CHAPTER 100: CHAPTER 100 THE GAZE OF THE PANGOLIN (THREE UPDATES)

EDITOR: DRAGON BOAT TRANSLATION

"Are you leaving?" Huo Liang’s big eyes blinked as he looked at the Pangolin, his eyes filling with tears.

Five days had passed in the game. During this time, although the Pangolin hadn’t made Huo Liang stronger, it had resolved the reason he *needed* to be: the school bullies, after being bitten by the Pangolin, no longer dared to attend school. Moreover, on the third day, the Pangolin suddenly started talking, which gave Huo Liang quite a scare.

"You didn’t even memorize the formula for the volume of a cone?"

"The line before ’Shan Dao Song Zhi’ is ’How vast and deep the waters are!’"

"The price of the shirt is nine pounds and fifteen pence! Choose C!"

The Pangolin was hiding in Huo Liang’s backpack, speaking in a way only Huo Liang could hear. Coincidentally, these past few days were a monthly test before the final exams. Under the Pangolin’s guidance in cheating, Huo Liang unbelievably managed to quickly complete one test paper after another.

But after the exam, the Pangolin told him, "You’re finished!"

"You did well on this monthly test. But if you do poorly on the finals, the teacher will assume you cheated on the monthly test, and then you’ll never be able to clear your name! If you perform poorly, even your breathing is considered wrong!"

Huo Liang was puzzled. "What should I do?"

"I’ll tutor you for the next two days. If you don’t study hard, haha, just wait for your doom!"

So, for the next two days, Huo Liang studied under the Pangolin’s Teaching. He had never hired a tutor before and didn’t dare ask teachers questions in school. He also had no friends to turn to for help, leading to many gaps in his Knowledge. After the Pangolin addressed these points, it was as if Huo Liang had awakened from a dream.

Today, after school, Huo Liang ran home and, under the Pangolin’s supervision, completed three sets of test papers in two hours, covering the three main subjects.

"Actually, you’re quite smart."

"Well done, just like that, just what I was thinking."

"You’re pretty quick with the test. Hmm, you got these two questions wrong, so pay attention next time, but overall, not bad."

Huo Liang, watching the Pangolin lying on his test papers and checking them, felt very happy as he took the papers back to correct the mistakes. Then, he heard the Pangolin say, "I have to go."

Huo Liang exclaimed, "But, but I’m not strong yet..."

"Funny. Did I promise you anything? These past few days, I was just repaying you for the lamp stand."

Seeing Huo Liang on the screen looking like he was about to cry, Ren Suo thought for a moment and typed in the chat box, "Sigh, actually, I’m a thief who stole treasures from the Fairy Palace. I managed to return to reality, but I turned back into a Pangolin. If I stay any longer, I might attract the Fairy Palace’s pursuers and drag you into it."

The best excuse to placate a child is, ’I’m doing this for your own good; I’m leaving so I don’t drag you down.’ As for why the Fairy Palace... it was because Ren Suo only remembered that he had once idly invented such a super-faction in his past ramblings.

"I’m not afraid!" Huo Liang immediately said.

Ren Suo typed, "What about your mother? Do you want to drag her into this too?"

This silenced Huo Liang.

Ren Suo continued typing, "Study hard. My True Form isn’t human, so I don’t have any Dharma methods to teach you Cultivation. But if you study hard, maybe... it won’t be of any use."

"There’s no such thing as some miraculous boon just falling from the sky. Don’t overthink it."

Ren Suo typed this sentence while involuntarily glancing at the TV cabinet holding the Mini-World Game Console.

"I’m leaving. If I’m not dead, I’ll come back to see you."

Not letting Huo Liang obstruct its grand plan of devouring, the Pangolin left the residential area without any lingering attachment, having already collected all the Spiritual Objects there.

In these five days, Ren Suo had found a total of 91 Spiritual Objects with a Trace Amount of Spiritual Energy and 13 with a lesser amount in this residential area. Combined with the bathroom tile obtained earlier, these provided the Pangolin with 16 opportunities to Evolve.

Not all old lamp stands were valuable; whether they became Spiritual Objects depended on luck—the luck associated with old items.

However, dozens of mysterious thefts occurred in the neighborhood over these few days. Posters even appeared downstairs warning: ’Fireproof, Burglarproof, Vagrant-proof!’ This suggested the residents believed a vagrant was brazenly targeting peculiar items.

Still, Ren Suo didn’t go to grind in a second old district. He had stayed an extra day because of Huo Liang—for an eighth-grade student’s homework, one extra day of tutoring was sufficient. After all, the further it Evolved, the more Spiritual Energy it required. Having cleared out this residential district, Ren Suo found that Spiritual Objects with lesser amounts of Spiritual Energy were no longer very useful to the Pangolin.

He needed to find stronger substances to devour.

The Pangolin leapt from the fourth floor, its flesh sac bursting out into meaty wings—

A rare Blue Stripes Red Card evolution, "Bat Wings."

It landed smoothly outside. Its form blended with the environment—not by becoming completely similar, but rather by resembling a dirty smudge. No matter where it landed, it wouldn’t draw human attention or be stepped on, and this camouflage could change rapidly as it moved. It didn’t make the Pangolin invisible but made it ’inconspicuous.’

The rare Blue Stripes Red Card evolution, "Filth Concealment+," originated from the bathroom tile’s Ability.

The Pangolin went to the bus stop, waited for 3 minutes, slipped onto city bus route 8, and after 1 hour and 30 minutes of travel, arrived at the Anshun West High-Speed Rail Station.

