Chapter 71 Collective Evolution! Catastrophe Level?

Ma Yi, deep in unconsciousness, found his mind a chaotic swirl; his body was equally tumultuous. Countless cells were destroyed and then reassembled, over and over. As Ma Yi collapsed, his clothes were incinerated to ash by lightning, leaving three naked figures sprawled in odd poses on the ground. Each time lightning struck again, their bodies would involuntarily shift shape, muscles twitching at random.

Creatures that had survived passed through the area, feasting on the corpses of fishmen, yet none dared approach the trio. Unfortunate animals struck by lightning as it hit the rocky ground met their end here, becoming food for later scavengers.

Erha had morphed into a new form to adapt to the relentless electric shocks. His cells evolved constantly, learning to withstand the poisonous gases saturating the air, and above all, to endure greater bolts of electricity. The red patterns on his skin crackled with currents, small arcs darting through the lines. Massive amounts of electrical energy were devoured by his cells; the current changed the cells, and the cells consumed the current. With every passing moment, his cells evolved at astonishing speed. Whenever lightning destroyed a cell, another instantly filled the gap, healing any injury.

Ma Yi’s body gradually shed its human shape. Compared to Iron Pillar and Erha, he was closest to the lightning’s epicenter, taking strikes several times worse than theirs. If Iron Pillar and Erha bore currents in the millions of volts, Ma Yi endured hundreds of millions—enough to rival the output of a nuclear power plant. The tremendous current no longer merely altered his cells, but obliterated them.

After each strike, Ma Yi hovered near death. Fortunately, his recovery abilities were extraordinary, and now his cells healed faster than the lightning could destroy them. As long as he wasn’t killed outright, Ma Yi was nearly immortal. Stranger still, as his cells recovered ever more rapidly, their strength increased, and they seemed to act with purpose, summoning more lightning.

A magnetic field radiated from Ma Yi, drawing thunderbolts from the sky to strike him, again and again. Within his body, down to the genetic level, change transcended human understanding. Though Ma Yi’s stature remained around ten meters, the density and weight of his cells reached terrifying extremes. Even metallic boulders could not bear his weight, sinking beneath him and forming a pit. Ma Yi kept sinking, his immense mass carving his own shape into the earth.

Within the pitch-black hole, silvery currents leapt and flowed among Ma Yi’s cells. The collisions between cells produced electricity rivaling the lightning itself. Where once magma-like patterns coursed through his skin, now only silver arcs remained. This was not magic, but a formidable form of electricity.

Ma Yi’s attraction caused the clouds to generate massive amounts of electricity. The cloud cover gradually dissipated, no longer forming a thick blanket overhead. In the distance, volcanoes—perhaps blocked by the earth sinking beneath Ma Yi, or for some other reason—ceased their eruptions, as if exhausted, letting out their last weak flows.

Without the volcanoes constantly evaporating water, the sea began to cool the slopes, and the boiling waves slowly calmed.

Iron Pillar was the first to awaken. He looked at himself in delight; following the boss brought good fortune. After a brief nap, he had risen a whole level, stepping into the realm of transformation. Clenching his fist, Iron Pillar felt powerful energy coursing through him—but he was ravenous. During the sleep, he had lost several sizes.

Cellular evolution required energy. Without external energy, cells began to devour each other for sustenance. When lightning was present, it supplied the energy needed. But when the storm ended, the cells continued their adaptation, and with insufficient energy, simply consumed their neighbors. The ten-meter-tall Iron Pillar, once muscular and explosive, was now gaunt as a skeleton—like a malnourished giant.

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"I'm starving; need to find something to eat," Iron Pillar muttered, seeing Erha equally shrunken. He rose, flapped his wings, and flew toward the other side of the mountains, where he had spotted a cluster of creatures earlier.

By the time Erha woke, Iron Pillar had brought back heaps of food—the third swarm of sea worms he'd wiped out. Each worm was at least six or seven meters long, with countless legs underneath. But hunger cared little for origins; they ate indiscriminately.

