Chapter 99: Section 100: The Beauty of Nature, the Great Love of Heaven and Earth


    Zhenjin spent a while fussing before he finally managed to wrestle his bat wings free from between the branches.


    A young man suddenly acquiring a pair of wings was, after all, not something one could easily get used to.


    However, the excitement of trying to fly soon took over his heart once again.


    He first attempted to take off from the ground, but the training effect was not very noticeable.


    Later, Zhenjin had an idea and climbed a tree. From high up on the trunk, he leaped down, spreading his bat wings wide to practice gliding and to feel the precise connection between the air and his wings during flight. Sear?h the N??elFirё.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.


    Changing his training approach, Zhenjin’s training efficiency improved dramatically, and his understanding and depth of flying increased.


    ...


    This training also brought another result—tree climbing.


    The bat monkey’s limbs were all strong and powerful. The bat monkey’s hands were similar to human hands, and the thumbs on the feet could also grasp, which made tree climbing quite easy.


    After practicing for a while, Zhenjin made significant progress in flying, and even more so in climbing trees!


    He now climbed trees very smoothly, using his hands and feet in unison, and he could leap to the top of the canopy in just a few breaths.


    Noticing such progress, Zhenjin changed his training method again.


    He began to learn from monkeys, leaping between large trees. He would leap up from one tree, soar in mid-air by spreading his bat wings, then quickly tuck in his wings and land on another tree.


    This training method significantly increased the time he spent gliding and vastly improved his efficiency. It also strengthened his jumping ability.


    “Previously, Zong Ge intercepted the Silver Rhinoceros while rescuing the shipwright by jumping continuously from the branches, as if descending from the sky.”


    “He must have trained in this aspect, which suggests that his martial arts are not bad.”


    “Now, compared to him, I definitely wouldn’t lose in jumping from branch to branch. The body structure of a monkey is just too suited for maneuvering between branches.”


    Zhenjin practiced flying for a while longer, then stopped on his own accord.


    “With this training efficiency, I estimate that in three more days, I will be completely proficient, knowing how to use my wings to fly between trees without crashing.”


    “But to fly flexibly and fast, to make flying an instinct, that requires much more time.”


    Zhenjin estimated.


    His flying still carried the possibility of failure. His success rate in gliding was relatively high, but even when he tried his best to control his body, true flapping flight often led to a haphazard flight path.


    However, he had adapted to the bat monkey’s physique and body shape, and no longer got stuck between branches like before.


    Ending his flight training, Zhenjin squatted on a tree branch when his expression suddenly shifted.


    In the quiet night, countless sounds came through.


    The soft wind, the rustling of leaves, the murmuring of a distant stream, the chirping of insects, the roar of beasts, and the singing of nightingales.


    “I’ve also adapted to the bat monkey’s ears,” Zhenjin realized.


    Initially, the plethora of noises, overly chaotic, had irritated him. But later, as he focused his attention on training to fly, he pushed the noise to the back of his mind.


    In the process, he gradually adapted to this excellent hearing.


    When he calmed down, he immediately noticed a huge improvement in this area.


    Sounds, countless sounds, were all being picked up by his developed ears.


    At first, Zhenjin tried to distinguish the types of sounds, guessing their origins, but he soon became immersed in the symphony of sounds.


    He subconsciously slightly opened his mouth, and his eyes lost focus.


    He felt like a young bird that had successfully flown for the first time, soaring into the vast sky, or like a droplet of water merging into the vast ocean.


    In this moment, he deeply felt a sense of beauty.


    The beauty of nature!


    Previously, on this island, Zhenjin had been clad barely and hardly fed, existing between life and death, filled with anxiety and impatience.


    At one moment, he sat on the gold mica stone, looking at the night sky and transformed his mindset, no longer agitated or plagued with despair.


    At another moment, he, Zi Di, and Cang Xu stared at the only two skewers of roast meat, facing life’s hardships with laughter, becoming open-minded and composed.


    And now, such a moment had arrived again.


    This time, Zhenjin forgot himself.


    He was like an orphan who, after wandering for countless years, was suddenly embraced by his long-lost mother.


    He experienced his insignificance, he felt the beauty of nature, he felt the vast love of the universe.


    Such beauty was so magnificent, such love was so moving!


    The emotion brought by this was so powerful, so unexpected, like surging waves crashing against Zhenjin’s soul, spreading throughout his entire being.


    He didn’t see, he only heard.


    He heard the grandeur of nature, the richness of nature, the beauty of nature.


    Cang Xu had said that human ears are limited and can only hear sounds within a certain frequency range.


    “Yes, humans are limited.”


    “Being a bat monkey also brings a happiness that ordinary people cannot understand.”


    Zhenjin’s thoughts scattered freely, and he indulged in this intense feeling of happiness, unable to extricate himself for a while.


    He thought of the Druids.


    He understood the Druids now.


    “Druids can transform into bears, wolves, eagles; they too can experience the beauty of nature through different life forms. Thus, Druids love peace. They feel anger towards any existence that tramples or destroys nature. Nature is so beautiful! How tragic it would be if it were trampled and destroyed. The perpetrator must be extremely wicked!”


