WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Haruto
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Became the EX-Rank Pet Maker Hunters Obsess Over ◈
Chapter 97: Effects of the Fruit
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Forward base.
As factions from all over gathered in Sichuan and pushed toward its center in search of higher-grade fruit, the sheer size of the region limited how far they could advance at once.
Since stronger mutated magical beasts appeared the deeper one went, they needed checkpoints along the way to gather high-grade fruit.
A forward base was an intermediate stronghold built to make gathering high-grade fruit easier. Its highest priority was barriers and defensive facilities so Hunters could rest and recover without worry.
Yes... resting was natural enough, but...
‘This is too much!!’
“Hunter Byeongcheol, give me another skewer over here!”
“Don’t eat in the pool. Come up and get it yourself.”
“Zzz~”
The Hunters here were resting far too comfortably. Some swam in the pool, others grilled meat, and some took naps.
How could such a peaceful scene unfold in the middle of enemy territory, where vicious magical beasts roamed?
To Celestia, they looked like they were camping.
Countless factions had gathered from around the world, but magical beasts still swarmed nearby.
‘But they’re sleeping in hammocks and having barbecue?’
All we have are tents and barriers!!!
As a religious faction, the Gate Church was highly skilled at establishing strongholds. They could turn an area into a sanctuary, create all kinds of beneficial effects, and efficiently block outside entry.
That was why Celestia had objectively considered the Gate Church’s forward base, made simply by installing barrier stones, an excellent place to rest.
But...
Irritated for no reason, she shouted.
“How does this make any sense!? Why are facilities like that still intact out here?”
“Huff... Huff, huff....”
How did they even make a swimming pool?!
Yeon Harim stared coldly at Celestia as though the question were absurd.
“None of the facilities you see were here originally. We made all of them ourselves.”
“What do you...?”
Celestia was about to argue, but recalling what she had just seen, she could not say another word.
Magical beasts and Hunters receiving construction materials from a giant Jellykko and swiftly putting up buildings.
...No, she could still see it out of the corner of her eye.
A giant gorilla-like magical beast pulled steel beams from a turtle-like magical beast with beams growing from its back and carried them away.
A caterpillar-like magical beast spewed out something like concrete, which hardened in an instant.
A spider-like magical beast spun steel-like thread to firmly secure the framework...
Anyway, something... something was happening.
“What on earth...? How did that giant Jellykko get here safely, and what was that mist we saw earlier...?”
Celestia was utterly confused.
Yeon Harim looked at Sugar, the Jellykko Little Devil Edition in Celestia’s arms, then sighed.
“Haah. We were originally going to drive you out, but since you’re acquainted with Mr. Yoo Hyun, I’ll explain. The giant Jellykko enters the mist zone through the air, so there’s almost no chance of mutated magical beasts attacking it. That’s why it transports supplies.”
“...”
“Huff, huff...”
“As for the mist zone... it comes from a magical beast Mr. Yoo Hyun made. I don’t know exactly how it works either. I only know that it makes living things reluctant to enter, and it separates the inside from the outside.”
At the outskirts Yeon Harim looked toward, there was a hermit-crab-like magical beast.
Its shell was riddled with holes, mist pouring from them and spreading around the forward base.
In truth, the Jellykko had played a major role in allowing Celestia to pass through the mist.
Those who raised Jellykkos were identified as allies by the Jelly-polis faction.
Sweeping a lock of hair aside, Yeon Harim continued.
“Anyway, as you can see, our faction’s search has been proceeding quite smoothly with the magical beasts’ help. We have four teams dividing the work, so we can rest without worry once or twice a week. Thanks to that, we can continue searching without getting run-down. Does that answer your questions? It doesn’t look good when other factions come here for no reason, so please head back now.”
Celestia blankly nodded, left the forward base, and escaped the mist zone.
“Ha... Does that even make sense...?”
The church members who had followed her also looked dazed.
“...What exactly are they doing with magical beasts...?”
“It really makes no sense...”
Among them, one person in particular was trembling like an aspen.
