4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution CH 7

Posted on December 23, 2016

Recap: Last chapter, Lin was fighting the shapes.h.i.+fting cell, something similar to an amoeba on Earth.

Chapter Seven Ten Miles Frozen

The shapes.h.i.+fting cell seemed to feel that it was surrounded by large amounts of cells. It produced large numbers of tentacles from its body and prepared to fight back.

The offensive power of the diggers could not compare to the cone-shaped cells but there were more than seven hundreds of them. Relying on the denticles at the front, they could also tear the outer membrane of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell.

Tactics … … planning … …

Other than the observer cell, Lin had every cell enter the battle. As it inspected, countless thought flowed through its mind.

When the tentacle of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell reached out, it could suck up dozens of diggers in one go. Seeing this, Lin instantly had the other diggers and cone-shaped cells surround this tentacle. It had them use their denticles to cut this tentacle off from the middle to rescue the cells that were not completely sucked in.

At the same time, on the digger and cone-shaped cells, Lin had the acid ejectors spray out large amounts of dissolving fluid.

The shapes.h.i.+fting cell seemed to have some immunity towards the dissolving fluid but when it was sprayed directly onto the wounds, it still seemed to cause great pain to the shapes.h.i.+fting cell. It twisted its body as though it did not plan on swallowing more of Lin’s cells and turned its entire body into an enormous oval.

The body of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell started to float as though it planned on running away. Its two sides started to flutter as it started to swim into the distance.

Kill.

Looking at the shapes.h.i.+fting cell, Lin’s idea was very simple.

The digger and cone-shaped cells use their sharp denticles to insert into the body of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell to prevent it from running. They continued to spin and create large numbers of wounds on the shapes.h.i.+fting cell.

The shapes.h.i.+fting cell furiously twisted its body, wanting to throw off the cells on its body. It was effective in its action. Many cells that were thrown off could not catch up with the shapes.h.i.+fting cell based on their speed.

Therefore, Lin had these cells go eat the pieces the shapes.h.i.+fting cell had left behind and had the cells that were still on the shapes.h.i.+fting cell to continue attacking.

Until the very last cell was thrown off.

On the road the shapes.h.i.+fting cell escape, it left behind countless pieces of debris. These were what Lin’s cells had torn down. However, the shapes.h.i.+fting cell was really too large and it seemed unlikely that Lin could kill it. When the shapes.h.i.+fting cell had thrown off the last cell, there was more than 70% of its body remaining. It was still very far from harming its nucleus.

However, the 30% of debris was enough for Lin’s cells to eat for a long time.

As Lin left the cells to eat the pieces of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell, it was also thinking.

The shapes.h.i.+fting cell could change its shape but that was not very stable. But because it had a large body size, it was extremely hard to deal with.

In this battle, Lin had almost lost half of its cells so the battle was unprofitable.

Lin should have retreated earlier. But every cell it lost meant that Lin’s intelligence would decrease. It had been unable to make the right move in time.

AT this time, Lin suddenly had a thought. How to increase the size of its cells?

Its cells would increase in size when they ate but after eating, they would divide. They could not continue to grow without limits.

If it was one enormous cell, then Lin could rely on it to fight. If it was an enormous cone-shape cell like the shapes.h.i.+fting cell, no, even if it was half of that size, Lin could easily defeat the shapes.h.i.+fting cell.

How to do it?

Maybe the shapes.h.i.+fting cell could solve Lin’s problem.

Lin looked at the cells that were eating the shapes.h.i.+fting cell’s pieces and thought about this.

Since the acid ejectors had evolved the ability after eating the strange cell’s dissolving fluids, then eating the shapes.h.i.+fting cell might also cause a change.

… … so painful!

A suddenly feeling interrupted Lin’s thoughts.

From the viewpoint of the observer, Lin saw a cone-shaped cell that ate the pieces sink down in the water. Lin had lost the connection to the cell.

Dead?

Why had it died?

In Lin’s memory, there was only that burst of pain. If it was an attack from a virus, then it would be a pain that would continue for a long time. If it was attacked by another cell, then Lin would definitely see it. But this time, Lin did not see a thing.

There was only a corpse that was slowly sinking.

A new danger … …

Following was another burst of the same pain.

Another cell also sank.

An unknown danger… …

Lin felt that something was wrong. It had all the cells stop eating the pieces and gathered them in layers surrounding the observer. The observer was watching all the cells to try to find the cause of danger.

This time, Lin saw it, a danger it had never seen before … …

Just at that place where the shapes.h.i.+fting cell debris was, a strange thing that was hard to describe was slowly growing in the water. It flashed with light and continued to grow in the water. It first reached out with countless protrusions and then these protrusions produced countless smaller protrusions. It caused the entire area of water to become the same as it, something that flashed with light.

The protrusions that it produced were not soft like the ones of the shapes.h.i.+fting cell but solid. These protrusions would not move when they grew, only lengthen. But it had already taken over the large span of water in front of Lin’s cell group and it was still expanding.

This phenomenon … …

A new term appeared in Lin’s thoughts.

Freezing, Ice.

This flas.h.i.+ng blue thing was called “ice!” And the phenomenon of its continuous grow was to freeze this entire portion of water!

Also, its freezing rate was very fast. As Lin was thinking, the ice had already reached Lin’s cell group.

The cells would instantly freeze when it came into contact with this ice that was continuously growing. At the same time, Lin would fill a burst of pain and then lose its connection to the cell.

Was this the cause of the burst of pain just now?

Even though it knew the cause, Lin could not do a thing against a phenomenon like freezing. Even the dissolving fluid that the acid ejectors sprayed out would be frozen into something solid the moment it came outside.

And the speed of freezing was very fast. Lin could not escape.

And was unable to fight back.

Unable to escape.

Then Lin could only wait.

Wait for luck to come, or … … death.

Lin had the cells huddle together to prevent the observer from being frozen. It only had this one cell that had the ability to see. Lin had to have sight because only then would Lin have the confidence it could survive.

The ice continued to spread and Lin’s cells were frozen one by one. Lin lost the feeling of them and felt the area of its perception continue to shrink. At the same time, it felt a kind of clear pain … … cold.

Countless cells surrounded the observer but they were unable to prevent the freeze. The cold ice frozen one cell after another. The power of the freeze would spread inside the cell. The ice could get the entire cell to lose its functions.

Lin’s cell group went from more than five hundred to only one hundred … … and dropped to the double digits.

Yet at this time, the pain in Lin’s thought suddenly stopped yet the feeling of cold was still present.

The freezing seemed to have stopped. Why?

Lin looked around. It found that its remaining 91 digger cells were surrounding its observer.

They had stopped the spread of the freezing.

Translator Ramblings: This would not be a fun story if the main character died seven chapters in.