Chapter 334: The Spirit Merlo Fruit

Chapter 334

The Spirit Merlo Fruit

The young girl had a plan and followed through with it. After letting the little Black Fairy play with the Ice Serpent as she had demonstrated the previous day, the next morning she immediately headed to Pan 4.1 City, as intended. Her appearance this time received the usual indifferent welcome from the Metis, but it seemed the atmosphere around had improved significantly after the eldest young lord had come and created a flower garden here. There were also spiritual fruits planted around and various stratagems. This benefited not only the spiritual fruits but also the Metis, a type of plant species, who reaped the advantages as well.

Ignoring the Metis soldiers, Ellie walked into the room where the Microbial Orb was on her own. The pond here still seemed as potent as ever, and the little orb was happily soaking in the water.

Without any preamble, as soon as she appeared, she threw a level 5 herb into the pond, causing the little orb to tremble with joy. It absorbed the energy from the level 5 herb and slowly savored it, while also giving Ellie a rather potent chunk of green fermented water in return.

Perhaps because Ellie hadn’t come to collect her benefits for some time, today’s green fermented water was of exceptional quality. However, it still didn’t compare to the first batch of fermented water that had transformed the 3 fruits into spiritual fruits. Ellie squinted slightly, hoping that her efforts today would make the little orb give her something good.

"Hey...little orb, you’ve received many level 5 and level 4 herbs from me. Why are the qualities of the fermented water still at this level?" Ellie crossed her arms, looking at the little orb like a mother scrutinizing her child. The little orb didn’t care; it slowly sank deeper into the pond, showing that it had no desire to negotiate with Ellie any further.

Ellie smiled. She had already anticipated that this little orb would be quite stubborn. At first, she didn’t understand why spiritual devices had such personalities, but after reaching the 7th floor, Ellie learned a lot. It turned out that these spirits used by the elves were actually the spirits of deceased humans, hence they were called flawed spirits. The price they fetched on the 7th floor was quite low, unlike the generative spirits like the spiritual fruits. Even at level 0, the spiritual fruits were still more valuable.

It wasn’t surprising that the device had such a personality. Even though their spirits couldn’t remember their past lives, their traits remained unchanged.

The greed and selfishness of this little orb made it unsurprising that it would ignore its master’s commands. Ellie didn’t intend to force it to comply. She knew that the orb retained only a fraction of the benefits, and its ability to digest things with its microorganisms had limits. It would need better resources to improve...

“Hey, are you sure you don’t want to negotiate with me?” The little orb still didn’t respond. But before it could sink so deep that it wouldn’t hear her anymore, Ellie slowly took out some herbs. This made the orb, which was sinking to the bottom of the pond, suddenly spring up.

Bloop!

The sound of water bubbles rising couldn’t keep up with the orb’s rapid movement. Ellie smiled slightly. The little orb, upon seeing the level 6 herb, almost screamed in excitement. A whip appeared immediately, hoping to snatch the herb and toss it into its pond. Unfortunately for it, Ellie still held the upper hand.

“Did I order you to do that?” At Ellie’s command, as its master, the orb, no matter how much it wanted to resist, could do nothing but blink at her.

“Good boy.”

“I’m not a good boy!! Give me that herb!”

“Oh, is that how you speak to your master?”

“I want the herb!!”

"Oh, you don’t want it?" Ellie pretended to put the herb away. The little orb trembled. Since Ellie arrived, it had refused to speak. Who would have thought that after she took out this herb, the orb would start making such a fuss?

"............" Seeing that its master had no intention of giving it the precious herb easily, the orb fell silent. It tried to muster all its energy to produce the green fermented water. However, as mentioned earlier, it had very little stored up. The result was a batch of fermented water the same size as before, and the quality was not that good.

"Is this all you have? How disappointing. With your current power level, level 5 herbs are sufficient for you."

"No! I can do better than that. I just don’t have the herbs. Give it to me, and I’ll prove it!"

"Oh, you know you can’t deceive me, right?"

"O-Of course, I know!" Just one taste of a level 6 herb in its lifetime would satisfy the little orb. So, even if it had to give everything back, it would still feel happy.

"Very well, then. Here you go." Ellie handed over the level 6 herb. The orb’s little whip snatched the high-level herb and joyfully tossed it into its pond. Like a fish getting its food, it circled around the level 6 herb several times, clearly excited and happy.

Being a level 6 magical device, it had existed for a long time but had never encountered such a powerful herb. After spending more than 1 hour, a dark green lump finally appeared. Ellie looked at it and nodded in satisfaction.

"Thank you very much." Knowing that it had once been a human spirit like herself, Ellie became a bit kinder towards it. A spirit trapped for thousands of years was more like a punishment. How long had the orb been alone? Even though its memories were wiped, it couldn’t be truly happy.

If she were to die, Ellie would rather enter the cycle of reincarnation than be like this. Living for thousands or tens of thousands of years as a magical device, unable to help oneself, wouldn’t that be terrible? With this in mind, she decided to be kinder to the magical devices she owned. At least for now, they would have a master who could also be a friend. Better than just using them until they were slowly destroyed.

