Chapter 351 – Evolution Across Space

“Evolution Points have become more abundant now.”

Previously, the various types of Evolution Points he had on hand weren’t that plentiful.

Unless he intended to evolve Epic Three-Star units, he wouldn’t keep too many Evolution Points.

However, now that Evolution Points have been unified, the incorporated power of evolutionary miracles doesn’t just come from major categories like ‘Undead’, ‘Human Race’, ‘Elemental’, ‘Nature’, and ‘Flying’, but also includes some scattered minor unit series.

Mu Yuan didn’t sell all the Rare Remnant Souls obtained by the exploration teams during their hunts.

For instance, units like Nuns, which start at Rare One-Star, he would keep for his own recruitment. Beyond the major categories, units such as Giants, Giant Rock Steel Snakes, and Ironclad Giant Scorpions would also be retained and recruited by Mu Yuan.

Simply because these units are quite suitable for the construction industry.

These ‘Elite’ units alone didn’t provide him with many Evolution Points. However, after the territory’s location shifted, ordinary Remnant Souls couldn’t be sold, so Mu Yuan selectively recruited some.

He considered that the power of evolution might continue to evolve and potentially unify all categories.

“I didn’t recruit all the ordinary Remnant Souls before because there were still uncertainties about the future, and I was concerned that maintaining a large number of useless units would place too great a strain on the territory’s food supply.”

He had his own principles.

Either don’t recruit the Remnant Soul units at all, or once recruited, take full responsibility for them. Even if the newly born units possess no intelligence.

Previously, he only recruited units like ‘Bronze Statues’, ‘Iron-skinned Soldiers’, and ‘Oakwood Men’, which have very low daily maintenance costs.

But now…

Even if it significantly increases the territory’s food consumption, Mu Yuan has to recruit minor units like ‘Goblins’, ‘Grey Wolves’, ‘Half-beasts’, and ‘Burrowers’. They are no longer useless; they have become Evolution Point production machines.

After successive battles, the ordinary Remnant Souls piled up in the Tianyuan Territory’s Warehouse are countless.

Mu Yuan organized his thoughts, “Of course, even if we’re going to recruit these ordinary units, it must be under the premise of ensuring sufficient food supplies… Having just taken in a large number of refugees not long ago, the food pressure has already increased considerably.”

Currently, if Tianyuan Territory wants to cultivate farmland outside the City Walls, it’s possible, but not safe enough.

Mu Yuan tries to control the territory’s expansion range as much as possible, and when elite squads go out and return, they do their best to conceal their tracks, precisely because he worries about being discovered by Monster Overlords.

Under these circumstances, neither large-scale farmland cultivation nor constructing a second, wider-ranging wall outside the first-generation City Walls is appropriate.

In the past, Mu Yuan would have been troubled about how to increase food production to support a large number of Lords and Evolution Point production machines, but now…

He turned his gaze to the three and a half Secret Realms faintly visible above the territory.

Among them, neither the Skull Graveyard nor the Icy Spirit Cold Pool is suitable for agriculture or animal husbandry, but the Treant Forest is very suitable! The Treant Forest has flat terrain, with about half the area not densely wooded, and the other half, although lush with trees, also grows numerous fruit trees.

Even without cultivating farmland, the Treant Forest can provide a considerable amount of food.Acting as evolution point production machines, the small soldier types could also be freely raised in the two semi-secret realms, the Skull Graveyard and the Icy Spirit Cold Pool, preventing overcrowding within the territory.

He began calculating how many soldier types could be recruited first with the current food reserves.

After a while, his calculations failed.

Mainly because he wasn’t as clear about the daily consumption of the territory’s inhabitants as Isloria was.

“This task should indeed be left to little Yi. I shouldn’t take over her main job.”

He truly was a considerate lord who cared for his subordinates.

Mu Yuan silently recited the power of evolution, and a line of glazed-colored characters gradually appeared.

「Evolution Points: 150,233.66」

Just during his brief contemplation, a significant number of evolution points had accumulated.

Focusing his mind, he could even see particles of evolutionary miracle light, like sparks, converging from all directions. They gathered into streams, and the streams gradually formed a small lake before him. The lake shimmered with a seven-colored radiance, mysterious and revered.

At this rate, the amount of evolutionary power he could obtain in a full day would be approximately…

18,000+!

In just one day, he could evolve three and a half epic-tier lifeforms.

By saving up for just four and a half days, he could evolve one epic three-star lifeform.

“The prompt for transforming from epic three-star to legendary one-star lifeform is… 500,000. This number seemed enormous in the past, but now…”

It would only take less than a month to gather!

Factoring in the current stockpile, he only needed to save for another twenty days to give Deadbone a baptism and ascension.

