Chapter 18: Unexpected
Seeing the message in the war channel, Su Xiao was surprised, because there were actually members of the Travel Group in this world war.
The last time Su Xiao saw someone from the Travel Group, it was a gray-haired man, skilled in poison use, with very strong tracking abilities. His name was unknown for now. That guy was a fifth-rank contractor with formidable combat power, so strong that participating in the top-tier battlefield would even result in reduced rewards.
The gray-haired man was Travel Group's No. 5. As for what number this contractor named Witch was, it was temporarily unknown, because the Travel Group's numbering wasn't based on strength.
Su Xiao had seen this contractor codenamed Witch before. It was during the initial chaotic battle. She didn't make many moves, and her initial performance was similar to a wild support type.
But after the big healer from Holy Light Paradise was sent flying, she used only one strike to severely wound that big healer and interrupt her large-scale buff ability. Witch's biggest characteristic was her very slow speaking speed with a halting rhythm.
Su Xiao checked his Reincarnation Mark. Sure enough, there were already two unread emails. But the cost of transmitting messages within a war world was considerable, requiring 1,000 Paradise Coins each time.
As for the two emails Su Xiao received, both required him to pay the fee. This was an unwritten rule of intelligence trading.
Paying 2,000 Paradise Coins, Su Xiao opened the two emails in sequence. It was worth mentioning that Witch's email had a lip print on it, with the content as follows:
Skex (Three-Stage Combat Race):
Speed: ★
Destructive Power: ★★★
Defense: ★★★
Note: ★★★ represents top-tier among three-stage insect races.
...
Jumping Stinger (Three-Stage Combat Race)
Speed: ★★★
Destructive Power: ★★
Defense: ★★
...
Killer Bee (Four-Stage Combat Insect Race, Small Size)
Speed: ★★★★
Destructive Power: ★★★
Defense: ★★★
...
Flesh Fortress (Four-Stage Combat Insect Race, Ultra-Large Size)
Speed: ★★
Destructive Power: ★★★★★ (Exceeds Four-Stage)
Defense: ★★★★
...
Witch provided information on over a dozen insect races, with the locations of the nests these insect races belonged to marked at the bottom, and even a crude map that made one want to kill.
This map was so crude it only had one circle with a bunch of dots inside.
As for the information provided by Twilight, if one's reading comprehension wasn't good, it was hard to understand. The content was as follows:
Flesh Fortress (4) Strong, Enpusa (3) Okay, Giant Fang (4) Medium, (4) Sucker Very Troublesome...
It could be seen that Twilight was probably busy with something, taking limited time to write down this information. Some places didn't even have punctuation marks. Su Xiao looked for a long time before figuring out what '(4) Gray Bone Parepors (3) Strength Similar' meant. Gray Bone and Parepors were two types of combat insect races, the former being a four-stage insect race, the latter three-stage.
Witch's information was complete, with occasional annotations. As for Twilight, she provided many insect race types, but the classification wasn't detailed enough, and most combat insect races weren't marked with their nest locations.
Su Xiao chose to reach a deal with Witch, but this portion of information was far from worth one Soul Crystal (Complete). Su Xiao had already written in the trade contract that it should be at least 85 types or more. Therefore, Su Xiao proposed paying one Soul Crystal (Large).
Witch agreed to this request. This was almost free profit. When she first saw Su Xiao's message in the war channel, she knew Su Xiao was looking for a worker. Obviously, she wouldn't spend precious time specifically investigating combat insect race information.
As for Twilight, Su Xiao directly replied that he couldn't understand the information.
'Are you illiterate? Pay up, one large soul crystal. Didn't expect complete.'
For this email, Su Xiao selectively ignored it. Twilight was also getting carried away, sending this email at her own expense.
In Witch's information, Su Xiao found a very strong three-stage unit, an insect race unit called Blade Wasp.
Blade Wasp (Three-Stage Combat Insect Race, Medium Size, Fission Variant)
Speed: ★★★
Destructive Power: ★★★★
Defense: ★★
...
Blade Wasp belonged to the three-stage fission-type insect races. The so-called fission type meant the mother combined the genes of two insect race units. If it failed, not only would the mother herself be injured, but she would also lose those two insect race genes, a heavy loss.
The cost of failure was severe, but the fruits of success were also sweet. However, obtaining the 'remnant individuals' of Blade Wasp was very difficult. That was a nest located 90 kilometers away. It could be said to be one of the strongest nests among the three-stage ones. That insect queen even had her own name, Phantom Wasp.
Most named insect mothers were not to be trifled with. Phantom Wasp was one of them. The Blade Wasps she cultivated already had the combat power of four-stage insect races. Although only mid-to-lower four-stage, four-stage combat insect races possessed one to two True Attributes, which was an extremely formidable point.
"Baha, you and Bubu Wang go as representatives to negotiate with the Insect Queen Phantom Wasp. As for the bargaining chip, we'll consider that later."
Su Xiao wasn't sure if the Insect Queen Phantom Wasp would agree to negotiations. As for trading with Life Stones, that was unlikely. As one of the overlords of three-stage insect races, Phantom Wasp wouldn't give up her ace insect race, Blade Wasp, for 100,000 Bio Energy.
As for why Su Xiao didn't go negotiate in person, that was a death sentence. He might be surrounded by her insect army just by approaching Phantom Wasp's nest.
Baha and Bubu Wang set off as diplomats, while Su Xiao guarded the nest. Jila was in the evolution stage, and absolutely couldn't be disturbed by the outside world.
Night fell quietly. Fourteen Stingers were deployed in the nearby area as sentries. As for the 19 Mantis Armors, three were busy, while the remaining sixteen lay around the nest, conserving Bio Energy consumption.
Su Xiao waited until the middle of the night, but Jila still hadn't completed evolution. He simply leaned against the wooden shed to rest, but kept his perception fully open.
At three in the morning, the nest began to change. It stretched out from its contracted state, with emerald green energy flowing through the veins. Within a few minutes, the nest's horizontal volume expanded several times, while its height remained unchanged at thirty meters.
[Tip: Your temporary summon, Insect Mother, has been promoted to the third stage.]
[The nest has evolved to the third stage, with attached abilities enhanced.]
[Energy Storage Tissue has been upgraded to the third stage, energy storage cap increased to 50,000 points.]
[Oviposition Tissue has been upgraded to the third stage, can produce 300 insect eggs at once, egg production speed increased by 50%.]
[Cultivation Sac has been upgraded to the third stage, can cultivate 150 small-to-medium insect units at once, cultivation speed increased by 200%.]
[The nest has acquired a new organ, Energy Conversion Device (Third Stage).]
[The nest has acquired a new organ, Evolution Chamber (Third Stage, subsidiary organ of the Cultivation Sac, has a 1.5% chance of producing elite individuals when cultivating combat insect races).]
[New genetic memory awakened: Fungal Carpet (Insect Race Building).]
[New genetic memory awakened: Mantis Armor Elite (Size increased by 80%, load capacity and various other abilities greatly enhanced).]
[New genetic memory awakened: Demon Beast (Combat Insect Race, Medium Size, Alien Variant, this is a genetic memory awakened by receiving a trace of World Force blessing).]
...
Seeing the last prompt, Su Xiao was both surprised and felt it was within reason. He had previously injected Demon Force into Jila's body, a full 10% of the total in the Abyssal Jar. He himself was reluctant to use this stuff.
In the first two stages, Jila didn't show any signs of being blessed by Demon Force. But upon reaching the third stage, the Demon Force within her began to take effect.