Broken Adventure
- Thread starter theaceoffire
- Start date
- Crossover
- Status
- Location
- Here
Welp, to clarify: Adam originally set it to only allow each plant to exist for 24 hours before being destroyed and replaced. All odd crops were created within that slim time frame... Which likely explains why they were so bizarre.
Meanwhile, once Sister Quan explained to him that the time frame was significantly longer than what he personally expected... Then he threw out the absurd long time frame of five years.
- Location
- Canada
Ah, okay that makes sense. I didn't realize he was purposefully giving an absurd answer rather than replying with his best guess (which might have implied his prior estimate was month to year and not in terms of days.
As for the crazy results he was already getting, that can be explained by his use of already abnormal things. He specifically mentioned before that he couldn't grow normal things since they wouldn't work in such a short time.
edit:
Turns out if you quote a section of a persons reply instead of clicking 'Reply' then it doesn't keep the [ispoiler] formatting. I've edited the quote to remove the spoilered info.
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- Location
- United Kingdom
So, do the recursion Adams work like Memory Partition from the Fate series, like multiple cores on a cpu? Because that would be a lot of brainpower.
Barbaric Bob
The Barbaric One
- Location
- Soon to be plundering a village near you
Meanwhile delirious Adam is screaming
NOOOoooOooOOOooo
Don't do it! All pickles are perverts!!!
NOOOoooOooOOOooo
Don't do it! All pickles are perverts!!!
So quick question why was the Yang poison attacking the soul and the yin poison trying to attack the body? Shouldn't it have been the other way around since Yang is the material and yin is the soul/mind.
BobtjeNORMALguy
Color From Beyond
- Location
- Lost in time and space
You read about when Adam placed the Yang Volcano and Yin Pool in the same room right?
Until they were balanced they kept trying to destroy each other, my theory is that Yang Poison is a refinement of this process. Namely unbalanced Yang energy wrecking havoc on Yin in specific ways.
- Location
- Canada
That makes a surprising amount of sense. Yin energy wouldnt be poisonous to Yin energy, since they are both similar or the same, and vice versa. Kinda like water can't damage water.
- Location
- Wisconsin
I fully expect those fire oxen to be human shaped by the time he remembers them again.
BobtjeNORMALguy
Color From Beyond
- Location
- Lost in time and space
Actually the ironic thing here is that I'm pretty sure Yin Poison would be mildly more effective on women then men same with Yang Poison.
Yin Poison attacks the Yang that exists in the body something that men who are slanted towards physical power and defense would find easier to fight off.
Relatively anyway, one minute of extra life might not mean anything after all.
Jordisk
<Unverified N00B>
- Location
- Blind Eternities
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
People with more Yang would be MORE vulnerable to yang poison, if my understanding is correct. Yang Poison doesn't care about Yang, it cares about Yin. Having more Yin energy is like having more body mass for normal poisons, requiring a larger dose for equivalent effect. Yin Poison would be more effective on those with more Yin, for the same reason.
So Women and Mind-focused Cultivators have less Yang energy, and so need a lower dose of Yin Poison to utterly ruin their body forever.
Men and Body-Focused Cultivators have less Yin energy, and so need a lower dose of Yang poison to utterly ruin their mind and soul forever.
More advanced and controlled poisons do what Adam was subjected to, cause specific damage instead of total damage. Like using a non-lethal poison with permanent effects, or a low dose of an otherwise lethal poison.
BobtjeNORMALguy
Color From Beyond
- Location
- Lost in time and space
Yep that's the idea men have have an affinity towards physical expressions of power and accordingly defenses, women the opposite.
Now what we need to know is if there is such a thing as Yin-Yang Poisons and the likely esoteric madness they could produce..
Maybe it could do something like adapt itself to the targets physiology..?
Edit.
Found an idea: Yin-Yang Poison functions not by attacking Yin or Yang but by forcefully realigning the Mind/Body/Soul to a better Yin-Yang mix.
The poison would either ruin a cultivator on all levels.. or oddly give them a good boost to their base, which is oddly appropriate.
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Fragnostic
Cheshire
- Location
- Neko City
Suddenly there's flaming muscular minotaurs flexing a'la that one Pokemon crossdresser.
Jordisk
<Unverified N00B>
- Location
- Blind Eternities
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
I was thinking more Fab-stodes from If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speech Device, or the Pillar Men they are based off of.
