As a tree, unable to move, Ye Feng's targets for Devouring were limited.
He chose his first target among the earthworms in the soil.
With a dense network of roots, seeking out earthworms in the soil was a simple task, and he quickly locked onto one.
It's worth mentioning that the earthworms of present times had also undergone some mutation, with their size now comparable to chopsticks.
This was a bit frightening, but Ye Feng didn't care at all; his Main Root moved over and swiftly coiled around the earthworm.
The Mutated Earthworm tried to struggle, but numerous lateral roots followed suit, and within a few seconds, the earthworm was completely subdued.
Ye Feng's mind moved, and he activated his Devouring Ability.
Then he could feel the tree roots continuously extracting specks of Spirit Points and Bioenergy from the body of the earthworm.
In just a dozen seconds, the earthworm withered away, its vitality lost.
"Increased by 1 Spirit Point and Bioenergy," Ye Feng glanced at the system panel and immediately felt elated.
If left to his own devices, it would have taken at least an hour.
But now it took less than a minute to achieve.
Having tasted the sweetness, he naturally doubled his efforts.
In the following ten minutes, Ye Feng managed to find a total of five earthworms and Devoured them all, increasing by 5 Spirit Points and Bioenergy.
"Is that all? There's really too few creatures underground," Ye Feng swept the terrain with his roots once more to confirm there were no omissions, then heaved a light sigh.
His attention could only turn to the ground above.
Compared to the underground, there were far more creatures on the surface that could be Devoured.
Passing ants, centipedes, and crickets—all were his prey.
His Main Root was now 21.4 meters, and the lateral roots were roughly 80% the length of the Main Root, which is about 17.1 meters.
Under these circumstances, he could fairly easily hunt for any insects within 17 meters of his Tree Body.
Beyond 17 meters, he had to rely on his Main Root to hunt, and the difficulty increased dramatically.
However, he was located in a dense forest within a valley, where there were plenty of creatures within a range of 17 meters.
The hunt was on!
Centered around himself, centipedes, crickets, and ants swiftly vanished.
These three types of creatures, the finger-thick Mutated Centipedes, could also provide 1 Spirit Point and Bioenergy, but unfortunately, they were too few in number.
As for the crickets, they could offer only 0.7 Spirit Points, and the Mutated Crickets were extremely agile, able to leap one or two meters with a single bound, making them quite difficult to catch.
Therefore, compared to these two creatures, Mutated Ants were Ye Feng's preferred prey.
Although the fingernail-sized Mutated Ants could only provide him with 0.1 Spirit Point and Bioenergy, there were many of them.
From time to time, an ant would pass through his territory while foraging, so overall, ants provided the most Spirit Points.
An hour flew by.
Ye Feng took a glance at the system panel. His Spirit Points had increased to 20 and his Bioenergy had reached 25 points.
He was quite satisfied with the rate at which his Spirit Points increased; it was much faster than auto-accumulation.
It was clear that his earlier decision was correct.
"Time to add points."
The longer the roots, the more convenient it was to use his Devouring Ability.
Three minutes later.
Ye Feng completed his third addition of points, and together with the previous seven, he completed a total of ten additions.
At this moment, the value in the Evolution Points column on the system panel finally changed from 0 to 1.
"Huh! So this is how you get Evolution Points. Add points ten times to get one Evolution Point."
"It won't be too hard to accumulate ten Evolution Points and undergo an evolution," Ye Feng said with a bit of surprise.
Compared to extending the roots, evolving was of course more important.
Only through continuous evolution could he grow stronger and stronger, and maybe at a certain level, he could break free from his current shackles.
Next, Ye Feng continued to add points while hunting.
His root length was steadily increasing at a rate of 20 centimeters per minute.
It wasn't until 25 minutes later that Ye Feng completed 25 additions of points.
Yes, 25 times.
Because during these 25 minutes, with his hunting, he had gained another 8 Spirit Points and Bioenergy.
At that time, Ye Feng opened the system panel to take a look.
