Chapter 41: The Third Plant

The corners of Maine’s mouth curled up slightly, and he looked at him with a smile, “Want me to call you brother?”

Xie Sen inexplicably felt a hint of danger, and instantly wimped out as he muttered, “I’m older than you, so you should call me that.”

Maine reached out and rubbed his head. His tone firmly dispelled his thoughts, “No way.”

“Cut it out,” Xie Sen spat as he tilted his head away from his hand. “Anything is possible, and I’ll definitely make you call me that from now on!”

A smile flashed in Maine’s eyes. “That’s up to you.”

Xie Sen rolled his eyes, but couldn’t think of a good idea at the moment, so he asked, “What’s your birthday?”

“The 25th.”

“Wow, I’m exactly one month older than you!”

The two of them chatted casually, and soon dinner was ready. They sat in the living room, and as they ate dinner Xie Sen looked around. “Where’s the bird?”

“It flew out this afternoon, probably foraging for food.” Maine didn’t really care.

Xie Sen, “You didn’t give it anything to eat?”

Maine shook his head. “There’s not enough food in the whole fridge for him to eat.”

Xie Sen was stunned. He knew yesterday that the bird was a big eater, but he hadn’t expected it to be so amazing. The amount of food it ate should crush it to death. He didn’t know how it could eat like that.

He told Maine Sun Mao’s guess. Maine nodded. “I’ve checked. It should be a white-headed eagle beast.”

“I didn’t expect the first S class contract beast I saw to be so small and cute.” Xie Sen exclaimed.

Maine opened the bracelet, pulled up the information, expanded the virtual screen, then turned the screen to Xie Sen and raised an eyebrow, “Small and cute? You wouldn’t think so if you saw it as an adult.”

Xie Sen looked over, only to see the entire screen almost occupied by a giant bird flying in mid-air. The bird was very large. A single wing spread at least three meters, while the bird’s head was covered with hard white feathers, and the rest of the feathers were shiny black. It’s sharp claws, and the hook in the beak, all shone with a sharp light.

The giant bird’s light gray eyes were looking at the screen, stern and fierce as if it would attack in the next second. Just looking at the photo gave him chills.

Xie Sen not only had a back chill, but a heart chill as well. He stood up violently. The stool was knocked back by him, rubbed against the floor and caused a harsh sound.

Maine looked at him with surprise. “Scared?” He reached out to turn off the bracelet.

“Don’t turn it off!” Xie Sen hurriedly said, he propped his hand on the table, as he leaned his body closer to get a better look at the photo.

Sure enough, it was right!

The image of the bird was exactly the same as the leader of the beasts that attacked Star City with Maine in the book!

Xie Sen tried his best to recall more details, but only remembered the description of Maine’s attack, when Maine used his skills to hack into Star City’s largest live platform, then brazenly and arrogantly announced his return for revenge.

At that time, there was a giant bird hovering next to him. A white-headed eagle beast who was the leader of the beasts. Xie Sen’s hands clenched into fist. The original Maine that blackened that night had encountered the white-headed eagle.

He couldn’t help but be a little scared. If he hadn’t found Maine that night, would Maine have left Star City and disappeared? And when he came back again, it would have been very likely that he would have followed the plot of the book and taken the grown-up white-headed eagle to attack Star City.

“Chirp.” A clear bird call came from outside the window, and in a short while, the chubby bird stood on Maine’s raised left wrist. It stretched out its wings, patted its bulging belly, cocked its round head and looked at Xie Sen, cheerfully. “Chirp!”

Xie Sen looked at it, and then looked at the virtual screen. His expression kept changing.

The two villainous bosses had gathered, what should he do now?

Things weren’t the same as in the book anymore, and Maine wasn’t completely blackened, but… Would everything suddenly go back to the original trajectory? He stared at the palm-sized bird, and his eyes gradually took on a killing intent.

If he killed it, would Maine have no way to contact the beasts? Then the terrible scene of Star City being attacked by the beasts, would it not appear?

“Chirp.” The little bird emitted a sound that dropped several degrees lower than usual. It blinked its big eyes. Two wings covered its chest, and its neck shrunk. It was a resigned look. The half of its head feathers that were tangled in blood hadn’t been cleaned, and it looked really, really pitiful.

“Don’t like it?” Maine asked.

Xie Sen said, “How long will it take for it to reach adulthood?”

“Senior contract beasts have a long time until adulthood. At least three years.”

Xie Sen looked at the young white-headed eagle that was staring at him, and then at Maine. If it doesn’t grow up with the blackened Maine, things could be different! He couldn’t take away the rest of the creature’s life just because of what might happen, not to mention, the creature’s intelligence was comparable to a human.

