Starting Off Survival With A Small Treehouse

Chapter 1224 - 639: Creating a New Race

Alien invaders’... Source of Life?

"This substance, they call it—%&*@."

The creature made a very strange and harsh, grating sound.

"...What?"

Xu Xin and the others were momentarily bewildered.

"%&*@, that’s what they call this substance," the creature said, "I don’t know how to say it in human language either."

"Uh... could you say it again?" Xu Ying looked frustrated.

"%&*@."

"What the hell..." she gave up, "Never mind, could you describe what this thing is? Is it a liquid too?"

"No." The creature shook its head, "It’s not a liquid, it’s a... solid. A kind of red crystal."

...Crystal?

"Just a crystal of this size can supply an individual for a day."

The creature raised its arm longer than its leg, pinching two of its four pitch-black fingers together.

About... the size of a fingernail.

"This... this is the first time I’ve heard of such a thing," Xu Ying felt extremely curious, "Is this your energy source? You don’t need to eat?"

"Eat? You mean like Earth creatures, consuming other creatures? No need."

The creature slowly shook its head, "They only need to ingest that substance, which is actually what the surface of their home planet is made of. This layer of material nurtured and gave birth to their race. They can’t consume Earth organisms’ corpses like you; the moisture inside is poisonous to them, although it won’t kill them, it will make them uncomfortable."

Material that forms the planet’s surface?!

Xu Xin was amazed.

Goodness, their race is thriving by gnawing on their planet.

"Ah... so you don’t eat food, no wonder..."

Recalling her past experiences, Xu Ying couldn’t help but complain, "No wonder the food they provided us when we were first captured was so terrible, dry and gritty like chewing on dry wood, I thought they were deliberately torturing us..."

"...I don’t know about that. Back then, I wasn’t born yet." The creature twisted its neck, and its "muscles" seemed to ripple.

"Uh... indeed."

"What about you?" Shi Wanyun asked, "Do you not eat either? I remember the first time I saw you, you seemed... to be holding a cup drinking something."

"Because I was exploring and understanding the diet of Earth’s humans," the creature grinned, and at the same time, a long thin tongue extended into the air before retracting, "I also possess the organ humans use for tasting, the tongue."

Uh... alien invaders don’t even have tongues.

Xu Xin felt a bit embarrassed.

It seems his imagination was somewhat limited.

But indeed, from the creature’s words, it could be understood that alien invaders survive by consuming the "rocks" from their home planet, hence they don’t need taste.

However, since this guy can drink something now...

Xu Ying tilted her head, looking at the creature in front of her, "Aren’t you afraid of water?"

"... My body isn’t afraid, but previously, I felt a little mental discomfort about it due to my growth environment," the creature said, "But that was a long time ago, now in this space-time, I no longer fear this substance which doesn’t harm me."

"So do you need that red crystal as a Source of Life?" Shi Wanyun asked.

"It can be my Source of Life, or it cannot be," the creature was open, "I can also sustain life like humans by eating."

I see...

"Alright, so now we know they need this substance to survive, then what?" Xu Xin asked, "This substance doesn’t exist on Earth, right, so where do they get it from? Brought from the ’home planet’?"

"That’s right, brought from the home planet."

...

The alien invaders’ home planet is huge, even today’s Earth is much smaller by comparison.

On it, countless lifeforms live by gnawing on the "surface crystals."

Due to the absence of a food chain, the creatures on the "home planet" have no natural enemies, so at the dawn of life, the life on that planet was exceedingly prosperous.

But once creatures spread across the globe, despite the absence of a food chain, territorial conflicts still arose.

"Territorial instinct" is an ingrained awareness in the biology of that planet, similar to Earth’s food chain.

Due to "territorial disputes," mutual slaughter among lives was inevitable.

After a long period of thriving and breeding, the alien invader race emerged, evolving superior intelligence and becoming a sentient lifeform.

Suppressing other lives, they had no natural enemies, were surrounded by "food," and their numbers boomed uncontrollably over the last few millennia.

Spreading across the globe.

Their technology likewise showed an exponential upsurge.

But good times didn’t last long.

Since its birth, the planet had nurtured countless lives, and its surface’s Source of Life, the crystal’s reserves, compared to ancient times, were extremely scarce now.

And the planet had reached the end of its life, its crust had mostly stopped moving.

This material, formed through tectonic activity, had become a non-renewable resource.