Chapter Twenty-Six: A Step Further

After the initial shock wore off, Li Shang quickly regained his composure.

He knew that those giant creatures had no interest in the meager flesh he possessed. As long as he was careful not to get caught up in their incidental movements, he would be fine.

“The real threat comes from creatures my size or just a bit larger,” he mused, feeling as though he had already seen through the mechanics of this game.

It was simply a more complex version of big fish eating little fish. With caution, it should be easy to clear the levels.

Having figured this out, Li Shang’s gaze sharpened as he surveyed the creatures around him.

The hunt was about to begin!

Avoiding danger, seeking targets, striking when they were unguarded, then devouring their flesh and blood to fill his evolution bar.

Repeating this cycle, his evolution bar began to accumulate at a rapid pace!

Soon, he reached the third stage, his body swelling once more.

Those creatures whose mouths alone had dwarfed him at the start now seemed like mere children before him.

One bite, crisp and crunchy!

It was exhilarating.

However, after hunting several more and seeing his progress bar’s growth slow to a crawl, he lost interest and began to select targets that matched his own size.

Soon, a creature with a back bristling with spikes caught his eye.

It was oval-shaped, its mouth long and slender but not sharp.

“A herbivore?”

With this realization, Li Shang charged in without hesitation.

He was a carnivore—why would he fear a plant-eater?

Of course, he wasn’t foolish. The spikes on its back looked formidable, so he naturally avoided them, attacking at its weak points.

Though he was careless and got stabbed by a spike, losing more than half his health, he ultimately managed to kill it, escaping with only a fright.

After slaying the spiked creature, Li Shang immediately began to devour its flesh and blood.

Then he noticed his health slowly recovering.

The price, however, was that his progress bar did not increase at all during this process.

Clearly, when injured, the food he consumed couldn’t serve both purposes.

Li Shang nodded slightly—this seemed a rather reasonable mechanic.

After devouring most of the spiked creature’s body, his health was fully restored.

And just then, a prompt appeared before his eyes.

[You have devoured an unknown creature]
[You are absorbing its genes]
[You have obtained spikes]
[They grant you greater offensive power and make you harder to attack]
[Your evolved species has added ‘unknown’ creatures to its diet]
[You have gained one evolution point]

Seeing that he had acquired another gene, Li Shang quickly attached a pair of spikes to his sides.

Now, even if attacked from the flanks, he would remain unafraid.

“This game is only tough at the beginning; once you figure out the mechanics, it’s just a matter of having hands,” Li Shang shook his head. To be honest, he was a little disappointed in Yin Jian’s new game.

While it was decent overall, it paled in comparison to “My Little World.”

“I’ll leave a few pointers in the comments section after I clear it,” he thought with pride, not noticing the shadow looming behind him.

Then…

“Huh? Did it get dark?”

[You have encountered a powerful natural enemy during your evolutionary journey]
[You have not evolved genes to counter it]
[Your species is hunted down until extinction]
[Survival of the fittest]
[Natural selection]
[You have been eliminated by nature]
-END-

[Evolution points]: 2
[Gene points]: 2

“…”

Li Shang opened his mouth, wishing he could slap himself.

Serves you right for getting cocky—now he had to start all over again.

He gloomily selected restart.

This time, with experience and greater caution, his journey went smoothly.

[You have obtained a jet nozzle]
[It grants you tremendous speed]
[You have obtained scales]
[They give you powerful defense]
[You have obtained a venom sac]
...

Through a series of evolutions, he quickly reached the seventh segment of the evolution bar.

He was just a hair’s breadth away from the eighth segment.

Without hesitation, Li Shang devoured the flesh before him.

The progress bar instantly broke through the seventh segment, reaching the eighth.

At the same time, his body expanded dramatically.

After this expansion, he clearly sensed that he was in an ocean.

Though his body was now many times larger than when he first entered the game, it seemed, by real-world standards, to be no bigger than a little fish the size of a finger.

“If I evolve to the end, I should be as big as a boat,” Li Shang guessed, preparing to continue hunting for prey so he could clear the game sooner.

However, before he could act, a series of prompts appeared before his eyes.

[Due to a shift in satellite orbit]
[The climate is affected]
[Temperatures begin to change]

[The world is covered in white]
[Countless creatures begin to go extinct in the falling temperatures]

The prompts vanished.

As Li Shang was absorbing the information, he suddenly realized that his health was dropping at a rate of one point per second.

He only had 80 health points at this stage!

“What kind of random event is this!” Li Shang dared not delay, immediately searching for food to devour. Without sustenance, he’d only last 80 seconds.

He kept hunting and devouring, maintaining a safe health level.

But after some time, he realized that the health-draining buff had no time limit; as long as he remained in the eighth stage, it would not stop.

To make it disappear, he had to either die or reach the ninth segment of the progress bar.

By the time he understood this, it was too late.

The buff affected all creatures.

He had wasted too much time earlier.

Now, the ocean’s inhabitants were perilously scarce.

While he managed to keep his health at a relatively safe number, the available prey was barely enough to push his evolution bar forward.

Eventually, as nearly all life vanished, Li Shang fell in defeat.

[Your evolved sphere failed to adapt to the cold]
[The population dwindled in the freezing climate]
[Ultimately, you succumbed to the disaster]
[You did not reach the end of evolution]
-END-

[Evolution points]: 8
[Gene points]: 8

“…Well played.”

Li Shang muttered, stifling his frustration, then clicked restart.

This time, he evolved even faster, quickly reaching the eighth segment.

Prepared for what was coming, just before breaking through to the eighth segment, he stockpiled ample food—enough to boost his progress by one and a half segments, according to his calculations.

The random event this time differed slightly from the last.

It was a volcanic eruption beneath the sea, leading to global warming.

But although the event was different, the buff’s effect was the same: losing one health point per second.

This time, however, Li Shang was ready. He barely spent any time before his progress bar broke through the eighth segment, reaching the ninth.

[After countless generations of evolution]
[Your species has developed a brain]
[You begin to ponder]
[What is the world above the water like?]
[You attempt to leap out of the water to see it clearly]

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