Age of Evolution

Chapter 162 - 162: 162: Honeycomb (Third Update)

Li Changying burst into a grin and hurriedly took two steps to catch up with Lin Zhen.

He was a tough guy with a straightforward character, and he admired those with great courage. Lin Zhen’s plan to challenge the heavens had immediately won him over.

Regardless of life or death in the future, he would take a shot with Lin Zhen first!

Seeing Li Changying’s dark face smiling, Lin Zhen was also happy in his heart. Having Jiang Huai and Lou Qingfeng as companions was not completely reassuring. A team needs at least three or four strong members. And Li Changying was undoubtedly the best choice to join the team.

As for overthrowing the Sky Dome, it will probably take a long time, but without saying this, how could Lin Zhen make Li Changying submit? Both of them were fast, and half a day later, Lin Zhen finally saw the legendary hive.

After passing through the dense forest, the view suddenly opened up.

A long tree trunk lay across, with a huge mound in the middle. Numerous slender branches were twisted together on the mound, with countless flower buds waiting to bloom on it.

Unlike those flower buds that hadn’t bloomed before the appearance of the Star Crystals, these flower buds clearly had Star Crystals hidden within them. The only question was why the petals wrapped around the crystals once more.

At a glance, there were definitely more than a thousand flowers on this mound, or even thousands!

Each Star Crystal inside the petals looked like a colorful lantern in a child’s hand, beautiful and hazy.

Above the mound, about a hundred meters up, an immensely enormous bee hive hung from a tree trunk.

From Lin Zhen’s perspective, the bee hive was somewhat blurry, countless shadows flying around it. The light was refracted due to the excessive obstruction, causing the air in that place to have a bizarre distortion, strange and colorful.

Mutated honeybees, mutated wasps, and mutated hornets buzzed like little airplanes but never strayed too far from the hive.

There were martial artists waiting at a distance on both sides of the tree trunk near the mound.

Since the mound was in the middle of the tree trunk, it could only be approached from both ends of it. Other locations were suspended in the air, so the best spots to pick the crystals were in the east and west directions.

On each side, there were five rows of people lined up in a queue, with a distance of about twenty meters between each row. Beyond a hundred meters, there was no place left to stand.

Li Changying explained to Lin Zhen: “Lin Zhen, you see, this place is very different from the Ant Nest because all the Star Crystals are concentrated on this mound.”

“Why are the Star Crystals wrapped in petals? After crystallization, shouldn’t the flowers bloom?” Lin Zhen asked.

“That’s the most different part. After the flowers with Star Crystals bloom, the mutated honeybees will continue to collect nectar. This prevents the Star Crystals from absorbing more energy, so they instinctively protect their stamens. When they appear and are harvested by bees, they learn to close their petals.”

“So that’s how it is, but in this case, how do we pick the Star Crystals?”

Li Changying pointed at the huge bee hive above them, “It depends on when the nectar drips from this place.”

“Nectar will drip down? There’s still honey inside the hive?” Lin Zhen looked up at the sky.

“You can say that. After the bees mutated, they still retained their instinct to collect nectar. However, there isn’t any real nectar left in the stamens of the Star Fruit Tree flowers. What they collect is actually energy, stored in the hive.

Over time, the hive can’t hold it all, and the energy slowly drips out.”

Li Changying pointed at the densely packed holes under the hive: “Energy honey might drip from those holes at any time. Whenever a drop of honey falls and lands precisely on a Star Crystal flower, the petals will open to absorb the energy honey and let the Star Crystal grow. That’s when we martial artists can pick them. ”

Lin Zhen nodded, marveling at the wonders of this world, where nothing was impossible.

“The closer you are to the mound, the better chance you have of picking a Star Crystal.”

“Yes, the first five spots in the front row are the best, with a clear view and close distance. Star Crystals appear, and they can pick them at the first moment, while the people in the second row, due to the distance, will certainly be slower, and the chances of getting a Star Crystal become smaller. Picking Star Crystals here is a competition, and the elimination is quite cruel.”

While Li Changying was talking, the martial artists below suddenly became agitated: “There’s honey!”

Lin Zhen looked up and saw a golden liquid forming into a drop shape in a small hole in the bee hive. The drop was getting bigger and looked like it would fall at any moment.

Lin Zhen observed the direction of the falling honeydrop, which should be on the west side of the mound.

The martial artists on the east side also saw this and sighed. This time, they had no chance.

The honey finally fell, even shining as it fell, landing directly on top of a flower bud.

As the flower bud was nourished by the honey, it immediately opened its petals, greedily absorbing the energy of the honey, and the Star Crystal inside was revealed at this moment.

