Reincarnated as A Bamboo

Chapter 34: Evolution Points

Lin Ming was sensing the spiritual aura of all the creatures in this valley.

For the past ten days or so, he did not detect any signs of human troops entering the valley.

"I guess they won't be coming here anytime soon?" Lin Ming was not sure how he felt. He was not sure if he should feel lucky or disappointed. 

He did not think that humans coming here was a bad thing, but their absence would definitely mean less trouble for him. 

At least he would not need to divert his attention into dealing with the humans, and can instead focus on increasing his own strength. 

During this period, it rained a lot.

More often than not, it would be sunny during the day, but once it was nighttime, the rain would start pattering down immediately. 

Lin Ming did not hate the rain. In fact, he actually thought it was quite pleasant. 

Currently, the Evolution Points he obtained from the sunlight was at one point per hour. For the large number of Evolution Points that Lin Ming urgently needed, that was barely enough at all.

From the rainwater, however, he could absorb spiritual aura at a much better rate, which was ten points every hour. 

In addition, the spiritual aura he absorbed from the air, Spirit Lake, and the underground Spirit River also seemed to increase, allowing Lin Ming's total number of Evolution Points to increase considerably recently.

However, even though the entire valley was quite large, Lin Ming could only control it within a radius of about three hundred meters with him as the center.

Within these three hundred meters, except for the fishes, shrimps, and crabs in the Spirit Lake that could only provide about 0.2 Evolution Points, no bird, beast, or even insect dared step a foot into it.

This caused Lin Ming's main method of obtaining Evolution Points to now become completely pointless. 

Think about it, just killing a mutant bat would earn him 7 Evolution Points;

While killing an Unranked Grade-2 hare would get him 10 Evolution Points. 

How could that not be better than absorbing the spiritual aura from the rain, air, Spirit Lake, and the underground Spirit River?

Despite that, no matter how abundant the wildlife resources here were, there are practically no animals that could be hunted within Lin Ming's area of control.

Therefore, the number of Evolution Points that Lin Ming had accumulated up until now was really too little.

"Does this mean I have to move yet again..."

Lin Ming did not want to move, even if he could pull out his bamboo roots and move around in the jungle just like an animal.

Moreover, if he were to hunt down mutant animals by constantly moving, he would probably wipe out all the creatures in the valley very quickly.

If that were to happen, never mind the fact that he could no longer obtain more Evolution Points, all his subordinates would also starve to death.

These mutant animals that were under his control could obtain a certain amount of spiritual energy through his Spiritual Fluid, but they still needed to eat and drink to meet their most basic needs, just like normal animals.

However, Lin Ming also realized that aside from a few abilities that he would learn later, it did not require too many Evolution Points to strengthen his Bamboo Whips and Razor Leaves.

He had always assumed that each evolution would cost him a thousand points. He guessed that when he was dealing with those humans, he had probably been too busy so he did not pay too much attention.

Increasing the number of bamboo branches by one would cost 20 Evolution Points. 

Increasing the control of one Razor Leaf would cost 8 Evolution Points. 

Extending a bamboo branch by one meter would cost 1 Evolution Point. The same would go for increasing its thickness.

Increasing the Damage of one Bamboo Whip by 1 would cost 1 Evolution Point.

Increasing the Attack Range of all Razor Leaves by one meter would cost 50 Evolution Points, while increasing their overall Damage by 1 would cost 10 Evolution Points.

Increasing the Attack Speed of the Razor Leaves by 10% would require 100 points. 

In general, it seemed that it did not require too many Evolution Points to strengthen his Razor Leaves and Bamboo Whips.

However, after calculating everything carefully, Lin Ming found that in order to strengthen himself, the total Evolution Points required was actually quite a huge number.

Despite that, he added thirty bamboo branches, increased the length of all bamboo branches by five meters, and increased their thickness to half a meter in diameter.

As for the Razor Leaves, Lin Ming mainly increased their Attack Range from a hundred meters to a hundred and ten meters.

Just by strengthening himself this much, Lin Ming had used up all the Evolution Points he had saved.

'Not enough...' Lin Ming thought as he examined himself.

[Lineage: Mutated Moso Bamboo] 

[Evolution Points: 17] 

[Stage: Rank-1 Grade-8] 

[Abilities: Level-2 Razor Leaves (300 daggers). 110-meter Effective Range, 30 Damage (evolvable), 200-meters/second Attack Speed (evolvable), can be deployed at the same time, can deal either single-target damage or AoE damage. 

Level-2 Mutated Bamboo Whips (130 whips). 25-meter Effective Range, 100 Damage (evolvable), wherever the whip points will become barren! 

Level-2 Spiritual Fluid: Boosts the evolution speed of dependents, can heal severe injuries suffered by dependents.

Level-1 Ultimate Regeneration: After suffering an extremely severe injury, can recover 10% of normal body shape and 10% of strength in a short time.

Level-1 Aura Concealment: Can conceal 50% of your own power's spiritual aura, and will not be discovered easily. 

Level-2 Aura Detection: Can sense all spiritual auras within a wider range, and can sense the movements and actions of all creatures within said range.]

There were quite a few changes in the personalized dashboard, at least in terms of values.

Appearance-wise, his current size and the lushness of his foliage looked extremely scary, especially the red diamond-shaped mark at the center of his culm, which seemed to have become even more vivid now.

As for the bamboo roots, they were not displayed on the personalized dashboard and there was no option to make them more powerful, so Lin Ming assumed that they might grow stronger only after "upgrading", right?

After all, that was the case the last time.

After examining himself, he looked at his subordinates who had been taking shelter from the rain under him.

The little wolf pups were fast asleep while huddled together. 

Since the last time when Lil One and the other two leveled up to Rank-1 Grade-1, although Lin Ming's Spiritual Fluid did not stop, the remaining four did not make any progress and remained at Unranked Grade-9.

However, their fur had undergone some new changes.

A tan-colored patch emerged on Lil Four's back, while a light-yellow color appeared on Lil Five's tail. As for Lil Six, there was a tuft of fiery-red fur on his forehead. Lastly, Lil Seven's case was slightly stranger, as the layer of white fur below his neck was now a dark-green color.

Could they be awakening elements of different attributes?

That was what Lin Ming guessed, but he was not sure if that was the case. Who could be sure about something like this?

He looked toward Adorable Little Snake and the panda once again. 

The reason he grouped these two together was mainly that their current relationship was too good. No matter what they were doing, they would always be together.

Sometimes, Adorable Little Snake would occasionally bring a mutant mouse back for the panda to eat, while the panda would bring Adorable Little Snake every time he went out to play.

These two adorable animals would even hug each other when they rested. The silvery-white snake and the black-and-white panda, there was a strange beauty about the sight of them.

These two became like this ever since the last time they went into battle together and cooperated to get rid of four transcendents. 

Currently, Lin Ming had named the panda "Big Chubs", since the fellow was now as round as a ball. 

Although the fellow had curbed his own utter brazenness after becoming Lin Ming's subordinate, and would even go to the Bamboo Sea and bring back tons of bamboo when he felt like eating bamboo, he still relied on Lin Ming's favorable impression of him and would fight for his attention from time to time. 

Even when drinking the Spiritual Fluid, this fellow would frantically run to the front to drink it, not forgetting to bring Adorable Little Snake with him to enjoy it together.

"Awoooo!"

Just as Lin Ming was stroking the panda and Adorable Little Snake with a bamboo branch, a low howl was suddenly heard.

Lin Ming saw that the furs of the two jackals stood on end as they bared their fangs and snarled at the lynx who had an equally fierce expression.

"Again?" These three fellows did not have the best relationship.