Iron Pillar had consumed dozens of these massive creatures, and still could eat more. His once shrunken frame had rounded out but hadn't regained its former strength; he still looked like he could eat endlessly.

After topping up his own reserves, Erha glanced at the huge pit where Ma Yi lay. Sensing Ma Yi's aura was stable, he joined Iron Pillar in foraging. By Iron Pillar’s tally, he had devoured over a hundred gigantic worms in half a day, each weighing nearly a ton—almost a hundred tons in total. All that energy went straight into Iron Pillar’s recovery.

At last, Iron Pillar burped in satisfaction. He knew Ma Yi would never eat such creatures, regardless of their energy—they simply didn’t look appetizing. So he told Erha: all shellfish should be saved for the boss. Erha, clever as ever, collected suitable food for Ma Yi while searching for his own.

Erha now stood at the brink of the transformation level, just one step away from breaking through to Ma Yi’s tier.

Boom! Roar! The ground shook. From the depths of the pit came a tremendous bellow, with sparks flickering at the entrance.

Thud, thud, thud—the sounds echoed from the hole. Iron Pillar and Erha stared in shock; a terrifying aura radiated from the pit. For Erha, on the verge of the fear level, it made him feel utterly insignificant, as if a monstrous entity lurked within, ready to devour him at any moment.

Both were tense under the oppressive force. If Ma Yi lost control, would his first act be to eat them? The thought was terrifying. But when the figure flew up from the pit, both were left dumbfounded. Not a monstrous beast, but a skeleton—a mere skeleton, as if bones had come alive. It was impossible to tell what it once looked like.

It wasn’t really a skeleton—just so emaciated that it looked like nothing but skin stretched over bones. At ten meters tall, he was even thinner than Iron Pillar and Erha had been before, utterly devoid of any strength. His eyes bulged from the sockets, not from size, but because the skin was too thin to hold them in.

Yet the aura from this skeletal frame was terrifying, forcing Iron Pillar and Erha to retreat several steps, ready to bolt at any moment.

“Damn it, I’ve never been this hungry,” came a weak, hoarse voice from the shriveled throat. The skeleton glanced at the pair, then at the hillside piled with abalones, oysters, and crabs several meters wide.

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“Boss, you should eat first,” Iron Pillar said, shuffling back two more steps. Ma Yi’s gaze had seemed to size him up as food—a terrifying prospect even for a corpse king at the transformation level.

“Yes, boss, you eat first. If it’s not enough, we’ll get more. In fact, we should fetch more now,” Erha echoed, retreating while tugging at Iron Pillar, signaling him to leave. They moved carefully, fearful that Ma Yi’s hungry, glazed eyes would fix on them and tear them apart.

“Go,” Ma Yi managed to squeeze out the word, then slowly settled before the mountain of abalones, paying no mind that they were raw, biting straight into one.

Iron Pillar and Erha fled at his command, only relaxing once they were far away. Iron Pillar patted his chest, more frightened than when he first met Ma Yi after his return.

“It seems the boss has evolved again, but he’s even more terrifying now than when I was at the purple-gold level and saw him at the fear level.”

“Yes, it’s truly terrifying. I nearly lost control of myself,” Erha admitted, relieved to be away from Ma Yi.

“I feel the boss is now beyond terrifying. What’s the level after fear again?” Iron Pillar nodded, searching for food as he flew.

“I think it’s ‘greater fear.’”

“Yes, greater fear, then disaster.” Erha wondered if Ma Yi had reached the disaster level—how else could he inspire such dread?

While Iron Pillar and Erha envied him, Ma Yi himself felt pitiful. He was a cursed soul; every outing brought some calamity, as if the world’s tragedies waited for him. Yet calling him unfortunate wasn’t quite correct. Each disaster was followed by a stroke of luck, secretly aided by the goddess of fortune. His strength increased rapidly; he wasn’t some ‘chosen one’ or ‘protagonist favored by the universe,’ but his power always led the way, allowing him to overcome adversaries with ease.