232: Chapter 232 Resurrection Grass, Let's Feed It to the Pigs?

"Oh, it's nothing much, just this." With a flick of his hand, Hu Gualing pulled the arrow out of his backpack and handed it to Xiao Niao.

Seeing that Hu Gualing had indeed brought something out, a look of joy appeared on Xiao Niao's face. However, after seeing clearly that what Hu Gualing was holding was actually the arrow he had shot into the crown of the Millennium Tree Demon, the joy on his face vanished in a flash. With a look of disappointment, he took the arrow from Hu Gualing's hand and threw it into his backpack, just about to ask if Hu Gualing really hadn't found anything else on that tree? Before the words could leave his mouth, he noticed that Hu Gualing's other hand was glowing with a purple light that he found somewhat familiar.

"soul-returning grass!?"

Xiao Niao stepped forward twice, bent down, and cupped the soul-returning grass from Hu Gualing's hand to examine it closely in front of his eyes. His face showed a mix of surprise and confusion. The surprise was naturally because he hadn't been wrong—the crown of the Millennium Tree Demon really did hide something of purple, excellent quality. The confusion, however, was because this so-called soul-returning grass, while sounding quite grand, looked unremarkable, no different from the weeds seen everywhere along the roadside. What made it worthy of a purple, excellent quality rating?

"Huh, a plant actually grew on the tree, and it's even purple." At this moment, Tang Yao also leaned in with a look of curiosity.

The moment she saw this soul-returning grass, an indescribable palpitation suddenly appeared in her heart, as if this little plant shared some mysterious fate with her. Tang Yao herself couldn't explain what kind of feeling this was; she could only describe it as a very subtle, elusive sensation, like suddenly seeing something novel and beautiful that caught her eye.

Tang Yao couldn't carefully sense where this sudden impulse came from, whether it was just the natural feeling of pleasure that arose when seeing this green, vibrant little plant, so she didn't pay much attention to it. However, after she saw the attributes of this soul-returning grass, she couldn't help but frown, and with a look of confusion on her face, she asked: "This attribute description is too simple, right? Soul? Mysterious effect? What on earth is it used for?"

Hu Gualing curled his lips. "Who knows? But looking at the color of the light it emits, it seems even more purple than this piece of wood." As he said this, Hu Gualing took out the 'millennium ethereal hardwood' from his backpack. Holding the wood in one hand and the emerald green plant in the other, he put them together. Without needing much comparison, the difference between the two was obvious.

"It really is. The purple light emitted by this soul-returning grass is clearly much richer. It seems this soul-returning grass is not simple..."

Xiao Niao watched the purple light on the soul-returning grass, which was clearly much richer than on the millennium hardwood, sighing while pondering. According to their previous knowledge, the richer the light on an item, the rarer it was. From this, it seemed that this soul-returning grass was not the bottom-tier among purple, excellent quality items, but a truly rare object. It's just... the item description was indeed a bit mysterious: 'has a mysterious effect on the Soul'. What did this 'Soul' refer to?...

Xiao Niao thought for a while without coming to any conclusion and shook his head helplessly. However, he heard Hu Gualing guess nonchalantly: "I think this thing's description is similar to that monster essence. Could it also be used to feed the pig?"

As Hu Gualing spoke, he lowered his head and glanced at the ground, looking for the Sharp-toothed Piglet, but found nothing. After being stunned for a second or two, he suddenly realized belatedly that the Sharp-toothed Piglet had already sacrificed itself heroically in the battle against the Millennium Tree Demon and would have to wait 24 hours before it could be Resurrection. He then lifted his head helplessly and sighed with a touch of regret. Judging by his expression, if the Sharp-toothed Piglet were still alive now, he really might have taken the soul-returning grass in his hand and fed it to the Sharp-toothed Piglet to see if it could eat it...

Seeing his expression, Xiao Niao roughly guessed his intentions and was speechless, thinking to himself that this guy really was a warm-hearted person. He was actually thinking of taking a purple-quality item to feed a pig, and not even his own pig, but Tang Yao's pig. The level of obliviousness was truly unparalleled... Fortunately, the Sharp-toothed Piglet should be resting in a place they couldn't find right now, so there was no need to worry about such a rare item being wasted by it.