...Given that Adam now has both Yin and Yang poisons as part of his cultivation base, and he is developing abilities that forcibly realign his body and soul, how much do you want to bet his final techniques will be BASED off his Yin/Yang Poison energies? He literally is poisoning himself to change his body. Which makes sense, given that most medicines are just really specific poisons. Blood-Thinners were used by assassins, and pain-killers and anesthetics can leave the target in an eternal coma, if they don't die outright.
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Fragnostic
Cheshire
- Location
- Neko City
But definitely flexing. It is absolutely vital.
Jordisk
<Unverified N00B>
- Location
- Blind Eternities
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
THIS FLEXING TECHNIQUE HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN THE FLAME-BULL LINE FOR GENERATIONS! *Flame-shaped sparkles appear around face and muscles*
Honestly, I expect the "human" forms of the Bulls to be either Centaurs or Minotaurs. Some kind of 'Taur, anyway. Maybe a Kithotaur, like Ferdinand from DC Comics?
BobtjeNORMALguy
Color From Beyond
- Location
- Lost in time and space
No bet those energies are too useful for him not to use them. Personally I'm wondering if he will figure out something like Yin-Fire techniques that stop healing or Yang-Fire that depletes his opponents Qi.
Also all of you are clearly wrong the the Flame Bulls will become muscle wizards and teach everyone the path of true gainz!
- Location
- Outside of the Omniverse slowly breaking in
I wonder whats going on with that ball shaped pig that Adam created in the sect. That thing amused me.
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Jordisk
<Unverified N00B>
- Location
- Blind Eternities
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Quite simple: It is going to make physicists laugh and philosophers cry.
Fragnostic
Cheshire
- Location
- Neko City
It's going to give birth to little meatball piglings.
Tisaku
Head Chief Thinkomancer
repelled
Arc 2: Breakfast? Steak and eggs!
- Location
- Here
The moss was getting thinner.
It was even possible to see exposed sections of Corpse Bog water in a few areas... and the depth was shallow!
Adam grinned as he flew closer and closer to the edge of this horrible place. The slight sting of more Yang poison being harvest was background noise at this point.
His jaw was mostly fixed, his teeth were only slightly sharp, and in another month or so his body would have completely recovered... even if his Soul needed at least two months of healing. Well, that was assuming 'Research' didn't improve on the Soul Techniques he had already developed.
Speaking of which, he tried to share these new tricks with the others... and found a couple of stumbling blocks. First, they couldn't detect the energies involved. Second, the Soul tricks were far too dangerous to actually train with... learn how to use after a certain level of competence? Sure!
Attempt to practice them as a method of improvement? Deadly and possibly self destructive.
So Adam had to spend even more time designing safe and easy (Also known as 'useless') Soul Techniques that could be safely attempted, had few if any drawbacks to failure, and could expose a newly learning Cultivator to the touch (and minor manipulation) of the Soul itself.
As a medical professional, Sister Quan was the most excited. There were several injuries her profession encountered that had to be left untreated due to underlying Soul injuries, curses, and infections.
Treatment was theoretically POSSIBLE if she could gain this skill set!
So she pestered Adam about the subject a lot. Rockette was buzzing away on his shoulder as he ran and she offered advice, asked questions, and tested new theories he designed (As he was a damaged research subject).
To keep things safe, all the new (useless) abilities focused on detection, minor manipulation, and encouraging self recovery rather than letting the Healer make conscious changes in the Souls she worked with.
Which was (mostly) fine... except Adam didn't want her working on the guards (And CERTAINLY not little Tianshi), so they decided that she could begin exploring the underdeveloped Souls of the Four Eye Flame Bulls instead.
It was suggested by Sister Quan, which was good... Because Adam had forgotten he had a couple of Spirit Beasts nomming away at rare herbs in his Martial Spirit at this point.
He sighed, body flying over the surface of the thinning Bog.
Right, the Bulls.
They uh. They had been modified by Adam. As mentioned before. Heavily modified.
A lot.
At some point in the previous leg of the journey, he had just gotten bored and did all kinds of testing with 'Research' to pass the time.
He felt it wasn't a big deal over all... The animals were too dumb to care, none of the changes caused pain or reduced the lifespan of the creatures.
In fact, the vast majority of the modifications IMPROVED the beasts in various ways. The ones that didn't were cosmetic, like increasing hair length for sheering or changing eye color to 'look more cool'.
Which was why Adam was currently so confused. "Just... one more time."
Sister Quan grumbled. "Shouldn't YOU be the one giving ME answers!?"
