Poor, just like he used to be! Which went to show that Chen Kai and his crowd were actually pretty well-off—otherwise they couldn't have kicked off a supplement craze in Ping City.

"Then I'll pay you first, and come back here in three days to pick up the paintings," Shi Jin said.

"N-no, it's fine, I'll paint first," the student said. "Once they're finished, you can decide the price."

"Let me decide?" Shi Jin said. It seemed the other party was quite confident in his work.

The little painter smiled slightly and nodded. After that, Shi Jin chatted with him a bit more and learned who he was: the boy was studying a painting-related major and seemed to be doing quite well, and his dream was to become a great painter, which was why he had contracted the Colorlight Mushroom as his pet beast, intending to use it to assist his painting.

Not every Beast Tamer contracted a pet beast for battle. In this world, pet beasts had long since integrated into every trade and profession.

Shi Jin decided to place the order. In the end, though, since the other party had no phone at all, Shi Jin had no choice but to go print out the images for him to use as reference, and he also forced a 1,000-yuan deposit on him.

It wasn't easy for a young classmate to come out and support himself at such a young age—it was worth supporting. If he hadn't met Rich Lady Lu, he might be in the same boat as this kid right now. Except the other party made money by selling paintings, while he made money by selling silk...

After commissioning the four Frost Dragon paintings, Shi Jin felt sleepy.

"This emperor is weary again."

"I clearly slept all day, and I didn't do anything—so how am I tired again?"

Shi Jin found it absurd.

Fine. Home it is—no more wandering around.

...

When Shi Jin got home, Eleven and the Green Silk Worm inside the relic pearl were still full of energy.

Shi Jin was envious.

With nutritious food, the boost from the relic space, and the rapid recovery of Absolute Sleep, the two of them could be utterly exhausted, nap for a bit, and bounce right back to full spirits—truly something to envy.

"If only the skill compendium could be used on myself."

"High-Speed Healing, Absolute Sleep—those would all have to be set up."

Shi Ling said that a beast-taming talent would level up along with the beast tamer's rank, and that some special talents' abilities would even undergo a qualitative transformation accordingly.

Shi Jin was very curious whether the skill compendium, besides gaining more pages, might change in other ways too.

By rights, since talents like "Sharing" and "Fusion" existed, humanity ought to have some unknown latent potential...

Though some also speculated that humans with such strange special talents might all be the offspring of humans mixed with other extraordinary beings...

"Once I take the professional exam, I should get to see all kinds of beast-taming talents, right? I wonder if I'll run into any beast-eared girls." Shi Jin still couldn't let it go—his curiosity about the unknown was boundless.

But the pressing matter at hand was still to keep training his two family dependents, Eleven and the Green Silk Worm.

[Name]: Iron-Eating Beast

[Growth Rank]: Awakening Level Nine

[Skills]: Hardening, Thunder Palm, High-Speed Healing, Super Vision, Intimidation, Absolute Sleep, Magnification

[Name]: Green Silk Worm

[Growth Rank]: Awakening Level Ten

[Skills]: Insect Silk, Absolute Sleep, Phantom of Truth and Illusion

As for Eleven, its various skills were enough for the time being, and its proficiency was basically up to standard, so Shi Jin planned to leave it alone for now—let it hone itself, and use plentiful food and training to raise its growth rank.

As for the Green Silk Worm, considering how hard it was working now, Shi Jin decided to first push Absolute Sleep to Mastery level to boost its training efficiency.

At the same time, he would also push Phantom of Truth and Illusion to Mastery level, and with that, he felt the Green Silk Worm's combat power would be roughly established.

Against a level-ten Commander-species pet beast it might still be a hard fight, but against same-level opponents of extraordinary species, he felt it could at least give them a try.

Beyond that, the foundation for evolution would also be laid.

When the time came, the Green Silk Worm after cocooning would basically be in a sleep state; other Green Silk Worms would be in ordinary deep sleep then, but it would be in Absolute Sleep, surely gaining far more benefits, since it could absorb more nutrients—and then, when breaking out of the cocoon, a Green Silk Worm with Phantom of Truth and Illusion would only need to materialize the phantom from its dreams and project it onto itself, and the cocoon could be broken however it wished.

Whether it wanted to fantasize about sprouting wings and becoming a butterfly, about a worm leaping through the dragon gate, or about a phoenix rising from ashes—it was all up to its own whim.

Of course, to be safe, Shi Jin would certainly teach it a few more skills before it cocooned—High-Speed Healing, Intimidation, Magnification, and the like could all be taught.

And whether Insect Silk at the Peak Mastery level could still be upgraded—that would depend on when Shi Jin had the energy.

Having decided to go to the Ancient Capital in July, Shi Jin for now set only a small goal: before setting out, push the worm's Absolute Sleep and Phantom of Truth and Illusion to Mastery level, and leave the rest for later.

"Worm, this is for you."

In the relic space, Eleven and the Green Silk Worm, busy training, suddenly noticed Shi Jin coming in.

They saw Shi Jin slowly walking over with an ice dragon model, carrying a photo bag as well.

"Awoo!!!" Eleven looked closely, realized it wasn't a real ice dragon, and lost all interest.

As for the Green Silk Worm, its eyes lit up.

"Chirp!!!"

So cool!!

Looking at the exquisite ice dragon model and recalling the thing from its dream, it suddenly felt that whatever it had shaped in its dream was utter junk by comparison...

"Study it well, imagine it quietly—tonight it will accompany you to sleep." Shi Jin chuckled. The main reason he had the worm use the ice dragon as its first transformation template was that he had quite a few ice-element energy crystals on hand, plus a single ice dragon whisker of unknown function—these things would later serve as excellent props to amplify the quality of its phantoms.

"And this too." Shi Jin handed the printed photos to the Green Silk Worm as well. He had printed two copies: one given to that little painter as reference for drawing, and one brought here for the worm to look at first—this was cheap, only a few yuan.

"And these are your own."

Besides that, Shi Jin took out another stack of photos—this time the images were of Eleven training and the Green Silk Worm sleeping.

Shi Jin distributed the photos to Eleven and the Green Silk Worm. The worm was fine, just ordinarily surprised, but Eleven—looking at its own photo, it quickly froze.

"Ying?"

"I snapped these secretly while you two were training—just to keep as a memento." Shi Jin grinned.

"Ying!!!" Eleven stared at the photo, and the more it looked, the more moved it became—it even gave itself a little nod of approval.

So the scenes of its own hard training could actually be recorded like this?

It really had to be treasured.jpg.

Eleven wanted to put the photo away properly, but alas, it had no pockets, so it could only tuck it between its furry forearms and its body.

Just then, Eleven suddenly looked toward Qi.

If the scenes from hard training could be recorded...

Then what about its heroic bearing in battle?!

Panda Eleven stared with eager eyes, looking seriously at Cen Yu.

"Awoooo!!!"

Could it film that? Back then, it must have been so handsome, so cool.

Moments of victory, even more than moments of training, ought to be recorded.