From the Abyss Invasion to the Blasting Star.

Having understood the rules of the true god's world, many questions have become answered.

If every being who ascends to godhood chooses the safe option, the result is that their true form will not easily descend to other worlds.

If that's the case, in most cases, the maximum combat power for those recruited in the Abyss Battlefield is actually that of a demigod.

Because the descent of a true god into the abyss battlefield would be subject to the restrictions of the world's laws.

If they insist on descending, the result will be like that of the Winged Demon God Salion, requiring a relatively long period of preparation to modify the world's laws before they can descend.

Even when they finally descended, they still suffered a defeat in front of the demigods.

Of course, not just any demigod can pose a threat to the descending demon god.

Lu Heng, Orianna, and Sona are three demigods working together, and both Orianna and Sona possess racial artifacts.

Moreover, Lu Heng also used the Elf King's Godslayer Crown to sever the arm of the Winged Demon God Salion.

Based on these world laws, a bold idea gradually formed in Lu Heng's mind.

Because the laws of the world impose restrictions on demon gods, the highest combat power summoned by the abyss is actually that of demigods.

In other words, as long as one becomes the strongest demigod, one will be invincible in the Abyss Battlefield.

So, you can do a lot of things using this rule.

……

After his conversation with Lismavi, Lu Heng went to find Azik and first went to see the Starship, which was more than halfway completed.

The planned length of this astral ship is 102 meters, which is not comparable to Azik's, but it is still a ship capable of navigating in outer space.

Lu Heng visited the half-built astral ship, but after the visit, he still knew nothing about the astral merchants' astral navigation technology.

The technology of this starship is completely beyond human comprehension.

The technology of the Sykes civilization is largely understandable to humans.

The astral technology of the astral merchants is, in many ways, more like magic.

Of course, Lu Heng doesn't need to understand the principles of astral technology; he only needs to state his functional requirements for the astral ship, and the astral merchant's engineers will handle the rest.

Azik led Lu Heng and the other person to see the construction blueprints of the Starship, which marked each compartment on the Starship and its different functions.

In addition, a list of the starship's features was provided.

"You can select some of the functions here, but you can't select all of them, because if you select all of them, the ship won't be able to fit them all, and it will slow down the construction speed."

Azik pointed to one of the functions above and continued to explain: "For example, this simulated gravity function is a relatively important function for most organisms."

"However, it is quite difficult to implement this function."

"For example, like an ecosphere, it can simulate gravity through centrifugal force. This function can be done for a 100-meter-long Starship, but it requires a lot of space in the ship's hull."

For ordinary humans, simulating gravity is indeed very important if they want to live in space for a long time.

If it's just a short trip, it's not a necessity.

If you have superpowers, then you don't need to do that at all.

In short, for starships, the simulated gravity function is not cost-effective.

It's not a necessary function, yet it requires a lot of space in the ship's hull, which is not worth the effort.

Lu Heng stated directly, "We don't need a gravity simulation function."

Azik nodded and continued to mention the next functional module: "And this, the water circulation function, do you need this? If we were astral merchants, we wouldn't need this function, but I don't know if you need it."

The water cycle is indeed very important to humans.

Humans would struggle to survive without water.

Although you can bring fresh water on the ship, it would be troublesome if you ran out of fresh water and couldn't find a world with water for a period of time.

Therefore, the water cycle is a basic necessity for human beings.

“This is a basic requirement; it must be included.” Lu Heng confirmed this functional requirement.

“Okay, I’ll write it down. That’s why I asked you to come and look at the feature list. There are many features that we don’t need, but they are essential for you.” Azik continued to introduce the feature list.

the following few days.

Lu Heng and his companion were discussing the required functions of the astral ship with Azik and the shipbuilding engineer from the astral merchant.

After all the function options were finalized, Lu Heng heard that research on the cultivation of golden trees and fluorescent plants had begun.

So I wanted to go and see how it was being planted.

Botanists from the Astral Merchant Civilization built a fully enclosed cultivation chamber in Ecosphere No. 1 specifically for growing Golden Trees.

Since the golden tree is an introduced species, it is risky to mix it with fluorescent plants before it is confirmed that this plant will not affect the ecological balance of the ecosphere. This could lead to unpredictable consequences.

Therefore, planting golden trees in a fully enclosed cultivation room is a necessary preventative measure.