Damn it. "Please?"
She snorted. "Fine. As far as I can tell, your 'breeding pair' of Four Eye Flame Bulls have laid over three hundred eggs. Thankfully, the majority of them are infertile... only four seem to be ready to actually hatch."
Just... when did he do THAT? "I... I don't suppose Four Eye Flame Bulls normally lay eggs?"
Her voice was dry. "No. No they do not."
Little Tianshi was over the moon! "Da, the non-baby eggs are all bright red and warm! Like... they don't burn or anything, but they are really sturdy and I bet they would be great to warm up places in the winter!"
Adam narrowed his eyes. The question was... did HE change them to breed via eggs rather than impregnation, or was it a mutation from their much more powerful diet?
Sister Quan answered. "It was you. You did this. Eating lots of good food doesn't make things like this happen."
He paused. "I... I didn't say that out loud though?"
The girls chuckled before she responded. "You only fixed your jaw enough to talk a few days ago... you haven't told Rockette to stop translating your thoughts to sound I guess."
Is that true?
Rockette was happy these days, the further they left the Bog. Ding!
Well... oops. Please stop exposing my random thoughts to others, dear.
Ding!
Adam hummed. "Well... what are we going to do? I don't want to risk going inside Rockette myself until we leave the Bog and I have a few days to test myself for issues first. And I CERTAINLY don't want you OR those eggs coming out here."
Sister Quan grunted, probably lifting an egg. "These things are easy enough to examine with medical skills at the moment, and we can gather the eggs for the tasting guards to check out."
Little Tianshi seemed fascinated. "They are kind of like massive, flaming chicken-cows now. I wonder if these taste like beef?"
Adam... wasn't sure. Huh. "How can you tell which eggs can be eaten and which will become... whatever the hell those mutated Spirit Beast Bulls are?"
The older woman was moving something. "These ones for eating are all bright red, smaller in size, and are just above warm to the touch. THOSE on the other hand..."
Tianshi jumped in the conversation. "The baby eggs are almost twice as big, the shells are almost white with a blue tinge, and they are WAY too hot for either of us to move around. Plus, the momma and poppa keep nudging them into various fire pits... neither of the Bulls seem to care about the other eggs at all."
Sister Quan agreed. "I did double check using medical techniques and none of the smaller ones are fertilized. They are also not poisonous, have high nutritional value... If the tasting guards give it a passing grade, we may want this to become a new food source."
Adam just... wasn't sure how to handle this.
He went silent as he listened to the two girls maneuver the parents around, order the Guards to use a long tool to carefully shift the potential new Bull eggs into a central area pit, then followed the various tests being done with the smaller (and hopefully delicious) red eggs...
His thoughts were a bit odd.
WOULD the new animals, should those eggs actually hatch, be Four Eye Flame Bulls? He didn't remember when in the experimentation he had made that change, thus he wasn't sure if all the changes he had made (Which were CLEARLY numerous) could be passed down genetically.
Also... the changes were so significant, that he wasn't entirely sure what the life cycle of these new creatures would be. They would eat little, store much energy, use that energy gained far more efficiently...
Oh crud, he had experimented on 'Genetic Memories' too. Shoved all kinds of stuff about cultivation into the Bulls to see if he could pass down data genetically like the Martial Spirits could pass down innate abilities conceptually.
That... that was supposed to be taken out before attempting to breed these damn things.
And clearly, he had NOT finished that project as planned, since at least egg laying was left in there. Probably got sidetracked when Ash Forest exploded after collection.
COULD they still have normal babies through sex and via their womb? Did he remove those parts entirely? Maybe. Honestly, he should have kept better notes when he did the 'Nothing to do, why not modify stuff?' thing... up TILL that point 'Research' had a full documentary going!
Well... crap.
If they turn out to be too intelligent, he would turn the babies infertile until they were adults. They would only produce consumable eggs until they were old enough to make a decision on their own. That... that was being a responsible sort of half parent, right?
Four Eye Flame Bulls WERE occasionally harvested, at least in human society. They were turned into beast of burdens due to how inefficient it was to butcher them.
This species took a lot of food, water, and time to grow... so it was a better return on the money to take advantage of their tremendous physical strength rather than a one time payoff from meat collection. Their meat was pretty flavorless and tough too.
Of course, that was before Adam started fiddling.
Now? Assuming he didn't accidentally make all these eggs into genius babies, growing them for slaughter was fully on the table, so to speak.
