GA: Chapter 190: The Gap Between Species Has Vanished — Those Who Fail to Keep Pace With the Era Are Destined to Be Left Behind
Before the spiritual revival, those creatures had posed no threat to humans — they wouldn't have actively sought to harm them. But after the revival, something had changed.
Just as humans occupied cities and refused to let any threatening mutated creature enter, the mutated creatures had carved out territories of their own. Any unfamiliar presence that wandered into their domain was met with immediate hostility.
And as their intelligence continued to grow, they had begun to do more — consolidating other mutated creatures under their influence, expanding their territories, forming alliances with mutated creatures from neighboring areas.
The most critical thing was this: in the eyes of these mutated creatures, humans weren't only their greatest threat — their most formidable enemy, to be treated with the utmost seriousness. They were also the finest food available.
Except for a small number of powerful individuals, most humans were weak, posed no danger, and existed in enormous numbers — each one carrying a meaningful amount of energy. They were among the best prey imaginable. So when mutated creatures in the wild encountered humans — the intelligent ones would first probe the other party's strength before deciding whether to treat them as prey, while the less intelligent ones would simply attack immediately and eat.
Perhaps many people had never imagined it. Humanity — which had sat at the apex of the food chain for as long as anyone could remember — would one day be regarded as food by other living things.
Even now, humanity still occupied the greatest expanse of land above ground, controlled the majority of terrestrial resources, and vastly outpaced mutated creatures in collective strength. Short of an outright civilizational war between mutated creatures and humans, no single mutated species could defeat humanity.
And yet — that was the reality. In the minds of mutated creatures, the concept of humans as food had taken root.
The spiritual revival was an evolution for all living things. A transformation for everyone.
In an era like this, every species and every individual had to seize whatever opportunity moved them forward. Those who failed to — were destined to be left behind.
Just like now. The moment Qin Tian stepped into this area, dozens of mutated birds perched in the trees above had fixed their eyes on him.
He could have released some of his presence and scared them off — but he had come here specifically to test his new abilities. That wasn't something he was willing to do.
"Chii chii chii—"
"Chii chii chii—"
Dozens of mutated birds called from the branches, then spread their wings and launched into the sky. Circling once overhead, they angled downward and dove toward him like a volley of arrows.
RUMBLE.
Qin Tian stood his ground. With a crack of thunder, blue-violet lightning wrapped around his entire body — a crackling shell of radiance. The mutated birds diving toward him like projectiles were struck and killed by the electricity before they could even make contact, dropping as charred remains from the sky.
As the first wave fell, the dozen or so mutated birds still airborne seemed to sense the danger. They beat their wings and tried to flee — but before they could make any real distance, bolts of lightning shot through each of their skulls, leaving clean, empty holes behind.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The lightning-pierced birds fell to the ground with dull impacts. Qin Tian paid the results no particular attention. He gathered the bodies into his spatial ring with a calm expression.
Then continued deeper into the wild.
These mutated birds weren't nearly enough to test the full extent of his lightning. He needed more powerful mutated creatures.
Along the way, it wouldn't hurt to check for any creatures with significant potential that hadn't yet matured — put them down before they could grow into threats against humanity.
Not far away, in a different part of the wilderness, a squad of ability users had walked into a life-threatening situation.
"You filthy beast — die!"
A powerfully built man gripped an enormous axe, his eyes blazing red. He raised the axe and swung it at the mutated creature before him.
It was a mutated wild rabbit — four or five meters tall. Unlike the ordinary white rabbit, its fur was white as pure snow without a single impurity. Its crimson pupils regarded the man with flat, dispassionate calm.
A flicker of ice-blue light.
The axe-wielding man collapsed to the ground. He looked at his legs — they had been encased in ice along with the earth beneath him at some unknown point.
He couldn't move.
On the battlefield around him, two others had already been completely frozen solid.
"Gugu gugu..."
The mutated rabbit glanced at him briefly, then shifted its gaze to the last human still standing unharmed — or more precisely, the one who was wounded but not frozen.
"Gouzi-shu — don't do anything rash!"
"If you die too, we're finished!"
A clean-featured young man who looked about twenty called out urgently.
"At this point it's not even about being rash or not. We might all die here today."
The young man beside him — bespectacled, roughly the same age — spoke with a surface calm that, if listened to carefully, carried unmistakable undercurrents of panic.
"We got through the mutated bird flock. We killed the mutated boar. We came out of the mutated wolf pack intact."
"And now a single mutated rabbit has done this to us."
His expression was complicated. The spiritual revival truly could transform a creature completely. Could erase the gap between species — allowing something that should by all logic be weaker to casually destroy things that were formerly so much more powerful.
"Ice-sealing ability. Speed more extreme than before its evolution. Fur that blades can't cut through."
"And... intelligence."
"It's not killing us right now — it's waiting for us to fight back."
"It won't let us escape, but it's letting us resist. Has it made pets of us, or prey? Is it planning to toy with us until we stop being entertaining and then eat us?"
He looked at the mutated white rabbit ahead — perfectly still, simply watching them with cool, patient eyes — and said it with self-deprecating bitterness.
Then he stood up anyway, and turned to the young man beside him.
"Qingmu — once I use my last attack, take Gouzi-shu and run."
"You still have your parents. Gouzi-shu has children. I... don't have anything left to hold me here. But Ruoshui and Yinguang's families — don't forget them."
"After all, we're the ones who brought them into this. We signed agreements, but we should still do what needs to be done."
Qingmu opened his mouth at Yusheng's words — then said nothing. He only nodded in silence.
"I've thought about a day like this for a long time. I just didn't expect it would come so soon."
"If you and Gouzi-shu actually manage to get away — pass along my thanks to this mutated rabbit, if you can. It may have been treating us like toys, but it gave me the chance to say all of this. And it's going to be what lets you escape."
"If you can't get away — we all die together."
Yusheng finished speaking and gave Qingmu a pat on the shoulder. Qingmu nodded. Neither of them said anything more after that.
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