Chapter 116: Eating the forbidden fruit, spiritual sublimation
Led by Julia Cook, the scarred woman, Luke and his companions soon found the tree that bore the forbidden fruit.

It stands alone in the depths of the valley, surrounded by dense jungle, with only a hidden path leading to it, as if it were a treasure deliberately hidden by nature.

The air around was moist and fresh, and the sunlight shone through the gaps in the treetops, sprinkling on the ground in patches, forming patches of light. There was a natural barrier of vines and shrubs around the tree.

The trunk is thick, more than two meters in diameter, and is covered with thick moss and vines, with wild orchids and ferns clinging to some places. The branches and leaves are lush, and the crown is huge, covering the surrounding land like a giant umbrella, providing a cool shelter for the creatures below. The leaves are dark green with a golden luster on the edges, as if they would sparkle in the sun.

However, the faint flash at the edge of the leaves was completely obscured by the golden fruit at the top of the tree.

This tree is very strange. There is only one fruit on the whole tree, hanging at the top of the tree, swaying gently in the wind. Compared with the forbidden fruit that Adam and Eve ate in the legend, in Luke’s opinion, it is more like the golden apple in Greek mythology.

However, considering the general Christian education background of Westerners, it is normal that they subconsciously imagine this apple as forbidden fruit.

“What is the function of that fruit?” Luke asked the woman beside him.

Julia thought about it carefully and replied, “I’m not sure about its specific function, but I’ve heard it say that it can enlighten animals and give them the same wisdom as humans.”

“Besides that, I was previously controlled by the python’s special ability and became its slave. Later, I found a fruit core under the tree and ate it subconsciously. After that, I got rid of its control and digested the energy it used to control me. I now have the ability to freely change between human form and snake form.”

Speaking of the ability to transform into human form and animals, Luke couldn’t help but think of a cat lady with a strong ability to squeeze juice.

Could it be that this snake girl became a nature druid by chance? She didn’t even use the extraordinary seeds!

However, the world is so big that there are all kinds of wonders. Perhaps the fruit core is also equivalent to a special and extraordinary seed.

Luke tested it and found that the tree was indeed a pure plant, with no sign of turning into a tree man and attacking people. Then he flew to the top of the tree and picked the golden fruit.

When the fruit was still growing on the tree, it didn’t feel very big, but when it was picked, Luke’s body immediately sensed the abundant energy in the fruit.

A desire that seemed to come from genetic instinct kept urging Luke to eat it! Eat it!

Damn, this couldn’t be a basilisk conspiracy.

Luke’s first reaction was not to eat the fruit immediately. Instead, he began to feel suspicious. It didn’t make sense that the basilisk would leave the fruit on the tree and not eat it, but wait for him to harvest it.

However, it was able to give the black bear a fruit at the beginning. Perhaps it would only work if the first one was eaten.

Luke held the fruit in his hand with a gloomy expression on his face.

After a moment, he made a decision – to test it first. If his mind was not affected or controlled, and he really wanted to eat the fruit instinctively, then he would eat it.

As for how to test?

The reactions of the Thompson brothers just now proved the excellent effect of that skill.

【Toothache Treatment】!
The goal is yourself!
“hiss!!!!!!!!!!!”

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK!
It hurts!

Luke almost dropped the golden apple in his hand. He felt as if there was a drill spinning inside his tooth. The constant pain was transmitted to his brain through the dental nerve without any loss.

The pain spread from the teeth to the ears, temples and even the entire face, causing pain on one side of the head. This pain seemed to have its own rhythm, intensifying with the pulsation of the heartbeat, and each heartbeat brought a new burst of pain.

Fuck!
No wonder it is a hard control skill, no wonder it can remove mind control, this feeling, damn it, I never want to experience it a second time in my life!
After waking up from the toothache, Luke clearly felt that his body’s desire for the golden apple in his hand had not diminished in the slightest.

Although humans are intelligent and rational creatures, sometimes we just have to give our bodies over to our intuition.

