The Strongest Gene Chapter 466
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The Strongest Gene Chapter 466: Heh, My Old Friend
At a certain location, the sky above was covered with dense dark clouds. Dark rain descended without stop, yet the numerous raindrops were all seemingly pounding onto thin air, not a single one of them capable of landing on the ground beneath them.
A person was there, looking up at the sky. "The sky is getting darker."
"Indeed." Lu Hun's gaze intensified. "Unfortunately, Chen Feng was able to ruin the Mysterious Organization…"
The other person replied faintly, "In any case, since the devil race is already awakening, there is no longer any meaning to its existence. For now, we should be thinking about how to ensure that our plan is completed without any hiccups. I keep having a bad feeling about those devil race folks…"
Suddenly, Lu Hun asked, "Should we seek Master's advice, then?"
"There's no need for that. Do you really think that Master is not aware of this?" The other person stared ahead and continued, "I'm afraid Master had already seen all this coming long ago…"
At the same time, at a certain faraway sea, an old man was pulling up numerous bones from the deep sea before joining them together. Next, his hands shimmered with a dim radiance, causing flesh to start growing on the bones.
Hum—
Hum—
Light swirled around. The skeleton started being filled up with flesh, and along with the reconstruction, signs of life started appearing, while the owner of the skeleton regained its previous appearance. This was actually a tortoise. On the shell of the tortoise, some faint words could be seen. A badge was taken out by the old man before it was hung around the neck of the tortoise. The silver badge was shrouded by a bizarre radiance, and the word "Duma" could be clearly seen on it.
"My old friend, this time, don't run from me anymore…" the old man muttered. Suddenly, the old man frowned as he rubbed his belly. "I'm hungry. Time to look for something to eat."
At that thought, he entered the sea only to find that, sadly, nothing edible could be found. Next, his gaze moved around before landing on the tortoise.
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"Mhm…"
Bang—
A clump of flame appeared. Shortly afterward, some delicious tortoise meat was done cooking. With a satisfied expression, the old man cut the meat into chunks and started eating them.
It has been quite a while since I last tasted this delicacy…
After a long time, all that was left of the tortoise was a pile of bones.
Mhm…
As the old man looked at the pile of bones, a feeling of sadness rose within him.
Hum—
A faint radiance swirled out, and next, the tortoise was once again resurrected.
The old man patted the tortoise's head. "My old friend, welcome back."
"Scram!" the tortoise roared angrily. "Screw you! I had only just returned, yet you were already feasting on me," the tortoise cursed.
"Hey, Didn't I restore you after that?" The old man shook his head and sighed. "You must maintain a refined attitude, a refined attitude."
The tortoise roared furiously, "Restore, my ass! Back then, when you reared me, wasn't the reason purely to satisfy your appetite? Damn you. I was truly blind back then for allowing you to use me as both mount and food, living a life worse than a livestock. Now that I see your true nature, I'm not working for you anymore. Not even if you kill me!" This was also why it had escaped back then. This was truly too excessive. This old geezer was totally a glutton who had a rare preference for the meat of tortoises. After this old man had started rearing this tortoise, this tortoise had suffered the fate of being eaten by that old geezer once per month. That was why it had escaped in the first place.
When it had escaped back then, it had been resolute that it would do whatever it wished moving forward without a care for the consequences. It would no longer suffer any restrictions. Unexpectedly, it had encountered freaks like Chen Feng and Wang Yao and ended up dead before long…
However, even death was not truly vexing for the tortoise. After all, it had years of experience dying all the time. Therefore, the tortoise was already used to dying. Unexpectedly, it hadn't even managed to stay dead for long before being found by the old geezer and once again being resurrected…
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The old man chuckled. "What a naughty tortoise."
The tortoise was extremely furious. "Naughty my *ss! Why can't you switch to a different tortoise for this?"
"No, it wouldn't be the same." The old man looked at the tortoise lovingly. "A mysterious crystal snow tortoise like you is a breed so rare that one can hardly meet one of you even in 10,000 years. Your meat is so incredibly tasty and filled with energy. You are the only one I was able to find after searching everywhere."
Tortoise: "…"
Curse this rarity! Suddenly, the rain seemed to grow heavier.
Whoosh!
Noticing that the old man was distracted, the tortoise was overjoyed and charged into the sea immediately before escaping. The old man gave it a glance, yet he wasn't really bothered. Instead, the old man maintained his gaze on the sky and stared blankly.
