Chapter 198: 198

A steady stream of CO2 poured into Mars. In just a few days, trainees in the matriculation camp on Mars could feel that Mars was warming up.

Yes, it was warm, and getting warmer by the day.

In the beginning, the temperature was -70°C or -80°C at night. It rose to minus 40°C in just three days. The increase was so astonishing that the temperature during the day had exceeded 0°C.

The frozen ground at the polar cap started to melt, releasing the frozen CO2.

Everything was going in the direction that people expected. This made the team of scientists in charge of the Mars terraforming program extremely excited.

It was one step closer to terraform Mars.

Of course, all of this had nothing to do with Ling Jiu for the time being. Early this morning, Ling Jiu left the forest after eating breakfast prepared by Bai Ya.

His purpose was simple: Venus.

After passing through the dimensional passage and arriving at the hellish Venus, his first feeling was that Venus was cooler.

When he was in Venus before this, he could still feel the heat even with his Venom Suit on. But now it felt much better.

“The CO2 content has reduced considerably, the greenhouse effect has weakened, and the temperature has dropped. This is something entirely expected.”

Ling Jiu muttered to himself and took a deep breath as he came in front of a massive lava flow.

The hot magma flew into his mouth like a flowing black river, forming a rare scene, much like a dragon drinking water above the lava flow.

A few minutes later, the lava river had almost dried up. Ling Jiu burped and stopped swallowing. He then sank his consciousness into the Inner World inside his body.

The Flame Astral Behemoths fed on magma, flames, and stellar energy so they could grow rapidly.

So Ling Jiu wanted to know what would happen if he drank this magma, too.

Of course, his real purpose was the Direbeasts on Venus. He wanted to devour them to strengthen himself. Drinking the magma was just an impromptu idea.

To his surprise, as the magma entered his Inner World, it did not transform into vitality like the monsters Rodan and others. Instead, it turned into another form of energy in the burning flames.

It then vanished from the Inner World.

“It disappeared?”

Ling Jiu blinked, shaking his head. “No! It didn’t disappear. It must have been infused into the Inner World. I can feel the Inner World expanding a little.

“Wait a minute. Expanding?”

“Could it result from absorbing magma?”

Ling Jiu’s eyes lit up. He came to the source of this lava flow: a huge volcano.

This was obviously an active volcano. It was spewing massive amounts of ash and black smoke from the crater, much like a chimney putting out exhaust gas.

Ling Jiu entered the crater and saw a vast magma lake. It was bubbling like a bowl of boiling soup, which immediately aroused Ling Jiu’s appetite.

He could not wait any longer. Opening his mouth with a terrifying swallowing force, he started sucking, and the boiling magma flew into the black hole.

It was an incredible scene. If it were to happen on Earth, it would definitely shock everyone. How could someone drink hot magma as if drinking soup?

Unfortunately, this was Venus.

No one was going to know it, no matter how mind-blowing the thing was on a dead planet like Venus.

Time passed and the magma level in the lake dropped.

Ten minutes later, the magma lake had bottomed out as Ling Jiu had swallowed all the magma in the volcano.

Ling Jiu burped with a few wisps of hydrogen sulfide gas coming out of his mouth. It smelled as horrible as a fart.

He took a look at his Inner World.

It was indeed expanding outward at a slow rate after drinking a tremendous amount of magma. The continent became wider, and the sky was higher.

Finally, the expansion stopped.

“The diameter of the continent has expanded by one kilometer?”

The light of joy flashed in Ling Jiu’s eyes. To his surprise, mysterious energy poured out of the Inner World and dispersed throughout his body at the end of the expansion.

“This is…”

Ling Jiu felt that a boiling, heavy, and thick energy enveloped him as if he was in an oven.

The next moment, he felt that his body was growing rapidly, from 1.8 to 1.9, and from 1.9 to 2 meters.

Ling Jiu felt he had grown to 10 meters and then stopped in a matter of a few breaths.

“My hands! My Legs!”

He looked in disbelief at his hands that had grown bigger and his legs that were several meters longer. “How come I grew taller?”

“What the heck is going on?”

Shocked. Puzzled.

He could not wrap his brain around this.

“After absorbing the magma, my Inner World expanded, and a mysterious energy was activated in my body before I grew taller. What the heck? How did this work?”

Ling Jiu frowned. He felt he had to figure out what had caused this before deciding whether to continue drinking the magma.

Half an hour later, Ling Jiu found 9527, and then told of what had just happened. 9527 smiled as it started to answer Ling Jiu’s questions.

“The Astral Behemoths are massive creatures. The Flame Astral Behemoths that possess the acme of bloodlines are among the best. A newly born Flame Astral Behemoth has a body size of 100 meters. As it continues to grow, it will become larger and larger until they reach adulthood.”

