Global Evolution

by Steffen Schmidt

  Although Qing Shui's squad sterilized the whole battle zone afterwards, the hypermutable bacteria was almost impossible to completely disinfect. Not only did the remainders reproduce, but also their resistance aided them in surviving by infecting other species.

  Those infected species suffered from the torment of infection, but if they lived through the period, they would have an exclusive spot to occupy in the jungle.

  Thus, after four years, the infected zone was more deadly and poisonous than any other in the jungle. Species in this zone were not only able to produce antibodies to resist the hypermutable bacteria, but also carried the bacteria themselves. More than that, they used the bacteria as a defensive weapon .

  When the news reached Qing Shui's ears, he was greatly impressed by the imagination of the nature. At the same time, he ordered a prohibition to this zone.

  "This is tricky..."

  As Chang looked around, he realized the the colors around had become monotone. The branches of the trees grinned at him, and the footprints of animals and insects were less frequently seen. It worried him.

  "Humans are the masters of destruction but nature is the master of creation..."

  Chang looked back to the fantastic world behind him, then turned to the greyness in front of him. He decided to stop here.

  "It's too dangerous, even it's me, I may get infected somehow," Chang murmured to himself. At the same time, a branch with a slim lump burst apart, and a shower of black juices splashed toward him.

  "What!"

  Chang dodged out of instinct, but the black juices were forced out from the lump and ejected intentionally toward Chang. He jumped back for a step but that wasn't out of the splash zone. The juice rain was a concentrated stream, so he was able to avoid most of it.

  However, what made the situation worse were the simultaneous bursts of other lumps, as if the trees were conscious of an invader. The black juices came as multiple streams of spray toward his location.

  Dodging wasn't the ultimate solution in this situation as more and more lumps were triggered.

  On Chang's camouflage uniform, there were two drops of black juice sprinkled and stained. Soon, the acidic juice corroded through the cloth layer, while a stinky smell of rotten eggs came forth from the spots.

  Chang swiftly removed the jacket and threw it in to the air as a lure. He sprang away from the besieged circle, returning to the fanatically vivid world.

  It was life threatening here.

  To mark the spot, Chang peed on a tree before leaving the place—a place he shouldn't intrude by himself.

  This was a place unintentionally and artificially made, which wasn't at a danger level that he could handle with ease.

  He veered, thinking that he should report this to Qing Shui immediately.

  At the moment he was turning to leave, a strange scent reached his nose. It was extremely familiar to Chang—the scent of the target! However, the scent seemed to came from the other direction instead of the poisonous zone.

  However, Chang didn't want to take the initiative to chase after it. Whatever that super life so named by Qing Shui was, it was not something that he could compete with. He came here to confirm its location and the scent assured his doubts. He was delighted as he moved at a steady pace.

  Unexpectedly, the scent smelled like it was approaching Chang. It came a few times faster than him—it must've been attracted by his pee mark.

  Perhaps, perhaps that organism was searching for humans too.

  Thinking of this, Chang sprinted away without hesitation, keeping to his highest speed. He even utilized his navigation skills to map out a route that was the most difficult to go through. However, his efforts seemed useless as that organism caught up with him after one hundred meters.

  Chang was sure that he couldn't run away from the pursuer. Instead of endeavoring to flee from it, he sprang up and clawed with his hands at a tree, coordinating his movements so he moved like a gecko. Once he reached a branch, his hands instantly operated the sniping crossbow and he aimed it at the source of the scent—a fishy smell.

  The trigger was pulled and the bolt shot off from the trigger mechanism. It tore layers of leaves, finding its way to the target.

  "Ah!"

  The bolt was nowhere to be seen but the voice came from a place beyond his vision; the scream sounded like a human's.

  Chapter 121: Perfection

  The reason why Chang thought that the organism was human-like was because the shriek didn't sound like rustling or squeaking, but a syllable that a human would emit.

  "Ah!"

  Though a slight difference in the pitch sounded strange. The pitch was unusually high, as if it was born with a vocal sac on the neck.

  And when the shriek came from the red fog, the organism got enraged. The assumption of emotion change was because Chang smelled that the scent came closer and closer.

  The scent sprang up as if running up, dashing towards Chang. He noticed a swirl formed in the red fog due to its great speed. That swirl pressed toward him, wildly and gustily.

  Chang didn't have time to think and just switched his weapon to the Shark and the handgun. The target was still nowhere to be seen, so he fired toward the growing swirl three times.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  A long flame tail stretched out from the muzzle, sending the bullets to the fog. This time though, there wasn't any scream that could cheer him up, neither was there a deep sound of flesh splashing.

  Chang knew that he had missed the shot.

  Later, a voice came from behind the layers of leaves, a voice that sounded strange but had a steady tone and was filled with curiosity. It was speaking decent Mandarin. "You can't see me, can you?"

  "Wait... what?" Chang widened his eyes. "You can speak our language?"

