Gollrakh Island was mostly empty now, devoid of any activity. The 60,000 Free Humans that had been living on the island were currently held victims in a large warehouse.
It was the warehouse where grains were stored. The warehouse was built to endure all sorts of weather conditions that appeared on the island. And to avoid dispersing manpower across the island to guard multiple warehouses, they decided on having only one warehouse.
It was built to accommodate a decade's worth of the island's grain production. And most of the time, it was maintained at an eighty percent capacity, ensuring to have a surplus necessary to be transported to any location that experienced a food shortage.
This was done to share the burden of a food shortage in the likelihood of warehouses in other regions being destroyed for one reason or the other.
At present, all the 60,000 Free Humans were lazily sprawled across the warehouse, where multiple new structures had been erected using stone to serve as spots they could lie around in the limited floorspace.
Amplified by their morbid obesity, their eyes had glazed over, as if living itself was a pain. Their laziness had been maximised to the extreme, to the extent they didn't even have the strength left to eat another morsel.
However, that didn't matter, as scuttling about in the shape of a trolley was a Nirclick, which had assumed such a shape. Filled to the brim within its trolley-shaped body were grains, which it poured into the open mouths of the Free Humans.
Once it passed by, another Nirclick arrived, shaped like a vat with tiny tentacles to move around. It flushed the grains down the throats of the Free Humans using water. It didn't matter if the Free Humans struggled to eat the food.
Once their obesity drops by a level, enough for their Prana to resume its healing activities, the digestion would be completed successfully, with the excess Prana generated in response being used to heal the damage done to the internal organs.
By varying the Free Humans' level of obesity, they could be treated as a perfect, food-producing farm. A Nirclick walked past a Free Human, triggering a cloud of pollen to rise from the other party's mouth.
The Free Human's fat deposits visibly reduced once the Niclick consumed the gathered pollen cloud. Then, it fed the Free Human once again, stuffing him until his stomach seemed to be on the verge of bursting.
Satisfied, it proceeded towards the next Free Human it was in charge of, consuming another pollen cloud.
By maintaining this farm, the Nirclicks were guaranteed a steady influx of food to consume, using which they could continue growing in strength.
In a large building closest to the warehouse were the Cooter Clansmen. There were approximately 180 of them alive now, with the remainder killed in the process of the Nirclicks taking control of Gollrakh Island.
The surviving Cooter Clansmen had been gathered to form concentric circles, their despair ridden faces giving in to increasing levels of laziness as their forms continued to bulge steadily.
Nirclicks entered the building one after another, bringing with them every vial of medicine the Cooter Clan had stockpiled on the island. One after another, the contents of the vials were dumped into the mouths of the Cooter Clansmen.
Their effects were ignored, the only concern being the quantity of Prana it could generate when digested by a Cooter Clansman.
In the centre of the concentric circles was a Nirclick shaped like a vat, singularly absorbing pollen from the Cooter Clansmen. Since they were all within its Spirit Weapon range, it could extract as much pollen from their bodies whenever it wanted.
And as it continued to consume pollen steadily from them, stripes of blue and white appeared across its form, granting it a wet lustre. Traces of mist began to gather around it, as if it was able to dominate over water vapour.
Steadily, the greater the quantity of pollen it consumed from the Cooter Clansmen, the larger its body grew, and the more it exhibited characteristics resembling Cooter Clansmen.
And unlike other Nirclicks that were only able to affect Iron Grade existences, this vat was able to affect Silver Grade existences too, which was why even Silver Grade Cooter Clansmen had become its victims.
Mutated Beginner Gold Grade Pranic Beast–Narlakk!
When a Nirclick mutates, it enters the Gold Grade to become Narlakk. This in response boosts its Prana capacity to 3844 at maturity, and elevates its lifespan to a whopping 1004 years.The effect of its Primary Nature also gets upgraded to Gold Grade, and most importantly, another Nature takes root in its Spirit Container.
Any creature, on Sumatra, upon undergoing a mutation, gains a Secondary Nature. The Nirclick was no exception to this rule. That was the cause behind the vase–the Narlakk–obtaining blue and white stripes.
Secondary Nature–Influenced Gobble!
When a Narlakk consumes the pollen extracted from its victim, it gains physical characteristics based on the genetic makeup of the victim. It was why the vat gained blue and white stripes, implying it was gaining physical characteristics related to Mystic Mist Arts.
It was gaining both affinity and resistance to Mystic Mist Arts, which had the largest influence on the genes of the Cooter Clansmen.
The Cooter Clansmen, in essence, are Free Humans with a perfect genetic makeup of Empyrean Snapper genes in them. Therefore, even though the possibility was slim, as long as the Narlakk consumes a sufficient quantity of pollen from the Cooter Clansmen, especially those at the Silver Grade, it could manifest physical characteristics of an Empyrean Snapper.
That would make it an absolutely dangerous existence!
And while the Narlakk on Gollrakh Island was steadily building up strength, the rest of the Nirclicks in the region gathered along the island's shores, targeting the ships there.
Runthral was on the ship's deck. Though an infant, he was an Empyrean Snapper. Capturing him alone would elevate the strength of the Narlakks to the pinnacle, allowing them to dominate Sumatra easily.
It was why they had been making plans for the past month, all in preparation to capture Runthral when he was the least protected.
Boom!
As the Nirclicks bombarded the ship and breached through its hull, Vice Captain Quoquo grabbed Runthral without hesitation and blasted a series of vapour cones that cleared out the immediate radius.
The vapour cones formed layers, numbering five in total, resembling oil in terms of viscosity, and radiating intense heat and fluctuating colour patterns. The first stack of vapour cones were directed at the sea where the Nirclicks had bombarded the ship's hull.
The vapour cone was immiscible with water, with the vapour cone's shape allowing it to interact with the water in such a way it could borrow the water's buoyancy alongside the repulsion between both mediums to propel itself forward.
It was capable of moving past the Spirit Range just by relying on this propulsive interaction.
The series of vapour cones slammed into the water and blasted away the Nirclicks. Every vapour cone had enough power to destroy a thick slab of stone. And when a stack of five such cones targeted a Nirclick, the other party was pulverised.
"Please stay close to me," Vice Captain Quoquo addressed Runthral, "I vow there's not a scratch on you as long as I have a breath of life in me."
He then shouted towards Captain Trotro, "Captain!"
"Good job! Protect him well." Captain Trotro eyed the Nirclicks that had surrounded them with calm as the Cooter Clansmen he was in charge of finished gathering behind him. Oily vapour revolved around his body as he released a powerful presence that crossed a kilometre in radius, "Leave the enemies to me."
As if being repelled away from him, the sea water within a radius of a kilometre around him was pushed back to form a towering wall. And a second later, it promptly crashed upon the Nirclicks.