Chapter 304: Fearsome Devouring Ability, An Extraordinary Background
Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
Meng Lei couldn’t understand why he was able to successfully refine the golden little tree right away at first try when the Magical Beast God had done everything it could and tried for thousands of years, yet it simply couldn’t.
Why?
Meng Lei couldn’t put his finger on it, either!
But was this important?
Of course it wasn’t!
What was important was that he had successfully refined it. Thus, Meng Lei formed a connection with the golden little tree.
In the instant he successfully refined it, both the golden branch and the golden leaf that had taken up a spot each in Meng Lei’s sea of consciousness flew out of his sea of consciousness in tandem and merged with the golden little tree.
A misty golden glow rippled outward from the golden little tree as it merged perfectly with the golden branch and the golden leaf. They became one whole entity and made no distinction between one another.
“What kind of background did this little tree exactly come from?”
Meng Lei suppressed the excitement in him and suffused the golden little tree’s internal structure with his divine cognition. Then, he began to inspect it.
Since the golden little tree had already recognized it as its master, perhaps he would be able to find a clue or two. However, he didn’t discover anything miraculous about it despite inspecting for quite a while.
The golden little tree was an ordinary golden little tree through and through. Apart from its fully-golden exterior that appeared as if it were made out of gold, nothing else about it differed from any other ordinary tree.
It had an average internal composition, an average level of pliability, and average sharpness.
Everything about it was average with nothing out of the ordinary.
Even its life force was also average. Its life force was really very so-so—it couldn’t even compare to that of a vine on Meng Lei.
“Is this little tree really that ordinary?”
Meng Lei sank into deep thought.
The Magical Beast God had easily pierced through my divine body just by moving one of its branches. How sharp must it have been? Is it really that ordinary?
It was just a shame that no matter how he inspected it, he simply couldn’t discern any of its secrets even after observing it for a good half a day!
“Never mind, I won’t bother myself with it anymore. It’s a treasure in any case, so I can’t go wrong keeping it.”
Through his connection with the little tree, Meng Lei then tried to move the little tree. The little tree slowly plucked itself out of the ground and flew into the air.
The golden little tree’s roots were also golden. As though a work of art forged from gold, the golden little tree was golden in color from head to toe and full of charm.
“Collect!”
Meng Lei collected the little tree and sent it into the Tower of Time with a thought.
“Where should I plant this, Dodola?”
“You can just plant it anywhere you want!”
“Okay!”
Meng Lei went to the Tower of Time’s 95th level. The wood magic elements on this level were very rich and concentrated, so it was the most beneficial to plant growth. He had also planted a Tree of Vitality sapling here in the past.
It had been a very long while since he’d last seen it. The Tree of Vitality sapling had already grown a lot since then. The little sapling that had only been about one-meter-tall previously had grown into a large tree over 20-meters-tall. Its fluffy crown spread into the surroundings and shrouded the area 100 meters from where they were as it gave off an astonishing aura of vitality.
Meng Lei was very satisfied with the Tree of Vitality’s growth. Given its current growth rate, the Tree of Vitality would be able to birth and nurture little Fairies in another few dozen years.
“I think you’ll like it here!”
Meng Lei went to a field a few hundred kilometers away from the Tree of Vitality and planted the golden little tree there.
Then, he brought out large quantities of wood-elemental elemental crystals and set up a magical energy-gathering magic circle around it to collect the wood magic elements in the surroundings.
However, just as Meng Lei finished setting up the magic circle, something that he would never have ever expected happened—all the plants around the golden little tree started to wilt and wither...
One meter, 10 meters, 100 meters...
,000 meters, 10,000 meters, 100,000 meters...
In the span of just a few short breaths, all the grass 100 kilometers of where the golden little tree was had withered. The whole field turned yellow and withered and became a dead zone. The grass was as though dry grass during winter...
They became withered, yellow, dry, dead, and highly flammable.