Host: Ye Feng (World Tree)
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Tree Body Height: 10 meters
Trunk Width: 0.5 meters
Root Length: 27 meters
Realm: Early Stage First Order
Evolution Points: 3/10 points
Special Ability: Devour
Spirit Points: 0/100 points
Bioenergy: 8/100 points
In just over an hour, his root length had increased by 7 meters, and he had accumulated 3 Evolution Points.
"Great, if all goes well, I should be able to complete my first evolution tonight," Ye Feng was somewhat delighted, working even harder.
However, when 8 o'clock came and Ye Feng tallied the second hour's gains, he realized he was wrong.
In that hour, he had only gained 16 Spirit Points and Bioenergy.
"The insects around here are lessening," Ye Feng slightly furrowed his brow.
This was rather bad news, and as time went on, with his constant devouring, the insects nearby would surely become scarcer and scarcer.
Just as Ye Feng was feeling troubled, suddenly a Mutated Frog entered his field of vision.
His vision now wasn't much different than when he was alive. If he shifted his viewpoint to the top of the tree, he could see even farther.
Right now, he watched as the Mutated Frog hopped toward him.
Following the path the frog was taking, it wasn't heading straight for his tree, but it would still cross his "territory."
Ye Feng grew a bit excited; this Mutated Frog was as big as a person's foot.
Devouring it would be worth at least two to three hundred Mutated Ants.
Of course, it wouldn't be easy to capture it because with a light leap the Mutated Frog could cover a distance of 5 meters. Although his Main Root was now 27 meters long, at most he only had two or three chances to strike.
He needed to prepare and was already "marshaling his troops" underground.
His Main Root and 100 lateral roots had silently completed a trap beneath the ground, unseen by the frog.
Finally, the Mutated Frog entered his territory.
Ye Feng didn't rush to act but quietly waited for the creature to venture deeper.
When the Mutated Frog came within a range of 5 meters and was about to pass by,
a root surged out of the ground, heading straight toward the Mutated Frog to entangle it.
Ye Feng's roots were hidden just 1 centimeter below the surface.
With such a short distance for an ambush, the Mutated Frog had no time to react, and its hind legs were entangled immediately.
However, the Mutated Frog was incredibly agile. The moment it was entangled, it powerfully kicked off the ground, and flew up into the air.
The subsequent roots couldn't continue their grip.
Moreover, the root that had entangled the frog was directly torn apart.
For the first time, Ye Feng felt pain, as if his finger joint had been dislocated.
At this moment, he was filled with shock and anger, yet he also directly felt the threat these Mutated Beings posed to him.
"To think I've been injured by a frog, I am still too weak. I must speed up my strengthening."
Ye Feng admonished himself, but his roots didn't slow down at all.
Although a root had been torn off, it had still played a significant role; the Mutated Frog's leap was greatly shortened, covering only three meters.
Moreover, while in the air, it had lost its balance and landed sideways.
By this time, Ye Feng no longer needed to hide. Three roots near where the frog was going to land had already burst from the soil, waving in the air.
Before the Mutated Frog even touched the ground, the three roots had entangled it.
But the strength of the Mutated Frog was immense; even in such a situation, it continued to struggle, and seized an opportunity to leap up once more.
In a desperate struggle, two more roots were torn apart, yet one remained attached, allowing the Mutated Frog to barely clear a meter before falling down.
The remaining roots had already shifted over, especially the thick Main Root, which had arrived and wrapped around the frog, finally subduing it.
Then came the activation of the Devouring Ability, beginning the absorption process.
The Mutated Frog provided him with a full 25 Spirit Points and Bioenergy.
This battle cost him three roots, but all of them had the ability to self-repair, and the torn sections weren't long. They would regenerate within an hour at most.
A mere price to pay for earning 25 energy points was definitely a steal.
"Not bad at all, if there were more Mutated Frogs like this one, perhaps I could evolve directly," Ye Feng was in high spirits.
At this point, he even thought back to the Mutated Wild Boar that had overturned their bus.
If he could devour such a huge Mutated Wild Boar, possibly he could evolve several times over.
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