Ling Cage: I am a spiritual master, devouring source matter to become a god.

An SUV sped ahead, followed by four Devouring Beasts.

In Jingyuan's perception, there were five humans in the car, and the aura of the other four humans was actually emanating from the four Devouring Beasts.

Upon closer inspection, Jing Yuan realized that the four Devouring Beasts were different from ordinary Devouring Beasts.

The most important characteristic is that they are humanoid, and only have four limbs!

An authentic Devourer should have six limbs; even if one pair of limbs is not used, they should still be attached to the body.

Jing Yuan looked again and saw that the four humanoid Devouring Beasts were robust and about three meters tall.

More importantly, they were still wearing pants and shoes on their lower bodies.

This made Jingyuan connect them with the footprints found in the research institute.

"Could this be an ecological chimera of the Zeon descendants?"

"If these four humanoid Devourer Beasts are descendants of Zeon, then who are they chasing?"

If it can drive, it must be human.

"Let's ask them first."

The off-road vehicle in front sped forward, and as it ran, it suddenly sprinted and took off, only to fly higher and higher!

"Hey, hey, what's going on? How did it fly?"

Hearing the sounds from inside the car, Jingyuan confirmed that there were humans inside.

Jingyuan used his telekinesis to make the vehicle fly. The four humanoid Devouring Beasts below saw the vehicle take off and immediately stopped, staring blankly into the air, not knowing what was going on.

Jingyuan steered the vehicle to his side and looked inside.

The "people" inside the car were all shrouded in khaki cloaks, with only their arms showing.

Even the exposed skin on her arms was several different colors.

Some have purple skin, some have blue skin, and some have green skin.

When they saw Jing Yuan, their first reaction was to pull out their weapons and point them at him!

Chapter 252 Ethnic Divisions

Seeing this, Jing Yuan swept his mental energy over them, taking away their weapons, and then quickly said, "Don't be impulsive, I mean no harm!"

"Who are you?" the person in the car asked.

"I come from the lighthouse!"

"A lighthouse? That big thing floating in the sky?"

"That's right!"

"You're the one who made our car fly?"

"Yes."

Jing Yuan looked at the people in the car. They were all covered in cloaks. Judging from their figures, they should be human, but judging from the skin on their exposed arms, they should not be "pure" human.

Jingyuan asked curiously, "Are you also descendants of the Jien Kingdom?"

"The Republic of Zeon?" a slightly aged voice said. "It's been a long time since anyone has mentioned that name. How did you recognize us as descendants of Zeon at a glance?"

Jing Yuan looked at the people in the car, then at the four humanoid Devouring Beasts on the ground, and asked, "Since you are the remnants of Zeon, then what are they?"

“They…” the aged voice continued, “They are also descendants of the Zeon!”

Jingyuan looked at the people in the car with a puzzled expression, then looked at the ground.

The four humanoid Devouring Beasts did not leave, but instead stared at Jing Yuan.

Jingyuan slowly descended.

Upon closer inspection, he noticed that the four humanoid Devouring Beasts were rather ugly, with strange skin, far less attractive than Mark's beast-like body. Instead, they resembled Bai Yuekui's failed experimental subjects, with varying degrees of overgrowth on their bodies.

One of the four humanoid Devouring Beasts stepped out from below and asked Jing Yuan, "Who are you?"

Upon seeing the talking Devouring Beast, Jing Yuan was somewhat surprised, and even thought of Tao Jun.

However, these humanoid Devouring Beasts in front of them were clearly not as powerful as Tao Jun.

"I come from the Lighthouse!" Jingyuan looked at them: "Are you remnants of the Zeon Kingdom?"

"Who we are is none of your business! You're in the sky, so don't concern yourselves with our affairs on Earth. Those few in your hands are our traitors; return our people to us!"

"Traitor?" Jing Yuan looked at the people in the car with a puzzled expression, then said loudly, "I came here to seek cooperation from the remnants of Zeon. Can you tell me, which of your two groups can represent the remnants of Zeon?"

The humanoid Devouring Beast on the ground said, "You Lighthouse People come to us for cooperation? Cooperation in what way?"

Jing Yuan looked at the humanoid Devouring Beasts on the ground; they were probably just low-level soldiers. Jing Yuan said directly, "Take me to your leader!"

