Book 2: Chapter 40 “Era of Monsters”


    Chapter 39 | Table of Contents | 0041


    Last chapter recap: Lin woke up from his deep sleep, goes exploring and finds something in crystal armor.


    This was Lins army. Each of them was only ten centimeters long, and mostly shaped like a warhead. They could move by using thest pair of segmented limbs to spout water. Their second pair of limbs were used to aid movement while the first pair of segmented limbs were used to attack. Most of them had forelimbs shaped like des, but some had openings to shoot exploding bombs.


    There were thousands within this army. Lin had dug a cavern in the big crystals and started to create them before its hibernation. However, once it had created a certain number, it stopped. The soldierss purpose were to explore this new world, to hunt and deconstruct anything interesting they found.


    They swam quickly in one direction as the warhead shape meant they could swim quickly through the water. The water surface above the crystalnd had been constantly covered in ice and never changed during the years. In the dark and cold water, thenterns of the warheads foundrge numbers of strange organisms floating in the water.


    These organisms with round shells and tentacles at the head were called ammonites  and extremely simr to the thunderstone except they had coiled their pointed cones [1]. They were about half a meter or so and extremely hard outer shells. Lin did not feel the warheads would be a suitable attack on the ammonites. Also, Lin felt there was nothing worthy to learn from the ammonites   However, interestingly, Lin did not know what the ammonites had evolved from. Maybe a kind of shell organism? The eyeballs had no information in their memories regarding this.


    The ammonites were numerous and spread out through the water. The warheads swam along the enormous swarm of ammonites. They quickly left behind the darkness and came to an area illuminated by daylight.


    This had originally been the sand beach of the giant trap worm. However, this strange and giant arthropod, which used its own body as a trap, had disappeared a long time ago. While Lin had not covered their trap when spreading the green carpet, the bodies of those monsters were not suited to this ce. From the memories of the eyeballs, thest giant trap worm seemed to have frozen to death on the frozen pir. Lin still could not exin how these pirs of ice, with their powerful ability to freeze, would appear randomly.


    Right now, everything was covered in green, but not Lins green carpet


    This patch of green danced along the seabed like tentacles. They had evolved from the green cells. The root parts were stuck on Lins green carpet, and they reproduced in high numbers topletely cover this area that originally were covered by the green carpet.


    Lins green carpet had a certain setting. If it did not obtain light for a long time, it would digest itself. Consequently, this area waspletely taken over by these evolved green cells called algae.


    Lin did not feel this was a problem. It was more effective to obtain nutrients by eating algae rather than through slow photosynthesis using the green carpet. When the time came, Lin could just eat this patch of algae which the warheads were not responsible for. Lin was interested in some of the organisms living in the algae.


    The warheads swam above this enormous patch of algae. It found some enormous organisms swimming through the algae. They were about two meters in size, and twisted their streamlined bodies as they chased smaller organisms through the water.


    Shark. One of Lins new terms could describe this organism, which evolved from the t fish. Once, the t fishes had been simr to each other and small in size, but they had evolved into many different organisms.


    This was a peculiar thing. Lin had thought that organisms who were simr but were separated by long distances could evolve differently. But this did not seem to be the case. Organisms that lived in one area could grow up looking different.


    Why was this? Lin did not care so much.


    One shark was hunting another kind of fish in the algae patch. This other fish was half a meter long, and had a thick pair of lobe-fins on the sides so Lin called it a lobe-finned fish. This lobe-finned fish, that the shark was chasing, charged out of the algae and swam in the direction of the surface.


    Sharks had evolved to hunt. This shark had arge mouth filled with teeth, and its tter fins were more suited to swimming at fast speeds. It quickly caught up to the lobe-finned fish, and its powerful mouth immediately tore off arge piece of flesh.


    The other sharks detected their fellows sess and came over in order to share. Through evolution, the senses of these organisms grew stronger. Even though there were no vibrations in the water, some organisms would know the precise location of their target without even needing their eyes. Lin knew that this was an ability called smell but what was smell? Lin did not know. This had to be studied.


    The the sharks had good vision but Lin learned from the memories of the observation eyeballs the smell of the sharks should be the best of all organisms.