What left Meng Lei even more flabbergasted was that more and more plants were withering, and the yellow, withered field was continuing to spread.
100 kilometers, 200 kilometers...
At last, when the entire field became dry and withered, the forests around the field began to suffer.
All the vegetation there, all the huge, towering trees, and all the ancient trees that had stood for 1,000 years—all of them began to wither!
Just like that, the whole forest started to wilt and wither at a dramatic rate...
Even the Tree of Vitality that Meng Lei had planted wasn’t spared, either, and became a dead tree!
“Just what kind of monster is the golden little tree, exactly? It can actually devour the life force of all the plants around it?”
Dodola appeared beside Meng Lei, its mouth wide as it stared at the rapidly-withering 95th level. It was so astonished that it couldn’t even speak.
“You’re asking me? Who am I supposed to ask, then?”
Meng Lei could only give Dodola a wry smile in response.
“At this rate, all the plants and vegetation on the 95th level are going to wither while the half-plane will also be reduced to a dead zone!”
Dodola took a deep breath and muttered to itself, “How domineering! It’s really too domineering! It has to be one of the most domineering plants I’ve ever seen!”
The final outcome was true to Dodola’s expectations. Ten minutes later, all the plants in the whole half-plane had wilted and withered.
Be it fields, forests, undergrowth...
Be it ordinary plants, the Tree of Vitality, or botanical Magical Beasts...
The golden little tree had absorbed all of their life force!
The lush and luxuriant half-plane on the 95th level that had been full of life and vitality had completely turned into a dead zone. Only one lone plant was still alive, and that was the golden little tree.
Yet despite having devoured so many plants’ life force, it actually didn’t change in any way.
It didn’t grow any taller, it didn’t sprout any new buds, and neither did its life force become any richer.
Nothing about it was different from before!
“What kind of monster is this?”
As they say, “What goes in must come out”. Even a random blade of grass would release oxygen after absorbing carbon dioxide!
Yet the golden little tree didn’t show any activity at all. Who would dare to believe something like that?
“Could it be that it has too voracious an appetite so that bit of life force couldn’t fill its stomach at all?”
Struck by a brainwave, Meng Lei brought out a deity’s dead body and threw it in front of the golden little tree.
The life force that the deity’s dead body contained was undoubtedly strong. Even the combined life force of all the plants on the whole half-plane might not necessarily be as rich and strong as the dead body’s!
The golden little tree didn’t let Meng Lei down. It was hard to tell how exactly it did it, but the life force within the deity’s dead body began to disappear at an alarming rate.
The originally plump and full dead body began to visibly dry up. Two minutes later, the dead body had turned into a dried corpse.
The golden little tree finally showed a hint of a change after absorbing the deity’s dead body’s life force. A tiny little bud slowly sprouted on one of its branches. Sparkling and translucent, it looked extremely tender.
At the sight of the bud, Meng Lei and Dodola exchanged a look with each other. Neither of them knew what to say anymore.
After absorbing the life force of all the plants in the half-plane, as well as a deity’s dead body’s, it had actually only sprouted a single bud!
Was there any plant out there whose growth rate was slower than the golden little tree’s?
“Although I don’t still know its origins, I daresay that its origins must be an extremely astonishing one. In fact, it might be even more amazing than the five Primeval Divine Trees!”
Dodola’s eyes sparkled as it said, “Its terrifying appetite alone has already greatly surpassed the Ancient Tree of Life’s!”
“Yeah!”
Meng Lei nodded slightly. The stronger a being was, the bigger its appetite usually was. Just like mortals and deities—mortals would be stuffed to death after eating a whole cow, but the same amount of food was nothing to a deity.
A deity’s digestive ability was simply too horrifying. They could digest while they eat, so once they finished eating a whole cow, they would also have finished digesting it at the same time. As long as the deity was willing to, they could eat even 10,000 cows.
“Cultivate it well. That golden little tree will definitely bring you a surprise!”