Since your body desires it so much, just follow its feelings.

The situation is not right now, and it is not convenient to activate [Gluttony Stomach]. If I take it back, I am worried that the fruit will be out of date if it is kept for too long. So I might as well eat it now.

Luke put the golden apple to his mouth and ate all the flesh in no time.

Thinking of what Julia had said just now, that eating the fruit core could have such a great effect, Luke gritted his teeth, chewed up the fruit core and ate it into his stomach.

Soon, there was a reaction.

A subtle tremor began from deep within the heart and gradually spread throughout the body.

There was no special change in Luke’s body, but his spiritual world seemed to be in turmoil. Waves of cool and refreshing energy emerged naturally from the depths of his soul and flowed into his mental power.

As the energy flowed in, a ray of light seemed to gradually light up in the depths of Luke’s consciousness, penetrating every corner of his spiritual world. His consciousness became unusually clear, and every thought seemed to be purified, sharper, and clearer.

The range of his mental perception began to expand, and his perception ability was greatly enhanced, allowing him to perceive details that he had never noticed before, even the flow of air and the life rhythm of tiny creatures, or the fleeting emotions in other people’s hearts.

At this moment, Luke felt the tension, shock and other emotions coming from behind him.

这 是
A spiritual sublimation!
evolution!

No wonder even wild beasts can develop wisdom, and no wonder even an ordinary person like Julia can achieve extraordinary things with the help of a fruit core.

This fruit is definitely Luke’s biggest gain today.

When the clear stream of spiritual energy is exhausted, the panel gives a prompt:

“Absorbing a large amount of pure soul energy, mental strength is improving.”

“Current mental strength: 900-1500.”

He had already overestimated the improvement that this fruit would bring to him, but he still didn’t expect that just by eating an apple, his mental strength would almost double.

The nearly doubled mental strength brings about a significant increase in the upper limit of the power of various skills such as Sun Fire, Sky Power, and [Spirit Fang].

I’m afraid that even the improvement brought by promotion to the third level is no more than this.

I would like to call this wave the ultimate enhancement!

The time it took to digest the golden apple was less than two minutes in the real world. The Thompson brothers and Julia only saw Luke eat the apple, stand there in a daze for a while, and then his aura suddenly surged, emitting a heart-pounding pressure.

“Brother, could it be that he has completed the third-level ritual and advanced?” the Bigfoot user asked his brother.

He had only seen the aura and oppressive feeling from Luke in the strong third-level warriors.

Alex was not sure. After all, in just one or two minutes, Luke’s aura changed too much, which was very similar to the difference he knew before and after his promotion to the third level. He hesitated and said, “It’s possible, but don’t ask. This is other people’s privacy.”

“I know!” Silas said with dissatisfaction, “I’m not a child who doesn’t know manners.”

Luke suppressed the joy of getting a super boost in his heart, looked at the three people following behind him with sparkling eyes, and said: “This tree…”

Before Luke could finish, Alex said, “I’ve said before that of all the gains from today’s battle, we only want the extraordinary seed, and the rest belongs to you, so you don’t have to ask us what to do with the tree, you can decide for yourself.” Julia, who was standing by except for giving a reminder at the beginning, had been watching the battle from the sidelines, so she nodded and said, “I have no objection either.”

“Well, I won’t be polite.”

Luke already had an idea about what to do with the tree, but now was not the right time.

“Don’t just focus on fighting, buddy,” he pointed to the wilderness around him, “You’re here on a mission, look for the bodies first!”

“If it’s not eaten.”

As it turns out, it was actually eaten.

At least Luke and his three companions searched the entire forest thoroughly, but apart from some signs of camping, proving that the person the Thompson brothers were looking for had indeed been there, they didn’t see even a bone.

The Thompson brothers also asked Julia, but sometimes the basilisk would send some small snakes to attack her, and some of the wounds on her body were caused by fighting with those snakes.

So she didn’t just stare at the road leading to the Snake Valley all day long, and there was more than one road leading to the Snake Valley.