Before leaving, Ellie tossed a level 5 herb into the pond as a gesture of repayment. It wasn’t any great effort for her after all. The orb paused for a moment, not expecting its cunning master to leave such a precious gift. When no one expected, the orb’s emotions began to stir...

"I don’t owe anyone any favors. If you do this, I will certainly repay you," the orb muttered before slowly dragging the level 5 herb into the depths of the pond, content to spend time with something it loved.

Ellie returned with excellent rewards. Though a single level 6 herb wasn’t as valuable as the fermented water the orb had previously given her, the quality of this fermented water was still very high. She returned to Pan 5.1 City and went straight to her resting room. Today, she didn’t plan to go out and fight but to spend the day collecting resources and improving the quality of her 2nd dimension.

She knew that the level of the dimension didn’t increase or decrease, but the quality of the environment within it was crucial. Ellie brought spiritual fruits into the 2nd dimension and found their growth slightly slower than in the first dimension. This might be because the first dimension had many valuable items and abundant life force, partly due to the Tezetrons herbs. So, she brought all the fermented water to increase the number of these herbs!

However, before Ellie could enter her dimension, the little Nocturnal Rabbit, who should have been resting outside after a sleepless night as Ellie had left it outside to absorb the moonlight and nature, jumped in and started gesturing urgently.

The little Nocturnal Rabbit was as cute as ever, but its serious demeanor made Ellie raise her eyebrows.

"You want me to go outside and see something?"

"Vi Vee," the rabbit responded eagerly. Ellie thought for a moment. Though she considered her time very valuable, the rabbit had never acted like this before. So, she decided to spend the day playing with it.

Unbeknownst to Ellie, the little Nocturnal Rabbit had done something significant the previous night. After absorbing a considerable amount of energy, the little Nocturnal Rabbit, which had never enjoyed the moonlight so freely in its life, began to feel its own great power.

In the past, after the elves disappeared forever, the races that depended on them had to endure hardships. The cities that the elves once controlled were stripped of their rights. Eventually, various wild animals took over these cities. Nocturnal Rabbits, which once thrived in great numbers, were hunted to near extinction. As a result, they had to hide in burrows at all times, even though nighttime was their best time.

It was truly fortunate that Ellie saved the last little Nocturnal Rabbit. Otherwise, such a wondrous creature would have vanished completely, which could have had severe consequences!

Wasn’t it a bit surprising? When the elves were still around, they could cultivate numerous spiritual fruits, including level 2-3 spiritual fruits for sale, even though those fruits were just ordinary ones.

And yes...all of that was because they had good companions!

Ellie followed the rabbit outside, initially thinking nothing of it. It’s true that she had allowed spores to spread around the city, but unless there was an emergency, there was no need for an alert. This place was unlike the human kingdom, where the chaos required her to meticulously monitor everyone’s actions. That took a lot of her focus. Hiding in this tower felt like living a retired life. Ellie felt so good that she once considered hiding here forever.

Unfortunately, her goal now had to be elevated to the next level...

Back to the present situation, it turned out she had missed something important due to not thoroughly checking! The girl looked up at a large fruit tree now surrounded by panicked Komodos. Seeing Ellie, they slowly made way. Upon seeing the little Nocturnal Rabbit, they showed even more respect.

"A spiritual Merlo fruit?" Ellie paused slightly. She looked at the little Nocturnal Rabbit, which proudly indicated that this was its work. The girl then understood.

She had read its details before. The nickname "Shapeshifting Spirit" likely came from this ability. No wonder the elves cherished and raised them the most. In truth, even the elves couldn’t awaken the spirits of plants, but their pets could!!

Ellie channeled her botanic magic power into herbs and fruits daily. It turned out she could only enhance their level. Once they had enough life force and magic power, their properties increased, but none mutated into spiritual vegetables or spiritual herbs.

If not for the Microbial Orb that previously gathered energy from the living Metis to ferment for hundreds of years, when used, it had elevated the fruits into spiritual fruits, Ellie wouldn’t have thought that spiritual fruits could be awakened and brought to life!

“Really good,” Ellie muttered. She noticed the Komodos eyeing the Spirit Merlo Fruit with desire, but because they belonged to her, they dared not eat it casually.

The girl picked only 1 cluster of the Spirit Merlo Fruit and then allowed the Komodos to take the rest. They were ready to kneel in gratitude; slaves like them never expected such kindness from her.

Ellie paid them no further attention and called the little rabbit to follow her. Unfortunately, her 2 dimensions couldn’t allow other living beings to enter. Otherwise, she would let the little rabbit run around and enhance the ordinary crops. But this was just wishful thinking. She knew using the little rabbit’s power wasn’t easy. Perhaps because it was a full moon last night, the little rabbit absorbed a lot of moonlight energy; otherwise, why had nothing like this happened before?

To be sure, the girl gave the little rabbit a level 6 herb, and it could only be a Tezetrons herb.“Next time, if you can do it again, please use this herb,” Ellie said hopefully. Even as an ordinary level 6 herb, it was very valuable. If the little rabbit could transform it into a spiritual herb, she couldn’t imagine how powerful it would be!!