Chapter 138: Chapter 138: Light Fruit
While Edward lived in anxiety for a whole day, Finnick and Oliver also worked hard for a whole day.
From the moment they woke up in the morning until they went to bed at night, apart from eating, most of the time was spent by the two children practicing how to use Divine Energy.
Nyx’s vegetable garden immediately suffered a disaster; a patch of grass appeared here, a puddle of water appeared there. Nyx marveled at this destructive power, and at the same time, he highly appreciated the two children’s eager-to-improve spirit.
"These two are so like their Papa and Daddy."
In the afternoon, when Kaelen finished his work, he first went to the nursery to pick up Ryder, then headed to Nyx’s house to pick up his own children. He was also horrified because Uncle Nyx’s house had almost turned into an abandoned building. The owner of the house was still leisurely sitting and drinking tea, enjoying the two children’s spectacular Divine Energy performance.
Kaelen stood rooted to the spot. After witnessing the destructive power of his two little rascals, he finally couldn’t hold back anymore, curling his finger and giving each of them a rap on the head.
"If you want to destroy things like this, follow your Uncle Zale to the military camp tomorrow!"
Finnick looked excited, while Oliver wrinkled his nose in disgust. He hadn’t forgotten that Uncle Zale had poured fish sauce on his eggshell, and on top of that, he kept saying that if the child born to Uncle Zale’s family in the future was a beastman, they would be betrothed to Oliver. He didn’t want that family’s stinky brat at all!
Oliver’s protest was, of course, invalid. Once Kaelen had decided on something, no one could sway him.
He waved his hand and uprooted all the weeds growing haphazardly on the walls, roof, and floor; then he put the plants in the garden back in order. As for the puddles of water, he had to spend a bag of salt to ask two people from the construction team to fix them.
After finishing the work, he brought all three children home.
This evening, Oliver and Finnick got to eat sorghum porridge with meat and green mustard, and also drank watermelon and pineapple juice. Ryder ate cornbread buns, and while he could eat whole pieces of watermelon, he showed a look of disgust towards the pineapple.
Kaelen didn’t force the boy; everyone had foods they disliked, after all. During this time, Sane was busy with work at the road construction site and wouldn’t be returning. After Kaelen and the three children finished eating, they went to the Temple to pray.
This was also the first time he had brought Ryder to this place. Just as they stepped into the main hall, Ryder was struck right in the soul by a dazzling golden light. The boy let out a moan, then lay still, enjoying this wondrous feeling.
Kaelen and the two children all looked at the little mouse in surprise.
He just leveled up like that? Since when had upgrading Divine Energy become as easy as eating candy!
Passing the initial shock, Kaelen hurriedly stepped into the main hall, knelt on the cushion in front of the statue, closed his eyes, and chanted an ancient incantation. Immediately, golden light flooded the grand hall, as powerful as the sun yet as gentle as an autumn breeze.
All the believers present prostrated themselves on the ground, murmuring prayers in a mix of reverence and fear.
The little mouse in Kaelen’s arms slowly floated up, then the boy’s tiny body gradually expanded, transforming into a human form.
"Ryder is only five years old, why is he entering the transformation period so early?!" Kaelen and Collins exclaimed in surprise at the same time. Waiting for the boy to land on the ground, they both stepped forward to examine the boy’s body.
The boy’s eyes were still squeezed shut, but an eye-like pattern appeared in the middle of his forehead. It looked somewhat similar to Walter’s Divine Energy pattern, but it was golden in color, and what was more, it was as sharp as if it had been painted on.
Ryder let out a long yawn and muttered, "So sleepy~" He then shifted into his beast form and started snoring soundly.
The two adults led the three children to the clinic for Draven to examine Ryder more deeply, but Draven didn’t find anything unusual. Kaelen had to bring Ryder back to his house, placed the boy in Edward’s nest, and then carried the entire nest onto his own bed for easier observation.
"Ryder isn’t feeling well today, don’t crowd in with him. Lie down next to Papa, okay?"
Of course, the two children refused. As soon as Kaelen put them on the bed, they crawled over to lie next to Ryder. Lifted out, they crawled back in; lifted out, they crawled back in again. Finally, Kaelen had to leave them be. Seeing that the two little ones were very sensible and didn’t lie on top of Ryder, Kaelen felt somewhat more at ease.
