After a wave of ecstasy, Lin Li reined in his excitement, got up from the damp grass, and hurried over to the unremarkable little tree in the center of the island.
'To think something so plain and malnourished-looking would turn out to be such a great treasure,' he mused.
Lin Li carefully sized up the unimpressive, two-meter-tall tree.
'When I came to this Mysterious Small Island before, this little tree clearly didn't have any fruit. How could it grow such a magical little fruit after just one day?'
'If it can grow one, does that mean it can grow a second? How do I get it to grow more?'
As Lin Li stared at the little tree, his mind full of questions, he reached out and touched its trunk.
The moment his fingers touched the trunk, a stream of information about the tree materialized in his mind.
'So that's how it is! For this Magical Little Tree to keep growing strong and produce more of those magical little fruits, it needs a large amount of the blood and flesh of Mutant Beasts!'
Having learned how to cultivate the Magical Little Tree, Lin Li's face broke into a happy smile. He decided to go to the market tomorrow to buy some Exotic Beast Meat and test if the method would work.
The Fireball he had just created using his Superpower had nearly depleted Lin Li's Spiritual Energy.
Just as Lin Li decided to buy some Exotic Beast Meat at the market the next morning, his vision went black, and just like last time, he was ejected from the Mysterious Small Island.
After Lin Li disappeared, the Mysterious Small Island returned to tranquility. The placid surface of the water, the slowly drifting white mist, the malnourished Magical Little Tree… If not for the damp grass at the edge of the island, everything would have seemed as it always was.
...
"Hsss…"
'It hurts so much…'
Appearing out of thin air on his sofa, Lin Li raised his right hand and tapped his head. It took him half a minute to recover.
'Sigh… although the pain is still bearable, there's no reason to put myself through this. I'll have to be more careful when using my Spiritual Energy from now on. I can't just use it all up again.'
After the headache subsided, Lin Li estimated how long it would take for his Spiritual Energy to fully recover. Suddenly, he froze.
'This… My Spiritual Energy is recovering so much faster! How?'
'Could it be that the magical fruit also improved my cultivation aptitude?'
Previously, when Lin Li exhausted his Spiritual Energy, it would take a full day to recover. Now, that time was cut by a third.
Feeling the earth-shattering changes in his body, an ecstatic smile spread across Lin Li's face again. Tonight was destined to be a sleepless night.
...
The next morning, as the first rays of sunlight appeared in the east, Lin Li threw off his covers. He had been tossing and turning all night. He quickly got out of bed, dressed, and hurried to the bathroom to wash up.
Washing his face and brushing his teeth took him less than three minutes. Afterward, without even eating breakfast, he rushed out the door and headed for the market.
The market vendors opened for business before dawn. By the time Lin Li arrived, a good number of shoppers were already browsing the various stalls.
Lin Li had a clear goal. He walked straight past the ordinary vegetable stalls, heading for a lavishly decorated shop deeper inside the market.
This was a shop that specialized in selling Exotic Beast Meat. Although it was significantly more expensive than regular meat, plenty of people still came to buy it.
When Lin Li reached the Exotic Beast Meat shop, a line had already formed.
'So many people! I should've gotten up earlier,' Lin Li grumbled and got in at the back of the line.
"Excuse me, how fresh is this Exotic Beast Meat?"
"Don't you worry, Old Zhang! My Exotic Beast Meat is guaranteed fresh. It's all from a new shipment I got this morning."
"The wholesaler told me these Mutant Beasts have been dead for less than twenty-four hours."
After about ten minutes in line, it was finally Lin Li's turn.
"How much you want, young man?" The butcher, clad in an apron and holding a glistening cleaver, was a little surprised to see someone so young buying meat this early in the morning.
After all, you rarely see young people getting up this early to go to the market anymore.
"Three pounds, please!" Lin Li only wanted to run a test, so he didn't ask for much.
"You got it." The butcher nodded, and with a single, practiced motion, he deftly sliced off three pounds of Exotic Beast Meat for Lin Li.
BEEP. Taking the three pounds of Exotic Beast Meat from the butcher, Lin Li took his phone out of his pocket, scanned the QR code, and paid the 300.
Lin Li had bought meat from a Wild Boar Beast, which cost 100 a pound. In contrast, regular pork from a domesticated Pig went for about 20 a pound, a difference of nearly five times.
With the Exotic Beast Meat in hand, Lin Li quickly left the market. He was now desperate to find a secluded place where he could enter the Mysterious Small Island.
…
After leaving the market, Lin Li crossed the road and entered a nearby park.
The park wasn't very large and its location was somewhat out of the way, so few people came there for their morning exercise.
At first, Lin Li planned to find a deserted copse of trees in the park to hide in before entering the Mysterious Small Island.
But on second thought, he decided it was better to be safe. He walked into the park's public restroom, found an empty stall, and locked the door. Then, with a mere thought, his body flickered with a faint golden Spiritual Light, and he vanished.
…
The barren island, the ordinary little tree, the placid water, the boundless white mist—everything was exactly as it had been when Lin Li left the previous night.
Appearing on the Mysterious Small Island, Lin Li took the freshly bought Exotic Beast Meat out of its plastic bag and placed it at the foot of the Magical Little Tree.
A minute passed. Then two. Five.
Lin Li stared at the Exotic Beast Meat at the foot of the tree for a full five minutes, but it showed no signs of changing.
'Why isn't anything happening? Could the information I received yesterday have been wrong?'
Just as Lin Li was feeling deeply disappointed, another stream of information suddenly surfaced in his mind.
'This Exotic Beast Meat is not fresh enough. The meat must be from a Mutant Beast that has been dead for less than an hour.'
"..."
Lin Li froze when this new information surfaced in his mind. He never would have imagined that the Magical Little Tree would be so picky about the freshness of the Exotic Beast Meat. It was completely unexpected.
...