Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
It was easier said than done. The jungle looked not too far from the highway, but Zhang Lisheng drove for over ten minutes to get them to the border of the jungle. The last ray of sunlight vanished completely, he gotten off the car and looked around the jungle with the help of the moonlight that had just appeared above the trees.
Looking at the neat trees on the outside, this should be a conservation forest with specially grown trees by the New York government to maintain a great ecological environment around the city. However, judging by the thickness of the trees and the devastating chirps that came deep inside the forest occasionally, the government must have given up on the management and allowed the trees to grow naturally.
Overall, the stealth condition here fitted Zhang Lisheng. He shuddered and walked behind his Explorer and opened the boot. He held onto the black cloth that was covering the huge metal cage in the boot and pull it with all of his might after taking a deep breath in. He walked backward to unveil the black cloth.
As the black cloth fell onto the ground, a pair of round, enormous, dark diamond-shaped pupils stared into Zhang Lisheng’s eyes. It was panting with its ‘shh shh…’ sound that was so deep that it was hard to be heard. Standing before the five meters long Komodo monitor, Zhang Lisheng looked like a midget. If there was no cage blocking between them, he seemed like he would be swollen at once.
Looking at the small, standing animal that captured and tortured it in front, eventually, the giant lizard mustered its last strength and supported itself up. It dashed all of a sudden and bang onto the metal cage. Its skinny body that was less than three pounds made the close to three tonnes SUV shook intensely. The metal cage was brought forward bit by bit, it seemed like it was going to fall off the car.
“You have such tough will to live. Judging by such a terrible environment, you shouldn’t be able to live more than 48 hours as one of the cold-blooded animals that required strict survival environment. But you made it alive and maintained your wildness and toughness with all of your might. I hope these two qualities of yours could let you out of your misfortune…”
Zhang Lisheng mumbled to the giant lizard that was going mad expressionlessly under the cold moonlight. Subsequently, he spat a mouthful of black bloody mist and shouted the word ‘assimilate’. The blood mist spread and faded, it flowed under the moonlight and covered the giant lizard’s enormous body. The blood mist penetrated its rough and thick skin. ‘Cha…’, a soft noise was heard, the giant lizard’s bones expanded and pierced through its thick skin. The white bones were exposed in the air. Soon, it expanded to the extent of turning into a giant skeleton that was close to 10 meters long. Its torn flesh curled within its skeleton in the metal cage, there was no gap in the metal cage now.
Zhang Lisheng cursed softly, seeing that he probably wasted his $97,000 while messing up his new car boot with blood and flesh, “Oh sh*t,” He was going to drive Mountoad to hop out of his backpack and eat the giant lizard’s carcass. At that moment, the metal cage in his Explorer boot exploded. His entire car was in a complete mess. The giant lizard’s slender skeleton expanded from the boot to the ground. There were black oval scales which was the size of an adult palm growing out of its torn skin, covering its bones that were showing. As the scales were formed, a gleam flashed through its smooth surface under the moonlight. It gradually looked exactly the same as the dark surrounding. Eventually, the giant lizard’s enormous body was completely invisible.
Zhang Lisheng who fell onto the ground from the exploded cage’s impact witnessed the giant lizard’s body grew before him. It almost broke his legs. He then watched the giant lizard disappearing bit by bit, a thought popped into his mind and he said this out loud, “Chameleon… This is a chameleon’s ability…”
In modern biology, lizard belonged to scaled reptiles with many pedigrees. Some lizards had multilayer pigment cells on their skin, giving them the special ability to change their body color to blend with the surrounding. People called it a chameleon. A Komodo monitor did not belong to the chameleon race, its body was made of bumpy, touch skin with no scales at all.
However, the giant lizard that Zhang Lisheng was currently refining grew scales under his witchcraft incantation. If it happened to give it the chameleon’s ability, it would be undoubtedly a blessing. He laid on the ground for a moment and breathed in the chilly air a few times to calm himself down. He then stood up from the ground clumsily in joy and chanted witchcraft incantation with a testing manner.
All of a sudden, a monster close to 11 meters long with dark scales and four paws curled its soft body into a ball appeared before him. Looking at the length, this monster was much bigger than Mountoad expanding its body with all its might. However, its body was considered slender. Together with its gigantic claws planted deep in the ground, it did not look plump but instead, it looked extremely fast and agile.