Finnick and Oliver lay in the nest, staring intently at the pattern on the little mouse’s forehead, then turned to look at each other, seemingly understanding something. It was mental energy resonance. Ryder had eaten a small portion of Edward’s mental energy in the resonance space, and that amount of mental energy had fused with Ryder’s original mental energy, accelerating the boy’s development.
However, as Edward had said, because Ryder was forced to enter the transformation period early, his mental energy was prone to losing control. It seemed that next time, they couldn’t let Edward feed Ryder recklessly.
It was just a pity that despite thinking so, the very same night when they entered the resonance space, they saw Ryder sitting up straight and gnawing on a block of white mental energy, while Edward lay not far away, watching the boy eat with an indulgent expression.
Finnick let out a panicked howl, lunging forward to smack away more than half of the remaining white mental energy block in Ryder’s hand. Ryder stared blankly at the delicious light fruit being knocked aside, which in the blink of an eye turned into small clusters of light sinking into the ground, vanishing without a trace.
His eyes gradually welled up with moisture, and he burst into squeaky tears.
Edward angrily used his tail to whip his younger brother away, moved forward to coil around Ryder, and coaxed softly:
"Don’t cry, don’t cry, I will get another fruit for you to eat."
Saying that, he used his mouth to bite a piece off his own body, pulling out a new cluster of light. Oliver panicked and slithered quickly forward, reaching out a hand to press Edward’s head down:
"Don’t feed him anymore! He will die from overeating!!"
Then he patted the little mouse’s head again: "Good Ryder, eating too much of this will make your stomach explode. Tomorrow morning, I will pick many other, tastier fruits for you, okay?"
Ryder sniffled. Hearing Oliver say that, he subconsciously used his two forelimbs to hug his round belly, but the boy still pouted:
"But those fruits aren’t as tasty as the ones Brother Edward gives me..."
Hah, even ’Brother Edward’... Oliver shot Edward a disdainful look. He was clearly a whole five years younger than Ryder, yet he still had the thick skin to coax the boy into calling him older brother.
Edward blinked, nonchalantly turning his face away and ignoring his younger brother’s gaze. After all, he had entered the transformation period as soon as he broke out of his shell. Although his actual age was only over two months, his bone age was already six years old. What was wrong with Ryder calling him ’brother’?
While he was caught off guard, a pale green light formed into vines that reached out, wrapping tightly around Edward’s neck, dragging him high up and then slamming him into the ground repeatedly. Dust flew everywhere; Edward was smashed so fast that one could only see a streak of light flying up and dropping down.
"Fin!!!nick!!!"
After a moment of being ambushed, Edward roared, shrinking his mental body to slip out of the vines’ binding, and with another roar, he charged in to fight with Finnick. In a split second, the resonance space was filled with green and white lights clashing together, and one could even hear *pew pew boom boom* sounds in the air like fireworks.
Oliver facepalmed, then picked up the mouse cub, quietly slithering to an ancient tree trunk he had just discovered. The two of them sat on a large branch, observing the fireworks display outside.
Oliver seriously instructed Ryder, though he wasn’t sure if the little mouse would be able to remember: "If that snake gives you anything to eat in the future, you must not eat it, okay? Eating his mental energy is no different from taking growth stimulants; sooner or later, you will explode."
Ryder hugged his belly in fear and nodded profusely. Then, the boy blinked again, observing Oliver from head to toe, his line of sight stopping on Oliver’s tail. Ryder wasn’t quite sure, asking:
"Are you Oliver?"
Oliver nodded, saying: "That’s right, I am Oliver. That green leopard over there is Finnick, and Edward is our eldest brother. Because your and Edward’s mental energies are similar, every time you lie in his nest, both of your mental energies will resonate, creating this resonance space."
Oliver patted his hand against the tree trunk, feeling it for a moment before looking further into the distance, telling Ryder:
"You just finished leveling up, and your mental energy is already stronger, so the resonance space has also changed. Last time, the ground was still cracked and barren, and this tree wasn’t here yet."
Ryder half-understood, nodding blankly, his eyes still fixated on Oliver’s snake tail. He remembered when he touched Oliver’s legs before, they were clearly a pair of soft legs, weren’t they?
Seeing Ryder’s expression, Oliver smiled. He pulled up his tail and presented it in front of the boy, pointing at the snake tail and saying: "This is my true original form."
