James Carter’s gaze was calm, and he fell into a state of complete self-forgetfulness. He was operating that thing called “Evolution Technique,” sitting cross-legged on the ground like a martial arts master meditating in a wuxia drama, with a faint layer of white mist enveloping his body.

　　During this process, the small crystal in his palm gradually shrank as its essence was slowly absorbed by James Carter.

　　“Successfully refined a primary primal crystal, gained 1 point of primal gene.”

　　After a long while, that mysterious thought came again.

　　The small crystal in James Carter’s palm vanished without a trace.

　　He glanced at his luminous watch and realized that refining the crystal had taken him a full five hours.

　　It was now midnight, pitch black all around, so dark he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face.

　　A chill ran down his spine and he felt a wave of lingering fear. Fortunately, Big Jack was lying beside him, keeping watch. Otherwise, who knows how many unknown dangers he might have encountered during those five hours of refining.

　　Standing up and stretching his muscles, James Carter felt a strange mix of emotions.

　　After absorbing 1 point of primal gene, he felt a slight increase in his strength and speed.

　　The improvement was subtle, but he could genuinely feel the progress. It was like someone with only ten yuan in their wallet suddenly discovering they now had eleven. The increase wasn’t much, but the change was obvious.

　　“Roar!”

　　Suddenly, Big Jack glared fiercely behind James Carter, letting out a beast-like roar.

　　James Carter turned around, shone his flashlight, and couldn’t help but curse, “Damn!”

　　He saw a crooked-necked tree as thick as an arm, slowly moving over like an Ent from “The Lord of the Rings.”

　　The tree moved very slowly, about as fast as a turtle, but James Carter could clearly see it was moving.

　　The night wind blew coldly, and under the flashlight’s pale beam, a tree was slowly inching forward, its leaves making a hair-raising rustling sound. The scene was indescribably eerie and terrifying—someone with a weaker heart might have wet themselves on the spot.

　　James Carter, who often watched horror movies, was pretty bold. He raised his machete and charged forward.

　　With a swift motion, he chopped off several tentacle-like sharp branches.

　　“Screech!”

　　The crooked-necked tree let out a piercing, bizarre shriek, like a black vine.

　　James Carter became a plant slayer, first chopping off the branches and leaves, then targeting the tree’s roots and hacking away madly. Gradually, the crooked-necked tree couldn’t even scream anymore and collapsed weakly to the ground.

　　At that moment, Big Jack suddenly pounced over and started digging furiously at the ground.

　　James Carter joined in, pulling a military shovel from his bag and digging with all his might.

　　Soon, several vibrant tree roots were exposed.

　　James Carter saw a small crystal forming within the roots and, without hesitation, dug it out with his Swiss Army knife.

　　Big Jack, meanwhile, happily grabbed a writhing root and munched on it with delight.

　　Watching this, James Carter felt a bit tempted. He sliced off a small piece of root and put it in his mouth, but a few seconds later, he spat it all out… The taste was terrible, no different from an ordinary tree root, and really not to his liking.

　　Gazing into the endless darkness, he formed a hypothesis: in this primeval forest, those gigantic towering trees were probably harmless. It was the smaller, seemingly innocuous plants that posed a deadly threat.

　　He took Big Jack and crawled into a tree hollow. Just as he suspected, Big Jack didn’t growl a warning, indicating the place was safe. James Carter breathed a sigh of relief, told Big Jack to keep watch at the entrance, then gripped the treant crystal and began absorbing its energy with that mysterious Evolution Technique.

　　“Successfully refined a primary primal crystal, gained 1 point of primal gene.”

　　Five hours later, a thought came again.

　　James Carter opened his eyes, full of energy, and saw a ray of sunlight outside the tree hollow.

　　It was now broad daylight, and his mood was as bright as the sunshine outside—he saw hope for survival.

Chapter 4: The Springtime of the Weakling

　　“Anyone else? I just want to ask: is there anyone else?”

　　The next afternoon, William Carter stood in the howling wind, exuding the lonely aura of a master.

　　He had truly earned the title of plant slayer. Relying on Big Jack’s keen sense of smell, he had taken down a flower, a blade of grass, and a tree that day, successfully obtaining three evolution crystals.

　　Someone who could show off about stomping a flower—besides James Carter, there probably wasn’t anyone else like that.

　　Finding a safe tree hollow, James Carter began an experiment.

　　Refining one evolution crystal took five hours—far too long—and the process was fraught with uncontrollable dangers. So he came up with a new idea: if he held three crystals in his hands, could he refine them all at once?

　　He held one crystal in his left hand and two in his right, operating that E-level Evolution Technique.

　　Five hours later, James Carter opened his eyes, feeling like eight hundred alpacas had just run through his mind.

　　“Successfully refined a primary primal crystal, gained 1 point of primal gene.”

　　As it turned out, he could only refine one crystal at a time; the other two remained untouched in his hands.

　　No choice—he would have to refine them one by one in the future.