Chapter 123

He was curious about was the crystal .

What was the crystal? No one truly understood it . The old civilization only mentioned something about calculi, which was also known as stone, that would form in human or animal bodies in the form of gallstones and kidney stones .

Crystal? Could it be considered a Śarīra of natural formation? In which era did such a crystal come into public notice? It did not seem like someone had made it up either .

Tang Ling was not a scientist . Although he was curious and eagerly sought knowledge, he did not have the time and suitable environment to study .

All he could say was that the crystal was unique to this era, and was usually found in the aorta of the heart .

Tang Ling had never seen a real crystal before, but according to the information that he had received, the bloody red crystal with a tint of purple was not something abruptly embedded itself in the heart . It was more like something that grew naturally and was connected to the veins .

The aorta around the crystal would undergo changes . It tended to become more tenacious and harder . The closer it was to the crystal, the more tenacious the aorta would be .

It felt like the cells in the heart were slowly changing, eventually forming the crystal .

As for the composition of the crystal, Tang Ling did not know the slightest detail . He wondered whether he could spot cells within the crystal .

However, such changes were logical in this era . Otherwise, given the heart structure of the people from the old civilization, it could not have handled the power and speed that the people of this era possessed, at least, not for human beings .

It also seemed like the stronger the living being, the higher the chance of the crystal forming in its heart .

As for insects…

Tang Ling was pondering upon the thought while he quickly and simply bandaged his wounds . He then smashed the black-winged mantis to death . Given his current strength, spending some extra effort killing a tranquilized black-winged mantis was not difficult .

Then, he searched for the crystal .

Insects did not possess hearts like human beings . Instead, there was an organ known as the dorsal blood vessel or ventral blood vessel, which could be found at either the upper or the lower part of the abdomen . It could be considered a combination of the heart and arteries, similar to the aorta . The muscles that pumped the blood to the aortic arches were also located there .

Tang Ling came searching for the crystal, so he must have had all this knowledge .

Without further ado, he used his sharp military knife, which he had borrowed from Orston for a week, and started to dissect the black-winged mantis .

When he exposed the dorsal blood vessel and noticed symptoms of hardening, Tang Ling’s heart raced .

He moved his hand along the hardened area and searched for the central point . His heart was praying for the unusual changes that were caused by the crystal formation to appear .

His hand moved exceptionally slowly until he finally felt an unusually hard spot, then he stopped . He quickly looked at what his hand had found .

It was small, probably only the size of half a thumb . It was in a bewitching red in color and glowed very dimly . It seemed very intricate and was translucent .

When he removed it from the black-winged mantis’s body, he raised it up under the sunlight and was able to spot some tiny purple lines in it .

So, this was the so-called crystal? The crystal that was worth 50 Hope credits per gram?

The crystal in his hand was about 3 grams, and he felt a little surreal holding it in his hand . He quickly calculated in his heart that in the past 20 days, even if he completed all the possible missions from the Hope Barrier without any rest, he would earn less than 80 Hope credits .

Yet, this little piece of crystal was worth 150 Hope credits?

Tang Ling curled his fingers and held the crystal tightly . It felt nothing like holding a pebble . It was warm and tender as if it was alive . One would love it from the bottom of the heart and would try to possess it .

Lucky!

Even a Level 3 mutated beast might not form a crystal if its whole heart was turning hard .

However, Tang Ling was able to find one on a Level 3 mutated insect! Moreover, judging from the grade of the crystal, it should be considered a quality good .

However, it was not the time for him to be infatuated with his findings . He was still on the edge of the battlefield, and the fight might extend here any second .

Besides that, this chameleon black-winged mantis was considered a high-value insect among the Level 3 mutated insects . Its front arms and wings were spoils that the Hope Barrier would purchase with Hope credits .

Its flesh might not be much but was definitely sellable as well .

Of course, Tang Ling could not deal with the body of the black-winged mantis here and now . If he was unlucky and ran into some other thing, he might not be able to keep his prime battle form since he was hurt .

No one from the battlefield was weak .

He kept the crystal but still did not come up with a viable solution to deal with the black-winged mantis, so he grabbed the body and sprinted back into the forest .

The black-winged mantis was around 100 kgs, but it had bled out and lost some weight . Furthermore, given Tang Ling’s current strength, carrying the body was not hard .

******

The spot where Tang Ling deemed as his eating ground was probably the best place to deal with the black-winged mantis’s body, and it was still considerably near to the battlefield .

The Goddess of Luck seemed to have favored Tang Ling this time . After he retrieved his tactical backpack from the tree, he sprinted with all his might and managed to return to his eating ground in around 5 minutes .

He did not run into any problems on the way back .

However, dissecting the black-winged mantis completely was troublesome as it had many tough body parts . Fortunately, he had the precious military knife from Orston . Otherwise, with his own refined steel knife, he would have to spend extra time just sawing into the body .

Even so, Tang Ling did a rather poor job at dissecting the black-winged mantis . However, the little hardened plate in front of its chest, the front arms from which the flesh had been emptied, and the pair of wings plus the legs were all taken .

Whatever he could stuff in his expandable tactical backpack, he filled, but the big front arms and the pair of wings must be hung outside instead . He did not have another option around this .

Fortunately, it was rare to run into someone in the northern forest, so Tang Ling believed that he would not get robbed .

As for the flesh, he gobbled every single piece of it after cleaning them .

His body required replenishment after the fight . Even though he was eating over his daily quota, using the eating method that Su Yao taught him, he could digest faster and store the energy in his body .

He tapped on his full stomach after the quick meal, savoring the power that he got from the Level 3 mutated insect . Even though he carefully dug out all the flesh from its heavy carapace, he got less than 5 kgs of meat in the end .

Thankfully, the 5 kgs of meat could at least cure his problem of hunger for the next two days . Then, he would have time for some missions and earn some Hope credits .

The important thing was that the quality of the meat seemed to benefit him more than a king beast’s meat .

In order to become strong, he must start with eating! He had to know how to eat properly!

Satisfied, Tang Ling carried his spoils and endured the fatigue as he headed towards his secret base to keep his spoils before he returned to the Hope Barrier .

The harvest might even grant him more luxurious sleeping time that night, but he could not afford to waste time on the way back . He must summarize his gains and losses of his hunt as soon as possible .