Chapter 236 - 172: Animals and Plants: A Drifting Stench

Chapter 236: Chapter 172: Animals and Plants: A Drifting Stench

"Leader, we’ve discovered a huge whale carcass east of the base. It’s highly decomposed, and the stench in the air is coming from it!"

Hearing this, Ren Yuanyang was taken aback. He’d thought the smell was just from the growing population of the base and the resulting increase in waste. He never expected it to be a rotting corpse from the sea.

"Come on, let’s go take a look!" Ren Yuanyang said, getting up and heading outside.

Hua Lingfang and the others followed.

Ren Yuanyang’s group quickly arrived at the eastern side of the base, where Qin Haonan was already waiting for them with a speedboat.

After boarding the speedboat, they quickly approached the whale carcass. The stench was even more intense here, sickeningly so.

Ren Yuanyang found a towel and covered his nose and mouth, then walked out onto the deck to get a closer look at the whale’s corpse.

The whale was at least twenty-five meters long. At this point, it was impossible to determine the cause of death. The carcass was swarmed by dense schools of fish, all pecking away at the putrid flesh.

The sight made Lu Jiamei’s and the others’ stomachs churn, and they nearly threw up. Amidst the swarm, they recognized the very type of fish they had eaten for breakfast that morning.

"From now on, let’s set aside some of the fish we catch for breeding and start our own fish farm," Ren Yuanyang said.

Everyone nodded in agreement.

’God knows what kind of crap these fish have been eating!’

’It used to be ’out of sight, out of mind,’ but now that they’ve seen this, it’s impossible not to feel grossed out!’

"Leader, how could a behemoth like this just die?" Qin Haonan asked, perplexed.

Ren Yuanyang shook his head. "It’s too decomposed. I can’t tell the cause of death. We should just tow it away."

Judging by the direction it was drifting, the carcass would surely collide with the Banyan Forest if they didn’t intervene.

Qin Haonan nodded, quickly covered his nose and mouth with a towel, found a section of exposed bone, and secured a cable around it.

He then started the speedboat, towing the carcass north. It was incredibly heavy, slowing the boat to a crawl, but at least they were making progress.

It took them over an hour to drag the carcass north of the Banyan Forest. From there, they let the wind and waves help as they towed it further west.

If the Banyan Forest had been any larger, it likely would have taken them much longer.

"It probably didn’t die of illness. Could it have been a fight between sea creatures?" Lu Jiamei wondered aloud, her brow furrowed as she watched the carcass drift away.

"What could possibly take down something that massive?" Qin Haonan was skeptical.

"What about an even bigger whale, or a ferocious shark?" Xin Wan speculated. "Especially with all the evolution and mutation going on, it’s hard to say for sure."

Ren Yuanyang nodded in agreement. "That’s likely the case. Are things getting chaotic in the ocean now, too?"

"Once those naturally ferocious predators evolve, they’re bound to become even more frenzied!" Lu Jiamei said.

"Hold on. If it was killed by an evolved predator, why wasn’t it eaten?" Qin Haonan asked, still having doubts.

Ren Yuanyang paused for a moment before replying, "Maybe it was too big to eat?"

"That’s a real possibility! This whale is absolutely massive!" Xin Wan couldn’t help but marvel.

"If it was too big to eat, does that mean whatever attacked it was actually a smaller species of fish?" Qin Haonan pressed on.

"It’s possible. But for a small type of fish to take down a whale this big, it must be something special," Ren Yuanyang said with a slight frown. "I hope a species like that stays far away from our base."

"Spit, spit, spit! Quick, spit!" Lu Jiamei said immediately. "Don’t say things like that! You’ll jinx us!"

With a sigh of exasperation, Ren Yuanyang complied and spit, then gave the order, "Let’s head back."

Qin Haonan immediately steered the speedboat back into the Banyan Forest. The moment they returned, Ren Yuanyang went straight to the base’s seed bank and began screening for plants with absorbent properties.

He was once again thankful that he was an Evolver. If he weren’t, he would have had to touch each seed individually for the system to begin its identification and screening process.

Even at one second per seed, ninety thousand seeds would take ninety thousand seconds—a total of twenty-five hours.

But now, as an Evolver, he could project his Mental Energy. As long as the seeds were within its range, he could identify and screen them all at once. The increase in efficiency was monumental.

In a mere ten minutes, he had found his target: spider plant seeds.

[Spider Plant: Possesses an extremely strong function for absorbing toxic and harmful gases...]

He enhanced their growth speed and absorption ability, then planted the seeds.

Although this particular stench hadn’t come from inside the base, it reminded Ren Yuanyang to be mindful of the base’s overall hygiene.

’The smells around the livestock pens and the latrines are getting pretty strong. Planting more spider plants could help purify the air there.’

「Meanwhile, approximately five hundred kilometers west of Peach Blossom Base, a massive fleet lay at anchor.」

"Have the components of that explosive been identified?" a man in a black suit and matching hat asked in a low voice.

"The analysis is complete. It’s reportedly some kind of plant. We’ve sent it to the relevant experts, and they’re working on identifying it now!"

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!

A knock sounded on the office door.

"Come in!" the man in the black suit answered.

"Lord Bao Mu, the lab results are in. It’s the fruit of a plant called the Sound Box!"

The man in the black suit, Bao Mu, frowned slightly. "Can a plant’s fruit really be that destructive?"

"Its destructive power is certainly much higher than any normal plant’s, but, my lord, do you remember that piece of intelligence that came out of Dawn Base a while back?" the person reminded him.