Chapter 145: The Mutated Oarfish

More importantly, this creature’s intelligence is beyond imagination. Over a month ago, the Dragon King suddenly summoned the tens of thousands of saltwater crocodiles from the Madura jungle to depart.

"Preparing to establish a territory in an alternate dimension"—this was the reply the Dragon King had given them.

Of course, Dong Mingjun did not believe it was that simple; the hidden motives behind it were terrifying to contemplate. According to the expert panel's projections, the entity was likely establishing a saltwater crocodile civilization similar to that of humanity. At the time, many members of the Crisis Management Team found the report absurd. It had taken humanity thousands of years to build a civilized world from nothing. No matter how intelligent the Dragon King was, it was still just a ferocious beast. It was impossible for it to achieve in a short time what humanity had accomplished over millennia.

However, after witnessing the scene before him, Dong Mingjun was convinced. When facing the Dragon King, one could never rely on conventional logic. He felt immensely fortunate right now that the crisis team had followed Professor Wu's advice and had not blindly attempted to capture the saltwater crocodile beast; otherwise, this scene would undoubtedly have played out against his own teammates. It seemed another meeting would have to be called to re-evaluate and discuss the Dragon King.

Lu Chen did not care in the slightest about the shock his recent attack had caused humanity. After everything was over, he did not return to the waterfall’s alternate dimension but continued flying further away. Along the way, he made no attempt to conceal his tracks. Lu Chen wanted to see what other schemes the humans hiding behind the scenes would come up with. As it turned out, aside from a few drones following closely ten thousand meters above, there were no other anomalies. It seemed that after their bitter lesson, the masterminds would likely remain quiet for a while until they could devise a new hunting plan.

Circling above the Madura primeval jungle, Lu Chen carefully sensed the changes below. Ever since the tens of thousands of saltwater crocodiles had migrated into the waterfall dimension, the other animals in the jungle had enjoyed a brief respite, and their numbers had begun to recover rapidly. The entire jungle was teeming with vitality. That was not bad at all. Lu Chen planned to wait for the jungle’s ecosystem to recover before leading the saltwater crocodiles back to "harvest the leeks" again. For now, the leeks were not yet lush enough, so he could afford to wait.

After flying over a hundred miles, Lu Chen’s massive body turned into a cannonball, plunging straight into the ocean and vanishing completely. Hidden hundreds of meters deep on the seabed, he swung his crocodile tail and swam slowly. Compared to the land on Blue Star, the changes in the ocean were even more drastic. As Lu Chen swam along, all kinds of rare fish were visible everywhere, and he even occasionally spotted massive fish weighing hundreds of pounds. This was almost unimaginable before the Great Transformation.

Lu Chen had checked files from his communicator; in recent months, powerful sea monsters and water beasts had emerged one after another, constantly attacking passing ships. Some had even charged onto the shore and tidal flats. Nowadays, aside from shallow coastal areas, humans no longer dared to venture easily into the deep sea. Moreover, unlike land-based beasts, these creatures held an overwhelming advantage in the ocean. If they encountered human hunting parties, they could easily escape into the water, rendering many offensive weapons completely ineffective. Constantly harassed, many coastal countries were in immense distress and had begun to initiate relocation plans. It was foreseeable that in the near future, the entire ocean would become a forbidden zone for ordinary humans.

Lu Chen grabbed two large fish at random to fill his stomach and continued swimming toward the giant kelp forest. His previous guess had become reality: in the absence of natural predators, the giant kelp had completely spread across the seabed. Even from hundreds of meters away, one could smell the thick scent of blood in the water. This stench carried a powerful lure, constantly stimulating nearby predatory marine life to draw near, only to be captured by the kelp tentacles and turned into piles of white bones.

However, the giant kelp seemed to have a poor memory. Having not seen Lu Chen for just over two months, it had completely forgotten the painful lesson he had once taught it. And so, in the spirit of helping others, Lu Chen directly fired a few energy blasts to refresh their memory. The next moment, the dense branches and tentacles dispersed rapidly, and a wide path opened up on the seabed. As rays of sunlight filtered through, the once-dim water became bright again.

Lu Chen moved forward, carefully observing the white bones piled on the seabed, but he found no new mermaid remains. Soon, he arrived at the seafloor fissure. The massive stone archway was still there, and even the marks Lu Chen had left months ago had not vanished. It seemed the mermaid tribe had not descended to Blue Star through the archway in recent times. After inspecting it, Lu Chen attempted to fire compressed energy blasts at the fissure. The results were disappointing; after much effort, he only dug up a dozen Grade 1 spirit stones, not even enough to cover the cost of the labor.

He ended his exploration of the seafloor fissure hastily and headed further out to search. It had been two years since he was reincarnated as a saltwater crocodile, and most of his life had been spent on land; he had never properly explored the ocean. Before, it was because he lacked the strength. Now, even with powerful water beasts emerging in the ocean, there shouldn't be anything capable of threatening him. Additionally, Lu Chen wanted to find other spirit stone veins.

The ocean occupied over seventy percent of Blue Star's surface area; theoretically, there should be more spirit stone veins present. For the current Lu Chen, spirit stones were the most effective way to increase his energy points. High-quality spirit stones, in particular, were always welcome.

After traveling several hundred nautical miles, Lu Chen soon sensed a massive disturbance in the water. Following that, he saw a group of slender fish over ten meters long appearing in the distance—a species he had never seen before. For such large-scale mutations to occur, they had nine times out of ten consumed spirit stones. Lu Chen grew excited and hurried to give chase. Initially, he thought these were a group of massive mutated sea snakes, but upon swimming closer, he realized he was wrong. Their bodies were flat and ribbon-shaped, with beautiful long dorsal fins, resembling giant white kelp.

However, to Lu Chen, no matter how beautiful the fish were, they were useless; they were just food. Without hesitation or delay, he opened with his simple and crude method... a blast of compressed energy. Accompanying a massive explosion, over a dozen of the strange fish died instantly, while the rest scattered and vanished. Lu Chen did not rush to follow; instead, he used his claws to grab a piece of flesh and swallowed it for identification.

"Mutated Oarfish, provides 5 energy points..."

Seeing the text appear on the system panel, Lu Chen shook his head, speechless. He had originally thought these creatures were something extraordinary because of their strange appearance, but it turned out they were just mutated oarfish. The oarfish was a type of giant fish; before the Great Transformation, they could reach lengths of nearly ten meters and always lived in deep-sea waters, making them difficult for humans to catch or observe. Because of this, the oarfish was surrounded by an aura of mystery.

The energy contained in this flesh was not high, but Lu Chen did not intend to waste it; he prepared to put it into his internal space and let the Demon-Eater Tree consume it. As expected, upon sensing the aura of the animal flesh, the Demon-Eater Tree sapling immediately swayed its leaves, emitting a joyful and excited aura. If one ignored its plant-like appearance, Lu Chen would almost have thought it was an animal that had just been born.