Discovering an ability

With that thought, Tao Qiu fell into a deep sleep.

An unknown amount of time passed before Tao Qiu caught a sweet, delicate fragrance in his sleep. It was very familiar; he was certain he had smelled it somewhere before.

Craving a taste, Tao Qiu woke up and opened his eyes. The first things he saw were bright green and red.

Chapter 4: Discovering an ability

Emerald leaves spread out like a skirt, with three slender but straight stems growing from the center. Two small, ripe red berries hung from the tip of each stem, giving off an enticing fragrance.

It was a wild raspberry plant. In his previous life, Tao Qiu had spent several of his elementary school years living with his grandparents in the countryside. He often went up the mountains with his friends to look for wild berries to snack on, and this was one kind they found.

If Tao Qiu remembered correctly, judging by where the raspberry plant was growing, it was the nearly dead weed he had seen before falling asleep.

With memories of both his previous and current lives, Tao Qiu knew full well that in this wasteland world, animals and plants weren't the only things that had mutated. Even the soil had changed.

Many plants Tao Qiu had seen in his previous life had changed their appearance here, presumably evolving in response to the soil's mutation in order to survive. Those that hadn't kept pace with the mutations had vanished into the river of time.

In the low mountains where he had lived for many years, the soil and the abundance of rocks meant that the plants growing there were mostly creeping weeds with extensive root systems. Even those were sparse, and taller shrubs were rarely seen.

When he went out or hunted, he occasionally brought back seeds from plants elsewhere by accident, but almost none survived to maturity after landing on this soil.

This raspberry plant's leaves were also somewhat different from those in his previous life, and it had managed to sprout in these mountains. That showed it was quite hardy, one of the plants that had evolved and survived.

What truly puzzled Tao Qiu was that the raspberry plant had not only survived when it was on the verge of death, but also grown to maturity in the time it took him to sleep.

Had the raspberry plant evolved this ability on its own too? In all his years, Tao Qiu had never seen a mutated plant with such a powerful ability. It was almost on par with him after he had eaten that special fruit.

It really was a little unbelievable.

But he had experienced so many unbelievable things lately that one more hardly seemed to matter.

At least the raspberry plant hadn't evolved into a sentient, aggressive mutated monster. He ought to be thankful heaven had watched over him.

And so, Tao Qiu accepted the fact with the calm resignation of someone who had given up worrying.

A big reason he couldn't be bothered to investigate the truth for now was that he had suddenly realized how hungry he was.

Even though he had eaten a whole large beast only a few hours ago, and it wasn't even dark yet, and he had gotten some sleep, fatigue and hunger swept through his body as if he had been doing physical labor for a long time.

The wild raspberries before him also seemed almost magical, constantly tempting Tao Qiu to hurry up, pick them, and eat them. It felt much like the fruit on the vine had before.

As for whether the berries might be poisonous, given how strangely fast the plant had grown, Tao Qiu couldn't tell. Privately, he didn't think they were.

The raspberries smelled so incredibly good, and he was so hungry that he was craving them badly.

Besides, he had even dared to eat that green fruit of unknown origin before. Why would he back down this time? He trusted his instincts!

But at Tao Qiu's current size, those berries, barely bigger than candy beans, probably wouldn't even be enough to fill the gaps between his teeth.

Tao Qiu tilted his head and stood up to check that there were no other living creatures nearby. Then he withdrew into the cave. When he came out again, his mountain-like body had shrunk to the size of a palm.

White and fluffy, round and plump, he could have been mistaken for someone's pet bird by anyone who didn't know better.

This was a skill Tao Qiu already possessed. Mutated monsters had all sorts of abilities, and the higher their mutation level and the longer they lived, the greater their potential. The ability to freely shrink his body was one Tao Qiu had awakened only a few years ago.

But in a world where the strong preyed on the weak, small birds belonged in the food category, which didn't make him feel safe. So he rarely made himself this small.

"Chirp, chirp~" Tao Qiu hopped up to the wild raspberry plant and pecked all the berries into his mouth with a few jabs of his sharp golden beak.

The berries tasted as good as they smelled. Their flesh was tender and their juice sweet and tart, instantly taking over his taste buds and making his mouth water.

They were several times more delicious than the raspberries he had eaten in his previous life!

Tao Qiu instinctively savored them slowly, wanting the taste to linger a little longer.

Unfortunately, no matter how much he treasured them, there were only so many. Looking at the bare raspberry stems, Tao Qiu was very reluctant to let the taste go.

If only there were more.

Tao Qiu regretfully returned to his original size and lay back down, thinking he would savor the aftertaste a little longer before going hunting.

Not long after eating the berries, Tao Qiu's languid, half-lidded eyes flew open. He had sensed a change in his body.