In her recollection, she had indeed never seen the college students described by the Thompson brothers. Perhaps they were just unlucky. On their way to the camping adventure, they did not meet Julia to block the way, and they did not believe the signs, so they unfortunately received the box lunch.

Now there was no one alive or dead, and the Thompson brothers could only take some dusty personal belongings from the campsite back to have their families identify them.

However, although most of the commissioned tasks failed, even if they succeeded in obtaining the extraordinary seeds, they could finally give an explanation to their sister when they returned, so the two brothers were not too depressed.

After thoroughly searching the nearby valley, the two men completed their mission and did not stop. They returned to the parking place, changed the spare tire, and drove away from Snake Valley.

Now, Luke and Julia were the only ones left in the desolate Snake Valley.

It is very easy for a man and a woman alone in the wilderness to create an ambiguous atmosphere.

However, this does not apply to Luke and the other two at all.

Julia was shocked by the bloody battle just now, and what she thought about most was how to avoid being killed by Luke.

As for Luke, he is really picky about food. Although Julia is a beautiful girl with a good foundation, her face is covered with scars, so he really can’t eat her.

Moreover, he had more important things to do at the moment and his mind was not on Sese at all.

“Are you going anywhere next?” Luke asked Julia.

Julia was silent for a moment, then shook her head. “I don’t know where to go. My parents are gone. I stayed in Snake Valley just to stop others from dying. I didn’t want so many people to experience my tragedy.”

After the basilisk died, Julia felt relieved, but also a little devastated that she had lost her purpose in life.

She said a little disappointedly: “I feel like a monster. I think the human world may not be suitable for me. I have gotten used to it here. If you have no objection, I would like to continue living in Snake Valley.”

“Don’t rush to make a decision,” Luke took out his phone, “I know a place that might be suitable for you to live in. You might meet a lot of friends like you there.”

He found the number he had saved for a long time but never dialed.

“beep”

Hang up.

Damn! Garbage operator!
No signal!
Luke tapped his phone and used the power of the sky to send himself to a height of more than three meters.

Well, not yet.

Fortunately, there were many trees taller than three meters nearby. Luke found the tallest one, climbed to the top of the tree, and held the phone high.

Hey!
There’s a signal.

Luke dials again
“Dudu.du.”

No one answered.

Come again!

Still no one.

Come again!

“Dudu.du.”

After several attempts, the phone was so hot that it was finally connected. A strange female voice came from the other end of the phone: “This is the Breath of the Wild tribe, who are you?”

“My name is Luke. I’m looking for Penny. It’s very important.” Luke said into the microphone.

“Penny? Okay, wait a minute.”

The person who answered the phone was very nice and didn’t seem to be embarrassed at all.

This number was given to Luke by Penny before she left. Although they were forbidden to use any modern electronic devices before reaching level three in the tribe, it was not completely so strict that there was no room for freedom at all.

If any friends outside want to contact them, they can use this number to find them.

In the Breath of the Wild tribe, the woman who answered the phone put the microphone aside, took a step forward, and before she took the second step, she turned into a mighty eagle, flapped her wings and flew out of the tent.

Penny wasn’t far from here, so she didn’t even hang up the phone.

After circling in the sky for less than half a minute, her sharp eyes spotted Penny sitting cross-legged in meditation on the grass, and she swooped down quickly and came to her side.

“Teacher Grace, what can I do for you?”

Penny’s face was full of tranquility and peace as she felt the breath of nature, like an old man who had seen through the world.

“There’s a call for you, Penny. It’s from a man named Luke.”

“Luke!” The tranquility on Penny’s face was instantly broken, and she jumped up excitedly: “He finally knew the call was coming!”

Without bothering to say hello to Grace, Penny fell forward, and when she landed on the ground, she turned into an agile jaguar and ran towards the pay phone.

“This child,” Grace, who had regained her human form at some point, stood where Penny had been sitting cross-legged, smiled and shook her head, “It’s good to be young. I hope she can have a happy ending.”

(End of this chapter)