be over in Mingzhu City. She guessed that Zhang Ping had used the Appraisal Technique, but because his body was here—and inside her body—she had also seen the Appraisal results.

"Captain, we have new intelligence."

Liu Sishan closed her eyes and compared Zuo Xiangming's and Feng Laixian's abilities in her mind. A moment later, she opened her eyes, took out her badge, and contacted Situ Shibai.

Mingzhu City.

Chen Weihua walked in front while two Awakened carried six crates of fruit up the city wall.

She quickly arranged for several dozen Awakened to throw the fruit. Since the fruit was covered in spikes, she had chosen tall, sturdy Awakened whose arms had all sorts of protection.

"Sister Weihua, stop keeping us in suspense. What exactly are these fruits for?" Zhang Ping asked helplessly.

He had already asked Chen Weihua once in the warehouse, but she had refused to tell him and deliberately kept him guessing.

Although Zhang Ping had studied material identification under Liu Tiefeng and knew many plants and fruits that did not exist on Earth, he truly had no idea what the fruits Chen Weihua had brought were used for.

This was a fruit he had never seen before.

"You'll find out in a moment." Chen Weihua smiled smugly.

Zhang Ping was speechless.

He could have simply used the Appraisal Technique to find the answer.

But if he used the Appraisal Technique now, Chen Weihua would see the results too, so he felt awkward about using it. More importantly, Chen Weihua obviously wanted to show off. Interrupting a woman's moment to show off was not very gentlemanly, so he decided to watch quietly.

Under Chen Weihua's direction, several Awakened exerted their strength and hurled the fruits at the Living Corpses, but several Living Corpses quickly blocked them.

Once the Living Corpses stopped the fruits, the fruits exploded one after another.

The fruits attacked indiscriminately.

They covered all three hundred and sixty degrees. If an Awakened had been nearby, they would have been caught in the blast too.

Fortunately, the Living Corpses were far from the Awakened on the wall, so the explosions could not reach the Awakened. They only blasted the Living Corpses and the Living Corpses around them.

Of course, some of the spikes landed on Feng Laixian as well, and he immediately felt a toxin enter his body.

"This poison!"

Feng Laixian immediately felt a different kind of agonizing pain.

The corpse poison in his body and this unknown toxin were both eroding his body, yet the two poisons were also fighting each other, giving him a chance to catch his breath.

Moreover, because the other toxin was extremely destructive to his body, his recovery speed accelerated instead, easing his current predicament.

With difficulty, he tore open the flesh on his body that contained corpse poison and roared, "Keep going! Again!"

Just now, many Awakened on the wall had tried to stop the attack when they saw it affect Feng Laixian. But after hearing his roar, they immediately realized that it was helping him instead. They all looked embarrassed and turned to Chen Weihua in confusion.

"These fruits are called Thousand-Needle Fruits. Once they suffer a heavy impact, they explode and fire the surface spikes outward. Those spikes contain Fire Poison, and anyone poisoned will feel as though their body is being scorched beneath the blazing sun."

Chen Weihua smiled faintly, then explained to the surrounding Awakened.

Scorched beneath the blazing sun?

Zhang Ping immediately realized that, for Feng Laixian, Thousand-Needle Fruits might speed up the release of Scarlet Emperor Blaze.

In fact, many abilities could be noticeably strengthened by the support and stimulation of specific substances, while some hidden abilities were more easily triggered.

Liu Sishan had once guessed that his ability contained this sort of hidden mechanism. For instance, he had awakened Wind Whisperer after coming into contact with the Wind Gem. It was hard not to wonder whether Wind Whisperer was related to his touching the Wind Gem.

In Mingzhu City, substances that could strengthen abilities or trigger hidden traits like this were called Resonance Substances.

In truth, the simpler an ability was, the easier it was to guess what one's Resonance Substance might be.

For example, water-element Awakened often carried several containers of water with them while they were still weak, while fire-element Awakened carried fire oil...

As for Awakened outside the elemental types, most did not know what their Resonance Substances were, or even fully understand what their own abilities actually were.

If the body were compared to a mobile phone, then an ability would be like an app.

As the program's sole user, the user only needed to use it; there was no need to understand its code structure or how it operated. As the user continuously fed back their usage habits, the program would update automatically, gradually adapting to those habits until it became the version the user wanted.

In other words.

Everyone used their abilities based on feeling and habit. In any case, abilities would gradually take the shape their Awakened were accustomed to.

In Mingzhu City, most Awakened who knew their Resonance Substances had stumbled upon them by accident. Only after encountering such substances did they discover what could strengthen their abilities, but very few Awakened specifically researched them.

The main reason was that dedicated research required a great deal of time, money, and energy.

Furthermore, constantly relying on Resonance Substances could gradually cultivate an ability into one that needed external objects to become powerful.

The more an Awakened relied on external objects, the more their ability would tend toward requiring external stimulation or activation before it could be used.

For example, an Awakened might naturally be able to release a Fireball, but if he always added fire oil to it to increase its power, then after advancing in the future, he might gain an ability called "Fire Oil Enhancement."

This ability could increase the Fireball's power tenfold or a hundredfold after he added fire oil, but in the end, it would not benefit the Awakened. It would only make him even more dependent on Resonance Substances.

Once the Awakened had no fire oil or similar external objects nearby, he would instead be far weaker than an Awakened who had advanced normally.

Thus, even if most Awakened knew which substances could strengthen their abilities, they would not use them often. At most, they would use such Resonance Substances only when they had to risk their lives.

Feng Laixian was in exactly that situation now.

If Thousand-Needle Fruits could truly speed up his release of Scarlet Emperor Blaze, they would undoubtedly be capable of turning the tide of battle.

Desperate times called for desperate measures.

At least for now, he did not mind borrowing external power.

Next, several Awakened continuously hurled Thousand-Needle Fruits at the Living Corpses.

Zuo Xiangming was no fool. He immediately saw that the fruits were helping Feng Laixian, so he controlled several Living Corpses to specifically block the Thousand-Needle Fruits.

However, Thousand-Needle Fruits had extremely strong penetrating power, and their spikes flew incredibly fast after exploding. Unless Zuo Xiangming built a castle around Feng Laixian, he could not possibly block every spike.

After several rounds of attacks, dozens of Thousand-Needle Fruit spikes were embedded in Feng Laixian's back. Red pustules swelled around each wound, giving off wisps of heat.

The spikes melted in the high temperature, forming a black liquid that slowly ran down his back.