    He then thought of the Heart Core.


    “My bat monkey mutation, the Heart Core brought it to me.”


    “Perhaps the Heart Core is not as dangerous as I previously thought,” Zi Di mused. “It’s like a sword, the crucial factor is who wields it. Used rightly, it brings good; used wickedly, it brings evil.”


    Then, out of nowhere, Zi Di’s thoughts drifted to Xi Suo.


    His understanding of Xi Suo deepened.


    According to Zi Di’s deductions, the rumors at the beach camp and the wounds on the Captain’s body were most likely inflicted by Xi Suo.


    Xi Suo was cunning and despicable. But he had suffered a shipwreck, lost his father, his ship was destroyed, he had no wealth left, the First Officer had died, and he had lost his support. He desperately hoped to grasp anything that could make him feel safer, to reassure himself he was still valuable and could lead among the crew.


    “He is despicable and hateful, but he is also pitiful.”


    “Perhaps this is the true meaning of mercy and tolerance.”


    Zi Di wiped his cheek.


    He was in tears.


    He now understood the excitement poets felt upon seeing their immortal works, the thrill painters experienced upon viewing unmatched beauty.


    It was purely the emotion wrought by beauty.


    And beauty, in turn, could inspire all that was wonderful in the world, the light and kindness within humanity.


    “Sadly, people usually lack the ears to discover beauty.”


    As time passed, Zi Di’s emotions gradually stabled.


    “There’s still a little time, I could practice that… ultrasound.”


    If it weren’t for Cang Xu, Zi Di wouldn’t have turned into a bat monkey and yelled in the middle of the night.


    But now, he tried to let out a shout.


    The screech came the next moment.


    “This shouldn’t count as ultrasound.”


    Zi Di took a deep breath and tried to control his vocal cords to make the sound sharper.


    The scream this time startled even himself; it was somewhat akin to the screeches of bat monkeys during combat.


    “But it’s still not ultrasound.”


    Zi Di felt a slight thrill again, knowing he had found the right path.


    Next, he kept raising his voice as if someone were squeezing his throat.


    The frequency of his cries got higher, like fingernails scraping a chalkboard, but within the range of tolerance for monkey ears, no longer unbearable like it would be for human ears.


    Moments later, Zi Di successfully emitted his first ultrasound wave.


    Almost instantly, he heard an echo.


    “There are trees over there, and stones beside the trees.” After his ears caught the sound, Zi Di naturally sensed the location and some of the shape of the trees and stones.


    The sensation was quite marvelous.


    The night was deep, and Zi Di could see nothing with his naked eyes in the pitch darkness.


    But it was this sensation that inexplicably painted a large tree and the stones beneath it in his mind.


    Zi Di immediately flew over to verify, and his sense was correct!


    “The eyes of a bat monkey don’t have night vision. But when they fly at night, they continuously emit ultrasounds of various frequencies. These ultrasounds, upon encountering objects, bounce back and are picked up by the bat monkeys. By distinguishing these different frequency echoes, the bat monkeys agilely dodge and avoid any obstacles,” Cang Xu’s words once again emerged in Zi Di’s mind.


    Zi Di immediately realized one key point—different frequencies!


    So, he continued to emit ultrasounds, controlling his vocal cords so that the frequency of each wave was unique.


    The ultrasound echoes came back and were smoothly caught by Zi Di’s ears.


    Because the frequencies varied, Zi Di easily distinguished them.


    Thus, the environment unfolded in his mind as if sketched out with a white pen on a black canvas.


    As Zi Di kept emitting sounds and continually catching ultrasounds, the canvas in his mind rapidly expanded—two hundred meters, five hundred meters, eight hundred meters…


    The objects on the canvas became clearer and clearer.


    A sense of control welled up inside him.


    Following that, came a sense of security.


    I know everything here, I perceive all the changes within eight hundred meters.


    Zi Di felt increasingly elated.


    Although he had used the eyes of a lizard, thermal imaging had a much smaller range than hearing.


    Zi Di kept track of the time in his mind.


    The team had more members now; he couldn’t stay out alone for too long.


    Regaining his composure, he returned to where he had transformed, resumed his human form, and put his clothes back on.


    Following the same path, he returned to the camp.


    “Lord Zhenjin, you’re back!” the guards greeted him.


    Zi Di encouraged them a few words and returned to his tent.


    He lay on the camp bed, but couldn’t fall asleep for a long while.


    The erratic flight was certainly thrilling, and the experience of ultrasound hearing was wonderfully beautiful, all of which left him yearning for more.


    Returning to human form, he could only walk on the ground with his feet; he couldn’t hear the myriad wonderful sounds, let alone use his hearing to scout the things within a kilometer around him.


    It felt as though a bird had suddenly been stripped of its wings, or a normal person had suddenly gone blind.


    A faint sense of loss, like ripples on the surface of lake, involuntarily surged up in Zi Di’s heart.