The big rat screamed in pain and struggled as hard as it could. However, the vines which had pierced into its body showed no sign of relaxing, only drilling deeper and deeper.
In a couple of minutes, the rat gradually stopped struggling.
After that, the parts of the vines which were stuck inside the rat's body started turning red, the redness quickly expanding upward.
It was like a backstream of blood caused during an intravenous drip… The mushroom was clearly drinking the big rat's blood.
Lin Qiao watched those red vines drain the big rat within a short span of time.
She glanced around the mushroom, wondering where the dead bodies of the other animals that the mushroom had drained were. The other high-leveled mutated plants had more or less dead bodies around them, but the area around the mushroom was perfectly clean.
While Lin Qiao was observing the area around the mushroom, the mushroom withdrew its vines, then threw the rat's drained body near its roots. After that, the soil near the mushroom's roots sook and cracked, and then, the large mushroom uprooted itself!
A couple of strong roots supported the mushroom, underneath which was a hole. A stench which was the mixture of the rotten mud and decayed dead bodies gushed out of the hole, making Lin Qiao speechless.
Obviously, the mushroom was able to move!
The large mushroom got itself out of the soil, then rolled up the dead rat with its roots and threw it into the stinky hole. After that, it sat back onto the hole.
After sitting back down, the mushroom's roots stirred the soil to cover themselves, also to cover the traces that they left just now.
What a smart mushroom!
Lin Qiao was surprised that the mushroom did not only drain its prey, but also covered all the traces! Apart from that, it stayed on that one spot, pretending to be unable to move!
The smart mushroom had a rich meal, then happily buried the dead rat near its roots to nourish its roots. It had no idea that its secret moves had been witnessed by the invisible Lin Qiao, who was hiding nearby in the woods.
As the smart mushroom sat back in the middle of the clearing, Lin Qiao prepared to leap off the tree to harvest it. But suddenly, some slight noises were heard from the woods that made Lin Qiao stop.
She stopped, because what was coming this time was not like that big rat. The rat was lured to the mushroom, but this second visitor was coming with a strong intention of killing. Clearly, it was a predator instead of a prey which was attracted by the mushroom.
The visitor approached with a strong, fierce vibe, without making any sound.
The smart mushroom seemed not to realize that a predator was coming at it. It was relaxing its mushroom cap leisurely and lazily.
'Here it goes!'
Lin Qiao turned to the predator and soon saw a dark and large figure crawling to the edge of the clearing.
The smart mushroom which was still relaxing its cap suddenly froze. Within a blink, it jumped out of the ground, shrank its cap, and ran toward the other side.
It ran away!
It ran away fleetingly! The mushroom flashed straight into the nearby woods and disappeared; Lin Qiao's eyes only grasped a shred of shadow that it left. At the same time, the giant black figure sprung up and turned into an enormous shadow, chasing behind the smart mushroom.
The two creatures disappeared before Lin Qiao's eyes in no time.
Lin Qiao was stunned for two seconds. After that, she swiftly followed behind the two creatures, following their vibes and soon catching up with the two weird beings.
The mushroom had shrunk its cap into a triangular shape, its body supported by four or five human-leg-sized roots. It swung those roots quickly, causing swishing noises and loud claps. With those roots, it ran so fast that Lin Qiao could only saw a blurry shape of it.
It was running as fast as a gust of wind!
After spending a while following behind the two creatures, Lin Qiao found that the weird-looking predator was clearly slower than the smart mushroom. It was trying its best to run, gasping loudly for air. Yet, the mushroom was far ahead of it. Lin Qiao silently mourned for that creature.
She travelled a long distance behind the two creatures, and the distance between the mushroom and the predator was getting longer and longer. As the mushroom disappeared, the mutated beast stopped reluctantly, because it was exhausted.
Right at that time, Lin Qiao swooped at the mutated beast from a treetop and swung her claw at the beast's neck.
"Roar…" The beast was gasping for air. Suddenly, it was overwhelmed by the sense of crisis, but failed to react timely. It struggled to try to dodge Lin Qiao's attack. However, it was already too late.
It was a gigantic black boar. The bristles on its neck were half a meter long, thick and strong. Its face looked ferocious; its teeth stuck out of its mouth, shining with a sharp, cold light.
It was as huge as a buffalo, covered in black bristles.
Despite how strong the boar was, Lin Qiao managed to cut off half of its head. Dark-red blood and brain matter splashed all over the ground.
She quickly threw the dead boar into her space, then kept chasing behind the smart mushroom.
The mushroom was still running. The boar had stopped chasing it, but it was still running like the wind, nimbly dodging the rocks, trees, and other obstacles in its way.
Lin Qiao hopped onto a tree and leaped forward fleetingly, soon catching up with the mushroom.
As she was about a hundred meters away from the mushroom, she suddenly noticed that it seemed to turn its head around quickly. After that, the mushroom raised its speed again.
'Eh? Did it see me?' Lin Qiao wondered. Was the mushroom able to sense her while she was in the invisible state? Why did it react so slowly to the boar just now? Or… was the range of its sensations limited?"
While thinking, Lin Qiao raised her speed to catch up with the mushroom. The mushroom wasn't able to climb onto trees, but was able to jump! It thrust its roots against a tree trunk and leaped onto a rock which was over ten meters away, then made another leap to a further area.
Even though it couldn't climb trees, it was able to run very fast on the ground. Nothing seemed to be able to stop it, until a river appeared before it.
The river was only about thirty meters wide, but the mushroom still forced itself to stop by the riverside, then turned and kept running along the river.