    The evolution of the eye also urred to some organisms. Lin had previously found some simple unicellr organisms that could detect light but could not analyzeplex images. Even when multicellr organisms appeared, that had been the case. Only now did organisms that were able to decipherplex images appear.


    Based on this, Lin should not have any vision in the past, but it obtained vision when the observer ate that crystal-like item. After that, the cells had copied the structure of that crystal in order to create eyes.


    What was that crystal? This was still a riddle. Up until now, all the crystals Lin found were different from that crystal


    Lin would consider this in the future. It would find this vision crystal sooner orter.


    The shark swarm quickly finished dividing the lobe-finned fish before they scattered apart. Unlike the t fish which liked to stay together, these sharks be organisms that distanced themselves from their counterparts over their evolution


    After the sharks scattered, the warheads swam towards the nearest shark. This shark originally did not put much importance on the warheads who were just ten centimeters in length but they were wrong.


    When this shark found it was surrounded, it was toote. The warheads charged and used their sharp forelimbs to cut apart the sharks skin. Some of the warheads attacked the sharks rtively soft underside.


    The shark did not think to fight back, and twisted its body, desiring to flee away. It quickly swam out of the algae and fled towards the water surface.


    The warheads followed closely. Arge volume of cells continued to spill out of the wounds of the shark. This attracted its peers. Its peers did note to help the shark, but wanted to consume the shark.


    These organisms had be so individualized they would even eat their peers. Lin could not understand why sharks would evolve such a weird method of living


    Lin had a portion of the warheads drive away the chasing sharks. The remaining hundreds continued to chase the escapee until it was forced next to a floating piece of ice at the surface with nowhere else to go.


    However, before the warheads could act, the enormous piece of ice next to the shark suddenly split. A sickle covered in curved hooks grabbed the shark.


    This was


    At this moment, therge ice floe slowly split open. Through the fragments of ice, a figure with shining crystal armor appeared.


    This organism was longer than five meters. Lin was very familiar with this organism because it was the evolved form of the ice crystal monster ..


    Lin had not understood the habits of the ice crystal monster back at the start. Through years of observation, Lin discovered that mature ice crystal monsters would return to thend of crystal to reproduce. The young ice crystal monsters would grow to a certain degree and then leave.


    The changes in the outer appearance of the ice crystal monster were minor but it had grownrger. It was still covered in crystal armor. Its forelimbs had evolved into long curved sickles. It had two enormous eyeballs on its head. This organism undoubtedly had the ability to kill a shark instantly.


    In this era of hunts, Lin felt that its previous idle way of living was not suitable. Just now, it should havepletely surrounded the shark. That way, no one would have been able to steal Lins food.


    Right now, the warheads could not injure the ice crystal monster. This meant that Lin had to also activate the trump card that had hibernated with Lin


    The ice crystal monsters mouth was a crack filled with des and denticles. It could easily tear apart the shark. But even when covered in crystal armor, the enormous ice crystal monster had enemies. An enormous organism slowly swam over. It appeared this organism was also attracted by the corpse of the shark


    Its ancestor was the t fish, but it had evolved from the helmet fish which had evolved from the t fish first. It was the biggest organism Lin had known up until now.


    Ten meters long, this enormous fishs head was covered in armor. Unlike the obtrusive head armor of the helmet fish, its head armor had enormous de-like teeth. At the same time, the head armor was divided into an upper and low part which could open and close to chew on prey.


    It charged directly at the ice crystal monster, biting tightly on the ice crystal monsters armor. If it turned its head, it could easily tear offrge pieces of the crystal armor.


    This organism had the power to crush the armor of the ice crystal monster. The ice crystal monster abandoned the shark and used its powerful propulsion system to quickly flee.


    The enormous fish was powerful, but it was slow. It could only give up on the ice crystal monster and eat the smaller shark.


    Such an interesting environment


    Lin felt as though it was watching a y from beginning to end. It had learned many things. Now, it should be serious, ande out to capture everything interesting!


    [1] The Chinese term for ammonite is weirdly Chrysanthemum  stone. I guess it came from the wrinkled and coiling shell. Ammonitees from horn of Ammon.


    Trantor Ramblings: Sharks practice cannibalism, even in infancy when they are eggs. They would absorb the unfertilized eggs around them. Embryo tiger sharks would even eat the surrounding embryos.


    Chapter 39 | Table of Contents | 0041