4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution

Book 2: Chapter 42 “The Cracking Lava Salamander”

Last chapter recap: Lin fights a thunderstone and encounters an amphibian.

Amphibian seemed to mean a certain group of organisms, and not the name of one organism. Lin found a more specific term in its vocabulary to express this organism.

Lava Salamander.

What was this? Such a strange name this amphibian seemed to have evolved from some lobe-finned fish.While Lin had no memories of the evolution process, this organism really appeared similar to some types of fish.

The lava salamander clearly was a hunter. It swung its tail and opened its teeth-filled mouth to bite at the tail of the Leviathan.

The Leviathan only had to speed up to dodge this. The salamander was slower than the Leviathan, but Lin did not plan on fleeing like this.

The slaughterer, who had just killed the thunderstone, had almost finished growing another new abdomen filled with toxic spikes. This new cell type the Leviathan had created could be used repeatedly. Also, it was unlike the other cell types as it had its own complete set of organs.

Lin had this slaughterer sway in front of the lava salamander. As expected, the salamander was attracted and bit the slaughterer in half.

This force was so great it seemed the slaughterer could not be used again. However, the toxic spikes inside the slaughterer had spread and the other would not live for long.

However, Lin was puzzled as this lava salamander did not show any problems. It continued to consume the corpse of the slaughterer and ate all of it.

Strange, was it immune against the toxin?

Lin suddenly found a bright red color had risen on the abdomen of the lava salamander after it ate the slaughterer. It was as bright as lava, and extremely similar to the color of the slaughterers abdomen.

So this was why it was called a lava salamander? Was it able to produce a similar toxin?

After the salamander consumed the slaughterer, it turned and swam away, seemingly uninterested in the Leviathan.

Lin immediately followed. At the same time, it looked at the Leviathans cell catalog for any cells that were suitable for defeating this lava salamander.

Leviathan had many unit types and Lin did not know which one to use. Therefore, it randomly chose one. This unit was called a smasher. and was to be used against heavy armored targets. While the lava salamander was not heavily armored, that was fine.

Leviathan created a dozen smashers. This kind of unit was oval in shape, about thirteen centimeters long, and did not have any armor. A long flat tail was used to swim, and it had a pair of segmented limbs on its head with hardened little hammers at the ends.

This kind of method was very similar to the mothership of the past. But it was so small, which power did it have?

After Lin carefully observed their inner structures, it found these small things were not simple.

Lin had these smashers charge towards the lava salamander. At the beginning, the salamander ignored them. Then Lin had one smasher go close to the salamanders back and then suddenly swing its forelimbs.

Snap

It seemed to have just been an instant. Lins eyeballs were even unable to detect the hammer. The power of the small hammers caused the ectoderm of the salamander to explode. The cells inside the blood vessels started to uncontrollably spurt out along with a strange red fluid as though lava salamander seemed to have put the toxin in the ectoderm at its back.

Lin found an interesting term to describe this phenomenon, split skin and lacerated flesh.

The lava salamander felt the pain and suddenly turned, opening its mouth and biting towards the smasher. Its numerous teeth and the pressure from the jaws crushed the smasher.

But at this time, the other crushers attacked in unison. They created wounds on the salamanders abdomen, tail,and head.

The salamander twisted its body in an attempt to flee. It had no desire to fight, but Lin would not spare it. The smashers gave chase, and attacked the uninjured parts of the lava salamander. Some attacks even exposed the muscular structures underneath the skin.

The salamanders blood continued to spray out under the ongoing attacks. The muscles of its limbs were damaged and it lost the ability to swim. It twisted its body as it sank down into the water.

A feeling of great power the smashers.

The smashers attacking method was similar to the mothership, but the internal structures were different. They did not rely purely on the contraction of the muscles to deal their blows, but used an extremely complex pressure system. In simple words, the limb used muscles to squeeze fluid to the forelimb, and then the blow would be dealt with the power of the muscles as well as the three hardened layers of the hammer. This could cause great damage.

No wonder this was a unit for heavy armor targets. But it was also effective against unarmored targets.

Right now, relying on this power, Lin easily obtained prey. But in this era, it did not seem to be easy to eat in peace. The blood fluid and cells that the lava salamander had spilled attracted some organisms to this place

Sharks.

They, who had the best scent of smell, could find injured organisms a thousand meters away. And they came in a group of a dozen. The Leviathan had to move back. Lin felt, even if the Leviathans units were so strong, it could not defeat so many sharks.

This era was truly different once upon a time, when Lin hunted, no organisms would come to steal prey. However, Lin did not worry that the sharks would steal the lava salamander.

A shark came close to the salamanders corpse. After it took a bite, it seemed to experience great pain. The shark twisted and then fled madly.

That was the toxin of the lava salamander. It stored the toxin in the ectoderm. When the smashers damaged the skin, the toxin was released in large amounts.

The remaining sharks saw this and lost interest in the lava salamander, swimming away.

It seemed they had high intelligence. Lin thought that each of them would try once now nothing would disturb Lin from feeding.

The Leviathan itself did not have immunity against the toxin but the slaughterers did. Similar to how the lava salamander did not fear the toxin of the slaughterer, the slaughterers could eat the blood and flesh of the lava salamander without any worries.

Lin now knew why the slaughterers had their own complete set of organs. Maybe the slaughterers were specialized in consuming the things that the Leviathan could not digest. They could also separate the nutrients and toxin, and also store the toxin in the spike cells in its abdomen.

Why had the Leviathan evolved such a strange cell? This was so interesting

Lin had only watched a small part of the Leviathans memories and information. If it started watching from the start, it would be too dull. Lin felt it would be more interesting if it tested the abilities by itself.

Lin created some more slaughterers and had them finish eating the body of the lava salamander. The interior structures of the salamander were complex. Just like its ancestors, the flat fish, they had a spine. However, this spine was much more developed.

Lin had no desire to learn from it. It would be more fun to test the new unit types of the Leviathan. Lin also should go look on land and see what the state of oxygen was at present.

Suddenly, Lin saw a large school of helmet fish in the distance. They formed long lines and swam in one direction.

It was the helmet fishs breeding activity

From the memory of the eyeballs, Lin knew what these helmet fish were doing. These helmet fish would all go to a special area to do an activity called spawning.

This was why they were still so numerous in this ocean filled with predators even though they have such burdensome helmet armor.

Lin knew where they were going so it followed them.

The enormous helmet fish swarm swam to a place where there was the shadow of land. They all swam towards that place at the center of the land. There, an enormous crack appeared.

There was a narrow flow of water at the crack that stretched into the land. Lin knew that this flow of water could be called a river.

As the environment changed, the ocean was not the only thing to change. Even the land would split apart, and the water of the ocean would flow into the split in the land.

However, Lin felt that the water in the river did not flow in from the ocean, and instead it was the water flowing out of the land as the water here was slightly strange.

The helmet fish swarmed into the river. At the entrance of the river, several dozen sharks were waiting in ambush. They seemed to have expected the helmet fish would come here. This was a rare feast.

The helmet fish ignored the sharks and continued to charge towards the river. Even as its neighboring fellows were torn apart by the sharks, they continued to advance. The sharks did not dare to chase after the helmet fish that successfully made it into the river.

The river water lacked something called salinity. If organisms of the ocean entered the river, strange things would occur, such as their organs exploding.

Lin had never entered the river. All of this knowledge came with the term of river.

The helmet fish seemed able to switch the circulatory system in their bodies so they could live in both the river and the ocean. Did the Leviathan have such an ability?

Should it go in and try?

Translator Ramblings: Lin is like a baby learning new things about itself.

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