"Hmph! Do you think you can just see our leader whenever you want?"

Jing Yuan frowned. Did they have to fight before they could have a proper conversation?

Fortunately, there were two groups of people at the scene.

Jingyuan was too lazy to fight them, so he turned to look at the car and said, "Answer my question, and I'll save you!"

The people in the car hesitated, but then the aged voice said, "Alright! Lighthouseman, what do you want to ask?"

Jingyuan manipulated the scale disc to transform into a giant disc shape, and then parked the car next to the scale disc.

"Come out and talk!"

The people on the vehicle hesitated for a moment, but still got off the vehicle and stood on the scale plate.

Jingyuan placed the SUV directly on the ground.

The men looked at the landing SUV with some worry. But upon reflection, they realized that whether the vehicle was there or not, they wouldn't escape the man's grasp. So they didn't care anymore.

There were five of them, all wearing khaki cloaks, and they varied in height and build.

Judging from their figures, there should be three men, one woman, and one child.

The person standing in front was a man.

The other person removed their hood, revealing an old and strange face.

This face, due to the presence of proliferating tissue, doesn't even look human anymore.

The others also removed their cloaks, revealing their faces.

Jingyuan glanced at them and noticed that their skin colors were different, and they all had different types of tissue hyperplasia on their faces, except for the woman and the child who did not have tissue hyperplasia on their faces.

Jing Yuan looked at them and said, "Let me introduce myself first. My name is Jing Yuan!"

"My name is Tumen."

Judging from his appearance and voice, the person standing in front should be an elderly man.

Jing Yuan said, "I can see that the genes of the Mana organisms have been integrated into your bodies, turning you into eco-chimeras."

"Yes! After the disaster broke out, we were hiding from the Devouring Beasts. In order to survive, our scientists began to try to inject Devouring Beast genes into our bodies, turning us into half-human, half-devouring beast creatures. This allowed us to evade the Devouring Beasts' pursuit, but we also became neither human nor monster."

Why are those people chasing you?

“Because…” Tumen hesitated for a moment, then said, “We have disagreements about the future of our people.”

"What disagreement?" Jingyuan pressed.

“We discovered that even after incorporating the genes of the Devouring Beasts, they can still detect us. Their previous act of not being able to detect us was a complete disguise. They can detect us whenever they want. As far as the Mana ecosystem is concerned, it knows everything we do; it simply sees us as domesticated pets.”

Domesticated pets?

Upon hearing this term, Jing Yuan couldn't help but think that this viewpoint aligned with the philosophy of the Lord of Light and Shadow.

The Lord of Light and Shadow believed that living in accordance with ecological requirements would allow humanity to continue.

These are actually a group of domesticated pets.

"Do you... have members of your tribe sacrificed every now and then?"

"Correct!"

Tumen was still wondering how Jingyuan knew.

But upon closer inspection, since they all claim to be raised in captivity, doesn't that mean they just slaughter a batch every now and then?

Just like livestock on a farm.

According to the people of Dragonbone Village, the Mana ecosystem on this continent has been constantly evolving. It seems that in addition to Dragonbone Village occasionally sacrificing lives for the ecosystem, the remnants of Zeon are also sacrificing lives!

Tumen continued, "We used to think that after incorporating the genes of the Devouring Beasts, they would treat us as one of their own. But over the years, quite a few of our people have died at the hands of the Devouring Beasts, and they also try to absorb our life essence."

Later, disagreements arose within our organization.

Tumen looked at the humanoid Devouring Beasts on the ground and said, "They believe that we were discovered by the Devouring Beasts because we did not fuse completely. Only by fully fusing into Devouring Beasts can we avoid being attacked by them."

Jing Yuan asked in confusion, "Then if you completely fuse into a Devouring Beast, wouldn't you become a true Devouring Beast? Then you wouldn't be human anymore!"

"Yes! That's a real Devouring Beast! Not a human!" Tumen said indignantly. "They've already conducted experiments, completely rewriting our genes. That's a Devouring Beast devoured without any reason!"

Jing Yuan looked at the people below, "But I think a few of them still have human reason."

Tumen said, "They are currently the most highly integrated eco-chimeras. Due to the high proportion of Devourer Beast genes they have incorporated, they are also very strong. However, they are still not complete Devourer Beasts."