War Truck in the Apocalypse

Chapter 31: Failed Product

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation

Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

‘Do cats grow spikes?’ 

Shen Cong had never seen one with any. 

‘Can cats grow bone spikes that are longer than their tail?’ 

The answer was clearly a no. It was a mutated cat. 

There were fifteen bone spikes growing off the mutated cat’s body, and they were all in strange locations. They were asymmetrical, and they were on its shoulder, root of its hind leg, butt, head, stomach, and back. One of the bone spikes even grew on its tail. 

It was a mutated cat the size of a tiger cub. The fifteen bone spikes on its body made it look savage and terrifying, but there was also something awkward about it; the bone spikes obstructed its movements. The one on its stomach occasionally touched the ground, and the bone spike at the root of its hind leg made it limp. 

The bone spike on its shoulder forced it to tilt its head all the time. 

When Shen Cong saw the manner in which the cat had mutated, he immediately thought of one word—deformity. 

The mutated cat limped to the poisoned peach tree from the top of the hill. Since the bone spikes held it back, it could not speed up. In fact, when it moved past a rather sharp stone, it was even tripped due to the bone spike on its stomach. 

Shen Cong worried for it. ‘Will the bone spike break? Or will it pierce the stomach?’

A few minutes later, the mutated cat finally reached the foot of the poisoned peach tree and tried to climb it, but unfortunately for it, its ability to climb trees was made completely useless by the bone spikes growing on its body. Its claws were unable to grab onto the tree trunk firmly. Every time it went up, it fell, and soon, the parts where the bone spikes grew started bleeding. 

Fresh blood quickly dyed the mutated cat from grayish-yellow to red. 

But the mutated cat did not seem to feel any pain. It continued to try and climb the tree, refusing to give up. When it fell, it bled, but it soon started climbing the tree again with the same end result. 

Shen Cong watched as the mutated cat grew weaker for some time before lowering his binoculars. He put on his Sky Lifting Pillar 1.0 and walked out of Titan. 

Of course, he made sure to turn around to check whether there were other creatures around Titan repeatedly once every few steps. Soon, he arrived in front of the peach tree. The mutated cat’s attention was entirely on the tree, and it did not notice his arrival. 

Shen Cong did not know whether it was because its capacity for thinking had been impeded by the Activity-fused poisoned peach or whether it was because it was just so stupid that it could not evaluate the dangers around it. 

Upon seeing this, Shen Cong looped a metal chain around the mutated cat’s neck and used his fang javelin to lift the chain up. The mutated cat was instantly hoisted into the air as if it was the load on a milkmaid’s yoke. 

“Mreow!”

The mutated cat meowed in anger, but its voice was rather strange. It sounded like it had phlegm in its throat. 

Shen Cong ignored the mutated cat’s struggles and brought it back to Titan. Then, he bound the cat with metal chains so tightly that it looked like a dumpling and tossed it on the floor of the truck compartment. 

He wanted to research this mutated cat; after all, he had finally managed to catch another living creature. 

‘The characteristics of its mutation are mainly focused on the increase in size and the fifteen bone spikes…’ Shen Cong casually picked up his fang dagger and cut off the bone spike at the mutated cat’s abdomen. 

“MREEEOW!” The mutated cat howled. 

Shen Cong held the bone spike in his hand and sensed it for a while. ‘Strange, the bone spike is not an Activity core. The Activity radiation from it is too weak. But I can pour Activity into it just fine.’

As he thought about it, he cut off the bone spike at the root of the mutated cat’s hind leg; these two bone spikes were the ones that prevented the mutated cat from moving. 

Shen Cong could sense faint waves of Activity radiation from the other bone spike too. It was not an Activity core, but it could transmit Activity. 

He sent Activity into the bone and swung it at scraps of a steel board. 

Crack.

The bone spike split into two, while only a faint white mark was left on the steel board. 

Shen Cong frowned in displeasure. ‘It’s not an Activity core. Activity didn’t manage to sharpen or toughen the bone spike… It’s a good conductor of Activity, but it can’t be sharpened or toughened. What a strange bone spike.’

