Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
“That should be it.” The Desolate Frost Lion nodded with a pensive attitude. Both the man and the familiar looked into each other’s eyes and smiled at the same time.
The road to the mountain was rugged, and Tian Zhu mountain was in the midst of howling wilderness. Before the disaster, there were only a couple of people living in the mountain. However, right after the disaster, it became an uninhabited restricted area. It was difficult for human beings to survive there. As for the human world today, Tian Zhu mountain was an abandoned area.
It was a consensus that a place with a special meaning behind it or a phenomenal landscape would likely be the birthplace for strong familiars.
For example, on the Sun and Moon mountain, there lurked a Sun and Moon Golden Goose King, whose greed had become its second nature.
Not far from the Sun and Moon mountain, there was a lake called Lake Qing Hai. It was known as the first lake in the Huaxia District, and it contained a large number of pikes. The Lord-level pikes that had been discovered were more than ten. Rumor said that there could have been more Emperor-level pikes living in the deeper ocean.
On top of Mount Emei, there lived a hoolock that was in charge of protecting the creatures.
Basically, the majority of the famous mountains, including Mount Tai, Mount Huang, and Mount Hua, were occupied by strong monsters…
However, it was fortunate that some of these monsters were closer to human beings. They tended to show kindness to human beings and consume the incense and candles given by human beings in exchange for protecting the creatures around their areas.
On the other hand, the monsters that were cold-hearted toward humans refused to approach them. So far, there hadn’t been any incidents of monsters attacking human base cities from any of the famous mountains. Looking at it this way, it was likely that there were some powerful monsters living on top of Mount Tianzhu.
“‘The one with morality owns the treasure.’ I like this quote from human beings.” The Desolate Frost Lion swung its head, comforting Gao Peng, who was hesitating. “We’re just here to help them keep the treasure. Moreover, these treasures don’t have their names written on them. Does that mean the treasure is only available on a first-come-first-serve basis? I’ve never heard of that rule before.”
Gao Peng took a glance at it. “I was just thinking about what to do if we failed to defeat those monsters on top of the mountain. Where would we go in this snowy place?”
“Why don’t you have some confidence in us. I was once a king.” The Desolate Frost Lion was speechless.
After three days, Gao Peng had successfully passed through Mount Tian Zhu along with his familiars. What surprised him was that he didn’t encounter any monster attacks on Mount Tian Zhu. The huge mountain peak was dead silent.
There would definitely be some treasures on the mountain. However, these treasures were far from Gao Peng’s expectations, not to mention that to recover the strength of the Desolate Frost Lion, it would have to be worth a good price. Gao Peng didn’t bother to take these lower treasures, and therefore, he gave them to the Treasure Sniffing Rodent. These low-level treasures were all stashed by the rodent, although they didn’t know where it kept all the treasures.
The place where this rodent kept things was weird. There was a time when Gao Peng sat on the sofa and was poked by something in the butt. He then lifted the sofa cushions and found out that there was a hole there with over a dozen Elite monster core crystals hidden inside.
“You’re not going to search for it anymore?” the Desolate Frost Lion said.
“No.” Gao Peng shook his head. “We’ve wasted enough time here. Our main purpose was to find the Essence of the Undying Heart and raise Dumby’s grade to Mythical.”
“Mythical grade. That skull is at Legendary-grade, too?” The Desolate Frost Lion was surprised. It had witnessed that this skull wasn’t strong at all few days earlier. It was even weaker compared to the duck. It had thought it was only at Perfect-grade or Epic-grade.
“Dumby’s main ability isn’t fighting. It has a special ability, which is called Resurrection,” Gao Peng explained.
“Resurrection? That’s a rare ability that can only be possessed by high-level Ghoul monsters.” The Desolate Frost Lion looked at Dumby because it hadn’t expected this ugly skull to have such an extraordinary skill.
“This ability is rare, even among the high-level Ghouls. Your familiar has such an ability but you bring it out with you every day?” The Desolate Frost Lion was somewhat speechless.
“How wasteful you are! You have no idea how to maximize the ability of your familiars.” However, the Desolate Frost Lion still doubted Gao Peng’s capabilities in raising this skull to Mythical-grade. After all, it was the Mythical grade that allowed it to be one step closer towards achieving God-grade.
Looking at Gao Peng, who was busy helping it to gather the essential ingredients, Dumby, who was at the side, said softly, “Master, I’m not in a hurry. You should help them search for the treasure first. I’m fine as long as I’m able to protect you.”
“I just need the Essence of the Undying Heart to for your part. However, for Da Zi and the rest, I still need to find a few more missing ingredients,” Gao Peng comforted Dumby.
“Okay.” Dumby nodded while agreeing to what its owner said. Dumby took a glance at the Desolate Frost Lion and passed it a Snow Pine cigarette, saying, “Do you want a try?”
The Desolate Frost Lion had been curious about the thing that Dumby had been smoking for the past few days. It looked stylish, but it hadn’t had the courage to ask for it.
Since Dumby had taken the initiative to give it to him, it would be difficult not to accept it.
It immediately grabbed the Snow Pine cigarette with its claws and put it into its mouth. Dumby then lit a dim flame on its fingertip to light up the cigarette for the Desolate Frost Lion. The Desolate Frost Lion took a puff with its black nose while sniffing the smell in the air and Dumby’s dull fingers uncertainly.
The cigarette puff had gone deep into its throat and mouth. The Desolate Frost Lion then took a deep breath like it normally would.
“Cough! Cough! Cough!” The Desolate Frost Lion coughed badly, and even tears rolled down its face. It immediately spat the cigarette onto the ground as if it was terrified of it, like snakes or scorpions.
“What is this? It’s choking.” Compared to Da Zi and the others, which evolved by Gao Peng by preparing them various ingredients since they were small, the Desolate Frost Lion had never witnessed the evolution of a familiar. Therefore, it was amazed by Gao Peng’s capability to help familiars evolve easily.
According to its understanding, human beings in the Black Fog World also had their ways to make their familiars evolve. However, those trainers had mastered the evolutionary route of a single or several kinds of monsters, and the methods of collecting materials and the methods of evolution were also fixed.
Most of them were methods developed by their ancestors. Families were formed through the passing of information from generation to generation, and some families or wandering trainers gathered to form forces or alliances.
There would be advantages and disadvantages to this method. The advantage was that there would be a complete upgrade process for a few of the legacy monsters, and the materials would be spread and stored by the force or family, which would also facilitate the upgrade or promotion stage. The breeding of specific familiars could also be more detailed, and therefore, they would be able to develop the abilities of these familiars and prepare their respective plans for growth.
But the drawbacks were obvious. There were very few familiars to choose from, and it was relatively difficult if one were to cultivate familiars that weren’t passed down from previous generations.
Was it possible that its master had been passed down by some other trainer’s family familiars? But there should have been no inheritance from the Desolate Frost Lion’s family, after all…
The Desolate Frost Lion’s face became helpless as if it had suddenly remembered something.
…
After passing through Mount Tian Zhu, they continued to walk for about a dozen miles and eventually entered the boundary of the Jinsha Region. Although the temperature in the air wasn’t high, the scenery in the surroundings obviously added a bit of greenery.
“Golden Hands.” Gao Peng smiled. “Old friend, we will meet again very soon.”