However, even so, Xiao Niao couldn't help but retort to Hu Gualing, "Why are you the same as Tang Yao, seeing everything as Pig Grass?"

Hu Gualing chuckled dismissively after hearing this. "Hehe, it's not that I see everything as Pig Grass, but anyway, we don't know what this so-called 'soul-returning grass' is used for right now. If it can be used to feed the pig like that previous 'monster essence' and allow the Sharp-toothed Piglet to evolve again, that would be a good thing."

"And you guys don't know! After the Sharp-toothed Piglet ate that monster essence and evolved, the help it provided us in battle was just too great! I think if it hadn't helped share the firepower during the battle with the Millennium Tree Demon boss just now, I'm afraid we would have had to use Resurrection several times before we even got the boss's health below ten percent. It definitely wouldn't have been as simple as it was just now!"

When speaking of this point, Hu Gualing seemed a bit excited, because he served the role of the tank in the battle, mainly responsible for close-quarters combat with the boss. It could be said that he shouldered the heaviest burden of the whole team, so he had the most profound experience of the role the Sharp-toothed Piglet played in the battle. To say nothing else, at least after the Sharp-toothed Piglet joined the fight and helped him share a lot of the boss's attacks, the pressure on him was suddenly reduced by nearly half!

Precisely because of this, Hu Gualing's perception of the Sharp-toothed Piglet became somewhat unusual. He no longer viewed the Sharp-toothed Piglet simply as a cute pet that had no real use other than being adorable and only dragging them down, but truly regarded the Sharp-toothed Piglet as a little partner who could fight side-by-side with him. So, even though the Sharp-toothed Piglet was not his pet, he did not reject the idea of taking this newly acquired purple-quality plant, whose specific function was unknown, and feeding it to the Sharp-toothed Piglet as Pig Grass. It was just a pity that after the little guy died, it had to wait 24 hours before it could be Resurrection, and there was no option for early Resurrection.

"Sigh, it's a pity Sharp Tooth hasn't been Resurrection yet. Otherwise, if we fed it this purple-quality plant, who knows what it could evolve into! Perhaps, after eating it, its tankiness would immediately increase several times over, and in the future, if we encounter a boss, we wouldn't even need me; it could hold it off all by itself!" Hu Gualing's face showed a look of regret, but as he spoke, he couldn't help but yearn for what might happen after the Sharp-toothed Piglet ate this 'soul-returning grass'.

Listening to this, Xiao Niao thought for a moment and nodded in agreement with what Hu Gualing said. In battle, he was responsible for watching the health of every person in the team; whenever someone's health was in danger, he would cast a 'Recovery Spell' to bring their health bar back up. So, he was quite aware of the damage absorption data in the battle. He knew that although the Sharp-toothed Piglet didn't look very impressive in size, it had actually taken a huge amount of damage in the battle against the Millennium Tree Demon just now—likely close to half of the total damage taken by the whole team! Furthermore, thanks to the powerful health-recovery passive that the Sharp-toothed Piglet had evolved after eating the 'monster essence', all the damage it received was mitigated by itself. From the beginning of the battle to the end, it hadn't received even a single 'Recovery Spell' from Xiao Niao. It was precisely because of this give-and-take that Xiao Niao's healing pressure was greatly reduced. Otherwise, it really would have been as Hu Gualing said: they would have had to pay an unknown number of extra revival coins to defeat the Millennium Tree Demon.

Therefore, viewed in this light, the role of the Sharp-toothed Piglet in their current three-person team was quite significant. Even a piece of purple equipment, or even a purple, excellent quality skill, would have a role that was completely inferior to this little pig that Tang Yao had just picked up from a pigsty!

"Indeed," Xiao Niao thought for a moment. He felt that although what Hu Gualing said about feeding this purple-quality 'soul-returning grass' to the Sharp-toothed Piglet as Pig Grass sounded particularly absurd, upon a little careful thought, it was quite reasonable. He couldn't help but nod in agreement: "Gualing is right. If this 'soul-returning grass' can be eaten by Sharp Tooth like that previous 'monster essence', then it can absolutely be used as food for Sharp Tooth."

