Chapter 217 - 184: Ming Taichiro

Chapter 217: Chapter 184: Ming Taichiro

"It’s not very nice to dwell on such a trivial thing, is it?"

Huai Yu looked at him, her expression obedient but disapproving.

Zhou Qian found this completely baffling. "Your beetle is literally walking upright, but me thinking twice about it is what’s ’not nice’?"

He looked at Huai Yu, a terrifying thought welling up in his mind. After all, from the very beginning until now, not a single thing that had appeared around her was normal. "Could this also have a special Super—"

"It’s a dung beetle, not a normal beetle. It has a trendy foreign name, Ke Taichiro," Huai Yu interrupted at the exact same time.

Zhou Qian fell silent, his expression instantly going numb.

"A dung beetle?"

"Yeah." Huai Yu nodded. "Because its previous owner was also a gamer, he named it Taichiro. Originally, it was going to be called Ming Taichiro, just like Boss Tang. Later, Gao Ming thought that sounded a bit like ’pollack,’ so he changed it to his favorite game protagonist’s name—Ke Taichiro. It’s the name of the male lead in Master’s Sword."

"How about it? Isn’t it cool?" Huai Yu showed it off proudly. "I’m telling you, Ke Taichiro is extremely smart and incredibly hardworking! It practically wants to work a twelve-hour shift every single day!"

It had only been a few days, yet the new large box was already half-filled with Klang Balls.

Zhou Qian opened his mouth, then closed it again. What could he even say? From the name to the fact that it was a dung beetle, he had a million things he wanted to articulate. But at this moment, his myriad of thoughts all circled back to the original question. "So, that red ball is a ball of dung? It evolved to walk upright, so it doesn’t need to push the ball with its hind legs anymore?"

Huai Yu began to feel guilty. Her eyes darted left and right as she offered a feeble reply. "It’s not a dung ball! Ke Taichiro doesn’t play with that stuff. That... might be some kind of flower or fruit or something."

Zhou Qian found it hard not to be suspicious. "If it’s not a dung ball, why are you afraid to look at me?" His expression suddenly went blank. "You... I... I remember there being this multicolored ball... You didn’t..."

"No, no, no!" Huai Yu shook her head frantically. "You didn’t eat it! You were unconscious at the time and couldn’t chew, so it just dissolved into the water."

But how was that any different from eating it? Zhou Qian looked down, staring at his legs again and again. Then, thinking back to the footbath water from the fat ginseng earlier, he figured this wasn’t completely unacceptable either. He was a tough, iron-willed soldier of the Defense Army. During the hardest times, what hadn’t he eaten? A mere dung beetle’s—

"If it dissolved into water... I was soaking in that barrel at the time, including my face..." He subconsciously reached up and touched the two hideous scars on his cheeks.

Huai Yu also glanced at them, then decided to just throw caution to the wind. "Look, I wasn’t even going to mention it, but you just had to get to the bottom of it... Our Ke Taichiro doesn’t play with poop! You only survived because of it!

"Besides, its Klang Balls are very popular when sold. Other people might not even be able to buy them with money.

"Brother Zhou Qian, don’t let a good thing go to waste."

The conversation ended entirely with Zhou Qian’s silence.

Ke Taichiro knew nothing of this and continued to work diligently and conscientiously. It was completely unaware that someone was silently following it all the way from the house to behind the distant hillside.

There, it found a cluster of mutated berries creeping along the ground. It stuffed them into its mouth, chewing continuously, and before long, spat out a pile of dry, red, fibrous residue. Although Zhou Qian didn’t understand the mechanics behind it, he soon saw Ke Taichiro using both its hands and feet to roll the residue into that bright red ball.

Ultimately, Zhou Qian’s psyche still took a massive hit. He bid farewell to Huai Yu. "I’m going to head back and sort out my thoughts before coming over again."

Soaking in that bathtub for three days, that multicolored ball had dissolved into the murky water, seeping from his head to his face, from his mouth to his stomach... Even a tough, iron-willed soldier of the Defense Army needed a little mental preparation for that.

How strange. Originally, when Uncle Zaozi wanted to drink the Klang Ball, Huai Yu had tried every possible way to deflect and resist, and even now, she still felt psychological pressure when selling them. Yet, when it was Zhou Qian’s turn to be unable to accept it, she actually felt that since their Ke Taichiro was so well-behaved and loved to stay clean, what could possibly be wrong with consuming a whole medicine ball? Traditional Chinese medicine even contained bat guano and boy’s urine.

But she was the only one at home. The talking fat ginseng was a stutterer, and listening to it speak was more exhausting than just breathing on her own. Harboring these thoughts, Huai Yu turned around and went behind the house to find Kuang Biao.

Kuang Biao was swaying its head and waiting for her!

"This guy is alright!" Kuang Biao declared decisively upon seeing Huai Yu. "Is this the partner you found for yourself? Good eye. The guy looks pretty reliable, and he seems quite strong, too.

"It’s just that you seem a bit lovesick. You haven’t even put down roots together yet, and you’ve already brought him over—Little Yu!" Despite its young age, Kuang Biao adopted the tone of an experienced elder.

"But don’t you worry. Even though he’s pretty formidable, he still can’t beat me.

"If he ever disobeys you in the future, bring him over, and I’ll deal with him for you. I’ll dig up his roots! Rest assured, us bamboos are extremely experienced when it comes to claiming territory and uprooting other trees."

"Thanks a lot!" Huai Yu thought, rolling her eyes. "What partner? Look at me, I’m so young and haven’t even fully grown yet. Why would I be looking for a partner?"

Although she was approachable and naturally beautiful, her beanpole-thin figure was an undeniable fact at present. She hadn’t even nourished her own body properly yet, so what was there to talk about romance?

"Who says!" Kuang Biao was displeased. "You’ve eaten so many of my bamboo shoots, you can’t have eaten them for nothing, right? Looking at you now, you’ve obviously grown a bit taller and chubbier than when you first started."

She wondered if that was really from eating bamboo shoots.

The bellyful of words Huai Yu had prepared were completely scattered by Kuang Biao’s few remarks. Right now, she only grasped another key point. "Did you just say Zhou Qian is pretty strong?"

That shouldn’t be the case. Zhou Qian didn’t have a Superpower. His combat ability wasn’t bad, but there was no way he could compare to a mutated plant of Kuang Biao’s caliber. How could this arrogant bamboo come to the conclusion that he was "pretty strong"?

"Yep," Kuang Biao said, its tone sour. "You humans just have good brains. Not only do you know how to graft our trees, but you also know how to graft things onto yourselves.

"Just look at that creeper on his body. It’s growing so well!

"If I could graft a creeper onto my body, then the next time the Rose Corridor hits me, I’d be able to share the pain."

Huai Yu froze, remembering the new biological material on Zhou Qian’s legs. She still remembered how he had been drenched in sweat, twitching in sheer agony.

But—

"Does having this creeper on his body cause him any harm?"

"Harm?" Kuang Biao pondered for a moment. "What harm could it cause? At most, it just has a big appetite and can eat a lot.

"After all, the stronger he wants the creeper to be, the more nutrients he has to provide it.

"But you humans are naturally very good at breaking down food and extracting energy anyway. He just needs to eat a couple more bowls of rice."

Huai Yu breathed a sigh of relief. Then, she suddenly realized something. "Kuang Biao, you’re a bamboo who stays here every day. How come your head is full of romance and love whenever you open your mouth?"

The entire bamboo forest fell silent.