Seed Improvement and Selection

The Duchy of Starlit Stars consists of seven major provinces.

Among them, Jinyan Province is located at the northernmost part of the duchy, with its southwest bordering Lake Lan Province, beyond which lies Frostveil Province.

“What is the epidemic?” Su Nan asked.

Brother Ke Yi didn’t say much and handed over the parchment.

Taking a look at it, Su Nan furrowed his brow.

It turns out that just a month ago, the city of Silver Ridge in Frostveil Province suddenly experienced a strange disease. Those afflicted would gradually grow beast-like fur, claws, and sharp teeth, along with more beast features, and would go mad, attacking others with an intense craving for blood and flesh.

Initially, the Lord of Silver Ridge did not take it seriously, sending guards to kill the infected and burying them hastily.

However, the matter did not end there. More people in the city soon displayed symptoms of the infection.

Within just a month, the number of infected in Silver Ridge exceeded five hundred and continued to increase at an alarming rate.

The situation developed to the point that the Silver Ridge army alone could no longer handle it.

Helplessly, the Lord of Silver Ridge had to seek the aid of the Marquis of Frostveil.

Currently, the Marquis of Frostveil has dispatched troops to suppress the rampaging infected.

After reading the contents on the parchment, Su Nan couldn’t help but grimace with a toothache-like expression.

Isn’t this Beasthood!

Instead of calling Beasthood a disease, it’s more of an atavistic phenomenon.

Humans infected with Beasthood will have their beastification genes fully activated, developing many beast features, losing sanity, and becoming bloodthirsty and brutal beasts.

However, Beasthood can only be spread by original beastmen.

Original beastmen refer to first-generation beastmen and their descendants directly bred from them.

For instance, beastmen bred from original beastmen with normal humans or common beastmen are not considered original beastmen.

For example, the beastman guard Ota beside Mu Zhuo from the Fire Fox Commerce Association is obviously an ordinary beastman.

In ancient times, the original beastmen caused a disaster known as the ‘Beastification Calamity’, resulting in massive casualties, which was later suppressed by the sorcerers.

Since then, sorcerers realized the threat of the original beastmen and exterminated them completely.

Those who remained were ordinary beastmen born from breeding with normal humans.

So theoretically, there should no longer be any original beastmen on the Starlight Continent, so why is Beasthood appearing again?

Su Nan was secretly puzzled.

“This is Beasthood.” Su Nan handed the parchment back.

Seeing Brother Ke Yi’s puzzled expression, he had to explain in detail what Beasthood was.

Upon hearing, Brother Ke Yi’s expression immediately became particularly solemn.

“Are the infected who turn into beastmen difficult to deal with?”

“It depends on the physical strength of the infected. If it’s an ordinary person, they would at most reach the level of an apprentice knight after being infected. But if it’s an apprentice knight or knight, it becomes quite tricky.”

“Beasthood can be minor or severe. If the source of the infection is found quickly, and the spread is controlled while clearing all infected, the situation can be resolved swiftly. However, if it’s not controlled well, it could lead to a catastrophe.” Su Nan shook his head.

Upon hearing this, Brother Ke Yi frowned even more and sighed, “I hope Frostveil Province can quickly control the situation.”

Su Nan pursed his lips but wasn’t too worried.

With Lake Lan Province separating Frostveil Province from the Shining Lands, even if Frostveil Province were to suffer from a full-blown Beastification Calamity, it would be the Marquis of Frostveil and neighboring lords who should be concerned, not him.

Time flew by, and soon it was the Moon of Summer Bounty.

The Fire Fox Commerce Association finally delivered the seeds of Silver Moon Flower and Red Vein Fruit.

The construction of the magical plantation could finally be put on the agenda.

However, before planting, Su Nan had to improve the seeds of the Silver Moon Flower and Red Vein Fruit.

The former was relatively simple, characterized by two words—synthesis!

Using basic Silver Moon Flower seeds to synthesize more superior varieties.

Of course, synthesis is not infinite.

Though theoretically, as long as there are enough Silver Moon Flower seeds, Su Nan could continually improve and advance them.

But the problem is, the better the variety, the harsher the growing environment required.

If the synthesized Silver Moon Flower is too superior, even the energy particle concentration in a magical plantation with an energy-gathering array might not meet its growth conditions.

Hence, what Su Nan needed to do was find the ultimate improved version of the seed that perfectly matched the energy particle concentration of the magical plantation.

This process is neither hard nor easy; it involves planting different synthesized seeds and then comparing their growth performance to select the best.

It took almost two months for Su Nan to select the most suitable superior variety.

The improvement process of the Red Vein Fruit, on the other hand, was much more difficult and prolonged.

He must first fuse the seeds of the Red Vein Fruit with dragon subtype blood, grow them once to obtain improved Red Vein Fruit seeds before he can proceed to synthesis.

Otherwise, fusing one seed after another would exhaust Su Nan.

However, even with the energy-gathering array improving the growth environment, the growth cycle of the Red Vein Fruit was still as long as three months.

Coupled with the time spent researching the fusion process, it took Su Nan four months to harvest the first batch of seeds, which he named Dragon Blood Fruit.

Then came the repetition of the Silver Moon Flower seed selection and adaptation process.

By the time Su Nan planted the final chosen Dragon Blood Fruit seeds, it was already late autumn, nearing the end of the year.

The weather had turned cold.

Fortunately, the magical plantation has a regime array that maintains a constant temperature, so there was no concern about climate impact.

Looking at the dense seedlings of Silver Moon Flowers and Dragon Blood Fruits in the magical plantation, Su Nan exhaled with a sense of accomplishment.

From now on, he wouldn’t need to spend a lot of gold coins purchasing Silver Moon Flowers anymore; the material problem for the Super Energy Potion was temporarily solved.

The substitute for the lesser Dragon Blood Potion was also similarly resolved.

Once the first batch of Dragon Blood Fruits was harvested, the issue of insufficient potion supply could be addressed.

Stretching lazily, Su Nan turned and left the magical plantation.

The base was quiet.

Because Su Nan was the only one here, the place was mostly calm.

Occasionally, the sound of clay golems’ heavy footsteps could be heard as they cleaned the base.

Since Xie Man and the other two still couldn’t handle things independently, the planting and cultivation process of the Silver Moon Flowers was done entirely by Su Nan himself.

As a result, he had become even busier in recent months.

This was why the iron magic golem hadn’t been crafted yet, and the black iron stones sent from Shining City were still piled up in the warehouse.

However, Su Nan hadn’t missed a day of meditation and spell training.

He had now successfully constructed the seventh star ring, getting a step closer to advancing to a third-level wizard apprentice.

His mental strength had also grown to 22.12.

Nonetheless, the proficiency of the Star Ring Meditation Technique at level eight had skyrocketed to 130,000 points.

He was still over 20,000 proficiency points away from leveling up again.

“Over 20,000 proficiency points, which equates to about a month’s time.”

“However, at this rate, the proficiency of the Star Ring Meditation Technique at level nine might reach 200,000, which means it could take at least seven to eight months to level up.”

Su Nan estimated, noting that the timeline was roughly as he had predicted.

If everything went smoothly, by the end of next year’s Summer Bounty or the beginning of the Moon of Fiery Flow, he would have constructed the ninth star ring.