That was quite fast.

However…

The current evolution points were universal for all categories. He couldn’t possibly use not a single bit of evolutionary power just to stack up one legendary-tier lifeform.

He basically evolved a batch of small elites every few days, helping them sprout wisdom and awaken consciousness.

Some veteran soldiers with self-awareness, after accumulating enough territory contributions, would also apply to him, requesting to advance to outstanding three-star or even epic one-star.

“At this stage, we are facing the threat of the Monster Overlord. It’s not suitable to hoard evolution points; they need to be converted into strength as quickly as possible to stay by our side.”

For example, giving Lu Liu a chance for baptism and evolution.

Through evolution, Lu Liu’s life tier would improve, shortening the time for his breakthrough to the Legendary Realm. At the same time, Lu Liu could use the power of the evolution miracle to deeply study the Limit Cultivation Method. At the very least, an evolved Lu Liu would have further enhanced combat power and be more confident in contending with the Gnoll Legend.

His Tianyuan Territory now possessed two super legends, Deadbone and Dolai, as well as himself, Lord Mu, a powerhouse wielding great might. But… the number of Legendary Realm beings they had was still far too few compared to the enemy.

If Jackal Fang wanted to fight on multiple fronts, their strength would be stretched thin.

Among the territory’s T1 powerhouses, Lu Liu, Uta, Rakshasa, and Tree Spirit Grandma all had the potential to confront Legendary Realm opponents head-on.

With evolution points now relatively abundant, Mu Yuan planned to arrange for each of them accordingly.

“And then there’s the Water Mirror Dragon, Tiff. If its contributions are sufficient, it could also be given a chance for evolution and baptism now.”

“As for tool-type soldier species like the Giant, they could also be evolved a little.”Mountain Giants have always been top-tier units for siege warfare, surpassing even Dragons of the same Rank when it comes to siege and destruction.

Mu Yuan didn’t have much need for siege warfare, but large-sized units like Mountain Giants were also quite suitable for dealing with ‘Flesh Aggregation monsters’.

Powerful individuals could single-handedly kill Flesh aggregation monsters but couldn’t stop them, while Mountain Giants could stop them.

What if he continued evolving the Mountain Giants?

“Unfortunately, we only started recruiting Giants three months ago, so their current Rank is still lacking. Epic evolution also requires them to earn contributions themselves, so we won’t be seeing that for now.”

The unification of Evolution Power provided him with more possibilities.

As he recruited batches of ordinary Remnant Souls he had stored, the accumulation rate of Evolution Power would increase further.

Not only that…

Mu Yuan gazed at the sky.

He saw Evolution light particles flying from the horizon, converging into streams and rivers.

These were provided by units outside the territory. He could vaguely trace the providers of Evolution Points – they were the Bone Undertakers traversing through the dense forest.

A very few light spots emerged from the Void Realm, coming from more distant places.

That was…

The Evolution Power provided by Sophia and the other two, along with the elites of Stone Ridge City!

“Even at such a distance, it can still be collected? And…”

Mu Yuan focused, following the incoming Evolution light particles. He had a vague feeling that he could roughly trace the location of the providers.

There existed an intangible connection.

Among them, the strongest connection point was Seventeen, who had undergone five baptisms of evolution.

“As long as this connection exists, it seems I can remotely bestow the power of Evolution Miracle.”

His previous range for remote evolution was several kilometers, but now it was… unlimited.

Of course, the premise was that they were his own units and had undergone at least one evolution baptism.

If they weren’t his own units…

“It seems evolution isn’t completely impossible either.”He could already capture the great power of Evolution Miracle in the intangible realm, which meant he could preliminarily utilize the power of Evolution Miracle without being constrained by frameworks.”

However, evolving outsiders was more difficult and required meeting two prerequisites.

“One is close contact.”Mu Yuan raised his hand, his right palm brimming with a large amount of Evolution Miracle power visible only to him.”

This was the Hand of Evolution.

“Second, this kind of evolution faces greater resistance. During the entire process, a large amount of Evolution Power might dissipate, requiring several times or even dozens of times more Miracle Power for the same evolution. This is an extremely cost-ineffective action.”

He couldn’t possibly do this for now.

But in the future, if necessary and with adequate confidentiality measures in place, it wouldn’t be impossible to offer this service externally.

This was quite a valuable bargaining chip.

Unification of Evolution Miracle; Cross-space evolution; External evolution;

These were the three intuitive changes brought about by the transformation of Evolution Power.

…

After mastering the Evolution Miracle and contacting Sophia and the others, Mu Yuan’s first thought was to give the three of them an evolution baptism.

Each of them required 20,000 Evolution Points, and all three together only amounted to 60,000.

