Chapter 40: Second Evolution

Everything was ready. The time for the second evolution had come.

From Wang Shuo’s previous experience, not only would it take a long time to evolve, but he would also lose consciousness.

If he wanted to avoid any accidents, it was better to find a safe place.

So he spent the next half an hour digging a small hole on a patch of soft ground, found some leaves to cover it, and snuggled within.

[You have met the requirements for evolution. Do you want to start evolving?]

“Yes.”

[Evolution list being generated: Strengthened Horn Thrust, Strengthened Bite, Hard Shell, Golden Horn+2, Talent: Intermediate Strength, Talent: Elementary Agility, Talent: Metal Essence Energy Affinity +1 (Intermediate)]

[Please choose the direction of evolution: Skill 0/1, Talent 0/1]

“Golden Horn and Metal Essence Energy Affinity.”

[Evolution direction has been chosen. Evolution beginning…]

Soon, a familiar sense of drowsiness washed over him, and his consciousness instantly went blank.

…

Wang Shuo was awoken by a strange restrictive sensation.

Previously, he had predicted that his body would definitely grow larger after evolving, so he had specially reserved more than ten times the amount of space. But it was still too small.

Fortunately, when he chose his hiding spot, he chose a place where the soil was soft. First, it was easy to dig, and second, it was to avoid situations like this.

After wriggling his body, he quickly shook off the soil and crawled out from the ground.

With his second evolution, his horn’s perception had become stronger.

Not only has his field of vision increased from three to ten meters, but his size also grew from soybean to walnut.

Now, he was comparable to the golden poison bee leader.

But what excited Wang Shuo most was his attributes after the second evolution.

Number: k2648263

Name: Wang Shuo

Race: Golden Horned Beetle

Evolution Number: 2

Evolution Points: 12.2%

Strength: 0.73; Agility: 0.145; Physique: 0.135

Talents: Devouring Evolution, Intermediate Strength (Strength x3), Elementary Agility (Agility x1.5), Elementary Physique (Physique x1.5), Strong Metal Essence Energy Affinity +1 (Intermediate)

Skills: Strengthened Horn Thrust, Bite, Golden Armor, Sharp Golden Horn +2

Element: Metal

Sharp Golden Horn: 1. Horn Thrust, Strength*4 (Elementary Affinity)*4 (Intermediate Affinity); Attack 2. Essence Energy Golden Horn, damage dealt determined by essence energy.

Golden Armor: 1. Physique+0.5; 2. By receiving the baptism of metal essence energy, your defense greatly improves. Defense = Physique*4*4

Strong Metal Essence Energy Affinity +1 (Intermediate): The Metal Essence Energy Affinity talent is gradually integrating into your bloodline (all attributes +0.05).

“Bloodline?

“Are the Essence Energy Affinity talents related to bloodline?”

Many thoughts surfaced in Wang Shuo’s mind.

…

Wang Shuo admired his current body. His body was very similar to the Neptune beetle he had seen before.

But he didn’t have the horn at the bottom, and his only horn was also thicker, sharper, and straight. Strangely, he had four legs instead of six, and they were thicker than those of ordinary beetles.

His streamlined body shined like plated armor, emanating an extremely charismatic aura.

But he didn’t care too much about his appearance. What he really cared about was that after his second evolution, his body’s capacity for metal essence energy had increased tremendously.

The capacity grew from the original 9 points to 36. Additionally, the absorption speed increased by two times. Basically, he could absorb 3 points of essence energy per minute.

But the consumption of Sharp Golden Horn had also increased tremendously. It went from three points per attack to six per attack. Of course, its power was not disappointing. Its penetrative power alone was more than twice as strong as before.

Furthermore, with the enhancement of the Strong Metal Essence Energy Affinity +1 (Intermediate) talent, he could recover the skill’s consumption every two minutes.

Coupled with his own accumulation, he could basically continue indefinitely as long as the battle was not too intense.

“I finally have the strength to protect myself. I can take greater risks now.”

Although it had been less than two days since the start of the dungeon, Wang Shuo’s heart surged with strong ambition after seeing the description of the Strong Metal Essence Energy Affinity talent.

His aim was to evolve this talent into a ‘bloodline’.

The perfect human bloodline needed to devour other bloodlines to complete its advancement. If he could evolve a few more times and exceed the quest completion requirements, he might have a chance to obtain this bloodline power.

In addition to progressing the perfect human bloodline, there was another critical use for bloodline power—increasing attributes.

If everything went well, not only could he perfectly solve the problem of attributes, but he could complete the first strengthening of the perfect human bloodline as well.

Other than that, the second stage of the Primordial Chaos Skill was the Metal Lungs stage.

If his guess was right, this stage should be cultivating metal essence energy.

Without a doubt, the metal essence energy affinity bloodline would be highly beneficial to his cultivation.

It would kill multiple birds with one stone.

However, the prerequisite for all of this was to strengthen the Metal Essence Energy Affinity talent into a bloodline and then try to exceed the quest completion requirements as much as possible.

“There’s still a long way to go!”

With a flick of his limbs, the scenery in front of Wang Shuo rapidly zoomed past. He slid for more than five meters before landing.

His speed was no longer slower than an average person running.

Although his current agility was only 0.145, the instantaneous acceleration of this fist-sized body was extremely terrifying.

He looked up and found a palm-sized bird standing on a dried branch in a daze. Suddenly, a golden light flashed and pierced a hole through its body.

Wang Shuo quickly flickered over and started eating.

The bite of his enhanced jaws was like a small file. With a few bites, even the feathers were ground into powder.

The taste buds of the beetles were different from humans. After these days, Wang Shuo had already accustomed himself to living as a beetle, and eating raw meat and drinking blood was nothing difficult.

[Evolution points +4%.]

After possessing essence energy skills and talents, Wang Shuo no longer cared about ordinary skills and talents, so he chose attribute points.

He had already decided to invest everything into Strength in the early stages. When the price/performance ratio of Strength came down, he would bring up the other two attributes.

Wang Shuo preferred to have balanced stats for all his characters in games.

But in the early stages, he needed the ability to protect himself, so enhancing his combat power was a top priority.

Afterward, Wang Shuo wandered around and searched for his next prey. As long as they were edible, he would never let a single thing go.

He had to admit that the benefits of his ‘cheat’ were too good. The snowballing during the development stage was atrociously fast.

Under normal circumstances, he should still be fighting with the little bugs like ants and creeping about carefully in fear.

After all, he would have just been an ordinary small beetle. Even if he had human intelligence, it was impossible to hunt and improve himself against the gap in attributes.

But with the help of his cheat, he obtained extreme growth every time he ate something. With a little luck, he had breezed through the most challenging beginner stage.