Searching for Direbeasts…
That was Sapling Ling’s other ability, which Ling Jiu had discovered by accident. It turned out that Sapling Ling could communicate with all the plants on Pandora.
It could find any creature on Pandora with the help of these plants.
There seemed to be nothing special about this ability, but it actually helped Ling Jiu a lot. He had been running around like a headless chicken looking for Direbeasts without the Direbeast Radar.
It had been half a month since they arrived on Pandora. The number of Direbeasts was decreasing day by day following the trainees’ killing frenzy. In the beginning, they could hunt several Direbeasts a day, but now, they could only find one. Their hunting speed and efficiency had dropped tremendously.
Now, things were looking up for Ling Jiu.
He could always find and hunt down Direbeasts accurately, hence his hunting efficiency and harvest far surpassed that of other trainees.
Today, Ling Jiu was not in a hurry to hunt Direbeasts. Instead, he gave Sapling Ling a new instruction: look for Hao Shuai.
The cooling-off period of his Replication Arcana had ended, and he could replicate again after half a month. The first thing he did was make Hao Shuai his target.
“Boss, I’ve found that guy.”
“Where is he?” Ling Jiu was raring to go.
“On the other side of the planet.”
“Take me there.”
Deploying the maglev airship without hesitation, Ling Jiu flew toward Hao Shuai’s location at full speed.
He arrived at a floating mountain half an hour later.
The mountain was floating in the air, with dense trees growing on it and a waterfall flowing down the mountain onto a vast piece of land below.
A lake was at the center of the floating mountain, while a maglev airship was parked on the edge of the lake. Hao Shuai was resting inside the airship.
It was midnight. Ling Jiu saw Hao Shuai sitting cross-legged and absorbing the Gene Arcana from a 10,000-meter radius to enhance his cultivation base.
Ling Jiu hid in a dimension as he slowly approached. As was within 100 meters of Hao Shuai, a notification popped up in his mind.
Name: Hao Shuai
Race: Homo sapien
Abilities: Time Halt (awakened, replicable), Blink Arcana (awakened, replicable), Super Physique (awakened, replicable)
“It’s replicable at a 100-meter range?”
Ling Jiu was stunned. “Is it possible that after the Gene Arcana was replaced with the Dark Bio-energy, the power of my Replication Arcana increased by 10 times? That must be it.”
Ling Jiu was so delighted. It was no doubt much more convenient to be able to replicate an Arcana from 100 meters away. It was cool because he could do it stealthily too.
“Replicate Time Halt.”
Ling Jiu activated his replication with no hesitation. He had been coveting this cool Time Halt ability for a long time.
Replication is successful. Install?
“No.”
Ling Jiu instructed it to not install the Arcana for now. Instead, he quietly left the floating mountain while Hao Shuai was unaware of what had happened the entire time.
Hao Shuai did not even realize that the Time Halt Arcana he had always been proud of was no longer exclusive to him.
“Install Time Halt.”
Ling Jiu finally installed Time Halt after a painful process. Just like the time he installed the Dimensional Arcana, Ling Jiu saw something different: a big golden river.
The incredibly vast river was filled with a kind of magical golden water that flowed forward at a slow and steady speed.
Ling Jiu saw airships, the floating mountain where airships docked, and everything in the distance immersed in the golden river.
“Is this great river a Torrent of Time? Or is it a River of Time?” Ling Jiu muttered to himself.
He did not know how wide, deep, and long the golden river was. All he knew was that everything within his field of vision was immersed in the golden river and deeply affected by it.
“Let’s call it the Torrent of Time,” Ling Jiu whispered. “It seems that I can stop a small part of the river from flowing. Is this a result of the Time Halt Arcana?”
He found a moth and froze the golden river water around the moth to verify his suspicion.
A part of the river flow halted, and the moth instantly froze in place. It stopped flapping its wings, its eyes stopping turning, and its body was completely still.
“This is Time Halt indeed.”
He was quietly overjoyed and happily studying it like a child who had found a new toy. After half an hour, Ling Jiu came to a conclusion.
As much as he could halt the time around an object, the length of the Time Halt was completely linked to the object’s strength.
For example, when he halted the time around the moth, he could keep it frozen for as long as he wanted until he exhausted his Dark Bio-energy.
When he tried to freeze Sapling Ling, he could only maintain the Time Halt for 15 seconds, not any longer.
It was apparent that he could only halt the time of a powerful creature for a short period and that of the weak creatures for much, much longer.
The case was similar for the Dimensional Shackle; he could immobilize a mouse for as long as he wanted, but he could only shackle a Class 9 Direbeast for a short while.
“It deserves to be called a BUG-level Arcana!” Ling Jiu exclaimed. “The power of time is indeed the most mysterious. The key to the vast majority of lives cannot touch the edge of time, and they can’t guard against time even if they want to.”
He had defeated Hao Shuai before, but he admitted to pulling a trick on him.
It was really hard to tell what the battle outcome would have been had Ling Jiu not set up a gravity field in advance to trick Hao Shuai into a trap.
“But now…”
Ling Jiu firmly believed that his Time Halt would be more powerful than Hao Shuai’s. He had no doubt about it.
He spent his remaining time studying Time Halt for a while. Once he was sure that he had mastered the Arcana, he started to practice self-cultivation.
He sensed the dark universe and extracted pure Dark Bio-energy from it.
Dark Bio-energy gushed out of the dark universe and into his body, pouring into him like a divine river. The cells of his body, Gene Arcana Core, and Sapling Ling went into overdrive.
His body cells absorbed the Dark Bio-energy frantically…
His Gene Arcana Core compressed…
And Sapling Ling sucked up the energy in a frenzy.
Time passed by quickly. After a long night, all the creatures on Pandora ushered in a brand-new day.
Getting to his feet and looking at the rising sun, Ling Jiu exhaled.
The cells in his body were overflowing with Dark Bio-energy, and his Gene Arcana Core had regrown to the size of a pomelo after a night of practice.
Sapling Ling had gotten its fill too. It had constantly fed Ling Jiu an enormous amount of vitality to strengthen his physique.
“It’s a new day!”
Just as Ling Jiu was about to resume hunting after breakfast, a loud broadcast sounded through the air.
“Attention all trainees!
“Attention all trainees!
“Attention all trainees!
“The hunting contest is over. Please return to Earth!”
“It’s over?”
Ling Jiu was startled.