From what few notes he HAD on the topic, the process of improving the muscles and bones had several delicious side effects. More fat distributed more thoroughly, acting as energy reserves, for example.
Also, theoretically? Making them so much stronger meant that MOST of their muscles will be used less often. They barely needed to move to generate enormous motion... it was intended to improve their ability as pack animals.
If they didn't need to poop? Barely needed to eat? Mostly didn't move?
Then various trips didn't need as many pit stops. They could move faster with less stress on the animals involved. Low maintenance, high performance, high endurance.
Side effect?
These creatures would be COVERED in high quality, delicious meat with amazing fat content distributed throughout it. The muscles would be of amazing quality but rarely used... And uh.
Did he make the bones mint flavored? Maybe? It wasn't documented.
Crud.
Depending on how tasty these eggs were? It was entirely possible that ALL raised kids would become invited to the dinner table. Sheesh.
At least he knew inbreeding wouldn't be an issue. He had a limited breeding pool as it was, making sure any and all changes would not cause genetic issues was a major concern from the start after all. Even with the fun and random changes, ensuring safe breeding was mandatory at every stage.
...Shit. "Sister Quan?"
A shuffle of annoyance. "Yes?"
Adam winced. "Just checking... but does the female Four Eye Flame Bull seem to have prominent udders?"
A pause. "Let me check."
An awkward silence.
Finally... "No, no she does not."
Oh thank heavens, he DID remove that. Some vague memory about the milking attempt producing pure fire... a good reason to get rid of the feature. "Oh good."
Sister Quan sounded... concerned. "Adam..."
Uh. "Yes?"
She coughed. "Were... were you adding 'Prominent Udders' to the Bulls?"
...Well ANYTHING sounded dirty if you phrased it like THAT. "No comment."
Seriously, some people and their filthy minds.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Little Tianshi had moved several of the 'Fire Eggs' into her treehouse, even if Mr. Whiskers was only able to supervise the process. It took several trips, even with root manipulation to help.
These things were awesome! It required hard work to break one open (The guards ended up using a sword on the watermelon sized things) and they were always giving off a warm glow and this soft heat...
So she ended up moving a dozen into her treehouse bedroom, wrapped a whole bunch of the massive things in a thick mattress of vines... and BAM! A heated bed!
She could even jump on the new mattress without worrying about her nap time suddenly becoming an eggy mess. Not that she would, she was a big girl and that would be childish. But she could.
Didn't get much height.
The warmth was... not just heat. It seemed to relax the muscles... not a healing field or anything big like that, more just a soothing sort of heat that soaked into the body.
...She would probably make another couple of these 'Egg Beds' for Sister Quan and Da. Then she would get hugs and stuff and maybe an extra slice of cake or something.
Right now, she had finished moving her bedding over to the new sleep area and was watching the crystal screen Rockette had set up to spy on the poison eye Da collected.
The 'Asura Stone Cavern' had changed a lot.
The black pool of poison on the bottom now had floating white patterns shifting on the surface. The white clouds floating above had shifting black runes moving about.
And the eye had combined with the Asura Stone, floating in the middle of the cavern.
Now? The eye was no longer a basic glowing green orb with eyelids.
Its back side was the solid black Asura Stone... the front a white rock eye with several black concentric rings of crystal acting like the iris, the center pupil a mesmerizing glowing blue dot.
The blue dot matched her Master's flames.
It was soothing.
Now however, where ever the Asura Eye glared... a green poison eye would form on that surface. Once the focus was lost? The green eye would blink out of existence.
She wasn't really sure what either of the changes meant, but watching the process just conveyed a feeling of... satisfaction. Of peace. Harmony?
The eye stone seemed happy, though she wasn't sure why. The poison eyes being generated seemed... eager? But completely unconcerned about how short a time they had before fading away. Either they were unaware how little time they had or unconcerned about the issue.
Her idle evening was interrupted by the dinner call.
Ooh! Time to find out how these new Fire Eggs taste!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
The lead guard (and to be fair, the other guards as well) stared at their plates.
She poked the 'fried egg'. "Since the Yolk is white, and the Whites are red... do we call this the egg Reds?"
If one ignored the colors, the cracked eggs were shaped fairly normally. A yolk supported by goo, one that apparently hardened when cooked easily enough.
But the center was this glowing white, blue tinged color. And the goo, when cooked, was nearly an unnaturally cheerful red color.
She sat at her place carefully. "At least the portions are large."
