So This Was Where Rubber Came From

After dodging Lilia's attack with its rubber arms, the gorilla returned to its original branch.

It did not leave, but stared fiercely at Lilia and Bai Ling, seemingly still pondering how to attack.

"You little monkey, you dare glare at me? Get down here and fight me for three hundred rounds!"

Lilia waved her scythe and shouted aggressively.

From its movements just now, she had already realized that the gorilla's physical abilities were not particularly impressive. It was not the sort that could kill her in one hit.

She had never been afraid of weaklings that could not kill her in one hit!

That said, Lilia had no real means of attacking at range, and she certainly could not climb trees as nimbly as a gorilla, so for the moment, she could only wave her scythe beneath the tree to intimidate it.

The gorilla immediately discovered this weakness of Lilia's. Knowing it was in no danger of being attacked, it laughed with two squeaks, then turned around and smugly waggled its backside at her.

"You dare laugh at me!" Furious at being mocked by such a weakling, Lilia swung her blade at the great tree the gorilla stood on.

She had remembered what Lin Yuan had done on Skull Island and was following his example.

Once she cut down all the trees, where would this damned gorilla run?

Boom!

Lilia's scythe was certainly sharp. A few strikes brought the great tree down.

Unfortunately, this was a Rubber Gorilla. It stretched out an arm, grabbed a branch on another tree, and pulled itself over.

Lilia charged over again and cut down another tree.

Two trees, three trees...

"No! Stop!"

It was Bai Ling who cried out first.

"Everything on this island shares a common aura. Although it's faint, there seems to be a central presence behind it. If you damage the environment too much, you might attract something very terrifying!"

Hearing this, Lin Yuan's first reaction was-another hidden boss?

High Inspiration really was handy. She could even sense where to find hidden bosses.

But he temporarily set that thought aside.

A Rubber Beast was right before him. He would get the 100 units of rubber he needed first, then consider the hidden boss.

So he ordered Lilia to stop.

Meanwhile, seeing Lilia stop attacking, the gorilla grew even more emboldened.

Gripping a branch with both hands, the gorilla let its legs dangle, then abruptly pulled them upward. Using the rebound, it hurtled like a cannonball at Lilia on the ground!

Caught off guard, Lilia was sent flying, and one of her arms was blasted off at the shoulder.

Naturally, such a minor problem posed no difficulty for Lilia. She picked up her severed arm and plugged it back into her shoulder socket, restoring herself to normal.

But the gorilla kept attacking, and Lilia was kept busy picking up her knocked-off parts, leaving her rather bedraggled for the moment.

"Ow, my hand!"

"My foot!"

"My great scythe!"

Lilia yelled and shrieked, her cries rising and falling with the gorilla's excited calls, almost in harmony.

A peculiar look appeared in Bai Ling's eyes as she watched.

In her view, eldritch beings should all be mysterious and evil. The doll girl's earlier innocence and friendliness had merely been a deliberately performed facade.

But if her current behavior was a deliberate performance, she was taking it much too far.

It looked more like she had been born with a screw loose.

Was I overthinking it?

The thought had only just surfaced in Bai Ling's mind when she heard a scraping sound from the coffin lid behind Lilia.

Then the coffin lid opened, and Lin Yuan emerged halfway. He pointed with his right hand, and a translucent harpoon materialized out of thin air, shooting toward the gorilla!

The gorilla should have been able to dodge this attack using its rubber-stretching ability.

But it had become far too excited while attacking the sitting duck that was Lilia, squeaking and bobbing its head. By the time it noticed the harpoon, it was too late, and its shoulder was pierced straight through.

With a click, the harpoon transformed, extending barbs that lodged firmly in the gorilla's flesh.

Lin Yuan then pulled hard. Against his 500 points of strength, the gorilla was dragged down without the slightest ability to resist.

"That's what you get for laughing!" Lilia seized the chance to finish off the unlucky gorilla with one swing of her scythe.

Bai Ling immediately shuddered.

So this doll girl was deliberately making a fool of herself to make the gorilla lower its guard, allowing her captain to deliver a fatal strike!

Innocent and friendly? She's a master actress who will even throw away her dignity to achieve her goals!

Bai Ling, oh, Bai Ling, you nearly let appearances deceive you. You really shouldn't have. You must think things through more in the future!

Bai Ling swallowed, frantically warning herself inwardly.

Then she saw Lin Yuan give her a friendly smile before stepping out of the coffin and standing before the gorilla's corpse.

He smiled at me? Is it because I didn't show any contempt at Lilia's behavior just now, so he thinks I'm not that stupid?

That must be it. "I didn't expect you to know your place. Don't underestimate us. Your only option is to cooperate obediently." That must be what he meant!

Meanwhile, Lin Yuan was delighted. With Bai Ling around, their efficiency really was different.

Previously, he had wandered around the forest for ages without finding anything. Now, they had killed a Rubber Beast as soon as they arrived.

At this rate, his supply of rubber seemed assured.

So he smiled gratefully at Bai Ling, then instructed Lilia to chop the gorilla into pieces, preparing to collect the rubber.

What he had not expected was that, after the gorilla died, its body seemed to lose its rubberlike stretching ability and turn into ordinary flesh.

[Fresh meat]

[An ordinary ingredient. Can be eaten after cooking.]

Lin Yuan held a piece of meat and looked at the information provided by the system, utterly puzzled.

This was merely ordinary flesh, not even the flesh of Magical Creatures!

But that gorilla had definitely not been a normal gorilla.

What was going on?

"Huh, how strange! Couldn't it stretch however it wanted just now?"

Lilia also noticed something was wrong. She poked the gorilla meat repeatedly with a finger, her little face full of curiosity.

These words snapped Bai Ling out of convincing herself. She jolted, immediately realizing that these two terrifying fellows must be questioning her!

They were asking why killing the Rubber Gorilla she had led them to had yielded no rubber!

They were holding her accountable!

Bai Ling immediately jogged over.

"Let me take a look!"

She first touched the gorilla's flesh, confirming that it was ordinary flesh, then closed her eyes and carefully sensed it for a while.

"The source of the discrepancy is here!"

Following Bai Ling's guidance, Lin Yuan blasted open the gorilla's skull with a punch.

There was actually no brain inside its head. In its place was a plant seed the size of a fist!

[Rubber Seed]

[A special seed that parasitizes living creatures, granting them the ability to stretch and reshape their limbs.]

[Although called a seed, it cannot grow. It seems to be a hunting method used by some kind of tree.]

[Can be crushed. Every 10 Rubber Seeds crushed yields 1 unit of rubber.]

"So this was where rubber came from!"

Lin Yuan truly had not expected that obtaining a seemingly ordinary material would involve something so bizarre.

No wonder there was barely any rubber for sale on the exchange, and what little there was cost a fortune.

On this sea, he could not use his old way of thinking to judge the origins and value of materials.

Lin Yuan committed this to memory, then frowned slightly.

He needed 100 units of rubber, which meant 1,000 Rubber Seeds. That meant he would have to hunt 1,000 of these parasitized creatures.

Were there that many prey animals on this island?