Lord Mu indicated this was just a light drizzle.He was also quite concerned about the three who were venturing deeper into the Wilderness. The more he could enhance their strength, the safer they would be and the greater their chances of finding clues. However…

“During Epic evolution, some unusual phenomena will appear.”

This was a rather troublesome issue.

Well, perhaps not that troublesome.

Concealing it was definitely impossible, but the actual evolution process only lasted a few minutes. Even if Sophia and the others’ evolution light was overly dazzling and would attract the attention of nearby enemies, nothing problematic would happen within those few minutes.

As for afterward?

Sophia and the others would have long since slipped away. At most, there would only be rumors of an Epic Treasure or Epic life being born in that location.

In fact, those who frequently explored the Deep Wilderness knew that Epic radiance wasn’t all that rare. After spending enough time in the Wilderness, one was bound to witness it once, twice, or even three times.

However, seeing it didn’t mean there was an opportunity to obtain it—there might still be a tiny, tiny gap between the two.

Mu Yuan usually concealed Epic phenomena because he was worried about exposing his own territory. The territory’s location was fixed, whereas Sophia and the other two were not. They only stayed briefly before moving on—what did the emergence of an Epic Treasure have to do with them? They were merely passersby.

That being said, necessary preparations still couldn’t be overlooked.

Mu Yuan instructed Sophia and the others to find a relatively safe and concealed area and set up some alert and defensive measures.

“Fortunately, the Mental Link talent has super evolved. Otherwise, even if I could perform the evolution baptism across space, I wouldn’t dare to do so without any means of communication.”

Seventeen hours later, Sophia activated the Mind Seed and sent a message to Mu Yuan.

“Is this place suitable? We need to be cautious of intelligent monsters in the surrounding area.”

“No problem, this place is absolutely safe.”

Sophia was very certain.

Mu Yuan grew uneasy—was there really an absolutely safe place in the Deep Wilderness?

“There is—the time-limited Challenge Realm is very safe.”

Mu Yuan: “???”

Was that even possible?

Sophia and the others had discovered a low-Rank universal Challenge Realm and cleared the challenge stages in just a few moments.

Since the Secret Realm’s Rank wasn’t high, they didn’t obtain any particularly rare Treasure rewards, but…

There were no other challengers in the entire Secret Realm—not a single person in sight. The Secret Realm also isolated the inside from the outside world, making it a very safe venue for conducting the evolution ceremony.

Mu Yuan even began to wonder whether, if he went to the Hall of Knowledge, he could use the rules of this Miracle Building to conceal the evolution phenomena.

“Probably not. After all, the Hall of Knowledge is somewhat lacking—it couldn’t even withstand Deadbone’s Epiphany storm.”

Inside the Secret Realm, Sophia still set up some simple defensive arrangements before gazing up at the sky with wide eyes.

There was no sky inside the Challenge Realm.

But she knew that the familiar evolution baptism would descend from above.

“It’s coming!” She felt it again—that warm, familiar, and reassuring light.

The first to evolve was the Polar Star Arrow, Seventeen.

At the moment the evolution Miracle descended, the connection between Mu Yuan and Seventeen grew even closer. Vaguely, he saw Seventeen sitting on a marble-paved floor, a bow placed beside her, with two blurry figures not far away, eagerly looking on.「Notification: Your unit ‘Seventeen’ has bathed in the miracle of evolution, advancing to Epic Two-Star lifeform, and awakening the Epic talent ‘Star-Chasing Power’.」

——

「Star-Chasing Power: Seventeen shoots an arrow toward the starry sky, and the cosmos responds with endless stellar radiance. Through the Polar Star Arrow, Seventeen can channel the power of starlight, tempering herself within its glow to gradually enhance her basic three attributes, Mind Power, and Soul Power. Simultaneously, Seventeen can use starlight guidance to lock onto enemies or gather the power of starlight to significantly boost her lethality for a short duration.」

The moment Seventeen’s transformation completed, starlight pierced through the Secret Realm, showering down upon her.

Her basic three attributes continuously soared, her body growing stronger, her thought processes clearer. Without even opening her eyes, her mind could perceive all things around her.

Her consciousness became more transparent.

Her Willpower Light ignited.

Without a moment to marvel at Seventeen’s evolution, the next to bathe in the miraculous glow was the Witch of Nether Crow, Sophia.

「Notification: Your unit ‘Sophia’ has undergone evolutionary baptism, advancing to Epic Two-Star lifeform, and awakening the Epic talent ‘Nightshade Eyes’.」

A pair of profound black giant pupils materialized behind Sophia.

Her form seemed to fade from reality.

Under the gaze of those dark colossal eyes, Sickle Moon’s fur bristled once more, feeling utterly exposed before them.

(End of Chapter)