Two days later, the first ‘Yashan Brand Exoskeleton Rune’ was successfully engraved. Su Hao began to infuse it with blood energy. The moment the rune was completed, it burst out with blinding brilliance, temporarily blinding Yashan.
“Boss Wei, what is this?” Yashan’s eyes were still somewhat dazed, but he was trying to act surprised.
Su Hao smiled and replied, “This is power!”
He continued, “Yashan, let me first teach you how to control your blood energy.”
Yashan scratched his head and asked, “Blood energy? What’s that?”
Su Hao explained, “It’s the energy accumulated in your body. You have a significant amount of energy within your body, but you instinctively use it to transform into a 【Rampager】. However, the use of blood energy is not limited to that. So, if you want to gain the power to defeat the Bone Demon, you need to learn how to control your body, including the energy within your body.”
Yashan was eager and said, “Boss Wei…”
Su Hao nodded and started teaching Yashan the method of controlling blood energy. There were three advantages to teaching Yashan this. First, Su Hao could confirm whether the energy consumed during evolution was indeed blood energy. If it was, he could choose the timing for his evolution without fear of sudden death.
The second advantage was that with Yashan mastering blood energy, he could accumulate it at the fastest rate, thus accelerating the prerequisite for advancing to 【Thorned Beast】, making it more convenient for Su Hao’s research and saving time.
The third benefit was that Su Hao needed to conduct some runic experiments on Yashan’s body because he was very interested in the 【Shell Rune People】 sequence of exceptional individuals, especially the Bone Demon he had seen that day. With proper execution, a large number of runes could be inscribed on the exoskeleton, allowing him to go anywhere.
A year later, Su Hao was eight years old. During this year, he wandered the city of Silin every night, collecting the blood of various first-level and second-level exceptional individuals, and even making some gains with third-level exceptional individuals.
The database within the Bullet Ball Space was now very rich.
Furthermore, he had already marked all exceptional gene sequences except for the 【Prophet People】 sequence.
In addition, he had decrypted the expression functions of many common genes.
This achievement was not without its cost, as it had claimed the lives of quite a few unfortunate little hamsters.
Overall, Su Hao’s progress had been very smooth.
The only problem was that in this year, Temple Forest City had an unexpected visitor who roamed the city at night, causing chaos. Su Hao recognized his identity; it was the Silk Demon who had reduced 【Speed Demon】 to pieces on that day.
Every night, this Silk Demon wandered around the city, shouting for the 【Night Demon】 to hand over something. The city was in turmoil, and ordinary people hid in their homes, fearing for their lives at night.
The key problem was that the Silk Demon didn’t distinguish right from wrong. If he saw anyone, he believed that person was the 【Night Demon】 he was looking for and subjected them to severe interrogation, even going so far as to kill them if his mood was bad.
The Silk Demon had become a major villain in Temple Forest City!
If Su Hao hadn’t been unprepared and was eager to research the Silk Demon’s body structure and gene sequence personally, then it would be proper to get rid of evil and uphold justice.
What was particularly troubling about the Silk Demon was that many exceptional individuals reduced their nighttime activities due to fear of him, staying at home and making Su Hao’s gene collection work more challenging.
Fortunately, he had successfully deciphered the exceptional gene sequences of first and second-level exceptional individuals.
Thinking about it, Su Hao was ready to meet this Silk Demon after making sufficient preparations. The Silk Demon was too violent and looked like the Great Demon King of Temple Forest City, going for the kill directly. Otherwise, one day, someone might be inexplicably sliced into pieces while walking down the street.
The Silk Demon had been looking for the 【Night Demon】 for a year, found nothing, and still showed no signs of stopping.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Yashan had successfully mastered the conversion of blood energy, obtained elite blood energy, and could control it flexibly.
The Yashan Brand Rune made progress fairly smoothly, successfully etching runes onto Yashan’s exoskeleton.
The challenge of engraving runes on Yashan’s exoskeleton lay in the fact that every time Yashan transformed, the engraved runes would be automatically repaired by his body, causing them to dissipate. To use them again, they needed to be etched once more.
Su Hao quickly came up with a solution for this issue: tattoos! He tattooed the runes on Yashan’s body, and when Yashan transformed into a 【Rampager】, the clear patterns of the tattoos would appear on his exoskeleton.