Lu Heng and Su Muyu put on the dustproof suits given to them by Azik and walked into the incubation room together.

In the cultivation room, thirty-six golden trees have already been planted.

The astral merchants used a miraculous plant growth sap to accelerate the growth of the golden tree.

In just over ten days, the golden tree grew to the height of a person.

Azik led the two in for a tour and inquired about the progress of the botanist's experiments.

Botanists from the Astral Merchant Civilization are discussing species for grafting experiments.

Fluorescent plants are a general term for plants in the native world of the Astral Merchants; in reality, there are many different kinds of fluorescent plants.

However, in the No. 1 ecosphere, there are only more than twenty kinds of existing fluorescent plants.

Upon hearing Azik's question, the head of the experiment, botanist Helmer, explained:
"We have now selected several species for grafting experiments."

"The first one is Starlight Vine. The experiment has been going on for more than ten days, and the Starlight Vine is growing very well at present."

While answering their questions, Helmer led them to the cultivation room where the golden tree was grafted onto the star-shine vine.

Each golden tree has its own independent cultivation room.

Upon entering the cultivation room, Lu Heng saw a golden tree about half a person's height, with a kind of fluorescent vine-like plant wrapped around it.

According to Helmer, this vine is called Starlight Vine.

The fluorescence of the Starlight Vine is not strong; only a faint fluorescence exists on the leaves.

However, the Starlight Vine can produce a fruit, which is the Starlight Fruit that Azik once mentioned.

The concentration of fluorescent substances in this fruit is extremely high.

Currently, this star-shine vine has not yet produced fruit, so its fluorescent properties are not obvious.

Lu Heng leaned closer to take a look and discovered a problem.

The Starshine Vine is growing quite well, but the Golden Tree is not growing very well.

Moreover, this golden tree is only half a person tall, significantly shorter than the golden trees in the other cultivation rooms.

"This golden tree doesn't seem to be growing very well."

Helmer nodded and replied, "Yes, the growth rate is very slow because the fluorescent substance is absorbed by the Starlight Vine."

Lu Heng also discovered another problem. Although it was called grafting, upon closer inspection, it could be seen that the Starshine Vine had grown roots at the grafting site and had taken root in the bark of the Golden Tree.

"This doesn't really resemble grafting."

Helmer nodded and replied, "Yes, the experiment hasn't been very successful so far. Because Starlight Vine is a parasitic vine, we originally thought that Starlight Vine was quite resilient and wanted to test its effectiveness."

Normally, grafting has requirements regarding the family and genus of the plants; not just any two plants can be grafted onto each other.

Theoretically speaking, grafting is more likely to be successful between plants that are more closely related in family and genus.

However, this theory does not hold true in experiments with golden trees and fluorescent plants.

Because the Golden Tree is a plant from the Elf World, while the Fluorescent Plant is a plant from the Astral Merchant Civilization.

The plants from these two worlds are not even related in the slightest, let alone share the same family or genus.

Therefore, experiments can only be conducted one at a time.

Since it is an experiment, success cannot be guaranteed.

Judging from the current situation, the "grafting" experiment between Starshine Vine and Golden Tree has not gone in the expected direction.

However, the experiment was not entirely fruitless.

The grafting experiment was a failure, but the parasitism experiment was a success.

The Starlight Vine successfully parasitized the Golden Tree and is growing well.

If the fluorescent properties of the Starlight Vine can be maintained in other worlds by parasitizing the Golden Tree, then the experiment is actually a success.

The word "parasite" sounds like a derogatory term.

However, in nature, parasitism is a very normal way for plants to survive.

In the original world of the Astral Merchant civilization, Starlight Vine is a parasitic plant, usually parasitizing the branches of other tall fluorescent plants.

Similar parasitic vines are also abundant on Earth.

In nature, there are also cases where parasitic plants and their hosts are interdependent.

Therefore, if the experiment of using *Stellaria media* to parasitize *Golden Tree* can maintain the fluorescent properties of *Stellaria media*, then the experiment will be successful.

Helmer continued, "This experiment will continue for a while, after which it will be sent to other worlds for further experiments. Hopefully, there will be good news."

After visiting the Starlight Vine cultivation room, the group went to see the grafting cultivation rooms for several other fluorescent plants.