“Planet Crystal!”

Someone sighed. For the majority of Level Nine Martial Generals present, the use of a Planet Crystal was not significant, but it was better than nothing, so several Martial Artists lunged out to compete for it.

However, several Martial Artists sitting in the first row on the left did not move. Lin Zhen even noticed that of the five seats in the first row, only three were occupied, with two empty seats.

Those who rushed out were immediately attacked by honeybees. Three of the Martial Artists were in a group, and their cooperation was seamless, with someone plucking the crystal while others were responsible for defending and covering.

Out of the five Martial Artists competing, the group of three finally succeeded in seizing the Planet Crystal.

The other two Martial Artists, a man and a woman, seemed to be part of another team. The female Martial Artist performed very well, appearing to be a natural Divine Speedster, even holding her own in the competition against two Martial Generals of the group of three, but the male Martial Artist shrank back at a critical moment.

Without coverage, the female Martial Artist was attacked and still rushed out, but an arm was severely stung by a Mutated Honeybee, its spear-like stinger piercing through her arm, causing her to break out in a cold sweat.

The team that seized the Planet Crystal returned happily, and after discussing for a moment, one of the Level Nine Martial Generals left to find a place to absorb the Star Crystal.

By this time, Lin Zhen had roughly figured out the pattern of the bee nest.

Martial Artists on both the east and west sides were gathered around the large mound, where the Star Crystals were harvested. Whichever side the energy honey fell on, that side’s people would go and pick it up.

Some Martial Artists had clearly reached the level of compressing their Dantian Qi, and they would only be interested in Constant Star Crystals, ignoring other Star Crystals.

Furthermore, during the competition for Star Crystals, it was common for Martial Artists to fight each other, to trip up and play dirty tricks for the sake of gaining benefits.

It’s no wonder Li Changying said this was a cruel elimination ground, which was even more brutal than the Ant Nest and also had many more people than there.

As Lin Zhen and Li Changying were watching, a Martial Artist walked towards them.

“Li Changying? You dare to come back to the Beehive? I thought you’d run away and never show your face again. Don’t you know that Boss Zhou gave a secret order that anyone can assassinate you?”

Li Changying snorted coldly, “Tong Huan, since I dare to come back, I’m not afraid of his assassination. I’m here to challenge the Beehive ranking again.”

Tong Huan was the receptionist of the Beehive, and he smirked when he heard Li Changying’s words, “Well, you need a team to do that. Is this the guy who came with you? The two of you are not enough.”

“That’s not for you to worry about. In a couple of days, someone will come.”

“Alright then, since you insist on coming back, I won’t stop you. You can do as you please. You know the rules of the challenge, once you’re successful, we’ll take thirty percent of the Star Crystals you earn.”

Tong Huan said as he got up and left, lying down on a branch not far away.

Lin Zhen looked at Li Changying, “Even if Jiang Huai and Lou Qingfeng come, we still need one more person to form a team. Do you know anyone else here?”

Li Changying sighed helplessly, “Zhou Butong is the boss here, and the first group on the west side is his team. Since I offended him, I’m afraid the old people here won’t want to team up with me.”

Hearing this, Lin Zhen also felt a headache. If he had known this earlier, he should have let Ma Mingxing or Sun Tie come over to make up the numbers. But since those two wanted to stay in the Ant Nest, Lin Zhen couldn’t force them.

The two slowly moved deeper into the Beehive, and Lin Zhen even saw several people who had chased after Li Changying that day. When they saw Lin Zhen, although there was still some fear in their eyes, it was not like that day, and they obviously didn’t care too much about Lin Zhen in the Beehive.

As they were looking around, a commotion came from up ahead.

A girl seemed to be begging the others, “Please, don’t drive me away. My hand will recover, I swear I won’t be a burden.”

“Zhao Xiaoman, there’s no need to say anything else. Our team won’t support useless people. In the past, you were fine, but now you’re poisoned. Not only do you need an antidote, but also the energy of a Constant Star Crystal to clear the toxins from your body. We don’t have enough Constant Star Crystals, how can we give them to you? Besides, we don’t have the antidote either. If you want, you can go find Boss Zhou.”

The girl called Zhao Xiaoman looked around twenty years old, dressed in purple leather clothes, quite pretty, and seemed to be one of the previous batch of students. At this moment, her face was pale, and one of her arms was swollen; the toxins from the honeybee had entered her body, and she needed treatment soon.

Li Changying sighed when he saw this scene, “This kind of situation has happened before. The antidotes are all in Zhou Butong’s hands. If Zhao Xiaoman wants to stay, she has to go beg Zhou Butong, but if she ends up in that bastard’s hands…. sigh!”