Chapter 40: Aggressive Plants
The plant in front of Jiang Ning began to grow wildly. In a short while, a climbing herbaceous plant, about one and a half meters tall with rough stems and leaves, appeared in front of them.
The stems and leaves were covered with dense, short white bristles. The edges of the leaves were clearly serrated or wavy. A pale green, oblong fruit hung from a thick peduncle.
The surface of the fruit was also rough, covered with a layer of light yellow long fluff.
“What is this?” Before Jiang Ning could answer, Chang Ming approached curiously.
As he spoke, he was about to raise his hand to poke the green melon that had swelled to a certain size.
Jiang Ning shouted, “Don’t touch it!”
She wanted to stop him, but it was too late.
Chang Ming’s finger had already touched the surface of the green melon.
The next second.
The melon detached from its stalk. The pulp inside began to contract rapidly, and the seeds and fruit juice were simultaneously ejected from the hole formed at the base.
Under the reaction force, the fruit flew towards Chang Ming’s abdomen.
Its power was immense. Chang Ming, who was completely unprepared, was sent flying several meters and fell heavily on the ground in the distance.
“Are you okay?” Jiang Ning walked over and helped Chang Ming up from the ground.
Chang Ming clutched his abdomen where he had been hit and rubbed it for a while before he recovered. However, the burning sensation still lingered.
His gaze met Jiang Ning’s concerned eyes, and he smiled reassuringly. “It’s a good thing I usually strengthen my physical fitness. Otherwise, I really wouldn’t have been able to withstand this blow.”
“What kind of plant is this?” Chang Ming walked back slowly and asked curiously.
He had thought that all the plants Jiang Ning summoned were like the sunflowers that could increase psychic energy or were non-aggressive.
Jiang Ning glanced at Chang Ming’s face and saw that he didn’t seem to be seriously injured, so she was relieved and said, “This is a Squirting Cucumber.”
“What does it do?” Chang Ming asked, puzzled.
Jiang Ning: “It probably launches its fruit and automatically attacks people around it with a slight touch.”
“An aggressive plant?” Chang Ming said in surprise.
“If you’re okay, I need to continue the experiment,” Jiang Ning said.
She wanted to know if the Squirting Cucumber would attack everyone indiscriminately or if it would automatically lock onto a target.
“Come on, I’m fully prepared this time,” Chang Ming said with a determined expression.
It was too embarrassing just now. He, an A-rank ability user, had actually been sent flying by a plant.
The stem of the Squirting Cucumber was very long, and one plant could bear more than a dozen fruits, which was enough for them to conduct more than a dozen rounds of experiments.
Jiang Ning said to Chang Ming, “Don’t touch it directly this time. Try to use your ability or do it from a distance as much as possible.”
“Understood,” Chang Ming nodded.
His ability was also Word Spirit, but if he was just touching an object, a basic attack spell would be enough.
Chang Ming released his perception.
Jiang Ning felt a slight fluctuation around her heading towards a Squirting Cucumber.
In less than two seconds, the second pale green Squirting Cucumber was ejected from its stalk.
The direction in which the Squirting Cucumber was ejected seemed to be random, but it was actually heading towards Chang Ming again.
Seeing that it was about to reach him, Chang Ming tensed his body and used his perception to erect a defensive barrier around himself.
But he still couldn’t withstand the power of the Squirting Cucumber.
He was pushed back by a huge force and slid for one or two meters before stopping.
A layer of fine sweat covered Chang Ming’s forehead, and his breathing was slightly rapid.
He stared blankly at the Squirting Cucumber plant.
He hadn’t expected this little thing to be so powerful.
While the Squirting Cucumber was flying, Jiang Ning had been observing its movement. She pondered for a moment and said, “Try again from a different position.”
Next, Chang Ming tried several different positions, and at one point, he was even less than half a meter away from Jiang Ning.
But the Squirting Cucumber could always accurately fly towards Chang Ming.
Jiang Ning was basically certain that the Squirting Cucumber would automatically lock onto an enemy. Now she had to do one last test.
Chang Ming didn’t know if it was from fatigue or pain, but his clothes were soaked with sweat. Just as he was about to try again from the next direction, he was stopped by Jiang Ning.
“It’s my turn to try this time.”
Jiang Ning stepped forward, and the tip of her index finger touched the surface of the last Squirting Cucumber.
As the fruit and stalk separated, the Squirting Cucumber came at her face at an incredible speed.
Looking at the extremely oppressive Squirting Cucumber, Jiang Ning swallowed her saliva and quickly mobilized the psychic energy in her body, concentrating it towards her face, trying to block the Squirting Cucumber’s attack.
As expected, the Squirting Cucumber stopped just one centimeter from her eyes.
The slender fluff gently brushed against the skin around her eye sockets.
The Squirting Cucumber fell to the ground.
Jiang Ning picked it up, held it in her hand, and squeezed it.
Chang Ming walked over, a never-before-seen serious expression on his face, his tone solemn. “Your psychic energy seems very different.”
He could feel that the psychic energy on Jiang Ning’s body was very vast and strong.
Hearing this, Jiang Ning turned to look at him.
Chang Ming said, “Currently, the person with the highest known psychic energy in the Federation is the young heir of the Si family. The psychic energy he tested before the age of 10 had already far exceeded the SSS-rank psychic energy defined by the Federation. But because of this, his body cannot support this vast psychic energy, which leads to him having psychic energy but being unable to use it.”
Chang Ming paused and looked at Jiang Ning with a puzzled expression. “But you’re different.”
Jiang Ning’s body could completely support this vast psychic energy.
“It’s probably because my psychic energy is compressed,” Jiang Ning said, blinking.