The hunger and fatigue he had felt upon waking seemed to have lessened a little. A warmth rose in his stomach, and even the decay of his body had slowed somewhat.

The relief was slight, more like a drop of water falling into a desert or a pebble dropping into the sea: unnoticeable, yet only the desert and the sea knew they were there.

Since the premonition of death had appeared, this

sense of salvation

had only come over him when he ate the green fruit.

And this time, it was clearly thanks to those raspberries.

This miraculous discovery rekindled Tao Qiu's dormant curiosity, and he began to think it over carefully.

He must have brought the raspberry seed back unintentionally. By rights, it shouldn't have survived on this mountain. Before he fell asleep, it had only recently sprouted and had looked half-dead, so much so that he had mistaken it for a weed.

So, aside from the possibility that the raspberry plant had suddenly mutated on its own, its survival and rapid growth to maturity were most likely due to an outside influence.

Conditions such as air, humidity, and sunlight could be ruled out. If they were the cause, the grass on the low mountains would have mutated like the raspberry plant long ago.

The only difference between this raspberry plant and the plants that had died before was that it had grown beside him. And before falling asleep, he had also wished in his heart that both it and he could continue living.

He was the outside influence!

An idea instantly surfaced in Tao Qiu's mind.

After eating the green fruit that had grown on the vine, not only had his ability to heal himself grown stronger, but his blood could also help other people's wounds heal faster.

Could it be that this ability worked not only on animals, but on plants too?

At that thought, Tao Qiu turned his gaze back to the raspberry plant, but after examining it closely for quite a while, he found no blood near it.

With blood ruled out, all he had done before was think about wanting the raspberry plant to survive. Did that mean stimulating plant growth was different from healing wounds in flesh and blood, and was a mental skill?

Then could he stimulate plants to grow just by thinking about it?

Tao Qiu couldn't help recalling the apocalypse novels he had read in his previous life. The plant abilities in those seemed similar to his current situation, didn't they?

But it had been a long time, and he had only skimmed through them back then. He hadn't remembered at all how people used their abilities to make plants grow quickly.

So he could only figure it out for himself.

Tao Qiu couldn't wait to test his theory.

But he had stimulated the raspberry plant's growth while asleep, and he had slept for about three hours. He didn't know exactly how to do it, or how long it would take to achieve the same effect as before.

For now, he could only take it one step at a time.

He looked around and spotted a creeping weed, common on this mountain, not far from the raspberry plant. It had also only recently sprouted, but it looked much healthier than the raspberry seedling had before.

Tao Qiu crouched beside the weed and stared intently at the sprout. At the same time, he concentrated and thought as hard as he could: Live, live! Grow, grow, hurry up and grow!

As the thought emerged, Tao Qiu felt something invisible drift out of his body like threads, settling little by little on the weed.

The weed trembled, as if a breeze had brushed over its head. In a daze, Tao Qiu seemed to hear a contented sigh, like a starving child finally tasting a delicious meal.

Tao Qiu had realized he had found the right method, but before he could feel happy, a wave of weakness suddenly swept through his entire body.

He could no longer maintain his intense concentration. As he looked away, his vision abruptly went black, and he nearly slumped to the ground.

Tao Qiu knew this feeling well. It was what happened when he got desperately hungry.

In this life, Tao Qiu had been a high-level mutated monster from birth, so he had rarely gone hungry. But there were mutated monsters in this world stronger than him. During the period just after he had been driven away from his bird parents, he had suffered quite a bit because he lacked experience and was relatively weak.

For example, he had stumbled into other mutated monsters' territory and been beaten up, failed to catch prey, and had his prey stolen by mutated monsters.

A few times, he had been so unlucky that everything went wrong. He had been beaten and left without food, so hungry that he could barely stand, his consciousness drifting and every bone in his body feeling as though it had been pulled out.

The state he had been in then was much like his current one.

Tao Qiu finally understood why he had woken up hungry and feeling exhausted, even though he had just eaten his fill before going to sleep.

His ability to stimulate plant growth consumed a great deal of physical strength. It was even harder on his body than losing blood!

After figuring it out, Tao Qiu hurriedly relaxed his body and mind and sat where he was for a long while, recovering a little of his energy and strength.

His stomach unceremoniously began rumbling for food. Only after making sure he still had the strength to hunt rather than be hunted did Tao Qiu fly down from the cave and head toward the nearest hunting ground.

This time, he didn't have to worry about someone in the cave waking up at any moment. On top of that, he was truly starving, so he wasn't picky about his prey. He casually caught one and immediately began feasting on the spot.

With his current strength, ordinary mutated monsters didn't dare provoke him. Those at his level or slightly stronger wouldn't disturb him while he ate either. There was nothing to gain, and they weren't that idle.

The higher a mutated monster's level, the more flexible its mind and the more it valued its life. It considered every move and wouldn't attack without reason.