'What happened in the past year and a half?'

  System looked down at the nd below. The entire Warren Pins seemed to be covered in a yer of gray smoke, but this smoke was very unusual, and it didn't block System's sight.

  Because of the green mist covering Lilt Forest, System could no longer see the elf vilge, but he saw one or two figures in bright silver armor patrolling near the vine wall. He thought that they were probably elf soldiers.

  Over in the ratman gathering pce more than a hundred kilometers to the west, there were no traces of any ratmen.

  Many of the entrances to the ratman warrens were now covered by withered weeds. Either there were no ratmen left in the gathering pce, or the number that remained was so small that system couldn't detect them.

  System continued looking around, and he soon discovered a rotting gnoll. It was wandering around aimlessly behind a small earthen slope about three kilometers away.

  A few minutes ter, System and Shava descended from the sky and nded in front of the gnoll.

  The gnoll's eyes were vacant and dull. System wasn't sure if it could still see, since its eyeballs had become turbid from decay. Its mouth was slightly open, and some sort of bck and purple liquid was dripping down its chin from time to time. There was basically no intact skin left on its body, and its originally brown fur was mostly covered with bloody bck scabs and rotten flesh.

  From time to time, the gnoll's mouth made strange noises, and it sounded almost like the gnoll was snoring. The sounds, combined with the gnoll's appearance, made it seem a bit disgusting and terrifying.

  However, the gnoll's appearance didn't scare System.

  In fact, with System's own weird appearance, he didn't feel all that different from this rotting gnoll zombie.

  Meanwhile, Shava, who was born without fear, was rubbing the twin bdes on her forelegs together, impatiently waiting for System's order to chop this strange and unpatable gnoll in half.

  System told Shava not to do anything yet, then carefully observed the gnoll as it stumbled around.

  This gnoll looked basically the same as the zombies in the movies and video games from System's old world, only the species of the zombie had changed from human to gnoll.

  When System and Shava approached the zombie gnoll, it ignored them completely and just kept wandering aimlessly.

  System didn't know whether the zombies in this world were really that oblivious, or if this particur zombie just wasn't interested in insects.

  System tried throwing a rock at the zombie.

  When it was hit by the rock, the zombie turned around quickly and started rushing in System's direction.

  However, the gnoll zombie's running speed wasn't very fast. System easily dodged the charging gnoll, and the zombie that missed him just kept running straight ahead.

  The gnoll charged ahead for a full one hundred meters before it eventually stumbled to a stop, after which it went back to wandering around aimlessly.

  System was surprised to feel a familiar aura when the zombie passed by. To be precise, it was the bck and purple mucus that was oozing from the zombie's rotting flesh that gave him a friendly and familiar feeling.

  "Could this gnoll be infected with my [Pgue Mucus]?"

  System's throat subconsciously hoarse and strange muttering sounds. Because he couldn't use his vocal cords proficiently yet, his voice was extremely hoarse, and he didn't sound much different from a howling zombie.

  [Probe and Analyze] activated!

  System used one of the new abilities that he acquired during his third pupation. When he used the ability, some of the information about the zombie's body began appearing in his mind.

  ...

  Species: Gnoll Zombie (renameable)

  Height: 1.98-1.99 metersWeight: 70-80 kilograms

  Estimated Combat Power: 2-13Special Talents: -

  ...

  The details dispyed by this [Probe and Analyze] ability weren't very precise, especially the estimated combat power, which covered a fairly rge range.

  However, when System continued using [Probe and Analyze] to inspect the gnoll, the values slowly changed to become more accurate.

  Based on his understanding of [Probe and Analyze], System knew that if he used his tentacles to wrap around the gnoll and used [Perception], he would get much more detailed and accurate information.

  After using [Probe and Analyze] to constantly inspect the gnoll zombie for nearly three minutes, the gnoll zombie's combat power range had shrunk down to 6-9.

  System suddenly had the idea to use [Probe and Analyze] to inspect Shava. However, when he used the ability one her, the result surprised him.

  ...

  Species: Soldier Ant Knight (renameable)

  Height: 0.61 meters

  Weight: 13-17 kilogramsEstimated combat power: 1-7Special Talents: -

  ...

  System didn't know the principles behind the operation of his [Probe and Analyze] ability, but the combat power of the gnoll zombie was 6-9, while Shava's combat power was 1-7, which was obviously illogical.

  He was certain that Shava could easily chop this gnoll in half.

  "Shava, kill the gnoll!"

  As soon as System sent the mental message, a faint yer of white light appeared around Shava's body. An instant ter, the gnoll zombie was sliced in half from top to bottom.

  System saw a fsh of light blue fme erupt from the gnoll's head when it was split in half, just like the soul fire in the heads of some undead creatures from his old world's fantasy stories.

  However, compared to the fsh of fme from the gnoll's head, the new data shown by [Probe and Analyze] surprised System even more.

  The moment Shava activated her ability, her combat power soared to 150-350, and when her state returned to normal, her combat power dropped again to its original 1-7.

  System continued to observe her, and Shava's combat power finally stopped fluctuating once it reached a range of 5-6.

  His [Probe and Analyze] ability was obviously not as useful as he'd imagined. Although the detection of combat power had upper and lower limits, if the target burst out with some unknown power, the upper and lower limits of its combat power would change.

  Perhaps in the future, when the level of his [Probe and Analyze] ability increased, it would be possible to inspect things more accurately.

  ...

  Shaking his head gently, System walked over to the gnoll zombie's body and stretched out his tentacles to inspect the corpse's festering wounds.

  Just like he'd sensed earlier, the festering wounds on the zombie had indeed been caused by the bacteria from his [Pgue Mucus]. It was very likely that his [Pgue Mucus] had killed this gnoll.

  However, [Pgue Mucus] obviously couldn't have turned the gnoll into a zombie. System could tell that there was something else inside this gnoll's flesh and blood. There seemed to be some sort of magical power that was exuding a strange aura of death and decay.

  System stretched out his tentacles and tore off a small piece of the zombie's flesh, then put it into his mouth.

  After he tasted a very faint sweet and milky fvor, System tasted a foul fvor for the first time, and he quickly spat out the food in his mouth.

  This was the first time that he'd felt a little disgusted by any food in this world.