Chapter 33

The blood vessel structure worked well after completion, but Lin found some minor issues. The cells inside the blood vessels had difficulty obtaining oxygen, making their movements sluggish.

Lin couldn't drill holes in the blood vessels, as that would cause the contents to leak out. However, the cells inside the blood vessels were not meant to move on their own but were carried quickly by the water inside, so Lin wasn't too concerned.

Lin's devourers had also been updated. They had a blood vessel structure but no heart. Instead, there was a storage sac deep in their mouths, composed of muscle cells and connected to the blood vessels. The devourers could store the food they bit into the sac, which would then contract, squeezing the food and water into the blood vessel system. The cells inside the blood vessels would break down the food and distribute the nutrients throughout the body.

Excess water would circulate back to the sac and be expelled when the devourer opened its mouth again.

The plan to revive the round shield worm was temporarily put on hold because Lin couldn't produce enough cells to fill the worm's shell. Constructing the heart and blood vessels had already consumed a lot of resources, and Lin needed to find more food.

However, this cold spell lasted a long time. Although it didn't affect Lin much, it meant that other cells wouldn't appear, leaving no food. Although the fat cells could sustain Lin for a long time, creating something as large as an aircraft carrier would consume over 70% of the reserves. Lin didn't want to deplete so much of the reserves, what if another danger arose?

Perhaps it could digest the aircraft carrier and build a new base inside the round shield worm's shell?

No, Lin didn't want to rely on other organisms. It wanted to grow a hard shell on its own. If it lived inside the shell, it would be difficult to evolve a highly durable outer skin.

What should it do now?

Go out to find food?

Use the giant excavator to dig out again?

That seemed too slow. Lin wanted to create a more powerful ice-breaking structure, like how the round shield worm dug so quickly...

Right... the round shield worm didn't use its segments to break through the ice layer; it seemed to use the semi-circular shell on its head to smash through the ice. However, that required a large body and strength.

Since that was the case, the aircraft carrier needed to be modified.

Lin's aircraft carrier had a cylindrical body, which was very suitable for ramming. However, Lin didn't want to use the carrier itself to ram but instead formed two large tentacles on either side of the carrier. The front ends of these tentacles were shaped into sturdy, circular structures with serrated edges, called 'hammerheads.' The tentacles were composed of a large number of muscle cells, capable of exerting great force to shatter the ice.

Lin had thought of this structure long ago, but continuous hammering would consume a lot of muscle cells, and the time needed to replenish energy was too long, making it inefficient. However, with the blood vessel system, Lin could continuously supply energy to the muscle cells while swinging the tentacles, making it much more efficient.

After the construction was complete, Lin started the aircraft carrier. The carrier already had two tentacles for movement and a large water jet at the rear, allowing it to move very quickly. If it weren't for the surrounding ice, the round shield worm wouldn't have been able to harm it.

After leaving some cells inside the round shield worm's shell, Lin began its ice-breaking journey.

The aircraft carrier swam to the ice layer and the hammer tentacles smashed into the ice wall. The force was so great that not only did it create a pit in the ice wall, but it also produced countless cracks around it.

It was very effective, feeling similar to how the round shield worm dug.

Lin continued to swing the hammer, shattering the ice in front of it and creating a passage for the carrier to move through.

Lin also hardened the carrier's head, allowing it to both hammer and ram the ice.

Lin had been hesitant to do this before, fearing damage to the internal blood vessel system. However, it seemed there was no problem, as the hammer tentacles also had a blood vessel system, and there was no damage during the swinging.

Lin had regressed the large eyeball on the carrier's head and instead formed several small eyeball tentacles on the sides to observe.

With this, moving through the ice became much easier.

Should it continue moving downward? Lin thought the wild cells might be hiding in the sand below, where it might be warmer and the ice couldn't reach.

Thinking this, Lin changed direction and continued to break through the ice, moving downward. Although the ice had varying hardness, it was no problem for the hammer tentacles. It wouldn't take long to reach the sandy bottom.

Strange?

After breaking through another layer of ice, Lin saw an unusual sight. It wasn't at the sandy bottom yet, but there was an ice-free area.

This ice cave was large enough to accommodate three aircraft carriers, and there were no signs of digging on the surrounding ice walls. Lin didn't know how it formed and slowly swam into the open space within the ice.

What a strange place, why would there be such a place? Ice couldn't dissolve on its own like this. Was it dug out by some organism? But no such organism was seen.

While Lin was puzzled about how it formed, it suddenly noticed some small moving dots on the ice walls.

What were they?

The small eyeball tentacles on the carrier's sides couldn't see clearly, so Lin sent out the small devourers inside the carrier. When they approached the ice wall, they discovered that the moving dots were cells, almost the same color as the ice, making them hard to see.

These small cells were widely distributed on the ice walls. Lin didn't know what they were doing, but they were definitely food.

Without much thought, Lin had the devourers start hunting them and released more devourers to clear them out.

The devourers quickly devoured the cells on the ice wall. These cells had no defenses, were ordinary round shapes, and were very small, but they could do something strange to escape the devourers.

They could directly burrow into the ice without any digging method, simply drilling through it.

The small holes left by the cells were too small for the devourers to enter, so they had to give up the hunt.

How did they do that? Lin carefully observed them and saw through the eyes of the smallest devourers that these cells seemed to secrete a liquid that could instantly dissolve the ice crystals around their bodies, allowing them to move in and out of the ice.

So that's how this cave was formed? These cells should be called... 'ice-melting bacteria,' right?

The ice-melting bacteria hid in the ice, seemingly moving happily there.

Bang!

The next moment, the giant hammer tentacle of the aircraft carrier smashed into the ice wall. This not only shattered the ice wall but also dislodged the ice-melting bacteria inside. The devourers quickly devoured the small cells mixed in the ice fragments.

The ice-melting bacteria realized that hiding in the ice wasn't safe and fled deeper. Lin immediately broke through the ice again and pursued them.

Although the ice-melting bacteria could burrow through the ice, they were very slow, much slower than the aircraft carrier's ice-breaking speed. With each strike, Lin could dislodge a large number of ice-melting bacteria from the ice, and the large devourers would crush them into powder along with the ice fragments.

Lin continued to hammer them out of the ice and move forward. However, after not moving far, it suddenly found itself back in the water, with no more ice ahead.

Another ice cave? No, that's not right.

This was a vast, open water area. Lin had left the ice region.

What was that?

In front of Lin, a strange scene appeared.

The vast water area was still empty and void, but in the sand below, there were many things Lin had never seen before.

These things were mostly flat and elongated or round, with striped protrusions on their surfaces. Some lay on the sand, while others stood in it. After a while, Lin confirmed that they were organisms because they were almost motionless, but when water flowed past, their bodies would start to sway, and they would extend tentacles to wave in the flowing water.

These multicellular organisms were very abundant, almost covering the entire beach. It seemed that the round shield worm didn't eat single cells for a reason; it was better at eating these multicellular organisms.

Where did these multicellular organisms come from? Lin had only encountered single cells for so long. When did other organisms start to become multicellular?