Ryder scratched his head: "Then... are you a beastman or a Sub-Beast?"
"I am a Sub-Beast, a Sub-Beast of the Snake clan."
Ryder nodded naively. On the other side, Finnick and Edward had also concluded their battle. The final result: Edward smashed Finnick into the ground, creating a deep crater. Edward won!
"They finished fighting, let’s go down."
Oliver picked up the mouse cub again, slowly crawling down. Ryder clasped his two tiny paws under his chin and said to Edward:
"Brother Edward, you are so amazing."
Hearing that, Edward lifted his chin even higher. Finnick clumsily crawled out of the crater. Seeing his older brother’s posture, he found it completely an eyesore, so he threw a punch upwards, and Edward was punched flying into the sky again.
"You little brat, you’re itching for a beating, aren’t you?!"
Edward, furious, opened his mouth wanting to charge forward and swallow Finnick whole. Oliver couldn’t bear it any longer; his fists swung up and intimately landed on the heads of his two brothers. After a series of *bang bang thwack thwack*, one snake and one jaguar finally settled down, carrying a few lumps on their heads as they obediently sat still in one place.
Only now did all four of them have a chance to sit down and talk seriously. More accurately, three of them, because the little mouse had missed the previous conversation and didn’t understand a single thing.
"I think we shouldn’t let our two fathers come to the Northern Continent for now," Edward said solemnly. "A patrol captain already possesses level nine Beast Energy, and all throughout the Temple, the ones with the lowest combat power are already at level four. That Temple Lord was even able to easily neutralize my level eight Divine Energy pressure; I suspect he has reached the Holy Beast level or might have even touched upon the Demigod level."
Oliver sharply drew in a breath. Level eight Beast Energy was a normal occurrence, but level eight Divine Energy was equal in power to Holy Beast level Beast Energy. For it to be so easily neutralized, this Temple Lord was indeed someone they couldn’t confront head-on.
Edward added: "I heard the servants talking to each other, and learned that the City Lord of the Beast City is the strongest beastman on the continent. If he is the strongest beastman, then his level must definitely be higher than that level nine Black Wolf beastman. Probably a Holy Beast or a Demigod."
Oliver lowered his head, speaking with slight contemplation: "Aside from scouting the terrain and the defense system, you also need to find out the relationship between the City Lord’s manor and the Temple. If the City Lord’s manor absolutely submits to the Temple, then we will find a way to quietly sneak in and take both of you away without letting them find out. If the City Lord’s manor feigns compliance but is actually dissatisfied with the Temple, then we can make our move starting from the City Lord."
Finnick shook his head: "No, it’s too dangerous. To stand in the position of City Lord for so many years without falling, that guy is definitely not a kindhearted sort. Brother is just a beast cub; even if he is extraordinarily smart, there is no way he can see through the human heart. Moreover, he doesn’t have the ability to sense good or bad people like Ryder."
Ryder, who was drowsily nodding off, became a bit more awake upon hearing Finnick mention his name, and quickly asked: "Huh, what about me? Is there a job for me to do?"
The three brothers stared intently at the little mouse for a moment, then decisively ignored him, putting their heads back together to continue their discussion. Being ignored, the little mouse looked blank for a moment, then angrily placed his paws on his hips, throwing a tantrum and wanting to leave.
Edward had been paying attention to the mouse cub all along. Seeing that Ryder was about to leave, he hastily extended his tail to wrap around the boy and pulled him towards himself. His snake body coiled several times to embrace the mouse cub, and the tip of his tail rested on the mouse cub’s head, rubbing it comfortingly.
Even though his younger brothers had warned him, Edward still thought, *eating a little bit probably wouldn’t hurt.*
Therefore, taking advantage of the time Oliver and Finnick were bowing their heads and intently drawing their plans on the ground, Edward spat out a bit of his mental energy. He rolled it into a small fruit the size of a pinky fingernail, and as for the flavor, he imbued it with the taste of the red fruit he liked to eat at the Temple. He stealthily stuffed the small light fruit into Ryder’s paw, then used the tip of his tail to cover across the boy’s face, only exposing the top of his head from the eyes up.
Hiding within the large snake’s coils, Ryder sneakily brought the light fruit to his mouth and took a bite, so happy that his eyes curved into slits.
