Ji Xinghuo wore a look of helplessness.
Feeling a bit hungry himself, and having not yet searched this area, he decided to make a couple of grilled fish for it while scanning the surroundings with his magnetic field sensors.
He walked to a less crowded lakeside, where the Wanxiang Star Pupil saw a big fish in the water.
This lake had long been searched by mutants, including its depths turned inside out. If the Star Tears were here, it would not have been his turn to find them.
That was what everyone thought, so the lakeside was ironically a relatively safe place.
Ji Xinghuo had no fishing rod, but he had other methods.
He took out an arrow and tied a nano-rope to its tail, aimed at a fish in the lake with his bow. Scanning back and forth with magnetic induction, he locked onto a fish over half a meter long, ready to shoot, when suddenly his expression slightly changed, and he turned to look at another big fish not too far away.
It lay quietly hidden among the weeds at the bottom of the lake, over a meter long, half of its body covered by silt, making it very difficult to spot even upon close inspection.
Fish were plenty in the lake and weren’t worth noting.
However, its magnetic field was strange!
Ji Xinghuo sensed that its magnetic field was very different from other fish’s, as if two magnetic fields were superimposed, the smaller one being the biological field of the fish and another that was hundreds of times larger, centered within its body, with a very regular distribution of magnetic lines and intense strength.
There was something inside the big fish’s belly!
Ji Xinghuo’s heart raced with speculation. Could it be that the Star Tears had fallen into this lake and then been swallowed by this large fish?
No wonder so many had failed to find it.
When a meteor falls to the earth, it would inevitably leave a glaring mark, toppling trees and igniting fires, and there would be a big crater on the ground.
Yet to this point, no one had found a crater made by the meteor.
So, it had fallen into the water instead.
In this area of several hundred square kilometers, there are many such small lakes and streams. People had already turned them upside down several times.
It’s not that no one had thought that the Star Tears might have been eaten by a fish.
But there were too many fish in the lake; to catch them all and cut open their bellies was not a task that could be done in a moment. It could even waste time and give others the chance to get ahead. If no one could find the Star Tears afterward, surely someone would do this.
"Looks like I’ve stumbled upon a huge stroke of luck!"
Ji Xinghuo quickly calmed down and turned the bow in another direction, away from the big fish.
An arrow shot into the water, but missed its target.
A few nearby mutants glanced over, saw Ji Xinghuo reeling in the arrow with the nano-rope with an embarrassed look on his face, and lost interest.
There were many who tried to fish with a bow and arrow, but the refraction of light made it difficult to hit the target on the first try.
Ji Xinghuo tried several more arrows, but missed each time.
"Could you shoot from further away? Don’t scare all my fish away," a nearby angler said, dissatisfaction written across his face.
Ji Xinghuo ignored him and shot another arrow into the lake.
The angler got a little angry, started to stand up with his fishing rod, ready to curse out loud when he saw Ji Xinghuo pulling on the nano-rope taut; the arrow had obviously hit something.
A large fish was thrashing as it was pulled to the shore, the arrow striking through its gills and all the way through.
Ji Xinghuo flashed a smug smile at the fisherman.
"Using a bow to shoot fish lacks soul..."
The fisherman muttered a few words, sat back down to bait and cast his line, but his eyes couldn’t help drifting towards Ji Xinghuo, he hadn’t caught such a big fish many times. If he had caught it himself, he would have had to parade around the lake with the fish for a couple of turns.
Ji Xinghuo plunged the tactical knife into the fish’s head, ending its life without further struggle.
Then he proceeded to clean the fish as usual.
He scraped off the scales, slit open the belly, and started to clean out the innards. His hand reached inside the fish and touched a hard object, about the size of a ping-pong ball, smooth and even on the surface, yet edged with sharp ridges, feeling like a cut gemstone.
From such a close distance, Ji Xinghuo had already confirmed it was a Star Tear before he even started killing the fish.
In his eyes, ether energy was concentrating into the fish’s belly, with intense fluctuations, even forming an energy vortex invisible to the naked eye.
Suddenly, a massive surge of energy rushed into his arm.
Due to the overly violent and overwhelming energy, his body couldn’t bear it, and his entire arm experienced a stinging pain from inside out, as if holding a red-hot steel ingot, unbearably hot, forcing him to release his grip.
Only Super Mutants and above were capable of absorbing Star Tears.
Ji Xinghuo nonchalantly withdrew his hand and continued cleaning the innards, leaving the Star Tear inside the fish’s belly.
With his back to the fisherman and taking advantage of the fact that no one was paying attention in front of him, he quickly stuffed a prepared cloth into the fish’s belly, wrapped and bundled it, then got up holding it in his hand, pretending to go get the seasoning from his backpack, and slipped the Star Tear into his bag.
The whole process took only three to four seconds, without drawing anyone’s attention.
Only then did Ji Xinghuo take a covert sigh of relief.
"I can’t leave immediately."
"I need to delay for a bit longer, at least till this fish is cooked, I should play out the whole act."
Next, Ji Xinghuo finished cleaning the fish, brought the fish flesh to the lakeside to wash it, then went to the nearby forest to collect some firewood, lit a fire on the shore, and began to roast the fish.
He flipped the fish flesh, applied seasoning, and the aroma gradually wafted through the air.
Everything was normal.
When the fish was cooked, Ji Xinghuo immediately feasted on it, heartily filling his stomach. As the fish was too big for him to finish, he packed it up, planning to feed it to the little green snake when no one was around. Then he lay down on the lakeside grass pretending to sleep for a while before leaving.
The ground suddenly began to shake.
All the people by the lake turned to look as a large group of wild beasts and monsters came out of the forest to the lakeside.
In the sky, giant-mouthed Winged Dragons and Silver Winged Pegasi landed on the grass, a flock of blood crows settled on a nearby tree, leaving only five hawks circling above, continuing their reconnaissance of the ground.
"What a big lineup..."
The Mutants by the lake had no choice but to retreat to a distance, clearing a large space for them.
The Masters and Superconductor Mages dismounted from the Silver Winged Pegasi, Myriad Beast Garden Hunting Group’s Mutants also jumped down from the Winged Dragons, they busied themselves; someone took out portable tables and chairs, set up food and drinks, someone else directed War Pets to take turns drinking water at the lake and feeding, everything was well-ordered, obviously a routine for them.
Nearby Hunting Teams not wanting to be too close to Myriad Beast Garden quickly packed up and left.
Ji Xinghuo took a quick glimpse, then shouldered his backpack and left the lakeshore, quickly entering the forest and disappearing from the sight of the Mutants by the lake.
Hundreds of meters away, a Superconductor Mage eyed the retreating figure of Ji Xinghuo with a hint of doubt.
"Pei Hong, what’s wrong?"
The female Master beside him noticed his odd expression, so she asked.
Pei Hong shook his head slightly, uncertainly saying, "That Ranger just now, the etheric fluctuations on him were a bit strange, but he was too far away, I couldn’t be sure, might have been a mistake."