“How big is a Flame Astral Behemoth in adulthood?” Ling Jiu asked with curiosity.

“There is no one standard size for an adult Flame Astral Behemoth. It could range from over 100 million to over 1 billion light-years. Its strength is linked to its strength,” 9527 said.

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Ling Jiu gasped as he listened. Over 100 million to 1 billion light-years… He had a hard time visualizing it.

The diameter of the solar system is only 1 light-year. So this creature was bigger than the solar system?

Ling Jiu could not wrap his brain around it.

“You have replicated the Ultimate Physique of the Flame Astral Behemoth. But you will only become stronger and not bigger since you do not possess the Flame Astral Behemoth’s bloodline,” 9527 said. “But you have later replicated the Inner World of the Flame Astral Behemoth and is the reason for the change in your body shape!”

“I am none the wiser.” Ling Jiu knitted his brows together.

“As you know, the Inner World is the core of the Flame Astral Behemoth,” 9527 said. “The Flame Astral Behemoth’s Inner World is akin to the human soul, heart, and other important organs. If you replicate the Inner World, you are essentially replicating the Flame Astral Behemoth’s core.”

“Coupled with the Ultimate Physique, you have practically replicated everything about the Flame Astral Behemoth. It can be said that you have become a shrunken version of the Flame Astral Behemoth.”

“A shrunken version of the Flame Astral Behemoth?” Ling Jiu was dumbfounded.

“Yes.” 9527 nodded. “After swallowing magma and stellar energy, a Flame Astral behemoth’s Inner World will expand, and its body will grow correspondingly. The fundamental reason for your height change is the same.”

“Now I know.” Ling Jiu still did not understand it all, but at least he knew one thing. “In other words, if I continue to swallow magma, my body will continue to grow taller.”

“Exactly.” 9527’s reply was affirmative. “One more thing, like I said earlier, you have replicated the Ultimate Physique of the Flame Astral Behemoth, but you cannot be like the Flame Astral Behemoth having one million times higher in attribute index because of your body size.”

Ling Jiu nodded; his attribute index was 100,000 times.

“But now you can,” 9527 said. “As long as your body keeps growing and eventually reaches the same level as the Flame Astral Behemoth, your attribute index will also reach 1 million times.”

“Seriously?” Ling Jiu was struck dumb.

“Of course,” 9527 said. “As I said before, it is your body size that’s limiting your attribute index. But as your body grows, this problem will be solved.”

“You mean, as long as I have the same body size as the Flame Astral Behemoth, my attribute index will reach one million times?” Ling Jiu swallowed.

“You are right.” 9527 nodded with a smile.

“This will be great if this is the case.” Ling Jiu rubbed his hands. “One million times the attribute index. Unimaginable!”

“The only thing is, the Flame Astral Behemoths don’t possess the ability to change their body size freely. So once they have grown, they return to their previous sizes. The same applies to you,” 9527 warned. “If you don’t want to become an alien among the humans on Earth, you have to replicate the ability to change your body shape.”

“It’s simple.” Ling Jiu was not worried as he had thought of Celeste, which possessed the ability to shrink objects.

He could just replicate Celeste’s ability.

“In a few days, the cooldown period of my Arcana Replication will end. I can then go home and replicate this ability from Celeste. Thanks, 9527.”

Ling Jiu left Pandora and then returned to Venus.

Knowing that swallowing magma could increase his strength, Ling Jiu would not let go of such a wonderful opportunity.

He swallowed magma for the second time as he came to a volcano.

Ten minutes later, the magma lake of this active volcano had bottomed out, and his Inner World had expanded and his height increased as desired.

Following that, Ling Jiu was like a hardworking bee, traveling around Venus, looking for volcanoes and lava flow that he could swallow.

The Inner World continued to expand. So his height kept increasing.

Of course, this also had an enormous impact on Venus.

The magma in all volcanoes came from the inner layer of the planet. After he had swallowed that massive amount of magma, the level of magma within Venus had dropped tremendously.

The most direct side effect was that most volcanoes of Venus died down, or more appropriately, became dormant.

As the volcanoes became dormant, the emission of volcanic ash, CO2, sulfur dioxide, and other greenhouse gases reduced.

The temperature of Venus dropped rapidly.

A week had passed.

Ling Jiu finally left Venus and returned to Lantian Base City on Earth.

He found no one at home.

He knew Xiaotong had gone to school, but what about his dad, mom, and Celeste?

With a massive question mark over his head, Ling Jiu dialed his dad’s number.

“Ling Jiu!”

“Dad, where are you? Why is no one home?”

“Your mother and I are having fun hunting Direbeasts in the wilderness.”