CHAPTER 284 IT HAD COME

Truthfully speaking, the research on Rubygon only achieved two thirds of the target objectives.

Because even though Rubygon obeyed his orders, it failed to connect with him on a spirit level like

Uriah. This made it hard for Rocky to get into Rubygon's thoughts and this made it impossible to

establish a mutual communication link between them. Rubygon even acted contrary to what Rocky

asked it to do sometimes.

But Rocky was determined to complete the research. He was resolved to find a way to control spirit-

manipulated beasts without owners. If he succeeded in that endeavor, he would be able to command

an army of spirit-manipulated beasts.

Another research that Rocky worked on was additional information about the eggs of the Dark Heaven

Insect Queen. There was no record in the Beast Encyclopedia regarding the time it took between laying

eggs as well as the time needed before the eggs hatched. The good news was that Rocky was able to

proceed with this research as planned.

During the three months of experimentation and research, Rocky found out that the Dark Heaven

Insect Queen laid regular eggs and the Dark Heaven Eggs from the same ovary. An ordinary three-star

Dark Heaven Insect of the third grade needed four to six months to breed a Dark Heaven Egg. When

the queen bred the Dark Heaven Eggs at the premium stage, it also laid eggs. However, the two were

different. Eggs were living entities while Dark Heaven Eggs were formed from the essence of the

spiritual power of the Dark Heaven Insect Queen. Thus, their systems were completely different. This

observation provided Rocky with valuable information regarding his research.

Unfortunately, this information was not enough. Neither the Radiance Evaluation Skill nor the Stroking

Evaluation Skill could completely scan the interior of the Dark Heaven Insect Queen's ovary.

Fortunately, Rocky acquired a new technique in the Magical Evaluation Skill which could be of great

help in the evaluations that he needed to do. Compared to the Radiance Evaluation Skill and the

Stroking Evaluation Skill, this new technique was closer to being magical than a technique. It allowed

Rocky to complete an evaluation of a spirit-manipulated beast if he simply looked at it. Thus it was

called the Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill.

If the Stroking Evaluation Skill used the magical hand, the Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill used the

magical eye.

The operating principles of the Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill were based on the spiritual sources

of spirit-manipulated beasts. To cure Uriah before, Rocky grasped the Spirit Possession. At that time,

he was already aware of the significance of the spiritual sources of spirit-manipulated beasts.

Spiritual sources were equivalent to the second life of a spirit-manipulated beast. They were intricately

connected to the spirit-manipulated beast like countless, thin silken threads that went deep into every

fiber of its muscles, meridians and bones. The Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill made use of the holds text © rights.

spiritual sources to take a peek into the body of the spirit-manipulated beast.

When Rocky used the Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill, he could see the circulation of the spiritual

power throughout the body of the spirit-manipulated beast. Like the Radiance Evaluation Skill, the

spiritual sources represented the different bodily systems through colors and shapes. A close study of

a beast using this technique provided Rocky a thorough understanding of the body of the beast he

studied. This technique provided a more detailed picture of the internal structure of the spirit-

manipulated beast's body than any of the other two techniques. And this evaluation included the eggs

and the Dark Heaven Eggs in the ovary of the Dark Heaven Insect Queen.

However, this skill could only be learned by one who had reached the third level of beast evaluation. In

order to learn this skill, Rocky spent two months to enhance his beast evaluation level. After two

months of intense work, Rocky succeeded in improving his level to the required status. When he

learned the Mysterious Visual Evaluation Skill, he tried it immediately to conduct an analysis of the

Dark Heaven Insect Queen's ovary.

Rocky found out that eggs were formed within its body and it would give birth to them in a few months.

This was great news for Rocky. Rocky's problem was how to increase the egg hatching rate.

Before he conducted his research on the Dark Heaven Insect Queen, he assumed that genetic defects

led to the low egg hatching rate. However, after a series of studies, he concluded that the reason was

not as simple as he originally thought.

Rocky found out that the Dark Heaven Insect Queen was a hermaphrodite. This allowed the queen to

accomplish asexual reproduction.

This was one of the reasons why the egg hatching rate of the queen was very low. The eggs were

unable to get enough nutrition from the ovary, which resulted in defects in some of the eggs that were

mostly fatal.

Both the Dark Heaven Insect Queen and its eggs had severe defects. When these defects combined, it

reduced the egg hatching rate.

Thus, with the objective of increasing the egg hatching rate, Rocky decided that the only course of

action was to repair the genetic defects of the Dark Heaven Insect Queen as well as its eggs. And both

of these tasks were no ordinary challenges. But Rocky loved challenges.

Regarding Rocky's other research tasks, they were all basic studies about spirit-manipulated beasts

that paved the way for later genetic research. What Rocky intended to achieve was to establish a gene

library of spirit-manipulated beasts, a library that held the genetic information of all spirit-manipulated

beasts in the world. He wanted to eventually be able to improve their genes to make them more

powerful. He was aware that this was an enormous undertaking that was impossible to complete in a

single day.

Moreover, the events in the past three months placed Rocky in a situation where he had to conduct

numerous surgeries on different spirit-manipulated beasts. This provided him with much of the needed

experience and skills. Before Sheridan left, he trained Rocky in all that he knew about the Beast Curing

Skill and the knowledge that he had accumulated about the medical sciences. Taking what he had

learned from Sheridan and the advanced modern surgical techniques, Rocky combined both to gain

new insights and techniques.

This did not mean that Rocky was able to do complex surgeries. Complex surgeries required advanced

medical equipment that was not available in the current facility and situation. Moreover, Rocky was

already fully occupied with daily tasks, and he no longer had the time to build a more complex

operating room.

When Rocky dragged himself into his room after a tiring day's work, he was surprised to see Uriah,

Rubygon and a third beast that enjoyed relaxing as it rested on its stomach. This third beast, familiar to

Rocky, sparkled with colorful lights that came from its body that made it look like its body was made of

millions of tiny prisms that reflected light into an array of colors.

The third beast was the Rainbow Glow Unicorn, a beast that got Rocky into several troubles lately.