“If you don’t want to raise it and don’t like it, just kill it.” Maine said with little emotion. The moment the words fell, he suddenly reached out, and grabbed the bird with one hand.

“Chirp!!!” Screeching birdsong suddenly exploded in the living room.

Xie Sen was startled, and when he saw Maine’s murderous look, he hurriedly grabbed his hand. “No, let go of it. I like it.”

Maine looked at him, and let go of his hand. The bird swung its wings, turned its body around and pecked at Maine’s face. Maine easily dodged, and stared at it with an unfriendly face.

When he saw that the bird was about to attack Maine again, Xie Sen hurriedly spoke up. “He’s playing with you. It’s just to test your reaction ability, it won’t happen again!”

The little bird didn’t react to his words. Although it was young, it was born with a fierce nature in its bones, and was super vindictive. It attacked again and again, but Maine dodged and wasn’t angry. It was trying to attack from all angles, and just wanted to peck Maine.

Xie Sen was alarmed. Although the bird was small, its speed was very fast. Even though Maine could easily dodge, if it were him, his face would have been pecked and disfigured. He thought about it and said, “Chirp.”

Instantly, one person and one bird both stopped moving and turned in unison towards him.

Xie Sen blushed slightly, then raised his eyebrows proudly, and waved towards the bird. “Don’t be angry, rest for a while. Have you eaten?”

The little bird chirped twice at Maine in the fiercest tone, as it landed on the table and pointed its fat ass at him. Then it walked to Xie Sen, patted its stomach with its wings, and rubbed Xie Sen’s hand on the table.

The feathers on its body were particularly soft, which tickled Xie Sen’s hand. Xie Sen poked his finger at its fat body. “You’re so fat. You’ll be called Tuan Tuan from now on. Remember not to hurt anyone, understand?”

The little bird nodded its head. “Chirp.”

Xie Sen called out tentatively, “Tuan Tuan.” 1

“Chirp.”

Xie Sen praised, “So smart.”

Maine looked at him. “What happened to you just now? When you saw the picture, you didn’t react right.”

Xie Sen laughed dryly. “I was just shocked. I didn’t expect such a cute little guy to be so fierce as an adult.”

“Were you worried about it hurting people in the future, so you intended to kill it?” Maine asked, having followed his thoughts.

“I was the one who thought wrong,” Xie Sen said, as he nodded at Tuan Tuan’s small body. “S class contract beasts have high IQs, and being tough is even less of a crime.”

Maine looked at him, and Xie Sen smiled. “Hurry up and eat. It’s getting cold.”

When the two of them finished eating, Xie Sen took Maine’s injury into account, and refused to let him wash the dishes. He then cleaned up the dishes himself, and went to the kitchen. Tuan Tuan kept following him, and was flying around him as it curiously watched him do his work.

Xie Sen knew it had a high IQ, so he didn’t see it as an animal but as a child, and introduced the kitchen while he washed the dishes. He wasn’t expecting it to understand everything, since washing dishes was boring anyway.

After he washed the dishes, he looked at the feathers on top of Tuan Tuan’s head which hadn’t been cleaned, and reached out. “Let me help you clean them.”

Xie Sen took him to the bedroom, checked its head, and found that the wound had healed. He stopped worrying, and washed its head feathers with a little water from the sink.

Although he was very careful, it was hard to avoid getting its whole head wet, and all the head feathers drooped down and stuck to its head.

It looked as if it was bald.

“Chirp!!!” Tuan Tuan stared at the mirror for a moment, called out mournfully, then turned its back to the mirror, and tilted its head to look at Xie Sen aggressively.

Xie Sen took a piece of paper towel, and gently sucked the water from its feathers as he said, “It will become beautiful when it dries.”

Sure enough, that night after Tuan Tuan’s head feathers were clean, the white feathers naturally fluffed up, and were so beautiful that Tuan Tuan flew in front of the mirror for a while before it flew out of Xie Sen’s bedroom.

Xie Sen was getting ready for bed, when Maine came to his bedroom and sat down by the bed naturally.

Xie Sen was stunned. “What are you doing?”

Maine said, “Don’t you have nightmares in your sleep? I’ll keep you company.”

Xie Sen blinked and moved to the side. It was good to sleep together. He wouldn’t have to worry about Maine sneaking away.

On Saturday afternoon, Xie Sen was playing a game with the children at the orphanage when a familiar warmth suddenly filled his mind. His eyes lit up. The hard-backed, green book in the System slowly turned over, and dense vines gradually appeared on the third blank page. Finally, a circle was outlined in the middle of the vines, the circle turned from virtual to real. When the real appearance emerged, Xie Sen couldn’t help but laugh out loud.