Two fried eggs were enough for all twelve of them, if they each had a single serving. The yolks alone were as large as some of the bigger fruits!
Sister Quan chuckled. "True... but the tricky part was cooking them."
She pointed at the wedge like slice she had just served to the lead guard. "These things ignored our attempts to increase their temperature. After all, they were laid in flames and generate heat."
A chuckle. "To cook them? I had to COOL THEM OFF. These things are not 'cooked' so much as 'frozen' into solidity."
The lead guard blinked. "What?" She cautiously used her fork to tear a small segment away... and it tasted like a properly cooked egg. Sort of. "What seasoning did you add to this? It is amazing!"
She laughed. "I know, right? One of the tasting guards found out that the shell was made of reinforced salt, to better resist the high heat involved. Either that or Adam was trying to be clever when designing these things."
Sister Quan passed a bowl of glowing red powder. "This ground up eggshell is safe to eat, but tastes like a mixture of salt and mild peppers. Slightly spicy... I'll be honest, having a renewable seasoning source like this is almost better than the promise of future steak."
The lead guard took another bite, this time with some additional 'Fire Salt'. The Spiritual Energy density in the egg was higher than expected, though not enough to be dangerous to people without a cultivation base... as long as they didn't have more than one serving a day or so.
The 'spice' or 'heat' the new salt was not overly strong either... "And you have to cool them off to cook them?"
Sister Quan nodded, adding some more bright red seasoning to her portion. "Just like how molten metal 'freezes' into a solid, these eggs 'freeze' into 'cooked' eggs. It is the only dish I have ever seen that can be properly cooked without any fireplace or heat source involved."
The guard blinked. "That could be VERY useful in some undercover missions I had. Or in places with little brush or wood to get easy cooking done." Another bite... Mmm! "Especially since those missions wouldn't allow me to just use Battle Qi to generate a cooking source. Sometimes you can't risk using techniques in the field."
Sister Quan chuckled. "It was a heck of a surprise though. We were all still messing around, using bonfires or heated crystal pipes... basically FAILING at cooking these things. Then a guard tried to retrieve a new egg from the refrigeration room and cracked a perfectly boiled egg into the pan."
The cooking woman grinned. "Imagine our SECOND surprise when the boiled egg MELTED back into a 'raw' egg! Though that did help us figure out how to properly prepare these things."
The guard leader looked into the distance wistfully. "I wonder how good a chef I could have been if I could uncook my mistakes and try again?"
Little Tianshi shoved a serving dish to her older friend. "Sister Quan, try the scrambled eggs! The ones with cheese!"
The Sister's expression dropped a little. "Ah... the last of the cheese." They REALLY needed to find a town to trade with for supplies. Still... She took a large bite.
And seemed lost in happiness. "That. Was. Worth. It."
Almost as one, the other guards began reaching for the scrambled cheese eggs.
No wonder the tasting squad had seemed so smug to get that dish first!
It was even possible to see exposed sections of Corpse Bog water in a few areas... and the depth was shallow!
Adam grinned as he flew closer and closer to the edge of this horrible place. The slight sting of more Yang poison being harvest was background noise at this point.
His jaw was mostly fixed, his teeth were only slightly sharp, and in another month or so his body would have completely recovered... even if his Soul needed at least two months of healing. Well, that was assuming 'Research' didn't improve on the Soul Techniques he had already developed.
Speaking of which, he tried to share these new tricks with the others... and found a couple of stumbling blocks. First, they couldn't detect the energies involved. Second, the Soul tricks were far too dangerous to actually train with... learn how to use after a certain level of competence? Sure!
Attempt to practice them as a method of improvement? Deadly and possibly self destructive.
So Adam had to spend even more time designing safe and easy (Also known as 'useless') Soul Techniques that could be safely attempted, had few if any drawbacks to failure, and could expose a newly learning Cultivator to the touch (and minor manipulation) of the Soul itself.
As a medical professional, Sister Quan was the most excited. There were several injuries her profession encountered that had to be left untreated due to underlying Soul injuries, curses, and infections.
Treatment was theoretically POSSIBLE if she could gain this skill set!
So she pestered Adam about the subject a lot. Rockette was buzzing away on his shoulder as he ran and she offered advice, asked questions, and tested new theories he designed (As he was a damaged research subject).
To keep things safe, all the new (useless) abilities focused on detection, minor manipulation, and encouraging self recovery rather than letting the Healer make conscious changes in the Souls she worked with.
