Chapter 7: Super Double
Inside the central nest chamber of the Raging Beetle Hive, after Su Xiao knocked out Raging Beetle, the entire hive fell into a leaderless state. However, the insectoid warriors did not become chaotic. Without the mental binding of the insectoid leader Raging Beetle, their self-awareness grew stronger. Some insectoid warriors even looked as if they were about to flee.
This method of evolution had both advantages and disadvantages. The advantage was that the race would not be easily exterminated and had the ability to evolve independently. The disadvantage was that with thoughts came emotions like fear and anger.
Inside the nest chamber, Su Xiao waited quietly for a moment. Through Bubu Wang outside, he learned that most of the insectoid warriors around the hive had fled. This was normal. Even the insectoid leader Raging Beetle itself had evolved step by step from a lower-tier insectoid, eventually defeating the previous generation’s leader to seize this hive.
“Baha.”
“Understood.”
Without needing further communication, Baha flew out of the nest chamber to find the storage point of Living Ore inside the hive.
Su Xiao took out a syringe potent enough to anesthetize a top-tier eighth-rank giant super creature and injected it into Raging Beetle. Although insectoid leaders were not known for their physical strength, Raging Beetle was valuable. To be safe, he had to invest a bit more.
He tossed the empty syringe aside and checked the prompt that had just appeared. His reputation value had increased. Well, it could be considered an increase. Regardless of whether this value was positive or negative, as long as the number was large, the ranking would be high.
Su Xiao opened the reputation leaderboard, and a list appeared.
[Leaderboard refreshed. Current ranking as follows:]
First Place: Kain (Death Paradise), 2400 reputation points.
Second Place: Undead Girl (Reincarnation Paradise), -1760 reputation points.
Third Place: Black Demon (Reincarnation Paradise), -1685 reputation points.
Fourth Place: White Night (Reincarnation Paradise), -320 reputation points.
Fifth Place: Shenfu (Sanctuary Paradise), 290 reputation points.
Sixth Place: Luge (Apocalypse Paradise), 34 reputation points.
Seventh Place: Hao Mei (Apocalypse Paradise), 25 reputation points.
...
The leaderboard was more lively than expected. Su Xiao had heard of Kain, who was in first place. He was a magic tank from Death Paradise and also had another identity: the leader of the large adventure group, Hall of Heroes.
Kain’s strength was not weak; he was in the top tier of the eighth rank. But given his personal strength, obtaining 2400 reputation points at this point was somewhat fantastical. This only indicated one thing: many members of Hall of Heroes had entered this world.
Reputation points were very special. Sometimes they could be obtained by killing enemies, and sometimes by improving one’s status to gain a high amount.
The number of reputation points Kain currently had was likely because the members under his command had concentrated the opportunities to gain reputation points on their leader.
This was very wise. Reputation points could not be exchanged for anything. They only gave rewards to the top five every two days, and at the end of this world, the final first-place holder would receive an eighth-rank title.
This time, Kain, representing Hall of Heroes, seemed determined to seize first place. It seemed that after Shui Ge won the killing ranking in the World of Paintings last world, the Death Rangers, who had always been second in the eighth rank, finally stood up and proudly said, ‘See, Enzuo is from our Death Paradise.’
If Shui Ge heard this, he would definitely not be happy. The first place he got in the Treeborn World was a complicated situation.
He wondered how Shui Ge, who had ‘welcomed’ Mirror Daddy, was doing now. He hoped he was still safe.
Su Xiao did not plan to give up first place this time. The rewards given to the top five every two days were naturally more generous the higher the rank.
The current situation was not optimistic. Not only was Kain firmly in first place with the strength of his entire adventure group, but the second-place Undead Girl and third-place Black Demon were also difficult to surpass.
Seeing their current reputation points, someone who didn’t know better would think this thing was easy to obtain. But looking down at the sixth and seventh...
Su Xiao’s gaze focused on the seventh place. Seeing the name Hao Mei, he felt an overwhelming sense of wealth.
Su Xiao’s expression turned thoughtful. [Basic Passive: Spirit Toughness] and [Basic Passive: Awakening] were still eagerly waiting, and he badly needed Soul Coins.
For normal contractors, seeing the names in the top five of this leaderboard would give them a huge psychological shadow. If the Treeborn World was a chaotic battle of gods, then this world was a carnival for top-tier monsters. Normal contractors couldn’t even participate, and just seeing the names at the top of the leaderboard would ruin their mood.
Su Xiao closed the leaderboard. He wasn’t in a hurry about reputation points for now. Once the base camp mother nest developed, even if Kain had an entire adventure group, Su Xiao was confident he could suppress him.
Nearly an hour later, Baha finished counting the assets of the Raging Beetle Hive. The hive had a total of 3150 units of Living Ore. This insectoid leader wasn’t as wealthy as imagined. This made Su Xiao a bit worried. Could it be that Raging Beetle was also paying protection fees to someone higher up?
With the Raging Beetle Hive as the center, the surrounding large area was the territory of the insectoid mother queen, Kara. If Raging Beetle really paid protection fees, it could only be to the insectoid mother queen, Kara.
There was no use worrying about this now. The hive was already occupied. If the insectoid mother queen, Kara, really came to apply pressure, he would fight her. Kara wasn’t in an easy position either, locked in a death struggle with the Third Fleet. She probably didn’t have the energy to deal with Raging Beetle.