  "Of course! Dad teaches us about humans, and he even kidnapped a few human teachers for us. How can I not know how to speak?" The voice came from the tree crown, sharp but juvenile. "Though I'm not as old as you, but daddy told us that we are much smarter than you, learning your language is just a piece of cake."

  Chang didn't wait for the creature to finish his words. He fired in accordance to the source of the voice and scent. Though he missed the shot again.

  "How dare you!" The sharp voice penetrated through the layers of leaves again. "This is what you human calls despicable! Right! I'm gonna kill you!"

  When the voice dropped, Chang felt that he had lost his ability of locating the other with the scent suddenly. His nose could no longer detect that fishy smell, only the freshness scent of the jungle.

  "Surprise! Dad told me that humans are pose no threat if they can't smell or hear," that unnamed creature said with disdain. Then, sounds and scents associated with that voice disappeared completely.

  The swirl was gone as well. It seemed like it had left.

  "Here I am!" the voice burst out of a sudden. It was from behind Chang's back.

  A forceful strike came from behind Chang and he collided with a thick tree trunk that was more than fifty meters away. The pain on his back was burning.

  The creature disdained and shouted out, "This is how fragile you are, human! Your species only existed for over ten thousand years and those who ruled for more than a million years even went extinctict under the force of nature. Arrogant, how arrogant you humans are!"

  "Is that how you think of us?" Chang crawled up from the ground. He kept talking, "Even if we're arrogant as you said, the world still belongs to us, doesn't it?"

  "I know you're tricking me, you meant to locate me with my voice, right?"

  Out of a sudden, the voice came out from all directions. The source became ambiguous instead of one. Chang widened his mouth in astonishment as he hadn't expected that its camouflage system had evolved to such an extent.

  Sweat wet the handguns in his hands.

  "Unfortunately you're too clumsy in this. What on earth are you thinking by trying to trick me?"

  The voice approached again for it incr
eased its volume. But the directionless sound confused Chang's locating ability.

  "I hate humans. When I read about your history, it only told me that wherever you humans step your feet, there must be destruction or extinction.

  "A species like humans shouldn't exist at all. Your desire for materials and power seems endless. Daddy also mentioned to us that humans are fratricidal, how inferior is that..."

  The voice came closer and closer. Chang's perception melted into nothingness. Perhaps his enemy was venting out its anger, perhaps it was merely teasing him. But none of it did he care about. He was only seeking a way to flee, to survive.

  So he chose to close his eyes and refrain from smelling. When the voice came close enough, he emitted a very distinctive call.

  The sound could not be heard. It was more of a hypersonic wave that collides with the surrounding objects and can retrieve the information ahead of him. The returning echoes gave feedback to his brain upon what it hid up ahead.

  Then, the image of the creature was clear. He mapped out the figure by echolocation—it was about two meters in height.

  Instantly, the outline of the creature rendered and Chang held up his handgun in its direction.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM...

  He fired off all of his ammunition because he knew that his enemy wouldn't give another such golden chance to him.

  Instantly, a mix of sweet and bloody scent fused in the air, and a deep sound of a bullet tearing flesh was heard.

  "I got it!"

  Chang was delighted for a second but his ecstasy soon diminished when his handguns were shaken off from his hands. When he regained his mind, he realized that he was being stepped on with a big foot.

  "Despicable, despicable, despicable human!"

  The light seemed to twist when the creature swirled in the fog. Something with an appearance that he had never seen before was looking down at Chang.

  From what he could see at the closest distance were toes that gripped his chest—three rounded toes, flawlessly pale but with sharp toe nails growing on them like knives. The morphology of them resembled frog feet but above them were thighs similar to a human's. The body shape was similar to a human's but the difference was that it had a stout tail.

  The first thought that sprouted in Chang's mind was that the monster was a beautiful creature; not ascetically but sophisticatedly. The portion of strength and beauty was truly - well mixed. The streamline muscle could make people associate it with leopard and its bone structure seemed to be born with perfection.

  Though this beautiful creature was bleeding, its eyes flamed with anger.

  Chapter 122: Admiration

  "Die under my stomp!" the creature yelled.

  There were two bloody holes on its shoulder. Though the blood made it seem like the injuries were severe, they weren't fatal. The foot on Chang's chest slowly pressed him into the ground like a mountain squashing every bit of strength out of him. He couldn't move just lay under the creature's control.

  The gap between their physical strengths was extremely wide.

  What's more, Chang was disarmed completely; if he were to force a hand-to-hand fight, he doubted that he could hurt it even a bit.

  That's why he was certain that this was his last day alive.

  "I said, die under my stomp!"

  The creature stretched its leg further. Chang's chest was at the edge of collapsing and his face distorted from torment.

  "Ah!"

  The last breath was forced out of his lungs. His chest bone crackled as if a firework blooming.

  "It hurts, right?"

  The creature tilted its head, making a lopsided smile.

  "Cut... the crap," Chang squeezed out the words through his lips.

  "Wait... I changed my mind. Killing you on the spot is boring, I'll torture you to death." The creature drew back its leg and picked all the weapons for itself. "Without these weapons, you're just a bug to me."