The astral merchants brought back a total of thirty-six golden trees, of which twenty-two have already undergone grafting experiments, grafting onto plants currently grown in Ecosphere No. 1.

Seventeen of the grafting experiments have failed.

The reasons for failure were basically the same: the grafted fluorescent plants could not obtain nutrients from the golden tree, and their leaves withered.

In other words, there are only five grafting experiments currently underway, one of which is for Starflower Vine.

After inspecting all the culture rooms, Helmer sighed, "The current experimental situation is not very optimistic; most of the grafting has not been successful."

"Perhaps the grafting method and technology are not mature enough. We will continue to try and hope to achieve results."

Lu Heng remembered that Azik had said that there were originally more than 3,000 species of fluorescent plants.

However, only about twenty species of plants are still growing in the ecosphere now; most of the fluorescent plant species have disappeared.

However, for advanced civilizations, the absence of plants does not necessarily equate to "extinction".

"Besides the current twenty-odd fluorescent plants, are there no other experimental samples?"

Helmer replied, "Yes, there are only about twenty kinds of fluorescent plants surviving in the first ecosphere now, but we have more than a thousand kinds of fluorescent plant seed and tissue samples."

"We are considering which plants to cultivate for our experiments, and the research team is discussing this issue."

As they were talking, the group had already walked out of the incubation room.

I stopped by the botanical garden on the way and visited the botanical specimens.

In the astral merchant's botanical garden, some specimens are real, some are models, and some are holograms.

The astral merchants left behind data on thousands of fluorescent plant species, but not every single one has a specimen.

Those without specimens can only be preserved in the form of holographic images.

During this visit to the astral merchant's botanical garden, Lu Heng saw almost all the plants from the astral merchant's native world.

Holographic images of over a thousand fluorescent plants were used to simulate a primeval forest.

Because the astral merchants' native world is very peculiar, their star is a dim red dwarf, and their planets are covered with dust rings, resulting in very little light on the planets.

Fluorescent plants have become a unique form of lighting in the world of astral merchants.

The Astral Merchant's original world, stepping into the primeval forest is like stepping into a neon world, incredibly wondrous.

Not only fluorescent plants, but many animals in their world are also fluorescent.

However, according to research data from astral merchants, animals obtain their fluorescent properties entirely by consuming fluorescent plants.

Carnivores acquire their fluorescent properties by consuming fluorescent animals.

In other words, the animals of the astral merchant's native world do not have the ability to produce fluorescence.

What a wonderful world.

Azik walked over to several botanists who were discussing a problem and asked, "Which plants did you choose?"

Helmer took the information handed to him by his assistant and said, "We have selected these plants. We have preserved the seeds of these plants, so we can directly cultivate seedlings."

Azik took it and looked at it, then asked, "Based on what criteria were these plants chosen?"

Helmer explained, "In the seventeen failed grafting experiments, we obtained experimental data showing that different plants had different survival times after grafting."

"Based on this data, we drew some conclusions and selected these plants that are likely to have a longer grafting survival time."

Azik nodded: "Good, continue. If this experiment succeeds, we won't have to wander anymore."

Helmer was also somewhat emotional, nodding vigorously: "We will do our best."

These botanists were thrilled because the fate of the species was now in their hands.

If their experiment succeeds, it could end the tribe's millennia-long history of wandering.

The Astral Merchant Civilization has now reached a turning point in its racial destiny. Whether it moves towards the light or plunges into darkness depends on this seemingly insignificant experimental work they are carrying out.

Su Muyu watched for a while, hesitated several times before finally speaking, "Um... can I make a suggestion?"

During this visit to the botanical garden, she stayed close to Lu Heng and rarely spoke.

So nobody paid any attention to her.

Out of respect for Lu Heng, Helmer nodded and replied, "Go on."

Su Muyu continued, "I suggest trying several different parasitic vine experiments. I can sense the condition of the Golden Tree. The Starlight Vine absorbs nutrients too intensely, which hinders the growth of the Golden Tree."

"I suggest cultivating several parasitic vines that are not so aggressive in absorbing nutrients, and it would be even better if they were parasitic plants that could feed back to their hosts."

"In fact, there are also vines that parasitize the golden tree in Quildore."

"As long as these vines don't kill the golden tree, the elven druids won't remove them." (End of Chapter)