This idea worked successfully. Even after transforming, the exoskeleton still had the tattoo patterns.
Another issue was that the runes’ patterns required a blood energy compatibility difference to be effective. This was also easily resolved by selecting suitable tattoo materials, much like sealing a stamp. Filling the blank areas outside the exoskeleton patterns with the tattoo material created the necessary blood energy compatibility difference.
When Yashan transformed into a 【Rampager】, he only needed to input blood energy into the patterns on the exoskeleton at a certain speed, taking less than a second to activate the rune’s effect.
After completing the etching, Yashan was overjoyed, as if he had gained a new toy. However, Su Hao was aware that while Yashan’s smile increased, his hatred remained undiminished.
Su Hao etched more than ten commonly used runes on Yashan, including “hard,” “barrier,” “deflection,” “penetration,” “sharp,” “corrosion,” “double burst,” “strong light,” “fire ring,” “high voltage,” “earth thorn,” “coordination,” and “light absorption.”
Yashan practiced tirelessly day and night, gradually mastering the use of runes and applying them flexibly in battles.
For Su Hao, tattooing runes on Yashan was a trivial task since Yashan only learned how to use them but didn’t understand the principles. It was essentially the same as nothing. Moreover, Su Hao had added a backdoor to each rune, allowing him to retrieve them from Yashan’s body if necessary.
Most importantly, the 【Shell Rune】 sequence was genuinely suitable for him. He was curious whether this characteristic would be maintained after evolving into 【Thorned Beast】 and 【Bone Demon】.
One day, Yashan found Su Hao and calmly said, “Boss Wei, I’ve located the 【Thorned Beast】. I plan to hunt down its flesh and blood tonight.”
Su Hao nodded and asked, “Do you need help?”
Yashan immediately shook his head and said, “No need. I want to obtain the evolution using my current strength personally. However, Boss Wei, please stay nearby to watch over me. If I fail, I hope you will come to my rescue.”
Su Hao agreed, “I will.”
Su Hao didn’t want Yashan to die in vain.
At that moment, a five-year-old porcelain doll peeked out from the room, asking, “Daddy, Uncle Wei, where are you going? Take Taini with you!”
Su Hao said, “Call me ‘big brother’…”
Taini timidly called out, “Big brother…”
But Su Hao knew it was futile; the next day, she would address him as ‘uncle’ again.
Upon seeing Taini, Yashan awkwardly smiled, closed his mouth, and remained silent.
Su Hao went over and patted Taini’s little head, saying, “We’re just staying at home, not going anywhere. Come on, today, big brother will allow Taini to pick your favorite little hamster as your companion.”
Taini’s large, round eyes instantly lit up, and she asked with excitement, “Really? I want the white little hamster.”
The hamster they kept for experiments had a round, adorable appearance. Taini had been yearning for it for a while but had been refused by Su Hao, who claimed that the little hamster might bite. Today, in a good mood, he directly fulfilled Taini’s small wish.
Su Hao replied, “Of course, you can have it now.”
Taini excitedly ran over, grabbed Su Hao’s hand, and dragged him to the feeding area, saying, “Hurry, hurry.”
She pointed to the fattest and largest little hamster and said, “Uncle Wei, I want that one, that one.”
Su Hao was speechless and said, “Call me ‘big brother’.”
Taini giggled and said, “Big brother, I want the big one.”
Su Hao found a rope, tightly tied the tail of the little hamster, and handed it to Taini, saying, “Here, take it to play. Be sure to keep an eye on it and don’t lose it.”
Taini said, “Okay,” and immediately picked up the little hamster and ran off.
At that moment, Yashan finally relaxed, breathed a sigh of relief, and praised Su Hao, saying, “Boss Wei, you’re truly amazing. You have a way with kids!”
Su Hao’s mouth twitched and said, “Of course!”
He had transformed into a child so many times that every time he heard about children, he felt tired.
Internally, he lamented, “Ah… I don’t dare to have fun anymore. Please let me grow up quickly.”
Night soon fell. The nocturnal hunters left their nests quietly, looking for their prey.
Su Hao and Yashan were ready.
So, who was the prey?