Zhang Lisheng held his breath as he observed this beautiful, big worm that looked brutal in the whistling evening wind. All of a sudden, he drove the giant lizard into the forest not far away. As soon as the witchcraft incantation came, the giant lizard plunged forward agilely and hopped four to five meters high. Under the moonlight, its slender body disappeared entirely. Subsequently, there was a ‘paa…’ noise in the forest whereby some big trees broke into four to five parts and fell onto the ground.
“Tsk tsk, so I didn’t waste any of my money. Too bad it doesn’t have any omniscient power, but there’s a chance that I could…” Zhang Lisheng spoke Sichuan slang absentmindedly as he looked at the giant lizard’s odd stealth ability and powerful destructive ability. Sensing half of the wizard power flowing in his body, Zhang Lisheng drove the giant lizard back to him with witchcraft incantation. He then spat another mouthful of black blood and shouted ‘transform’.
The giant lizard’s enormous body grew a fold bigger as the black blood went to it, the cerebrospinal fluid in its bones boosted out of nowhere. When Zhang Lisheng drove it to attack the forest this time, it was jumping over ten meters high while its body hovered in the air for quite some time. As its scales changed color, it flew above the trees like a glider and messed up many treetops. The only thing was that its nature remained the same, despite the tremendous boost in its power.
Clenching his teeth, Zhang Lisheng who was feeling a little dizzy called his wizard worm back again. His cheeks were flushing and his eyeballs were bulging, he spat a mouthful of black blood for the third time in a short period of time and shouted the word ‘transform’. After strengthening his giant worm and squeezing his spirit dry, he drove it into the forest once again.
As he looked at the giant lizard again, two hieroglyphic words finally appeared in his head on its own – nihilate, solidate. At the same time, the giant lizard that was dashing turned into nothingness. It passed through two big, lush trees like a shadow and broke the third fir tree on the last row with its mouth.
“Expand, shrink. Nihilate, solidate. Mountoad has a tough body, it’s great for a long-distance attack. The giant lizard, no, let’s give it a name. Dragon… komodo dragon… Let’s call it Island Dragon. Island Dragon has a powerful lethality, agile speed and the ability to travel through obstacles in the form of nothingness. These two wizard worms are perfectly compatible…” Zhang Lisheng mumbled in excitement while watching the giant lizard’s terrifying performance from far away.
He felt nauseous from his stirred emotion and fell onto the ground, “Or rather, it would be perfect if it doesn’t drain so much of wizard power,” He forced a smile and rested for a long time on the ground clumsily before getting up again. He was surprised to find his second time of wizard worm refinement went well and its power was out of his expectation. Now that the worm hunting was over, the biggest issue he had now was how to get home.
He began looking at his destroyed Explorer that he had just bought. Apart from the front windshield and the two windows in the front row that was in one piece, the four windows at the back were completely broken. Looking into the broken window, he could see faintly that there was blood all over his car interior and the broken metal tubes under the moonlight. Fortunately, the damage was not considered serious judging by the fact that the car was not deformed from the outside. However, he would definitely bring trouble to himself if he was to drive the car with four broken windows and boot filled with blood on the road.
Zhang Lisheng thought about it and began chanting witchcraft incantation. He drove Mountoad out of his backpack and forcefully expanded it to half a meter tall. It then licked the blood in the car and the metal tubes were cleaned by its huge tongue. The blood became Mountoad’s foul saliva, the situation seemed worse now, but at least it would not attract anyone’s attention and call the police.
As soon as he was done with that, Zhang Lisheng put away Mountoad in his backpack and went into the Explorer by limping. He turned on the lights and started the engine. As a soft ‘cha’ sound went off, the SUV’s engine started successfully. He drove slowly while tolerating the strength and chanting of his witchcraft incantation softly.
The giant lizard’s enormous body disappeared under the moonlight as Zhang Lisheng chanted ‘pst shh…’ in the car, so soft that it was almost inaudible. It hopped onto the top of the car agilely and curled its body in an odd angle. Although its body was enormous, its weight did not grow too much. To the large SUV’s reinforced top, such a burden was nothing. Zhang Lisheng realized the situation was much better than he thought as he drove slowly for a while. He was getting braver and braver, eventually, he accelerated into the road tolerating the stench and chilly wind.