Which was (mostly) fine... except Adam didn't want her working on the guards (And CERTAINLY not little Tianshi), so they decided that she could begin exploring the underdeveloped Souls of the Four Eye Flame Bulls instead.
It was suggested by Sister Quan, which was good... Because Adam had forgotten he had a couple of Spirit Beasts nomming away at rare herbs in his Martial Spirit at this point.
He sighed, body flying over the surface of the thinning Bog.
Right, the Bulls.
They uh. They had been modified by Adam. As mentioned before. Heavily modified.
A lot.
At some point in the previous leg of the journey, he had just gotten bored and did all kinds of testing with 'Research' to pass the time.
He felt it wasn't a big deal over all... The animals were too dumb to care, none of the changes caused pain or reduced the lifespan of the creatures.
In fact, the vast majority of the modifications IMPROVED the beasts in various ways. The ones that didn't were cosmetic, like increasing hair length for sheering or changing eye color to 'look more cool'.
Which was why Adam was currently so confused. "Just... one more time."
Sister Quan grumbled. "Shouldn't YOU be the one giving ME answers!?"
Damn it. "Please?"
She snorted. "Fine. As far as I can tell, your 'breeding pair' of Four Eye Flame Bulls have laid over three hundred eggs. Thankfully, the majority of them are infertile... only four seem to be ready to actually hatch."
Just... when did he do THAT? "I... I don't suppose Four Eye Flame Bulls normally lay eggs?"
Her voice was dry. "No. No they do not."
Little Tianshi was over the moon! "Da, the non-baby eggs are all bright red and warm! Like... they don't burn or anything, but they are really sturdy and I bet they would be great to warm up places in the winter!"
Adam narrowed his eyes. The question was... did HE change them to breed via eggs rather than impregnation, or was it a mutation from their much more powerful diet?
Sister Quan answered. "It was you. You did this. Eating lots of good food doesn't make things like this happen."
He paused. "I... I didn't say that out loud though?"
The girls chuckled before she responded. "You only fixed your jaw enough to talk a few days ago... you haven't told Rockette to stop translating your thoughts to sound I guess."
Is that true?
Rockette was happy these days, the further they left the Bog. Ding!
Well... oops. Please stop exposing my random thoughts to others, dear.
Ding!
Adam hummed. "Well... what are we going to do? I don't want to risk going inside Rockette myself until we leave the Bog and I have a few days to test myself for issues first. And I CERTAINLY don't want you OR those eggs coming out here."
Sister Quan grunted, probably lifting an egg. "These things are easy enough to examine with medical skills at the moment, and we can gather the eggs for the tasting guards to check out."
Little Tianshi seemed fascinated. "They are kind of like massive, flaming chicken-cows now. I wonder if these taste like beef?"
Adam... wasn't sure. Huh. "How can you tell which eggs can be eaten and which will become... whatever the hell those mutated Spirit Beast Bulls are?"
The older woman was moving something. "These ones for eating are all bright red, smaller in size, and are just above warm to the touch. THOSE on the other hand..."
Tianshi jumped in the conversation. "The baby eggs are almost twice as big, the shells are almost white with a blue tinge, and they are WAY too hot for either of us to move around. Plus, the momma and poppa keep nudging them into various fire pits... neither of the Bulls seem to care about the other eggs at all."
Sister Quan agreed. "I did double check using medical techniques and none of the smaller ones are fertilized. They are also not poisonous, have high nutritional value... If the tasting guards give it a passing grade, we may want this to become a new food source."
Adam just... wasn't sure how to handle this.
He went silent as he listened to the two girls maneuver the parents around, order the Guards to use a long tool to carefully shift the potential new Bull eggs into a central area pit, then followed the various tests being done with the smaller (and hopefully delicious) red eggs...
His thoughts were a bit odd.
WOULD the new animals, should those eggs actually hatch, be Four Eye Flame Bulls? He didn't remember when in the experimentation he had made that change, thus he wasn't sure if all the changes he had made (Which were CLEARLY numerous) could be passed down genetically.
Also... the changes were so significant, that he wasn't entirely sure what the life cycle of these new creatures would be. They would eat little, store much energy, use that energy gained far more efficiently...
Oh crud, he had experimented on 'Genetic Memories' too. Shoved all kinds of stuff about cultivation into the Bulls to see if he could pass down data genetically like the Martial Spirits could pass down innate abilities conceptually.
That... that was supposed to be taken out before attempting to breed these damn things.
