With a map, things really did become much easier.
Before long, he found Daji and the others inside a rock cave at the foot of the mountain.
When Hunter Five and the others saw ppear, their faces immediately lit up with joy, "Lord, you're finally back!"
"Didn't I tell you to wait for me where you were?", Ethan asked strangely, "Why did you all run over here?"
"Meow~"
"Meow!"
"Meow! Meow! Meow~"
Seeing Ethan return, Daji didn't know whether it was excitement or something else.
It kept circling Ethan nonstop, desperately running around him, occasionally rubbing its head against him, then spinning around in place again. Its movements were very strange.
"Daji, what's wrong with you?"
Ethan rubbed Daji's little head and then picked it up.
He saw that Daji's face was flushed red, its eyes were red too, and there were even tears hanging at the corners of its eyes, about to fall but not yet falling.
"Meow~"
Daji let out a sound that seemed full of grievance.
It made Ethan's heart ache so badly that he quickly wiped away the tears at the corner of its eyes and asked the villagers, "What happened to Daji?"
"Reporting to the lord, earlier there was a very strange sound that suddenly rang out. It scared Lord Daji so badly that it ran here like crazy, so we could only follow along," Hunter Five explained, "After that, we followed all the way into this cave. There are many strange plants inside. After Lord Daji took a bite of one of them, it became like this."
Ethan finally understood the whole story.
As a cat demon, Daji's hearing was naturally more sensitive than a human's. The magma octopus's sonic attack might not have had much effect on the settlers below, but it still had a huge impact on Daji.
So Daji wanted to run somewhere to hide, but ended up eating something it shouldn't have.
As for what Daji had eaten, Ethan would have to go inside the cave and see exactly what had turned Daji into such a pitiful state before he could help it.
"Come on, follow me inside and take a look."
Ethan held the pitiful little Daji in his arms and walked into the cave.
Inside the cave, there truly was a whole other world.
Clearly, the outside was a snow mountain.
But inside this cave, there was actually a beautiful paradise-like scene.
Not only was there a large forest, but countless kinds of plants grew around it. There were all kinds of bird calls and insect sounds, and most importantly of all.
Right at the very center of the cave, there was actually a lake giving off steam.
'A hot spring?'
The instant Ethan saw it, his heart gave an uncooperative jump.
After working hard all day, what could be more comfortable than soaking properly in a hot spring?
"Lord, this is what Lord Daji ate!"
At this moment, Hunter Five suddenly spoke up, drawing Ethan's attention.
Ethan turned his head and saw that Hunter Five was pointing at a red plant. It kind of looked like a chili pepper, but not quite.
Its shape was more like a bell pepper, a bit round, but the middle was all wrinkled, like a squashed lantern, full of folds.
And this plant even gave off a faint fishy smell.
No wonder Daji ate it by mistake.
[Magma Chili: An extremely spicy chili grown by absorbing magma fire elements all year round. When cooking, remember to use only a tiny bit, otherwise the massive fire element will burn you from the inside out! Special effect: Increases cold resistance]
'So that's it.'
Only now did Ethan finally understand. Daji had eaten chili peppers.
That was why it looked so miserable.
"Hahaha!"
At this moment.
Not only did Ethan not feel sorry anymore, he even found it a bit funny.
,,Ծ‸Ծ,,
Daji looked up, its face full of resentment.
After thinking for a moment, Ethan said, "Normally, when you get burned by chili, drinking milk works best. I don't have any milk on me right now, but can you drink cola?"
However, just as Ethan took out the cola, Daji didn't say another word and directly sliced off the bottle cap with its sharp claws, then started gulping it down.
Watching Daji hug the cola bottle and drink cola, Ethan was amazed.
'Is this really still a cat?'
But with Daji's current physique, it probably wouldn't have any problems.
As for the magma chilies in front of them, since they'd already been discovered, Ethan naturally couldn't let them go.
[Collect Magma Chili!]
[Magma Chili +10000]
[Unripe Magma Chili detected. Collect?]
After thinking about it, Ethan ultimately gave up.
After all, finding a second chili field like this wouldn't be easy. Leaving the smaller ones to grow slowly meant that when he finished using what he had, Ethan could come back and harvest again.
As for planting them himself, Ethan absolutely wouldn't consider it, because these magma chilies needed magma to grow. Where was he supposed to find a pile of magma to plant chilies?
As for the other plants, Ethan swept his gaze around and unexpectedly discovered something called black oil fruit.
That thing had long stalks, with round green balls at the top. These balls were actually about the size of a palm, and looked a bit like a certain unspeakable kind of tree flower.
[Black Oil Fruit: A top-tier seasoning, beloved by the dwarf race. Its taste is a bit like soy sauce. Whether used for dipping fish or meat, it tastes excellent.]
"Soy sauce?"
Ethan's eyes lit up.
The soy sauce he had traded for with lightning leopard meat earlier was almost gone.
He didn't expect something this good to be right here. He hurried forward, preparing to pick some black oil fruit and test how it tasted!
However, Ethan had only taken two steps.
When he suddenly saw the red exclamation marks in front of him, as if they were swaying.
He quickly scanned them and realized that mixed inside were some things that weren't called black oil fruit, but looked extremely similar to it.
[Corpse-Eating Fruit: Almost identical in appearance to black oil fruit. The only difference is the white spots left by corpse poison on the roots and fruit. Its fruit is not merely a fruit like black oil fruit, but a flower that bites people. The flower's thorns are highly poisonous and can cause people to fall unconscious and die, eventually becoming its nutrients.]
[PS: People often lose their lives by mistaking corpse-eating fruit for black oil fruit.]
"Damn it!"
If he hadn't been sharp-eyed just now and noticed that those red exclamation marks seemed to move a bit, he would've fallen for the corpse-eating fruit's trap.
Ethan casually picked up a dead branch and walked near those fruits, quickly sticking the branch over.
Snap!
Several corpse-eating fruits instantly opened their huge mouths and lunged at Ethan.
Only then did Ethan see clearly that the "fruits" sitting on top of the corpse-eating fruit's roots weren't fruits at all, but something like pitcher-plant traps that could open.
Inside were densely packed hard spikes that could even pierce dead wood.
The corpse-eating fruits quickly realized that what they had bitten wasn't edible.
They immediately opened their mouths again and spat it out.
"Ptoo~"
After that, those corpse-eating fruits quickly shrank back.
Only then did Ethan realize that within this patch of black oil fruit, there were actually dense clusters of corpse-eating fruit growing everywhere.
'This thing is made specifically to screw people over, isn't it?'
'If it's about being sneaky, I've never been afraid of anyone.'
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