72: Prelude to evolution

The five days of the Meihu Island Fishing Carnival finally came to an end, and it was now ten o'clock on Monday morning.

Wu Song and Lin Shu both looked pale, with dark circles covering their entire eye sockets. They walked unsteadily, feeling as if they might drop dead on the spot if they pushed themselves any longer.

The Double-Bladed Mantis, however, was fine. As a high-tier spiritual object, it could endure another month without much issue.

Shadow Mantis and Tu Yao were also similar; they just felt a bit tired, without such a strong reaction.

After five days, with Lin Shu's help, a total of 130 fish were caught. Perhaps due to the large number of fishing enthusiasts, the quantity in the last two days was far less than before.

Most of them were common fish, with the rest being rare fish.

Wu Song was calculating the final points on the side, a total of 320 points.

He couldn't help but smile, but due to extreme fatigue and a disheveled appearance, this smile looked somewhat eerie.

With this score, getting a ranking was guaranteed!

He could finally get a medal.

The exact ranking would depend on other contestants, which would be known in a day.

Behind them, staff members were collecting the video recorders one by one, and they would also check the contents.

Cheating would definitely result in disqualification, and all these recordings could be viewed and played on the official website.

With this, it was completely over.

Lin Shu was also looking at the proficiency in the panel, which had finally reached the target. It was truly not easy.

Subtracting the 245 points from Shadow Mantis's upgrade to level 25 in the first two days, there was currently a balance of 2230 proficiency points.

This naturally included a small portion of proficiency gained from training skills by Mirror Image and his own spiritual object, roughly a little over two hundred points.

It had been a long time since he had fought such a wealthy battle; all of this was exchanged for his health.

At this moment, Lin Shu had no intention of dealing with these matters. The only thing he wanted to do now was sleep.

He was truly too sleepy; now, as long as he closed his eyes, he could fall asleep instantly.

After handling the competition matters, Lin Shu and Wu Song quickly returned to the hotel to rest... and they slept until three o'clock in the afternoon the next day.

Lin Shu woke up in his room, still feeling exhausted and lacking Mental energy, his hair having turned into a bird's nest.

Shadow Mantis and Tu Yao were full of worry, constantly looking at Lin Shu. Having been motionless for so long, they were afraid their master had died.

After some comforting, the two beasts finally relaxed, but they still kept a close eye on Lin Shu at all times, fearing any accidents.

After drinking a few sips of ice water and sitting on the bed staring blankly for half an hour, he finally felt a little more energetic.

He rubbed his slightly swollen head. Staying up late was too tormenting; he couldn't do this again in the future.

Proficiency could be acquired over time; there was no need to rush.

He picked up his phone, which was placed aside, and started checking it. He then realized he had slept for nearly a day and a half, which he had not expected.

Scrolling through the phone screen, he found no messages, only some chat messages from the school team and class groups.

Browsing the messages in the school team group, he found that within this week, they had already entered the top 32 of the Binzhou Cup.

This competition progressed really fast.

After congratulating them a few times and chatting with everyone in the group, he put down his phone.

He began the most important task of the day.

That was to purchase Shadow Mantis's evolution path.

With a thought, 1500 proficiency points were deducted, leaving 730 points, followed by a surge of information into Lin Shu's mind.

Lin Shu quickly and clearly understood the evolution method, materials, and some precautions for the Dark Veil Hunter.

It was as if it was etched into him; as soon as he thought of it, he could recall everything.

Indeed, this path was completely tailor-made for Shadow Mantis. First, an Shadow Mantis with both dark and spatial attributes was the most basic condition for evolving into a Dark Veil Hunter.

Next were the evolution materials. Since it directly reached the Lord quality and the direction was rather special, skipping two qualities, the required materials were indeed much more numerous.

They appeared even rarer and more uncommon; judging by their names alone, they would be expensive.

They were: kong yuan spirit stone, 5th-tier spiritual object Extreme Dark Sand, 5th-tier Mantis-type spiritual object skeleton (must be complete), 5th-tier spiritual object Dark Source Soul Crystal, and Void Stone, a total of five materials.

Among them were two dark-attribute spiritual objects, two space-attribute materials, and a skeleton.

Thinking of this, Lin Shu couldn't help but frown. The combined price of these materials would likely not be cheap.

However, these were Lord-tier evolution materials, so it made sense.

He first searched for the two dark-attribute spiritual objects. This attribute was relatively common, so the price should not be too high.

He searched in the evolution materials section of the spiritual object Mall and quickly found them. Both items were in stock.

The total price for both was 1.22 million daxia currency, which was relatively cheap, thus solving two items.

He then used the same method to search for the two space-attribute spiritual objects, only to find that they couldn't be searched at all; nothing was displayed.

This indicated that these materials were not available there. Lin Shu was mentally prepared, as space-attribute materials were too rare and very expensive, not something an ordinary Beastmaster could afford.

This made things a bit difficult. Lin Shu sent the names of these two spiritual objects to Bai Sheng, wondering if White Cloud Arena had these two items in stock.

After receiving Lin Shu's message, Bai Sheng immediately replied. They had been in contact these past few days and knew that Lin Shu was currently in the Otherworld of Hai Province.

Looking at the information about the two spiritual objects sent over, Bai Sheng was somewhat curious as to why Lin Shu needed these two space-attribute spiritual objects.

But he only had such a thought and didn't dwell on it too much.

He immediately stopped thinking, rushed out the door, and headed to his father's secret vault. There were quite a few such rare spiritual objects inside.

"Wait a moment, I'll check first and get back to you later."

Seeing the message from Bai Sheng, Lin Shu replied with a "Okay."

Then he began to search for the 5th-tier Mantis-type spiritual object skeleton.

He had originally thought this rather rare material would be scarce, but it turned out there was quite a bit in stock in the mall, which relieved Lin Shu.

Now, he had leads for half of the materials. As long as he collected the two space-attribute materials, he could prepare for Shadow Mantis's evolution.

On the other side, Bai Sheng was pacing around his father's secret vault. Guided by the signs, he arrived at the cabinet for space-attribute spiritual objects.

Compared to other attributes, which had several cabinets to store their quantities, the number of spiritual objects on this one was not many, only about a dozen.

Checking the two materials Lin Shu sent, he scanned the small tags on each item, which had the item's name.

He quickly found one of the materials, the Void Stone.

Although it was a pity not to have the second one, this was the most effort he could make.

He would see if there were any other ways to find it later.

He took a picture of the Void Stone and sent it to Lin Shu, along with a message.

"Currently, I only have the Void Stone. I'll try to think of a way to find the other one for you."

"But whether I can get it is uncertain."

...