"It's finally starting?"
***
At the Genetic Union, the attention of countless people was attracted by the sudden heavy downpour.
"The rain seems to have changed."
"True. It's heavier now, and the raindrops are more concentrated as well."
The technicians of the Genetic Union were able to finish their analysis speedily. "The density of the unknown particles in the rain has increased."
"Is this happening everywhere?"
"Yes. The black rain has grown heavier worldwide. Nothing major has happened recently. The cities have remained the same as well. However, it is said that the bizarre phenomenon has been happening quite frequently at the unknown regions. A lot of lightning is appearing, and the sky and ground are trembling without stop.
"Unknown regions, huh… There is nothing capable of blocking the black rain in those places."
Everyone was anxious. The unknown regions were desolate lands, and those were also the only regions outside of their control in this world. As the black rain descended, those experts that had existed once upon a time there were seemingly being restored. The bizarre phenomenon seemed to be the signal for the start of something even scarier.
"Ignore the unknown regions for now. Presently, what is the location where the black rain is the heaviest?"
"Star City."
At this, they all blanked.
"The headquarters of the Gene Production Association?"
"Yes."
"That place…"
They exchanged glances, yet they did not appear too surprised at this development.
"Looks like the information given by Chen Feng is accurate. The target of the black rain and the origin of the phenomenon is the restoration of the devil race."
"Devil race… For now, set our yet unknown target as the devil race," the head commanded.
The rest nodded. "Yes!"
"Since the information given by Chen Feng has been verified, let's start our plan. This time, let us do battle with them at Star City. I want those fellows to have a good look at us. We, the new age humans, are not akin to those barbarians back then that they were able to slaughter at will," the head stated, hammering down the nail of confirmation on the path they should undertake.
"Yes!" the rest howled. Their voices filled with battle intent seemed to pierce even the heavens. At Star City, the black rain was still falling, and the sky was still as dark as always. The entire city was brightly lit by their lighting systems, while the residents there were still busy with their affairs as always. These people were seemingly not bothered at all by whatever major incident that was about to come their way.
High above, in the black sky, suddenly, a cloud appeared before assuming the form of a pair of huge eyes. The eyeballs formed of cloud started gazing at this city attentively, and as it noted that everyone in the city was still behaving like normal, it dissipated in satisfaction, like it had never been there in the first place.
Splat! Splat!
The raindrops landed on Star City's barrier, the pattering sound clear for all to hear.
Shua!
A cold wind brushed past. Somewhat surprisingly, these producers that usually had low resistance to the cold were not at all affected, none of them shuddering from the cold. Was this because of the wind not being cold enough, or was it because of these producers now had resistance against the cold? Nobody seemed to have noticed this. In the sky, darkness converged accompanied by the occasional rumbling of thunder. A bizarre phenomenon thus appeared here, signaling the arrival of true darkness.
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Sword System Academia
2/17 NOTICE: I'm putting this on hiatus, possibly permanently. I didn't want to spam with an "update chapter", so hopefully here and in the story blurb will get enough eyeballs. There are a couple reasons for ending SSA for now. 1) I wrote the next chapter but wasn't happy with it. I've been less and less satisfied with SSA's quality the more I thought about it. Part of the reason is... 2) I am seriously thinking about trying to publish some novels to help pay the bills, since I don't have my other source of income anymore. I have never asked for anything from SSA readers, no money, not even a review or rating. SSA is written for fun to amuse myself, primarily, and I would kind of feel bad actually charging someone money for something as unserious as that. I don't think it is good enough to ask anything in return. To use an analogy from music, SSA is more like a jam session with a bunch of friends. You're just chiling and having fun playing some music. 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I've spent a lot of time recently trying to understand the self-publishing industry, and I'm pretty sure I can make some money by using short-term strategies with my current amateur skill level. But I've seen too many authors come and go/burnout, and really, the only way that I think I can enjoy writing and still make money on a long-term basis is to become a better writer. And the next step for me, which I haven't done much before, is to spend more time on rewriting and outlines. That is pretty much antithetical to the way SSA is developing. I've always been kind of 20/80 plotting/pantsing, but I want to spend a lot more time outlining before I even start writing. SSA jam sessions don't really fit my goal anymore. If you're curious about what's next, read on... Among other regrets, I regret not finishing SSA. It's the first story I've dropped, but then again, it's the first web novel I've attempted, so I suppose that's not a surprise. 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