Mutant Creatures

The next day.

When Fang Yuan arrived at school, his classmates were still discussing the wild animals that had gone missing from the zoo.

Apparently, several animals still hadn't been found.

Some of them were extremely dangerous.

The local television station was now interrupting its programming at regular intervals with news bulletins, reminding residents to call the police immediately if they spotted any of those dangerous animals.

Fang Yuan sat down at his desk, took out the copy of Introduction to Star Source Power Industry he had borrowed from the library, and slowly leafed through it.

There had once been a claim online that anyone who thoroughly mastered Introduction to Star Source Power Industry could build Star Power kinetic weapons.

Of course, that was only a joke.

Still, it gave some indication of how solid the book's contents were.

Beef Meatball suddenly turned around, clutching his enormous schoolbag, and leaned toward Fang Yuan. With a mysterious air, he said, "Fang Yuan, let me show you something."

"Didn't our affection level drop to zero?" Fang Yuan said offhandedly.

"That was two days ago. Affection recovers naturally. I'm telling you, this thing is guaranteed to make your jaw drop." Beef Meatball wore an expression that said, "I'm only showing you."

"It's not another one of those crimes-against-humanity snacks, is it?"

Fang Yuan eyed him suspiciously.

This guy sometimes brought in particularly atrocious snacks. Stinky tofu and roasted durian counted as normal by his standards.

Beef Meatball waved a hand. "If it were a snack, I'd eat it myself. Why would I show you?"

As he spoke, he unzipped his schoolbag, reached inside, and lifted something out, setting it on the desk.

"Ta-da! Look what this is!"

His voice was loud, immediately drawing their classmates over.

A girl immediately shrieked, "Niu Dazhi, are you sick in the head? Why did you bring a rat to school?"

Fang Yuan looked up and saw that it was indeed a hamster.

However, something was off about its size.

It was as big as a basketball and probably weighed about five kilograms.

An ordinary hamster weighed only around fifty grams. Anything over a hundred grams was a heavyweight among hamsters.

Beef Meatball's hamster looked to weigh over five kilograms, a hundred times as much as an ordinary hamster. Its size was clearly abnormal.

The hamster was also clutching an ear of corn and gnawing away at it with a crunch, crunch.

"Hehe, impressive, huh?" Beef Meatball was very pleased by the girls' horrified expressions.

"If you don't throw that thing out, I'm telling the teacher," one girl warned.

"Wu Tingting, all you know how to do is tattle. If you dare tell the teacher, I'll report you for bringing cheat sheets to last semester's finals!" Beef Meatball refused to back down and started arguing with her.

While the classmates around them were making a racket.

Fang Yuan guided Star Power into his eyes and glanced at the hamster.

Species: Hamster

Star Power level: Lv.1

Attributes: Strength 3, Agility 12, Constitution 6, Spirit 3

Superpower Trait: Rapid Digestion

"This hamster has the superpower you've always dreamed of," Fang Yuan said with a smile.

"What?" Beef Meatball hadn't understood.

"I said your hamster has the superpower you've always dreamed of," Fang Yuan repeated.

"What superpower?"

"Rapid Digestion."

"You're saying my hamster has a superpower?" Beef Meatball's eyes widened.

"Yes. It's mutated," Fang Yuan replied.

Hearing that the hamster had mutated, their classmates immediately became interested.

Even the girl who had said she would hand the hamster over to the teacher stopped saying so.

They all crowded around to look, studying the hamster curiously as though they had spotted some rare treasure.

Most people often saw mutant creatures on the news but rarely encountered them in real life.

"This is a mutant creature? Fang Yuan, you're not making that up, are you?" a boy asked doubtfully.

Beef Meatball reached out and clapped him on the shoulder. "Fang Yuan's superpower is Iris Data. What he says has to be true. You guys don't get it. My hamster is freaking awesome."

"Come on, how awesome can a superpower like Rapid Digestion be?" the boy said, unconvinced.

"It's awesome, all right." Beef Meatball didn't know what made the superpower awesome either, but that wasn't important.

"Where did you buy this mutant hamster?"

"What do you mean, buy it? I raised it myself. It grew up on my leftover potato chip crumbs," Beef Meatball corrected.

"When did it get this big?"

"I think it started over summer break. It grew this big in two months." Beef Meatball thought back, not entirely sure.

"Why has there been so much news about mutant creatures lately? Mutant creatures escaped from the zoo, and now we're even seeing one at school."

Once one classmate brought it up, the others noticed it too.

"I noticed that too. There's been more and more news about mutant creatures lately. I've seen people discussing them on forums, and people have even posted videos of mutant creatures on Weibo."

"Hey... Qiao Zeyu, don't you have a relative working at the Supervision Bureau? Got any inside information?"

The classmates around them all turned toward a fair-skinned boy.

"Yeah, Qiao Zeyu. If you've got inside information, share some with us."

Qiao Zeyu looked up at his classmates. "I do know a few things, and there's no harm in telling you. But I'll only say what I'm allowed to. Once I'm done, don't press me about anything else."

"Just tell us already. Stop dragging it out."

"Actually, there hasn't been more news about mutant creatures online. There's been more news about mutant creatures in Donghai City," Qiao Zeyu corrected their earlier discussion.

"What do you mean?"

"You probably browse Donghai City's Tieba boards and forums, so you've gotten the false impression that there's a lot of news about mutant creatures online. In reality, it's only Donghai City that's seeing more mutant creatures."

"What's going on, exactly? Why are there more mutant creatures in Donghai City?"

Qiao Zeyu said, "If you've read any extracurricular books about Star Beasts, you should be able to guess the reason. There's a little related material in the history textbook too, but it's only mentioned in passing. Maybe no one noticed."

"What is it? Just tell us!" His classmates could hardly bear being kept in suspense.

Fang Yuan thought back over the books he had read, turned to look at him, and asked, "You mean spatial rifts?"

"You actually guessed it. Spatial rifts," Qiao Zeyu said with a smile.

"What about spatial rifts? What does this have to do with spatial rifts?" their classmates hurriedly asked.

Since Fang Yuan had already guessed the reason, Qiao Zeyu stopped keeping them in suspense and explained, "According to past records of spatial rifts, relatively intense Star Power fluctuations always occur before a spatial rift appears. The scientific community believes that before a spatial rift appears, dark matter seeps through from the other side of the rift, causing intense Star Power fluctuations..."

"...The emergence of Star Power fluctuations increases the likelihood of creatures awakening or mutating."

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