Tang Yao hadn't expected that her Sharp-toothed Piglet had become so favored. Such a 'soul-returning grass' emitting purple light was clearly a very rare item, even if its exact function was still unclear. Yet, Gualing and Xiao Niao were both without exception willing to feed such a precious thing to Sharp Tooth to eat. "Tsk tsk tsk." Tang Yao let out a small exclamation of surprise. However, she didn't understand the game very well. Since Gualing and Xiao Niao, both veteran players, were willing to treat this 'soul-returning grass' as Pig Grass and feed it to the Sharp-toothed Piglet, there must be a reason for it. As the owner of the Sharp-toothed Piglet, she had no reason to refuse. She would just wait until the Sharp-toothed Piglet was Resurrection and see if it would eat it. She just wondered, if Sharp Tooth really ate this purple-quality plant, what kind of changes would happen again?

While Tang Yao was thinking this, Xiao Niao couldn't help but think too: 'If the Sharp-toothed Piglet can really eat this 'soul-returning grass', then what level would it evolve to after eating it? After all, the 'monster essence' it ate before was only a blue, fine-quality item, and it was able to cause an almost earth-shaking change in the Sharp-toothed Piglet. Now that this soul-returning grass is of purple, excellent quality, what kind of evolutionary effect would it produce? It's just...'

Xiao Niao thought involuntarily, casting his gaze once again toward the emerald green plant in Hu Gualing's hand, carefully examining its attributes: 'A companion plant of the Millennium Tree Demon? Said to have a mysterious effect on the Soul?'

He could understand the meaning of the word 'companion'. Generally, plants and minerals do not exist in isolation. Besides the main entity, there are secondary entities that grow alongside the main object. For example, in independent mineral deposits, besides the main minerals or elements, there are also relatively smaller amounts of rare earth materials that grow together. Or, for example, there is a rumor that around poisonous plants, one can always find corresponding antidotes; these things are the companion items of the poisonous plant.

Then, it was very obvious that the 'soul-returning grass' was this kind of companion item, taking root on the trunk of the Millennium Tree Demon and growing in a mutually reinforcing way with the Millennium Tree Demon.

And from the rule that companion items must have a certain connection with the characteristics of the main body, the reason why the 'soul-returning grass' could have an unknown effect on the Soul was because of the Millennium Tree Demon's mental control ability?

Xiao Niao thought back to the battle with the Millennium Tree Demon. The Millennium Tree Demon had just looked at him from afar with its pair of dark red eyes, across a distance of tens or even hundreds of meters. Just through eye contact, it had made him experience a feeling of losing focus he had never felt before. His consciousness lost control of his body, and in a completely unaware, dazed state, he had cast several 'Recovery Spell's on the Millennium Tree Demon in one breath until his mana was exhausted before he felt something was wrong. Although it was only in the game, and although the Millennium Tree Demon had already been killed by them and turned into rich loot, Xiao Niao still felt a lingering fear even now when recalling it, and even his back felt cold.

'Mental control... Soul...' Xiao Niao thought in his mind, and suddenly had such a guess.

"The Soul mentioned in the item description of the soul-returning grass is actually the mental attribute in the game?"

"So the effect of this soul-returning grass should be to increase the mental attribute value? No, no."

Xiao Niao had just told Gualing and Tang Yao his guess when he immediately denied it himself: "If it was just to increase the mental attribute value, the item description would just state it that way; there would be no need to say it 'has a mysterious effect on the Soul'. So there is another possibility: this 'soul-returning grass' does indeed have an effect on the mental aspect, but the specific effect is not fixed. It might be a good effect, or it might have side effects, or even cause unexpected mutations that no one could foresee. In short, since no one knows the result, that's why it is called a 'mysterious effect'." Xiao Niao analyzed it this way.

Hu Gualing and Tang Yao listened, half-understanding. "So, according to what you said, if we really fed this plant to Sharp Tooth, its mental value might become higher, meaning it becomes smarter, but it's also possible it becomes stupider?" Tang Yao thought for a moment and asked seriously.

"Uh..." Xiao Niao was obviously stunned. "That could also be understood that way. However, since the quality of this 'soul-returning grass' is so high, I think compared to its positive effects, the possibility of causing negative effects should be relatively small, or rather, it would be reasonable to assume that any potential side effects should be relatively acceptable."