Looking at the electrical panel in the lobby, Ren Suo realized there was, indeed, no direct high-speed train to Lianjiang. He had checked this in reality and had anticipated it.

Should I make the Pangolin come all the way to Lianjiang just for this?

But Ren Suo glanced at the Pangolin’s combat power of 336 compared to the World’s Strongest’s 46,832, and he dismissed the idea. Time was of the essence, and he couldn’t afford to waste it.

Besides, if the Pangolin did come to Lianjiang, Ren Suo guessed it would see him playing on the game console.

Would it believe him then, or not?

Unless this game’s timeframe was set decades in the future, where observation might hold some specific purpose, Ren Suo figured he could predict his own future for the next few days or even months. After all, an ordinary person’s future tends to be quite mundane.

Luckily, Ren Suo found a high-speed train about to leave Anshun West Station and immediately rushed the Pangolin to the security check area. The security check was for people, not pangolins. Using its "Filth Concealment," the Pangolin easily slipped into the waiting area by hiding. The only issue was the narrow ticket gate, which just left enough space for passage.

That’s when the Pangolin said to the ticket checker, "Hey, guess who I am?"

The "Mind Transfer" Skill, a Yellow Stripe Red Card evolution, allowed the Pangolin to transmit its thoughts directly to a creature—in the game, this manifested as a one-way dialogue box. This was one of only two Yellow Stripe evolutions the Pangolin possessed. Ren Suo hadn’t specifically chosen it just to help Huo Liang with his studies; the Skill was extremely effective for communication, disruption, or intimidation.

The person hearing the voice would become paranoid as the sound lacked direction; nobody would suspect an invisible pangolin was speaking. For instance, a particularly bold hooligan, cornered by the Pangolin in an alley, was literally scared to soil himself by the voice.

The ticket checker, momentarily stunned, looked around. At that moment, the Pangolin used "Afterimage" and slipped past like the wind. After waiting a short while below, it boarded the high-speed train!

Fast forward 10 hours and 30 minutes. Just before dawn the next day, the Pangolin finally arrived at what Ren Suo considered the place with the most Spiritual Objects—

The Capital of Mysterious Country, Sky Capital!

Speaking of which, Ren Suo himself had never been to Sky Capital. After all, Sky Capital’s tourist spots were always crowded during holidays, and all his friends who had been there advised him—

"Don’t go."

This time, however, the Pangolin managed to stow away on the high-speed train, getting a free and quick trip to Sky Capital. But the most important thing was to hurry and level up; the World’s Strongest had gained another 1,000 combat power overnight!

Ren Suo was beginning to understand this combat power evaluation. The Pangolin’s Claws and Teeth could already pierce concrete and crush aluminum cans. It suffered only moderate injuries when hit by a car traveling at 60 km/h (thanks in part to its 15 layers of Armor) and could fully Recover within an hour. Yet, its combat power was merely 336.

Therefore, he suspected an adult human’s combat power might be around 100, establishing 100 as the baseline unit. The current Pangolin, though still a pangolin, possessed bite force, mobility, defensive power, and Recovery Ability far exceeding human levels, making it a veritable overlord among its kind.

However, it didn’t help much since the game wasn’t about fighting bosses but about finding ways to become the strongest.

The current challenge was that the Pangolin’s Attributes were nearly maxed out. For instance, its Recovery Ability was already at the limit: 150.

For humans, a score of 150 might represent 1.5 times their normal recovery capability. But for a pangolin, it meant a recovery rate more than ten times greater. This was because a regular pangolin weighs only about 2 kilograms, while this overlord Pangolin was just 4.5 kilograms—roughly one-tenth the weight of an average adult human female.

Once any Attribute reached its peak, the attribute bar would show a notice:

"Maximum Value: The next evolution will definitely result in a ’Super-Evolution’."

Ren Suo was looking forward to seeing what kind of changes this Super-Evolution would bring to the Pangolin.

Still, he first needed to find Spiritual Objects from which it could absorb Spiritual Energy.

Pressing R3, he entered the Spiritual Vision mode, and the screen instantly turned yellow.

A few seconds later, the screen returned to normal, and Ren Suo was stunned to find the entire Sky Capital filled with Spiritual Energy columns piercing the clouds.

The Pangolin found a slightly taller building to crouch on, and then Ren Suo used his phone to locate the building. "A Kaifeng Cuisine fast-food restaurant next to Sky Capital West Station... found it."

"Directly to the East, visually about 7 kilometers away... yep, should be the Forbidden City Museum."

"Directly north, visually about 10 kilometers away... probably the Summer Palace."

By then, dawn was breaking. Suddenly, a golden column of light, far beyond the Forbidden City Museum, erupted into a crimson glow, almost engulfing the sky and earth, tinting everything in view a deep red.

Ren Suo was startled, wondering if the game was turning into a Horror Game.

A few minutes later, the crimson light slowly converged and then vanished. The Spiritual Energy column, located further to the East, seemed to have grown even thicker.

That terrifying column of Spiritual Energy can’t be from the Forbidden City Museum, can it? Ren Suo checked the game time: 04:51.

Without a doubt, the burst of Spiritual Energy must have been due to some event. If it wasn’t because the Pangolin just happened to encounter a sudden incident, then this must be something that happens daily in Sky Capital City.

That direction, at this time... the most likely event is...

The flag-raising ceremony?

Ren Suo blinked. Then, that overwhelming column of Spiritual Energy just now... could it have been...