Chapter 870: Evolution Network
Evolution Network
Half an hour later, the area was flooded with countless corpse fragments. Natalie, now only half a body remaining, suddenly opened her eyes. The nearby corpse fragments vanished like foam, and her body had been fully restored.
It was just that her body was somewhat different from the original.
"Is that deity named Lin Ye a god associated with the ocean?"
Natalie looked at her soft arms, which had transformed into octopus tentacles, her expression incredibly complicated.
"No. Your level is too low. You have no qualification to contact deities at all. This is the ability of one of his node creatures."
Lin Ye still couldn't sense the Parasitism Network, but with Natalie's help, he at least had some ability to fight back.
"I was too hasty earlier. I just picked one at random. This panel is way too complicated. I can't make sense of it."
Natalie stared at the system panel existing within her consciousness. There were thousands of evolution routes on it, and she had no idea which one to choose.
"Complicated? They didn't give you the basic panel? Damn, that's their evolution panel. Don't go randomly clicking things!"
This genuinely exceeded Lin Ye's expectations. The mental network stored various panels of different specifications, including special panels prepared specifically for the new version of parasitic nodes. When he saw tentacles appearing on Natalie, Lin Ye had actually already considered this possibility.
Because the new version of parasitic nodes could change bodies at any time, those special panels contained many bizarre evolution routes, and a significant number of them leaned toward experimental in nature, with extreme uncertainty.
"Ah? Then what am I supposed to do? Am I going to turn into a monster?"
Natalie wiggled her tentacles. Although the evolution routes on the panel looked incredibly powerful, she really didn't want to evolve into a monster.
"I can't do anything about it either. You must have messed up the content of your prayer... You weren't praying for the deity to keep you alive the whole time, were you?"
Octopus, jellyfish, multi-headed shark - among these three semi-independent parasitic nodes, the octopus had the strongest survival capability, which was why tentacles had grown on Natalie's body.
With no connection to the Parasitism Network, Lin Ye couldn't help Natalie switch her system panel either.
"...That's right. Because I didn't want to die."
Natalie revealed a relieved smile. This was exactly what she had prayed to the deity for.
"You can try praying again to get a basic panel. If that doesn't work, I suggest you choose those main trunk evolution routes in the middle. The further out the route, the more extreme it is... Oh, and don't pick that self-destruct trunk route."
All the system panels were written by Lin Ye, so he had a general idea of what those panels contained. However, since his mental energy had been greatly weakened, many details were fuzzy in his memory.
"But evolution requires collecting materials. Where am I supposed to find materials?"
Natalie looked at the complex information on the panel and felt a headache coming on.
"Flesh evolution routes don't need special materials. You only need to create mutation organs of different tiers. Materials are everywhere around here. As long as you can find suitable corpse fragments, you'll quickly advance and become a ninth-tier spiritual energy user."
Of course, that was all on the premise that Lin Ye could control the Parasitism Network to help her create suitable mutation organs.
But clearly, they didn't have those conditions right now. Natalie could only find corpse fragments of similar types and hand them over to the mental network for processing.
That was highly unstable.
Lin Ye had no idea what kind of abominations those parasitic nodes would cook up.
"That easy?"
Natalie found it hard to believe. Even when trading with a deity, one had to follow a certain degree of equivalent exchange, and she hadn't offered up a sacrificial offering worthy of receiving such grace.
"A hastily assembled body isn't the most stable, but it's definitely way stronger than your original body. Ignoring stamina, you could take on several thousand of your same-tier opponents without issue. And the higher the tier, the bigger the gap."
This was the system panel Lin Ye had created for the parasitic nodes, incorporating his understanding of flesh and blood Alienation.
"I'll go find materials right now."
Natalie extended her tentacles, letting Lin Ye step onto them.
"There's a decent piece of material over there. You can check the system panel to see what mutation organs it can transform into, then pick a suitable route."
Lin Ye pointed at the corpse fragments not far away.
"...This is a complete heart? Let me see... It can transform into a flesh core... This evolution route seems pretty good too... But it requires paying 10 parasitism points... What are parasitism points?"
Natalie asked, somewhat confused.
"That's a trading system currently in testing. Don't worry about it. Just submit it directly."
When a parasitic node transforms a parasitic organism, it gains one parasitism point. Parasitic organisms can also transform new parasitic organisms to earn parasitism points, and then use those points to evolve into new parasitic nodes.
But this was only the test version. The Parasitism Network didn't really need this system right now.
If Lin Ye weren't on this Plane, Natalie wouldn't have been able to connect to the Parasitism Network at all.
Once Lin Ye's mental energy grew stronger, strong enough to approach the level of a deity, he might be able to establish a massive cross-Plane Parasitism Network through the mental world.
Though externally, it couldn't be called the Parasitism Network anymore.
'Maybe it could be called... the Evolution Network.'
Lin Ye glanced at Natalie. She could be considered the first member of the Evolution Network.
"...Doesn't this seem a bit off? It doesn't look quite like the picture..."
Natalie held up a squirming octopus. That was the flesh and blood organ the mental network had Alienated for her.
"Nothing I can do. You don't have evolution points, so you can only use this defective product made by the node creature. Just make do with it."
Lin Ye couldn't create precise mutation organs for her, so he could only leave it to the octopus node for processing.
"Is this really okay? Why do I feel like it's staring at me?"
Natalie brought the octopus close to her mouth. Under normal circumstances, replacing a mutation organ was an extremely troublesome process. Some routes on the system panel had similar conditions, but this octopus seemed to require nothing more than swallowing it whole.
"It is staring at you. This is a living organ. If you don't swallow it soon, it's going to run away."
Lin Ye really wanted to shove the octopus into Natalie's mouth, but he couldn't reach.
"...Fine."
Natalie closed her eyes and stuffed the octopus into her mouth.
The octopus didn't struggle. It slid down her esophagus and into her stomach as smoothly as silk.
"Ugh!"
Natalie clutched her stomach and collapsed onto her knees among the corpse fragments. That octopus was already remodeling her body.
Massive amounts of spiritual energy surged into her. The core replaced her heart and began changing her entire circulatory system, along with the rest of her organs.
Fifteen minutes passed before Natalie finally relaxed her tense body.
"...This feeling is so strange. I feel like I've become an octopus."
Natalie climbed up from the corpse fragments and slowly moved her body.