And clearly, he had NOT finished that project as planned, since at least egg laying was left in there. Probably got sidetracked when Ash Forest exploded after collection.
COULD they still have normal babies through sex and via their womb? Did he remove those parts entirely? Maybe. Honestly, he should have kept better notes when he did the 'Nothing to do, why not modify stuff?' thing... up TILL that point 'Research' had a full documentary going!
Well... crap.
If they turn out to be too intelligent, he would turn the babies infertile until they were adults. They would only produce consumable eggs until they were old enough to make a decision on their own. That... that was being a responsible sort of half parent, right?
Four Eye Flame Bulls WERE occasionally harvested, at least in human society. They were turned into beast of burdens due to how inefficient it was to butcher them.
This species took a lot of food, water, and time to grow... so it was a better return on the money to take advantage of their tremendous physical strength rather than a one time payoff from meat collection. Their meat was pretty flavorless and tough too.
Of course, that was before Adam started fiddling.
Now? Assuming he didn't accidentally make all these eggs into genius babies, growing them for slaughter was fully on the table, so to speak.
From what few notes he HAD on the topic, the process of improving the muscles and bones had several delicious side effects. More fat distributed more thoroughly, acting as energy reserves, for example.
Also, theoretically? Making them so much stronger meant that MOST of their muscles will be used less often. They barely needed to move to generate enormous motion... it was intended to improve their ability as pack animals.
If they didn't need to poop? Barely needed to eat? Mostly didn't move?
Then various trips didn't need as many pit stops. They could move faster with less stress on the animals involved. Low maintenance, high performance, high endurance.
Side effect?
These creatures would be COVERED in high quality, delicious meat with amazing fat content distributed throughout it. The muscles would be of amazing quality but rarely used... And uh.
Did he make the bones mint flavored? Maybe? It wasn't documented.
Crud.
Depending on how tasty these eggs were? It was entirely possible that ALL raised kids would become invited to the dinner table. Sheesh.
At least he knew inbreeding wouldn't be an issue. He had a limited breeding pool as it was, making sure any and all changes would not cause genetic issues was a major concern from the start after all. Even with the fun and random changes, ensuring safe breeding was mandatory at every stage.
...Shit. "Sister Quan?"
A shuffle of annoyance. "Yes?"
Adam winced. "Just checking... but does the female Four Eye Flame Bull seem to have prominent udders?"
A pause. "Let me check."
An awkward silence.
Finally... "No, no she does not."
Oh thank heavens, he DID remove that. Some vague memory about the milking attempt producing pure fire... a good reason to get rid of the feature. "Oh good."
Sister Quan sounded... concerned. "Adam..."
Uh. "Yes?"
She coughed. "Were... were you adding 'Prominent Udders' to the Bulls?"
...Well ANYTHING sounded dirty if you phrased it like THAT. "No comment."
Seriously, some people and their filthy minds.
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
Little Tianshi had moved several of the 'Fire Eggs' into her treehouse, even if Mr. Whiskers was only able to supervise the process. It took several trips, even with root manipulation to help.
These things were awesome! It required hard work to break one open (The guards ended up using a sword on the watermelon sized things) and they were always giving off a warm glow and this soft heat...
So she ended up moving a dozen into her treehouse bedroom, wrapped a whole bunch of the massive things in a thick mattress of vines... and BAM! A heated bed!
She could even jump on the new mattress without worrying about her nap time suddenly becoming an eggy mess. Not that she would, she was a big girl and that would be childish. But she could.
Didn't get much height.
The warmth was... not just heat. It seemed to relax the muscles... not a healing field or anything big like that, more just a soothing sort of heat that soaked into the body.
...She would probably make another couple of these 'Egg Beds' for Sister Quan and Da. Then she would get hugs and stuff and maybe an extra slice of cake or something.
Right now, she had finished moving her bedding over to the new sleep area and was watching the crystal screen Rockette had set up to spy on the poison eye Da collected.
The 'Asura Stone Cavern' had changed a lot.
The black pool of poison on the bottom now had floating white patterns shifting on the surface. The white clouds floating above had shifting black runes moving about.
And the eye had combined with the Asura Stone, floating in the middle of the cavern.
Now? The eye was no longer a basic glowing green orb with eyelids.
Its back side was the solid black Asura Stone... the front a white rock eye with several black concentric rings of crystal acting like the iris, the center pupil a mesmerizing glowing blue dot.
The blue dot matched her Master's flames.
It was soothing.
