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“Sis, did you find anything new?” Mylene looked over curiously as she asked.

On the other side, Pixie’s gaze also settled on Yae-hime.

“Let me take a closer look first.” As she spoke, Yae-hime released her aura, lifting the largest ant into the air before placing it in her palm for inspection. It was much larger than the ants below. Its glossy black shell gleamed under the light, while the faint patch of green on its head stood out conspicuously.

It was precisely that streak of green that had caught Yae-hime’s attention.

“The body structure of this ant is different from the others. If those ants were mutated specimens… then this one has undergone a second mutation. Strictly speaking, it is one, or perhaps several, evolutionary levels above the others. What’s strange is that its mutation appears to have occurred only recently. The cause was most likely the unusual energy inside its body.”

Yae-hime explained while using her vision to examine the green-headed ant from the inside out. Mylene leaned closer, studying the mutated ant with great interest. Pixie walked over as well, her curiosity equally piqued.

“If it had completely absorbed all of this energy, it might have ascended to an entirely new level. I’d really like to study it in detail. Too bad it’s already dead.” Yae-hime said.

Hearing that, Mylene’s lips twitched slightly. Pixie, however, couldn’t help but chuckle.

After extracting the strange energy from the green-headed ant’s body, Yae-hime was suddenly struck by an inexplicable sense of familiarity. She felt as though she had encountered a similar energy fluctuation somewhere before. Yet no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t remember where.

‘Was it just my imagination…?’ Shaking her head, she stopped chasing after that fleeting sensation.

“Sis, what are you planning to do with these ant corpses?” Mylene asked at that moment.

“They’re of no use to me. Have the Ability Management Department take them back for research.” Yae-hime replied. If it had been a complete insectoid lying on the ground, she definitely would have taken it with her. But a pile of ordinary ant carcasses held virtually no research value.

Of course, if the green-headed ant in her hand were still alive, it would have been worth studying.

Just as Yae-hime was about to toss it aside, she “noticed” a red fragment among the undigested food remains inside its abdomen. With a light swipe of her finger, she neatly sliced open its remarkably tough shell.

Then, using her released aura, she carefully turned out everything inside the ant’s stomach. Among the still-undigested remains were quite a few broken fragments. Yae-hime patiently pieced them together while Mylene and Pixie waited in silence.

Neither of them knew what Yae-hime was trying to accomplish, but they were certain she had her reasons.

After some time, Yae-hime finally stopped. Floating before her was a tiny leg. It looked like the leg of a cooked shrimp.

“The bite marks are relatively fresh. It probably ate this only a few hours ago. Judging by how far the rest of the food has been digested, my estimate should be correct.” She said.

“Is it really that important whether this ant had eaten something?” Pixie asked in confusion.

“It is. Food can reveal a great deal of information. For example, this ant had already eaten before coming here. If I’m not mistaken, this is probably the leg of a shrimp. Judging by its size, it’s most likely a Green Island shrimp. There are also plenty of other food remnants in its stomach, proving this little fellow had quite an appetite. The question is, if it ate so much, why did it only eat the shrimp’s leg?” Yae-hime said.

“Maybe… it was just eating leftovers that other people threw away.” Mylene said uncertainly.

“Exactly. It was feeding on kitchen waste.” Yae-hime nodded.

“But what does knowing it ate garbage actually tell us?” Pixie became even more bewildered.

“A great deal.” Yae-hime looked ahead. “A few hours ago, aside from late-night food stalls, most hotel restaurants had already closed. Their kitchen waste would naturally have been cleared away long before then.”

She paused briefly before continuing, “Of course, not every hotel maintains that standard.”

“Sis, Sis, why do you keep talking about hotels? There are so many restaurants around too.” Mylene raised her hand like a diligent student asking a question.

“Mm, that’s a good question. The key this time lies with the Green Island shrimp. Fresh shrimp transported from Green Island are extremely expensive. Even hotels rarely serve them, let alone ordinary restaurants.”

“That’s right. Shipping them from Green Island to Roc City takes quite some time, even by air freight. Naturally, the price rises accordingly. Besides that, scarcity is also a factor. As the saying goes, things are valuable because they are rare.” Pixie said. She had already begun to grasp what Yae-hime had discovered.

“I suspect this ant sneaked into the kitchen of the Rosen Hotel and stole something to eat.” Sure enough, Yae-hime voiced the very conclusion she had reached. The deduction itself wasn’t difficult.

Before Yae-hime had left earlier, the hotel had prepared several packed meals for her to take away. As for the remaining kitchen waste, there hadn’t been enough time to dispose of it, so it had been left in the hotel.

“Let’s go take a look.” Yae-hime said.

Mylene and Pixie nodded. Neither of them knew exactly where the hotel’s kitchen was, but they could roughly guess its location. After searching around for a while, the group eventually found it.

When they pushed the door open, they found the kitchen spotless, with a faint scent of disinfectant lingering in the air. It was obvious the hotel staff maintained an exceptionally high standard of cleanliness.

As expected of Roc City’s top-tier Rosen Hotel.

The three of them did not rush inside. Instead, they carefully examined the traces on the floor. While ordinary people would never notice them, they were plainly visible to Grandmasters.

Before long, they uncovered several subtle clues. Following those traces, they arrived at a large blue plastic barrel. It was filled with kitchen waste, emitting a pungent mixture of unpleasant odors.

Yae-hime released her aura, isolating the foul smell from the surrounding area. In the next instant, Mylene and Pixie caught the fragrance of a fresh, delicate feminine scent instead.

The two of them instantly felt like little bees that had wandered into a blooming flower garden, nearly intoxicated by the aroma.

“My guess was absolutely right. That little fellow really did sneak in here to steal something to eat.” As she spoke, Yae-hime successfully extracted a tiny droplet of liquid from the blue barrel.

It was virtually identical to the residual substance she had previously extracted from the green-headed ant’s body. If there was any difference at all, it was probably its purity. The droplet she had extracted from the barrel was exceptionally pure, completely free of impurities.

After sensing the aura of the droplet, Mylene and Pixie carefully compared it with the residual aura left inside the green-headed ant.

“They’re practically identical.” The two spoke in unison. Their admiration for Yae-hime immediately rose to an even higher level. To deduce so much from nothing more than a few traces of aura and some food scraps… her powers of observation and ability to sense aura were simply terrifying.

In reality, Yae-hime had merely formed a hypothesis and then set out to verify it. If it proved correct, then so be it. If it didn’t, then so be it.

“Now the real question is…” Yae-hime said with a solemn expression as she stared at the crystal-clear droplet floating in the air. “Who did this droplet belong to?”

It was now obvious that the green-headed ant had mutated after feeding on the garbage inside the barrel. And the true cause of its mutation lay within this mysterious droplet of liquid.