“Congratulations master for activating the watermelon vine. The toughness of the watermelon vine is at your discretion.”

Xie Sen was flabbergasted. So the main part was the watermelon vine, and the supporting part was the watermelons!

He looked at the exchange button, and a prompt immediately appeared in his mind, “One energy for one meter of watermelon vine, please choose the quantity.”

Xie Sen blinked, what about watermelon? He was more interested in eating now. When he thought of the taste of watermelon, he couldn’t wait to eat it. He checked his remaining energy, only 2. He wanted to give back to the children and wanted to try to redeem it, but didn’t really want to.

He looked at the blank fourth page. At the bottom it showed 2/400. That meant the fourth plant needed four hundred energy. He wasn’t very anxious. After all, by activating three plants, Adam could already feel where the scattered energy was. When he thought about that, Xie Sen closed the System, and continued to play games with the children. Only when the children were about to eat dinner, did he say goodbye and leave, at which point his remaining energy value was 8.

He went straight back to the apartment, and paged Adam.

Adam blew a bunch of rainbow farts as usual before he started to feel the energy. Xie Sen only felt the temperature of the pattern on his right shoulder getting higher and higher until he even thought he would get burned, when Adam spoke again and the temperature dropped rapidly.

“The red energy is on this planet,” Adam’s voice was a little weak.

Xie Sen asked worriedly, “Are you okay?”

“Yes, I can only feel the red energy now. The rest of the energy is farther away than it is, and is disturbed by the red energy, so I can’t feel it for now.” Adam said.

Xie Sen opened the bracelet, and entered the Starnet to find the map of Brandt Star. The map was very large. Except for the three main cities in the middle, the periphery was full of continuous wild forests, and the middle of the forest was marked with red lines to form a ring-shaped area. He asked Adam, “Can you sense exactly where it is?”

“To the east, about a thousand kilometers from here.”

Xie Sen marked their location, then found the location a thousand kilometers to the east, and looked at the destination. He bemoaned, “This is too hard!”

It was in the middle of the deserted forest! Even without having looked up the information, just a glance at the red area marker, and he knew it was dangerous.

“Difficult? Why?” Adam wondered.

Xie Sen explained, “The forest beasts are rampant and the plants are also exceptionally tough. There are even carnivorous plants. The location is in the most dangerous central area. In addition to that, there may be poisonous gas and miasma. I don’t know if there is any decent terrain either.”

Adam, “You carry a natural aura. As long as you don’t actively attack, moving plants generally won’t attack you. As for the rest of the difficulties…A’Sen, you must have a way, right? You can definitely get the red energy. I believe in you!”

Xie Sen looked at the sky. “I can’t believe in myself.”

“No! How can you think that? You’re the best!” Adam’s tone of encouragement was followed by pressure. “If you don’t get the energy back, your body won’t be able to recover, and…The consequences of dragging out your soul’s instability for too long will be serious.”

“What consequences?”

“Your soul leaving your body.”

Xie Sen was shocked. Wasn’t that death? He took a deep breath, “I will find a way to find the energy, but…I can’t see the energy, can I?”

Adam explained, “The energy will find its carrier. I can feel it, and as soon as you see it, I’ll sense it, and I’ll tell you.”

“Okay, I got it. I’ll think about what to do to prepare.”

“Go, Sen. I’m going to refill my energy.”

Xie Sen walked out of the room, worried. Once he reached the living room, he met Maine who had just returned. Xie Sen looked at him in his black strong clothes. He was clearly dressed for hunting, so he asked, “You went to the forest?”

“Yes.”

Xie Sen got angry, and took him by the hand, as he pulled on his collar to check his shoulder injury, “Are you crazy? Don’t you know you’re injured? Huh…”

The original bloody wound was only a black scar, and it didn’t look like anything was wrong.

Maine said, “I’m fine. The scabbing will fall off in two days.”

Xie Sen was stunned. “Your recovery ability is too strong!”

Maine gave him an exasperated look, and rubbed the top of his hair. “Modern medicine and trauma technology is the best. This recovery rate is normal.”

Xie Sen knew he had made another mistake of common sense. He coughed dryly, then changed the subject. “Did you go hunting?”

“No,” Maine said. “I read the news report. There seems to be some big changes deep in the deserted forest. One after another, people found different species of senior contract beasts at the edge of the danger zone. I went to the forest to see, but there’s no change at the periphery. I want to do some preparations to go deeper. If I go deeper, maybe I can find a flying lion beast.”

Xie Sen’s heart thumped. Such a coincidence?

It can’t be related to the red energy, right?