Shiver, shiver...
“...Ha. Luciella, what is it now?”
She had seemed somewhat better after turning pale every time she saw a Jellykko, but had seeing the giant Jellykko put her back in this state?
She reacted this way even to something wobbling like jelly, like pudding.
Something about space splitting open and eyeballs appearing, apparently?
“Ugh... Well, at least she isn’t having an episode anymore. She’s improved a lot.”
Still...
“...Should I ask my secret friend to make something for me too...?”
After seeing that resort-like forward base, Celestia suddenly felt deprived at the thought of sleeping in the Gate Church’s tents.
* * *
Boing!
Using the jelly’s elasticity, Amon jumped and landed on my shoulder.
[ Turn it. Amplify the power by circulating the Dharma Arts Organ’s cycle. A circle resembles the form of causality. To twist established laws, sufficient rotation is required. ]
Following Amon’s words, I focused on the Dharma Arts Organ within my body. More precisely, I moved the parasitic magical beast that possessed it.
When I recited the incantation Amon had taught me, mist poured from my body... and was soon sucked into the small cultivator in front of me.
The inside of the cultivator filled with thick mist.
This was that mist.
It was nearly identical in nature to the mist Amon had used in Japan to make creatures from humans.
An effect that twisted a living being and made it into something else.
More precisely, it was an art that targeted humans and damaged their humanity to create monsters very efficiently.
Of course, I had not used humans as material.
Because I had a material that could replace them.
The golden fruit available at the outermost edge of Sichuan Province.
Classified as elixirs, they were the farming items the Hunters gathered here were after.
These fruits were made from humans.
More precisely, they had grown by using humans as nutrients.
In other words, since the raw material was the same, I could use them as material for my Mist Dharma Arts.
With these fruits, I could produce creatures anywhere.
Unlike magical beasts that required cultivators, I would not be constrained by location.
“...It’s practically a philosopher’s stone.”
“Huff, huff....”
[ Hmph, I don’t know. It seems less efficient than living humans. ]
I watched the mist inside the cultivator.
I had already placed fruit and a Seed inside it.
Ssssss...
The mist melted the fruit and was drawn into the Seed.
The Seed soon swelled into a lump of pink flesh...
Crash!
The cultivator shattered.
But the mist did not scatter.
The magical beast was still growing inside it.
That was right.
Using this Mist Dharma Arts, I could create magical beasts without a cultivator.
“I wanted to apply the cultivator’s mana infusion as well, but a small cultivator won’t work.”
“Huff, huff....”
When fruit was dissolved in the mist and used as nutrients, a magical beast Seed grew in an instant.
Furthermore, when the mist became dense enough, it itself became an otherworld, a separate space where laws different from reality applied.
In other words, by cutting it off from the outside, the mist itself could serve as a cultivator.
‘Well, it’s still a technique I can’t use without an environment where I can consume fruit or other living beings.’
At its core, it was a Dharma Art for invasion.
Or perhaps it could be used to fuse two magical beasts of different natures into one creature...
But I did not know whether magical beasts would want to fuse. There was no guarantee a fusion would remain normal, either.
Would anyone want to fuse with someone other than themselves? Magical beasts probably would not want to lose themselves either.
So I had not yet reached a conclusion about fusion through Dharma Arts.
While I was thinking that, the magical beast made with Mist Dharma Arts had already finished growing.
“Huff, huff....”
“Meow....”
A magical beast with pointed ears and mist wrapped around its front and hind paws.
The unusual thing was that it stood on its hind legs.
It was a bipedal cat-type magical beast.
[ Model Name 》 Mist Cat ]
[ Mana Core Rank 》 B+ ]
[ Dharma Arts Organ Rank 》 C+ ]
[ Lifespan 》 31 years ]
[ Traits 》 Bewitching Mist (A+), Blessing of Mist (A), Charm (B+), Faint Presence (B) ]
“So this is what happens when I make one without any distinguishing features.”
I had simply tried to make a feline magical beast, but perhaps because it had been affected by Mist Dharma Arts, it ended up with traits like those.
