Ultragene Warlord

of stealth.

As he got used to the even higher gravity, Zhang Lie approached the closest bear carcass and began harvesting the bear's-heart grass.
His movements were gentle and slow, but exceedingly tiring in such a fatiguing environment.

Zhang Lie could sense the stamina draining out of his body at a rapid pace.

He had only harvested ten blades of grass before he felt as though he couldn't lift his arms any further.
In fact, were it not for his armor, he thought that he might not have been able to move about on this outcropping at all.
The armor was negating much of the increased gravity, and what he was experiencing was only a small fraction of its usual intensity.

Under ordinary circumstances, without the need for stealth, Zhang Lie would be able to revitalize and invigorate his body with genetic energy, but Zhang Lie had no choice but to overcome the magnetic field with nothing but his mortal body.

He lasted two more minutes, harvesting almost all the bear's-heart grass on the first carcass, before his stamina finally gave out.

He retreated from the Bimu Harbor.

The next few days were a cycle of resting, waiting, recuperating energy, and harvesting grass.

His muscles ached, and he was often bored, but Zhang Lie was proud of what he was able to accomplish. 

Unfortunately for him, this idyllic period wasn't to last.
In just three days, there were four more aged bears up on the Bimu Harbor.

Zhang Lie found it hard to imagine just how many bimu bears had to be wandering around the floating spires.
After all, these were superior-grade creatures, which were relatively rare in the first realm of the dimensional world.

In retrospect, however, it shouldn't have been surprising.
The unique geography and environmental factors in the region would prove a significant disadvantage to most hunters, even those at the top of the gene leaderboard.
And if no one were to hunt these bimu bears, if they were at the top of the food chain, then certainly their numbers would just keep going up.

Zhang Lie rested for another three days.

On the last day, Zhang Lie found, at long last, an opportunity to give a dying bimu bear a lethal blow.

He didn't know whether the will of the world would recognize such a contemptible attack; as it turned out, it did.
After the aged bimu bear died from Venombane, the will of the world spoke up in Zhang Lie's mind,

 [You successfully killed a superior-grade bimu bear, but did not obtain a soulshard.
For consuming the flesh of a bimu bear, you may receive one to ten superior gene fragments.]

Naturally, Zhang Lie, under the cover of night, stuffed the bimu bear he had killed into his potbellied-toad pouch.

And then he continued his harvest.

It took him two whole weeks before he was ready to leave, after having collected over a thousand blades of bear's-heart grass.
At the same time, he trained and strengthened his body dramatically in the grueling high-gravity environment of the Bimu Harbor.

After his harvest was complete, he immediately left the Bear Spires, then headed back to the Blacksteel settlement as fast as he could.
Of course, this time around, instead of heading to the Blackgold Inn, he went to the settlement-owned Blacksteel Inn.
He didn't want to have another run-in with Chu Xun, nor for any rumors to spread about what they were doing in a room together.

After getting a high-class suite in the Blacksteel Inn, Zhang Lie prepared for a long stint of seclusion.
During this period of time, he was planning to consume the bimu bear's flesh, concoct Potion #2, and advance all his genetic techniques.

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