  The creature tidied up the weapons, then it curiously opened Chang's backpack.

  "What is in there?"

  It stirred the backpack.

  "Some food and water, as well as medications."

  Chang slowly sat up from the ground, rubbing his chest bone.

  "Food? Is it delicious?"

  The creature looked back at Chang, its eyes shining.

  "Nothing special, some hardtacks." The innocence of the creature intrigued Chang. He couldn't help but ask, "How old are you?"

  "I just had my first birthday a few months ago." The creature continued on browsing through the backpack until its fingers gripped a piece of hardtack. It clumsily opened the packaging, then pushed the food towards Chang. "You take a bite first. Daddy told me that humans are all insidious. I need you to test if you've poisoned it."

  "Okay..."

  Chang bit the hardtack from its hand while thinking about some other things.

  Judging from its age, he assumed that the creature was in its early childhood and has lived in the jungle for almost its whole life. Though it was extremely intelligent, it still lacked social experience and seemed to be curious about everything. A beam of hope ignited when he realized that the creature might be less brutal due to having high intelligence.

  "Hey, what's your name?" Chang asked searchingly while the creature was busy gnawing at the hardtack.

  "Liu Xin, Liu means flow, and Xin means heart. My dad named me," the creature slurred. "This is dry, I like fish better."

  "Do you have fish for your daily meal?"

  Chang's eyes lingered on the webbed feet while he intentionally continued the conversation.

  "We do." Liu Xin dragged Chang up by his collar upon finishing enjoying the hardtack. "Don't try to dig things out from me. You hurt me today really bad. I'll take revenge on you but I haven't thought of a way yet so I'm thinking of handing you to daddy."

  "Is there room for negotiation between us?" Chang quickly asked, going into a slight panic when he heard that Liu Xin planned to transfer him to his father. He was almost sure that the chance of escaping from that experienced creature may be non-existent. The mature one must have an abundance of social interactions, and it had even avoided Qing Shui multiple times.

  Taking into consideration that Liu Xin was still an amateur and lacked experience when interacting with humans, he was innocent enough to be tricked. But if Chang was to be brought back to its habitat, he would definitely be caged somehow. Thinking of this, he urged Liu Xin, "Hey buddy, we are both intelligent species, we could just have a talk about this. Though I hurt you but those wounds don't seem fatal. Besides, you hurt me as well, it's fair game, you know?"

  "It doesn't count this way." Liu Xin shook his patterned head. "If I were to use human language to describe you, you are my captive. You aren't allowed for negotiate at all."

  "If you let me go, I'll bring you yummy food," Chang suggested, making a last struggle.

  "Although I'm still a kid, you won't fool me like that." Liu Xin chuckled. His wet and cold fingers gripped Chang's collar again and he started walking into the jungle. "I don't care about what you say, I'll let daddy make the judgment."

  Liu Xin steadily walking on. He bypassed the poisonous region and soon made it to the Yellow River shore. From what Chang observed, Liu Xin was more than three times faster than he was and its endurance was exceptional as his pace was kept constant. Even though he was running fast, his wound didn't lacerate and bleed again. He was simply superior to any of the humans Chang knew.

  On this short trip, Chang struggled, joked, teased, and hoodwinked, but none of it worked. Liu Xin only chuckled at his attempts and said nothing about them.

  A natural habitat for mutated amphibian creatures was where the flow of the Yellow River was the slowest.

  There was a place beside the river where competition was the fiercest for that place was the most prosperous. Liu Xin's kind was apparently the most noble out of all the species near the river.

  Some of the creatures were drinking, some of them w
ere resting. None violated others' territory recklessly. It was clear that this place had achieved an equilibrium in power.

  Perhaps Chang was the first person to discover these monsters that lived underwater.

  In this special habitat, there were pythons coated in thickened and colored scales; frogs that that had their moist and green skin but were now walking with straightened legs; fish which had grown into the appearance of salamanders; as well as species that looked exactly like water plants... This was a heaven that celebrated differences and uniqueness but was dangerous at the same time.

  The different species were either resting or lurking for prey. Some were drinking at the waterside but their strained back leg muscles betrayed their nervousness. Liu Xin and his family had to be the top predator as all the other animals spread out to form a circle as fast as a drop of ink dripping into water when he approached.

  Liu Xin threw Chang on the beach at the river shore, then shouted at a gigantic sand hole. "Papa, papa, I captured a human, but he is strange, he is capable of a lot of things..."

  In seconds, from that three meter wide sand hole, a head sprouted out. The head was a perfect sphere shape, its skin the same as Liu Xin's and the pattern laid over like a well crafted artifact. What came after the head was the body. Its structure was also similar to Liu Xin's but this creature was more muscular. His height was about five meters and his physique stretched out more. Instead of being pale, his skin had a metallic reflection, and his stout tail fell on the ground when he moved out from the sand hole.

  Chang felt a pressure coming from the creature that made him feel as if his heart was about to stop beating. The feeling was much more intense compared to when he had met Zhuo.