Chapter Ninety-Six: Cave Salamander (Fourth Update, bonus chapter for Alliance Leader Tu'a)

Congratulations, the player has successfully acquired a third avatar.

Third Avatar: female olm

Olm Status: expanded

Good

Life Level: 1

Vitality: 0.02 (maximum 0.05)

Body Length: 29.13 centimeters (maximum 50 centimeters)

Age: 2 years (maximum 15 years)

Trait 1: Environmental Adaptation (Low)
Slightly adapts to environments beyond deep mountain caves; adaptability will gradually strengthen over time.

Reward: Because the player has successfully unlocked a third avatar, one random advanced-or-higher trait has been granted to the third avatar.

Congratulations, the third avatar has acquired the trait Absolute Zero (Special-Grade).

Trait: Absolute Zero (Special-Grade)
Mastery: 1%

Maximum vitality increases one hundredfold; body growth ceiling increases fiftyfold.

Absolute Zero: the temperature of the surrounding area can be continually driven downward. Owing to the special nature of this special-grade trait, its strength will continue to grow with the owner’s usage and the strengthening of life force, ultimately reaching a state capable of freezing time and the posture of space.

Note 1: Special-grade traits are exceedingly rare and require the owner to slowly adapt to and develop mastery over them.

Note 2: This special-grade trait is exclusive to aquatic lifeforms, singular and unique; the player cannot obtain its enhancement.

Guidance Quest, Phase One: Please imagine, as vividly as you can in your mind, the scene of absorbing the essence of water. Rewards will be granted without interruption according to the depth and duration of your imagination.

After Ji Yu finished reading all the prompt information related to the third avatar, the female olm, he actually froze for a moment.

Setting aside for now the utterly pathetic attributes of the olm itself, the trait rewarded by the game was astonishing beyond measure.

This time, the reward had actually broken through the advanced rank and produced what was called a special-grade trait.

Absolute Zero.

Such a trait had already surpassed the limits of what Ji Yu had ever imagined.

According to the game’s data prompt, the final developed form of Absolute Zero could even freeze time and space.

That absurd power made Ji Yu’s heart surge with excitement for a while.

But that excitement was soon forced down.

Because although a special-grade trait was outrageous, it also came with a mastery gauge that none of the previous traits had possessed.

The potential of this trait was unquestionably immense, but it had a flaw.

It required development. That alone was not on the same level as the fawn’s initial Life Grafting trait, which had started in a state of maximum mastery.

Still, even so, it was enough to make Ji Yu happy for a long while.

Mastery and development could come slowly. The amplification brought by Absolute Zero, however, was real and immediate.

The olm truly was weak—so weak that calling it trash would not be an exaggeration.

The limit of a level-one life form was only 0.05. Even if it broke through the extraordinary and entered level two, it would still be merely fifty centimeters long.

Even if it possessed abilities, the scene Ji Yu could imagine of it fighting would be absurd beyond words.

A fifty-centimeter creature, looking like a little water snake, spitting at people with some pathetic skill, only to be stomped to death by a human?

Such a level-two life form would be nothing short of a joke.

So now, with the one-hundredfold amplification brought by Absolute Zero, its growth at least became somewhat presentable.

At level-one peak, the value reached five, already enough to stand against the seven peak-level-two spotted deer in the forest corridor belonging to the fawn.

With the blessing of Absolute Zero, the olm’s potential was at last roughly on par with the spotted deer and the oak tree.

“Not bad. At least I don’t have to worry that the third avatar will turn out to be useless.”

Ji Yu thought, somewhat unscrupulously.

After that, controlling the olm, Ji Yu crawled out of the cave.

From the olm’s point of view, to be honest, Ji Yu felt rather uncomfortable.

This thing practically had myopia; the scenery it saw was all in black and white, and anything a little farther away had already blurred into indistinct haze.

Ji Yu did the math: the visible range of this olm was no more than three meters.

For the first time, Ji Yu truly saw what it meant to be useless.

If not for Ji Yu’s descent granting the olm future possibilities, a life as fragile as this one would remain nothing but a tiny weakling even after breaking through to level two.

Ji Yu was actually a little envious.

Because he himself could not obtain this trait and bestow it upon his own body.

A water-exclusive trait?

Well, Ji Yu could only accept that. Who told him he was a land-born species?

Of course, the game’s mechanics were still somewhat exasperating.

But the olm was his avatar, and Ji Yu would not dwell on the matter too long.

It was enough to gain benefits. To be insatiable would be going too far.

Looking at this stream so shallow it could scarcely be called a stream, Ji Yu no longer had much else on his mind.

Observing the surrounding environment could wait until he was a little stronger. Otherwise, wandering about in this shallow water now would only make him an easy target for water birds.

If the campaign had scarcely begun and he died before seeing any success, that would truly become a laughingstock.

Thinking of this, Ji Yu immediately focused his attention on the guidance quest.

“Imagine the scene of absorbing the essence of water?”

“Essence? Of water?”

Ji Yu looked blank.

Absorbing water was one thing. Water’s essence? What was that supposed to be?

Of course, he was only complaining. After all, in films and animation, things like the essence of water or the essence of fire were still within Ji Yu’s imagination.

He would just treat “essence” as some gaseous, mistlike existence.

With that thought, Ji Yu wasted no more words. He immediately returned to the cave and began to imagine.

Ten minutes later.

“Congratulations, the player has successfully guided the third avatar into a meditative state. Vitality +0.01.”

After ten full minutes of ceaseless imagining, Ji Yu finally, through a kind of torment, succeeded in sensing the so-called essence of water.

Ripples stirred in the stream outside; as the current passed by, an enigmatic and ineffable airflow was drawn toward the olm.

Thereafter, every ten minutes Ji Yu was able to grant the olm a bonus of 0.01 vitality.

At the same time, under the pull of the olm’s meditation, a peculiar change began to arise in the stream outside.

Above the shallow water where the olm lay, a tiny whirlpool formed, made entirely of flowing water.

The whirlpool was about fifty centimeters in diameter—small, yet strangely beautiful.

Clear as a mirror, it showed distinct boundaries and layers above and below.

Beneath the sunlight, the light reflected from the whirlpool was like a polished mirror, and in an instant it illuminated the few trees lining both sides of the stream.

That moist light, carrying a subtle ripple, shone outward and created a rare and lovely scene all around.

Within that scene, the little olm’s body began to grow with striking speed.

An hour later, the minuscule body that had originally been barely thirty centimeters long had reached eighty centimeters.

Two hours later, the young olm had already grown to the length of an ordinary water snake, reaching 1.3 meters.

By the time Ji Yu withdrew from meditation for a while in the fifth hour, the little olm’s body had already transformed beyond recognition.

The change was comprehensive, and extremely dramatic.

At this moment, the olm, now about three meters long, lay coiled in the stream, whose water was less than twenty centimeters deep.

Its body was as fluid as water, its color almost perfectly blended with the stream itself. If one did not approach closely and look carefully, no one would ever discover that such a miraculous creature was coiled here.