It was almost certain now that the art itself affected Cultivation.
Amon looked at the mist-wreathed cat-type magical beast and spoke.
[ It has a Dharma Arts Organ. It is still weak, but it has the potential to reach Tier 2. ]
“Hmm. Still, it turned out oddly close to human form.”
Besides this Mist Cat, I had experimented with fox- and wolf-type magical beasts, but every one of them had walked on two legs.
If there was a cause...
“I think it’s the fruit rather than the Mist Dharma Arts.”
Since these fruits had formed using humans as nutrients, I suspected they might contain human genetic factors.
That was why they all tried to walk on two legs!! To become closer to humans!!!
“No, wait. That’s not it... Not genetic factors...”
If they contained human genetic factors, they should have looked more like humans instead of merely walking on two legs.
Amon, arms crossed, spoke.
[ Human lingering impressions must have mixed into the fruits. ]
“Lingering impressions?”
[ Something like residue that a soul leaves behind in a body. If that was absorbed into the fruit as it was... then it likely affected magical-beast Cultivation and made them instinctively walk on two legs. You can think of it as something like memories of a past life remaining. ]
It was a spiritual explanation I could not fully understand, but it was interesting.
“Then could these fruits effectively be human-form essence?”
I said it as a joke.
“No, wait...!!”
[ ...? ]
But I soon realized an absurd fact.
Due to Sichuan’s nature... the closer one got to the deepest region where the giant tree stood, the better the quality of the fruit and the stronger its effects became.
Naturally, high-grade fruit would surely contain the lingering impressions of countless people...
And according to what Hunters had observed while hunting mutated magical beasts at the outermost edge, mutated magical beasts could eat these fruits as well.
If anything, these fruits seemed to be the usual means by which mutated magical beasts enhanced themselves.
“Could it be...? Then perhaps... the mutated magical beasts in the deepest region that we haven’t observed yet...”
Crash!
“Graaah!! What is with this cat!? That took forever to obtain!!! Don’t eat it!!!!”
“Shoo! Shoo!”
“Why is it so fast?!”
“Fuck, it’s scattering like mist!!!”
Just as I was about to reach a certain truth, a commotion suddenly broke out outside.
I realized that the Mist Cat model had vanished at some point, then hurried toward the disturbance.
Cheonseong Guild members had returned to transport their spoils to the base camp. The fruit they had brought was loaded into a large basket-like container, which was attached to and carried by a giant Jellykko.
...And the Mist Cat I had made was sitting atop that cargo, eating the fruit.
...With front paws that had somehow grown blunt fingers.
The Cheonseong Guild members were flustered by its sudden change.
“Uh...? W-were this thing’s legs always that long?”
“No!! Its body got bigger too!! Did it absorb Essentium!?”
“Fuck, wait...!! It went from a level-four furry to a level-three furry!!!”
“It’s getting suspicious!!!”
Before long, the Cheonseong Guild members’ attention shifted to me as I ran out in a hurry.
Suspicion filled their eyes, but some of them looked desperately hopeful.
“Meow....”
The Mist Cat came over to me and rubbed its cheek against mine.
As the situation grew increasingly suspicious, I broke out in a cold sweat and spoke.
“...Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not a furry.”
Whether I tried to explain or not, the guild members, who had suddenly grown desperate, excitedly rushed at me.
“Director Yoo Hyun!!! Please, give our Lantern human-form Essentium!!!!!!”
“This is insane!!! I’ll pay any amount...!!! Please sell it to us!!!!”
“In the past... people and magical beasts were one. There were magical beasts who married people. There were people who married magical beasts.”
“Hm. Hunter Jeongchan... I didn’t think you were like that. You were a furry.”
“D-director!!! I don’t know what it is, b-but can that furry medicine be used on Jellykkos too!? I’m desperate!!!!”
The base camp fell into chaos.
Footnotes:
The numbered “furry levels” joke rates the degree of anthropomorphism. A lower number means a creature has become more humanlike.
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