Now however, where ever the Asura Eye glared... a green poison eye would form on that surface. Once the focus was lost? The green eye would blink out of existence.
She wasn't really sure what either of the changes meant, but watching the process just conveyed a feeling of... satisfaction. Of peace. Harmony?
The eye stone seemed happy, though she wasn't sure why. The poison eyes being generated seemed... eager? But completely unconcerned about how short a time they had before fading away. Either they were unaware how little time they had or unconcerned about the issue.
Her idle evening was interrupted by the dinner call.
Ooh! Time to find out how these new Fire Eggs taste!
~~~Broken Adventure~~~
The lead guard (and to be fair, the other guards as well) stared at their plates.
She poked the 'fried egg'. "Since the Yolk is white, and the Whites are red... do we call this the egg Reds?"
If one ignored the colors, the cracked eggs were shaped fairly normally. A yolk supported by goo, one that apparently hardened when cooked easily enough.
But the center was this glowing white, blue tinged color. And the goo, when cooked, was nearly an unnaturally cheerful red color.
She sat at her place carefully. "At least the portions are large."
Two fried eggs were enough for all twelve of them, if they each had a single serving. The yolks alone were as large as some of the bigger fruits!
Sister Quan chuckled. "True... but the tricky part was cooking them."
She pointed at the wedge like slice she had just served to the lead guard. "These things ignored our attempts to increase their temperature. After all, they were laid in flames and generate heat."
A chuckle. "To cook them? I had to COOL THEM OFF. These things are not 'cooked' so much as 'frozen' into solidity."
The lead guard blinked. "What?" She cautiously used her fork to tear a small segment away... and it tasted like a properly cooked egg. Sort of. "What seasoning did you add to this? It is amazing!"
She laughed. "I know, right? One of the tasting guards found out that the shell was made of reinforced salt, to better resist the high heat involved. Either that or Adam was trying to be clever when designing these things."
Sister Quan passed a bowl of glowing red powder. "This ground up eggshell is safe to eat, but tastes like a mixture of salt and mild peppers. Slightly spicy... I'll be honest, having a renewable seasoning source like this is almost better than the promise of future steak."
The lead guard took another bite, this time with some additional 'Fire Salt'. The Spiritual Energy density in the egg was higher than expected, though not enough to be dangerous to people without a cultivation base... as long as they didn't have more than one serving a day or so.
The 'spice' or 'heat' the new salt was not overly strong either... "And you have to cool them off to cook them?"
Sister Quan nodded, adding some more bright red seasoning to her portion. "Just like how molten metal 'freezes' into a solid, these eggs 'freeze' into 'cooked' eggs. It is the only dish I have ever seen that can be properly cooked without any fireplace or heat source involved."
The guard blinked. "That could be VERY useful in some undercover missions I had. Or in places with little brush or wood to get easy cooking done." Another bite... Mmm! "Especially since those missions wouldn't allow me to just use Battle Qi to generate a cooking source. Sometimes you can't risk using techniques in the field."
Sister Quan chuckled. "It was a heck of a surprise though. We were all still messing around, using bonfires or heated crystal pipes... basically FAILING at cooking these things. Then a guard tried to retrieve a new egg from the refrigeration room and cracked a perfectly boiled egg into the pan."
The cooking woman grinned. "Imagine our SECOND surprise when the boiled egg MELTED back into a 'raw' egg! Though that did help us figure out how to properly prepare these things."
The guard leader looked into the distance wistfully. "I wonder how good a chef I could have been if I could uncook my mistakes and try again?"
Little Tianshi shoved a serving dish to her older friend. "Sister Quan, try the scrambled eggs! The ones with cheese!"
The Sister's expression dropped a little. "Ah... the last of the cheese." They REALLY needed to find a town to trade with for supplies. Still... She took a large bite.
And seemed lost in happiness. "That. Was. Worth. It."
Almost as one, the other guards began reaching for the scrambled cheese eggs.
No wonder the tasting squad had seemed so smug to get that dish first!
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....
What?
No seriously, flaming bulls that lay eggs?
I know this whole fic is about Adam doing the impossible, but where did that come from?
What?
No seriously, flaming bulls that lay eggs?
I know this whole fic is about Adam doing the impossible, but where did that come from?
- Location
- Saipan
When Adam had that tinker fugue in genetically (and possibly conceptually) altering the bulls out of boredom. It did say that he zoned out and didn't even document the process, and we only saw when he came back from the fugue that he was messing with their coloring.
- Status