Having come into contact with so many ability users, Jiang Ning had more or less understood the situation of others’ psychic energy.
Unlike the ethereal ‘feeling’ of others, her psychic energy was quite intuitive. It was all produced in the form of suns and had always been stored in her body in the form of suns.
One sun was equivalent to the psychic energy required to summon one sunflower.
And the Squirting Cucumber she had just summoned required about four suns of psychic energy.
Even more, like when she was trapped in the underground oasis last time, she had needed ten suns to summon the pea plant.
Compressed psychic energy?
This was a bit beyond Chang Ming’s comprehension.
Psychic energy was invisible and intangible; only the ability user themselves could feel its existence.
“How do you compress it?” Chang Ming asked, puzzled.
Jiang Ning thought for a moment and said, “I can’t say.”
Her psychic energy came with a compression function from the factory. She really couldn’t teach this.
Chang Ming didn’t ask any further. He silently added another label to Jiang Ning in his heart.
After Jiang Ning had recorded the habits of the Squirting Cucumber, the two rested for a while.
She brought out the second pot of plants.
She used her psychic energy again to quickly ripen it.
The second plant was a climbing vine plant with thick stems and leaves. There were obvious ridges on the vine, and the base of the leaves was heart-shaped or semi-circularly curved.
The surface of the fruit was smooth, and it was quite large.
“Qingmen Green Jade Melon?” Chang Ming blurted out.
Jiang Ning shook her head. “No, this is a watermelon.”
“Does it have the same effect as the Qingmen Green Jade Melon, where eating it can increase psychic energy?” Chang Ming asked.
After all, the two looked too similar.
The two picked the watermelon and looked at each other silently.
Chang Ming took out a short blade from his nano-ring and cut the watermelon in half along its stripes.
Halfway through, his short blade was suddenly covered in frost.
Seeing that the frost was still coming towards his hand, Chang Ming quickly let go of the blade, thus avoiding the fate of being frozen.
The blade was stuck in the middle of the cut, firmly frozen.
The two looked through the cut and found that the flesh of the watermelon was not red, but ice blue.
The watermelon had its own cooling effect. The two felt the surrounding temperature instantly drop by a few degrees.
Chang Ming stared at her blankly. “This is a watermelon?”
“No,” Jiang Ning was also a bit speechless. She said, “This is an ice watermelon.”
The frost was still continuously spreading outwards, freezing everything in its path.
Jiang Ning and Chang Ming quickly retreated to a safe distance of five or six meters.
The two waited quietly for more than ten minutes. The frost finally stopped spreading at a distance of half a meter from them.
Chang Ming let out a light breath, turned his head, and forced a smile. “Your plants are all quite dangerous.”
“That’s why I asked you to help me with the experiment,” Jiang Ning patted his shoulder.
Next, the two tried several different methods, and Jiang Ning finally confirmed the power of the watermelon.
She opened her notebook and summarized the habits of the watermelon in her notes:
【Plant Name: Watermelon
Family: Annual climbing vine plant
Attribute: Aggressive plant
Function: The watermelon fruit has a strong frost effect and can freeze all nearby objects. The freezing effect lasts for half an hour.
Range: Within ten meters】
After recording, Jiang Ning also put a cross behind it and added a note: This plant is not suitable for sale to customers.
Jiang Ning sighed, looked at the evening sky that was already approaching, and said, “Let’s continue. There’s one last plant for today.”
She brought over the last pot of seedlings.
Under Chang Ming’s gaze, the plant began to grow at a speed visible to the naked eye.
In the flower pot was an umbrella-shaped plant.
The whole plant was about half a meter tall, with broad, ovate basal leaves, a compound umbel inflorescence, and the whole plant was smooth.
There were small yellow flowers on the umbel.
Chang Ming sniffed. “Do you smell a strong fragrance?”
“It’s the fragrance of dill,” Jiang Ning explained.
Jiang Ning’s tired mind felt a little relieved.
Compared to the previous two pots of plants, the dill looked perfectly normal.
Jiang Ning bent down and touched the small flower with her hand.
“…”
Nothing happened.
Jiang Ning’s tense heart relaxed a little.
Nothing strange was triggered, and the dill did not attack her.
Very good!
Finally, there was a plant that could be used.
As the dill flowers bloomed, the surrounding fragrance became stronger and stronger.
Before Jiang Ning’s suspended heart could completely settle, a new situation occurred with Chang Ming behind her.
‘Bang—’
Chang Ming slammed his fist on the wall of the house behind him.
The collision of bone and hard steel plate made a huge sound.
Seeing that he was about to continue smashing, Jiang Ning quickly stepped forward to stop him. “What are you doing???”
Chang Ming turned his head and looked at her. “Jiang Ning, I’m so excited right now. I feel like my whole body is full of strength.”
Jiang Ning realized that his state was not right. She carefully felt the changes in her own body.
Her brain also seemed to be in a state of excitement, but her reaction was not as obvious as Chang Ming’s.
Jiang Ning blocked Chang Ming to prevent him from smashing the wall again in excitement, while looking at the pot of dill in the distance.
She understood the effect of dill.
Dill was a living stimulant. The fragrance it emitted had put both her and Chang Ming in a state of excitement.
Jiang Ning released her psychic energy and quickly catalyzed the dill, making it wither as soon as possible.
She also forced herself to go back and get a basin of water and splash it on Chang Ming.
After all this was done, Jiang Ning collapsed on the ground, exhausted.
By the time she finally recovered, it was already midnight.
Jiang Ning recorded the habits of the dill and also put a cross behind it.
The three plants tested today all had a certain degree of aggression and were not suitable for sale.