A way of evolution

"Genetically?" Lark tilted his head.

Glitch slapped his forehead. 'How can I forget that the source of my space village is not science?' It was a little harder sometimes, as different source powers used different terms to say the same thing.

The other way of telling genes from blood sources was... he closed his eyes for a second, and then it hit him. He looked at Lark and said, "You can say each of them has slightly different bloodlines."

The moment Lark heard of the bloodline, he nodded his head. "Oh, I understand that, boss. Each of these groups possesses unique traits that must belong to different primordials."

This time, Glitch stared at Lark. He knew nothing about the primordials. He asked Lark, "Do you know about primordials?"

Lark shook his head. "Not much, boss. I just know that primordials are the massive beasts that used to roam the universe in ancient times. They used to be so big that they could destroy a planet in a few seconds. Beyond that, I know nothing."

Glitch just imagined a scene of massive space beasts landing on a planet and eating the entire planet in a few seconds. Just thinking about that sent goosebumps all over his body.

Now he understood why there was so much craziness about these primordials. There must be a few other players who learned about this information from their assistants. Although it was not much, it was a fact that everything that the assistant knew would always be true.

After all, for most first-timers, their source of information was their assistants, and these assistants never lied. 

He could relate to this obsession, where players chose all the species with primal traits. That kind of creature could be beyond the current known power cap in the game world.

Glitch shook his head, then pointed to the 10 circles. "These 10 circles are the 10 bloodlines of our village."

Lark nodded back and said, "Yes."

Glitch then started creating a few bigger circles under them. "I am going to explain one way we can achieve evolution, so focus."

Lark straightened his back and even moved closer to look more clearly; after all, these circles were smaller compared to other diagrams.

Glitch pointed to the second row of circles and said, "This row of circles represents the next generation of creatures." He then made two arrows that connected one circle in the first row to the second-row circle.

For the other circles in the second row, he made two fresh arrows connecting separate circles from the first row.

He pointed to the first circle in the second row, with both arrows pointing to the same circle in the first row. "Both parents of these newborn creatures are from the same bloodline. This is why it will remain a pure bloodline with little to no change from its predecessors."

Lark asked, "This is the normal way of creature reproduction, right?"

Glitch nodded and then pointed to the other circle in the second row. "Now here we come and force two different subspecies to reproduce with one another. The creature born from them will have a mix of two bloodlines. Now this creature will not be on the same level as others."

Lark looked at the diagram and said, "They will be stronger than their parents, right?"

Glitch shook his head. "Not always. It depends on many factors, but Lark, what do you think are the possible new creatures we could make out of the initial 10?"

Lark stared at the circles and tried to count them on his finger, but soon he looked up helplessly and said, "Boss, there will be a lot of them."

"It will be 90 if we include parental gender differences."

Lark tilted his head. "What do you mean by parental gender difference, boss?"

Glitch paused for a moment. All of this was now beyond the simple blood source power but related to the pure evolution path spectrum.

He said in simple words, "I mean, let's say the 1st and 2nd subspecies create a child. In the first case, the father is from the first subspecies and the mother is from the second; it's reversed in the second case. Do you think both of them will give the same newborn?"

Lark thought a little and nodded. "I don't think there will be any difference between both children, boss. In the end, both of them will end up with the same mixed bloodlines."

Glitch shrugged his shoulders. "You may be right, but what if in both cases the concentration of different bloodlines is different? We do not know this right now, so we have to find it by creating both creatures."

Lark did not argue, as he was not sure if he was right or not.

Glitch then made a third row of circles. This time, he created one arrow from the first row and the next arrow from the second row that connected to each of the third-row circles. "Now this is going to be the third generation that is going to have three bloodlines in them."

He looked up with a smile. "What about this one? Can you tell me the numbers?"

Lark just placed his hand on his forehead. "It's beyond me, boss."

Glitch smiled. "If we go by bare minimum characteristics, then there could be over 700 creatures. That's not all. Think of the creature with 4, 5, 6, and more bloodlines. The higher you go, the more possible ways you have to create different combinations of bloodlines. Can you guess the ultimate creature from all this?"

Lark said after some thought, "The one with all 10 bloodlines, right, boss?"

"Bingo! Do not think of the 10 bloodline creatures as a single creature. There are more than a million different ways these 10 bloodline creatures could form, and each of them can result in the birth of different kinds of creatures."

Lark fell face-up on the ground. "Million…" This number just went straight over his head. He expected evolution to be around in some thousands, but he never thought it would be more than a million.

He looked up at his boss with shining eyes. "Boss, can we really create so many kinds of creatures?"

Glitch shook his head. "It is not as simple as you think. With our current ability, we cannot even create 20 creatures from the second row, and most of these creatures born will be unstable and may not live a few days after their birth."

It was like cold water that jolted Lark to sit. "What? So low? Why?"

Glitch patted his head. "Don't worry, you will learn more things as we do, and combining bloodlines is just one method. There are many other ways to introduce evolution to the species. The path of evolution is much more vast." 

After explaining all this, Glitch stood up and started floating in the air. He waved to Lark, "Follow me."