“All right everyone, let’s come over here!” Professor Taoren called everyone to huddle around a small tree. “This is diploknema yunnanensis, one of eleven known olive trees native to this region. Although it used to be numerous several hundred years ago, deforestation had led it to decline over the years. Isn’t this the most exquisite specimen you have ever seen!?”

<diploknema yunnanensis: source: eol.org>

Everyone oohed and awed over the plant. There were eleven plants in the wild, so there was a marker to show that the plant had been documented and listed as one of the protected plants.

“We have since managed to produce 300 trees from the cuttings,” Professor Taoren further explained. “Although it has not produced any fruit in twelve years, we are optimistic that it will eventually adjust to its new environment.”

Li Yun liked medicinals, but he wasn’t as enthusiastic as the crowd of scientists. But as a challenge, he wanted to reproduce the olive fruit and rare fruiting plants in the greenhouse. He could ask Hunlun to take a clipping from the botanical garden that housed the 300 trees.

Dong Sun and the laborers were also indifferent to the olive tree, and watched from afar. They were there just for the scenery and adventure, but had also been in and out of the rainforest enough times that it was like seeing grass.

The scientists could be strangely over enthusiastic, but Dong Sun thought Li Yun was the strangest. He randomly grabbed branches from all the shrubs and low hanging branches. Once in a while, he would document the information in a notebook. Dong Sun thought Li Yun was a much more dedicated plant enthusiast than even the scientists. Luckily, he hadn’t seen Li Yun biting into the leaves, but if he did, he would worry about the state of Li Yun’s stomach.

Li Yun hoped to record as many plants as possible. He could have hired people to gather plants and insects for him, but to experience the environment in person allowed him to understand the rainforest biome and how to replicate it in the greenhouse. The environment was very different from the bamboo forest in Panda City.

As for the insects, he wasn’t that desperate enough to try bunching into them. He was going to collect them to provide gu energy, but if he ever ran out of plants to eat- highly unlikely- he’ll start eating insects. New species of plants were being discovered every day, at a rate of around 50/day.

The guide warned everyone to walk carefully the next portion of the hike. The ground was wet, sinking the boots of the trekkers in mud. It was the end of the wet season, but there was still dense fog in the air, keeping the environment moist. It was rare to see the ground completely dried, creating dangerous conditions for disease to thrive.

During the night, the hot and humid conditions quickly turned into a wet chill. Everyone wrapped themselves in their coats and sleeping bags inside their tents. There were portable heaters, but it was still chilly at night.

Outside the tents, Li Yun looked around the rainforest's floor, although dense, there was a small trail created creating by the excursion team. He adjusted the dilation of his eyes until they were completely black.

Li Yun took a hiking stick, backpack, and started to move around. He had meditated earlier, and left the tent past midnight while everyone was still asleep. His steps and movement were quiet, barely any type of vibration was generated as he walked through the darkness.

In the rainforest, the most dangerous creature in the forest wasn’t the giant panda or the crouching tiger, it was the murderous wasps known as the giant hornet, Vespa mandarinia. Luckily, the hornets were not active at night. Li Yun to deal more with the bamboo pit viper and scorpions that crawled out during the night. However, compared to the creatures of the woods, they all paled in comparison. If it was a year ago, he would never consider trekking the rainforest on his own. With his night vision, his journey was smooth, except for when he saw the moonlight sneaking its way down through the laurel and dipterocarp tree. Light was an enemy for his dilated state. As his senses had all improved, he didn’t even need to dilate his eyes to see and could rely entirely on his ears, but the visual at night was too breathtaking to miss. He passed by several plants he had already collected during the day. Prior to going on the trip, he had acquired a special license to collect rare species for research, making a pledge to open the greenhouse to the public and scientific community. It would not have passed without some of his connections.

The main reason Li Yun was out at night was to collect some bugs that only came out at night and to collect rare plants he had encountered, but did not mention to the scientists. He was being sneaky, but it wasn’t like he was going to take the entire specimen. Looking at the Metanemone ranunculoides, he divided the plant, and also took a sample into a bottled container riddled with holes. He also filled the bottom of the bottom with the laterite soil, which was rich in iron and aluminum, and created from granite and gneiss rocks.

<Metanemone ranunculoides>

Li Yun ate a sample of the plant and closed his eyes to focus on his internal systems. Afterward, he jotted down the information in his notebook. However, unlike usual, he focused on his DNA. There were too many to focus on, and he had decided to focus on the genes associated with prostate cancer, one of the more difficult regions to operate on. With the data store in his mind, he could study the other information later. By the time he finished, his body was still processing the plant, but he could still walk to the next plant to collect before consuming it again.

The samples he collected were filling up his bag quickly. He wished he had an inventory system! Dammit, why couldn’t it be more useful? Grumbling along the way, he felt a sting by his hand, and quickly slapped it. He could see the foreign chemical entering his body, but it had very little toxicity. Suddenly, he heard buzzing flying around him.

“S***!” Li Yun flailed his arm around, trying to break the swarm.

He wished his wushu training or charm had some effect, but it really didn’t. He couldn’t catch a fly with a chopstick, much less destroy an army of mosquitoes.

“Better retreat!” He moved away further, and the swarm dispersed, allowing him to gather plants until a small beep signaled that time was running out. He quickly returned to the camp before everyone woke up.

“Little Yun, you sure like to sleep!” Dong Sun commented early in the morning.

Li Yun was meditating to restore the energy he had used to look into his DNA. He was the last to wake up. The team typically departed at 7:30am. There wasn’t any showering, so that saved a bit of time, and any potential showers came from the rain.

“I was known as the sleeping sloth!” Li Yun didn’t mind the nickname as much as before.

Dong Sun laughed. Li Yun quickly took down the tent and packed everything up for their second day's journey. It was the same as before, more walking, with Professor Taoren occasionally educating the camera about the interesting sightings along the way.

During the second night, Li Yun continued his late-night excursion. Instead of using his eyes, he used his ears to generate a 3d image in his head. He had been practicing for awhile, but this was the first time he was performing the action in complete darkness.

What he could see in his head wasn’t just a flat image within his field of view, but his surroundings. Before he completed the Wu Xing, his eyes were simply processing the residual light energy from the plants and surfaces. However, with all of his senses heightened, his sensory organs translated pressure and vibration into pictorial images he could visualize in 3D. 

When he first tested the 3D images in his head, it was a bit disorienting, but he had since gotten used to it. The view beyond a meter radius was fainter, but he could trace the shape of a Etlingera yunnanensis flower growing on a cliff a few meters away.

<Etlingera yunnanensis>

Li Yun wondered why in the world it was grown so far down. He wasn’t that much of an idiot to climb down just to grab the specimen. He wasn’t particularly interested in the flower, although it would look gorgeous in the daytime. What he wanted was one of two rhizomes. With the correct environment, Li Yun would be able to produce and multiply the specimen.

Li Yun also spotted the callicarpa yunnanensis nearby. “Jackpot!” It was one of the plants with chemical compounds to combat lung cancer.

<callicarpa yunnanensis>

Many plants had cytotoxic effects on cancer cells. But like chemotherapy, the amount introduced into the body that can kill cancer cells could also kill the regular host cells. To isolate the positive effects and minimize the negative was the goal of many researchers. However, it was also the idea behind many ancient medical formulas.

Li Yun wanted to collect as many plants as possible to understand their compounds and ways to counteract the negative side effects. It wasn’t going to be a simple endeavor like inflammation.