After hesitating for a moment, Chen Yining decided that the Faceshifting Spider's bond skill was not as good as the strength increase for goblins.

There was only a fractional bind effect after getting four spiders, after all…

Not only was the chance low, the effect was weak as well.

Most importantly, it required four spiders gathered to activate the bond skill!

At the moment, Chen Yining could only summon a limit of three summoned beasts. He could not trigger the bond skill even if he gathered three spiders since it meant he was one spider short, not to mention that he had no idea how to increase the number of summoned beasts.

In the end, goblins were simple and crude.

Just three were needed to activate their bond skill.

Moreover, there were a lot of them, and they could be strengthened even if they were weak!

After all, Chen Yining had seen how easily Green Skin had wrecked the Faceshifting Spider on its own.

Still, something was unusual.

He had seen the summoned beasts of other people along the way, which were basically all goblins, slimes, or gnomes.

There was nothing wrong with that.

However, Chen Yining had not seen someone else with an evolved summoned beast.

Reasonably speaking, even if some of them had a collector's impulse to gather all summoned beasts, there was no way every person would behave like that.

Perhaps only Chen Yining himself could fuse summoned beasts?

"Brother, your goblin has evolved!"

Chen Jing appeared shocked, and being a perpetual joker, his series of stunned expressions could ultimately be summed up with a single sentence. "How did you do it?"

"Skill, nothing else."

"…"

"I'm just joking." Chen Yining chuckled. "You could just drag it."

"Drag?"

"Yeah."

"I think I get it," Chen Jing replied steadily, pulling up his backpack which was sagging slightly over his 1.91-meter frame.

Meanwhile, it turned out that the Faceshifting Spider had earned Green Skin 10 EXP, and its level bar reads: [Level 1 (10/100)]

It would need to kill ten Faceshifting Spiders to level up.

And judging from that number alone, leveling up was more difficult than evolving.

Moreover, they seemed to have run out of luck after getting rid of the Faceshifting Spider.

Along the way, they encountered small creatures such as rabbits and sparrows, but they were all ordinary animals.

Then, a big snake with brown, angular scales hanging off a tree suddenly dropped down, but Green Skin moved swiftly to catch it.

The snake promptly coiled itself around Green Skin's wrist and bit it.

Green Skin simply slammed its hand heavily on a nearby tree trunk, which looked as if it was wearing a boxing glove with the snake on it.

Thud, thud, thud~

The snake's movement gradually stiffened and its coils loosened.

Green Skin then nailed his rebar through the snake's head, pinning it against the tree.

At the same time, Green Skin's EXP bar also increased marginally: [Level 1 (11/100)]

It appeared that the snake did not meet the standards of summoned beasts, and nothing else happened aside from gaining 1 EXP.

There was no new summoned beast page either.

And as usual, Green Skin claimed credit for killing the snake from Chen Yining.

Chen Yining, however, was worried that Green Skin had been poisoned, since the snake's head was triangular. Usually, that would mean that said snake was venomous as it would store its venom sac and fangs within empty spots of its cheeks, and as time went on, genetic inheritance caused most venomous snakes' evolved triangular heads.

Of course, there were certain non-venomous snakes that mimicked the triangular head, but those snakes were rare.

As such, Chen Yining was a little worried. "You were bitten. Are you alright?"

"Just a trifle, no matter." Green Skin said pompously.

Five minutes later, it started wobbling, and swayed left to right even as it walked.

A little dizzy, Green Skin clung on to a tree for around three minutes, and become better after shaking its head a little.

It even became spirited, and stopped wobbling as it walked now.

That was quite similar to honey badgers, which also recovered by simply napping after being bitten by a viper.

After that, the brothers and goblin strolled through the forest for over three hours.

It was noon—the forest was hot and stuffy.

And since they were dressed heavily, they were now sweating buckets.

"It's so hot." Chen Yining wanted to take off his thick town jacket, underneath of which he had worn layers of clothing, not to mention that he had duct taped coils of plastic plating over his arms and wrists.

He did not know what the climate of this world was like.

It had been cooler earlier in the morning, but it was colder than Mountain Water City in April at night.

And yet, at daytime, it was hotter than Mountain Water City in April.

The fruits would be sweeter given the huge difference in temperatures between day and night, right?

Despite that, Chen Yining was merely rambling—suffering the heat would always be better than being bitten by mosquitoes and the like.

Soon, they crossed a small slope, beneath of which was a mire.

It was quite vast, and as they looked further along it, they could vaguely see a water source that resembled a lake.

"Brother, someone's there," Chen Jing said then, pointing at the distance.

There were four other people and their summoned beasts in a faraway slope.

They were holding sticks and poking it into the mire. Then one of them spotted Chen Yining and his brother, and started to wave in their direction.

Chen Yining, however, did not want more issues to deal with. Moreover, having more people meant more people to share any profits with, and it was safer to travel in pairs instead of traveling in a large group in a forest.

Therefore, Chen Yining waved back to decline—they would mind their own business.

And since he was unwilling, the other group did not try to force the brothers to join their group either.

The mire they were poking at was neither large nor small, and it was a public area that was not labeled as a private property.

"Brother, look at that." Chen Jing then pointed at something rolling in the mire.

It looked like a puddle of slimes, but they were coated with a thick layer of mud.

Chen Yining's Summoner's Grimoire reacted at the same time that he noticed the creature.

[Species: Slime]

[Introduction: Slimes are a lesser magical beast, mildly-tempered and weak in attack. They consume insects and tree leaves to sustain themselves.]

[Race Talent: Regeneration +2]

[Rank: Normal ⭐]

[Bond (Elemental)]

[(1) +15% elemental damage when there are more than 4 elementals.]

[(2) +30% elemental damage when there are more than 8 elementals.]

A piece of dried leaf floating near the surface of the swamp was then engulfed by one of the slimes, hence inching closer within its body.

"How do you guys usually kill slimes?" Chen Yining asked Green Skin then.

Green Skin shook its head. "We goblins don't usually eat slimes. They don't taste good and we would get an upset stomach."

"Are you interested in a slime, then?" Chen Yining turned to ask his younger brother.

Chen Jing showed a look of contempt. "I don't like such soft-looking summoned beasts. I prefer domineering ones, and the leopard we saw just now suits me."

Then, looking at Green Skin for a while, it suddenly said, "Come on, Green Skin, let's test each other's strength.

Green Skin turned to look at Chen Yining, who did not refuse.

He was curious as to how strong Green Skin was after evolving too.

After some thought, Chen Yining instructed, "Don't use your full strength at the very start. Just strengthen your grip bit by bit."

With that, Green Skin and Chen Jing shook hands and began to test each other's strength.

Chen Jing had intended to test his brawn discreetly.

However, although he appeared calm at first, his expression soon changed, with his neck turning red and veins bulging over the back of his hand.

"Phew… alright, stop." Chen Jing breathed a long sigh of relief and promptly loosened his grip, speechless. "You are too strong after evolving—your hand felt like pincer pliers."

Chen Yining then asked Green Skin. "How much strength did you use just now?"

Green Skin scratched its head—a question of that sort was too complex for him.

What does 'how much strength' mean?

After Chen Yining explained it in detail, it finally understood, and warily answered, "Half."

Chen Yining nodded thoughtfully.

The increase in strength was significant—it had more than doubled.

Moreover, it was still a goblin. If it kept evolving and leveling up, the gap between the average human and summoned beast would get even larger.