Aside from the bone spikes, the mutated cat did not have any other bone that was gigantified. Shen Cong found it strange. Activity cores being the enlarged bones was a general piece of knowledge he had collected over his time in the post-apocalyptic world. 

‘So exactly which bone is the Activity core?’

Shen Cong could not be bothered to guess. He cut off all the remaining thirteen bone spikes from the mutated cat and tried to sense whether they were Activity cores one by one. 

In the end, none of them were Activity cores. The mutated cat was like a plastic rabbit. It did not have an Activity core. 

The mutated cat was at death’s door because it had lost too much blood after all of its bone spikes were removed. 

Shen Cong fed it a piece of tumor pork chop, and the mutated cat immediately began getting better. Its spirits lifted, and it started struggling while meowing. It sounded really wretched. 

Shen Cong pretended to not hear anything. He just typed on his laptop calmly. 

[Fugly cat: A deformed, mutated feline. It is highly likely to be the mutated form of a domesticated cat. It has fifteen bone spikes growing out of different parts of its body and does not possess an Activity core. Activity can be infused into the bone spikes, but they do not possess the functions of an Activity core. They also impede the cat’s moving ability. It practically has no combat strength.]

Shen Cong typed in his laptop for a while. [Fugly cat might have gone through some unknown errors during its mutation, so its characteristics are strange and disharmonious. The tumor pig’s tumors seemed to be a mutated characteristic caused by some disparity in its mutation. Perhaps Activity can also bring about wrong evolutions when changing a living being’s body.]

It was clear to him that the mutated cat was a failed mutated creature. 

Even though Shen Cong did not think that the fanged wolves, earth-digging insects, and mutated ant colony were very intimidating despite the gigantification of their Activity cores, at the very least, their Activity cores were not stumbling blocks for their ability to fight. 

If they managed to master Activity, they could use their Activity cores to great effect. 

This was smooth evolution. 

The bone spikes from the fugly cat and the tumors from the tumor pig were failed evolutions. 

‘In conclusion, Activity is similar to an incentive for evolution. It guided genes to mutate, either in a way that would hinder a creature’s survival or in a way that would help them survive. Thank goodness I haven’t discovered anything that is not beneficial for my survival so far in my mutation.’

Shen Cong cast a glance at the scabs forming on the fugly cat, and his eyes sparkled. ‘If it doesn’t have an Activity core, then is the fugly cat like the plastic rabbit? Does it have a living metal vehicle attached to it? The possibility isn’t high. The plastic rabbit was like me. I mostly rely on Titan to give me Activity to evolve. I don’t have any special physical modifications.’

It was enough for Shen Cong to share a similar mutation to the plastic rabbit. He would feel incredibly uncomfortable if he shared the same mutation as the hideous, fugly cat too.

Yet even if it shared the same mutation as him, it would be difficult for Shen Cong to find the fugly cat’s metal vehicle. The fugly cat was lured over by the Activity-laced poisonous peach, so it would not think about returning to its vehicle. 

And Shen Cong did not have the strength to search a large area for the vehicle. 

Because of this, the fugly cat’s value was largely reduced. Since it looked extremely ugly, Shen Cong did not even have the thought of rearing it. There was no doubt about it. The fugly cat would end up being killed for food. 

Slap! Slap!

At that moment, faint crashing sounds suddenly came from the end of the truck compartment. 

Shen Cong was instantly on guard. He quickly grabbed his fang dagger and reached the cubicle at the end of the truck compartment. This was the place where he had reared the green-headed flies and left the ant eggs. 

Slap! Slap!

Shen Cong looked in the direction from which the sound came—it was the place where he put the glass bottle to experiment on the Activity-filled poisonous peach. 

The green-headed fly inside had been poisoned to death, but at that moment, a green-headed fly that was twice as large as the dead fly was going on a rampage in the glass bottle. 

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The mouth of the glass bottle was sealed, however, so it could not get out. 

The small slice of poisonous peach was gone, and a black pile of fly poop was at the bottom of the glass bottle. 

The green-headed fly did not die!

It had survived the poison and mutated!

Shen Cong quirked an eyebrow. His research finally showed a little fruit.