Su Xiao walked out of the hive, followed by Baha carrying Raging Beetle. As soon as he exited the hive, Su Xiao saw worker-type insectoids prostrate on the ground. They were all miners. After losing Raging Beetle’s mental network, they entered a ‘standby state.’ These worker-type insectoids were different from combat insectoids; they had no individual consciousness.
There were nearly 100,000 of these worker-type insectoids in total. Compared to the Living Ore obtained, this was an even greater asset.
The more than 9,000 Demon Beasts that had been sent to pursue earlier had achieved decent results. At this moment, these Demon Insectoids had arrived with 30 Spore Tanks.
After leaving 1,000 Demon Beasts at the Raging Beetle Hive, Su Xiao took the remaining Demon Beasts, Spore Tanks, and had Jila remotely guide the nearly 100,000 worker-type insectoids back to their own mother nest.
Su Xiao didn’t plan to occupy the Raging Beetle Hive for now. Although there was a large mineral vein there, it would be best to move there after the base camp mother nest had emptied the small mineral vein.
The journey went smoothly. Bubu Wang kept an eye on the Kara Hive to the west. They didn’t react to the destruction of the Raging Beetle Hive at all, as if it had nothing to do with them.
When the base camp mother nest came into view, Su Xiao breathed a sigh of relief. Although this attack was risky, it allowed them to directly overcome the fragile early stage.
One by one, the worker-type insectoids were decomposed and absorbed by the fungal carpet. The biological energy stored in the base camp mother nest rapidly increased, finally reaching 94850/85000. Jila could now advance to the Mother Queen level.
After some thought, Su Xiao decided not to do this for now. During Jila’s advancement to the Mother Queen level, the base camp mother nest would enter a growth state. During that time, the mother nest couldn’t produce troops. The current 12,053 Demon Beasts wouldn’t be able to hold off strong enemies for long.
Moreover, this was the territory of the insectoid mother queen, Kara. When two Mother Queens appeared in the same area, their mental coverage would inevitably overlap to some extent, causing them to sense each other.
The insectoid mother queen, Kara, was known for being fierce. If Jila advanced to the Mother Queen level and was sensed by her, being driven away would be a polite outcome. It was more likely that Kara would directly go for the kill.
Jila was currently an insectoid queen, which wouldn’t attract the attention of the insectoid mother queen, Kara. Su Xiao decided not to let Jila advance for now. It would be best to accumulate some foundation first before advancing to the Mother Queen level.
Su Xiao’s plan was to convert all the Living Ore. Combined with the existing biological energy, the total would be 126,350 points of biological energy. This could be used to cultivate 252,700 elite worker scorpions. Adding the existing 20,000, that would be 272,700 worker scorpions.
When the number of worker scorpions exceeded 50,000, the War Lord’s [All Ability Level Boost Lv.12] bonus would be triggered, greatly increasing mining efficiency.
The original mining efficiency of worker scorpions was 0.03 units of Living Ore per scorpion per day. After triggering the [All Ability Level Boost Lv.12] bonus, even if the efficiency didn’t double, it would at least increase to 0.04 to 0.05 units per day.
Furthermore, after using Raging Beetle as a plug-in, the obtained worker-type insectoid genes could further enhance the mining ability of the worker scorpions.
A conservative estimate was that each worker scorpion could mine 0.05 units of Living Ore per day. With 272,700 worker scorpions, that would be 13,635 units of Living Ore per day.
Although this was just theoretical data and actual mining would deviate, what Su Xiao planned to do wasn’t normal mining at all. It was devouring the ore.
Conventional mining involved digging mine shafts and then excavating bit by bit. Su Xiao planned to have the worker scorpions dig hundreds of mine shafts, surrounding the underground mineral vein, and then devour it from all directions—top, bottom, front, back, left, and right—with 360° no blind spots.
If the miners from Apocalypse saw Su Xiao doing this, they would definitely clench their fists in anger and accuse him of wasting resources.
Yes, this method was fast but had high loss. Su Xiao didn’t care about that. From the moment he entered this world, he had felt uneasy.
From the very beginning, he had a feeling that the Empire’s orbital cannons and space battleships weren’t as terrifying as imagined. It seemed there was something even more terrifying, stirring and awakening.
Su Xiao communicated mentally with Jila. Jila began to control the mother nest to cultivate worker scorpions. Cultivating worker scorpions was much simpler than cultivating Demon Beasts. A batch could produce 5,700, and it only took about 2 minutes to complete a batch.
Worker scorpions ran out of the mother nest one by one. They began digging holes everywhere on the fungal carpet, carrying out the most violent and direct mining.
In less than two hours, 252,700 mantis-armored scorpions were cultivated. When it came to producing troops, Jila was never inferior to anyone.
Just half an hour after officially starting mining, the base camp mother nest tilted slightly. The digging below was too aggressive, and the mother nest almost collapsed the surface, sinking into the ground.
Jila was genuinely startled. She wasn’t afraid of ghosts, the sea, or perception-type abilities. She was afraid of heights. Jila had a mysterious fear of heights from birth. If she looked down from a height of over 30 meters, she would become as soft as a noodle.
Su Xiao didn’t bother to correct this. No one was perfect. Jila’s eternal homebody personality meant her fear of heights didn’t matter.
Jila controlled the mother nest to retract and move 700 meters away. The mother nest settled down again.
Night quietly passed, and the sky gradually turned pale. At 6 a.m., their worker scorpions had developed to 340,000. While developing only worker-type units without combat units was risky, it was also the fastest way to develop.
340,000 worker scorpions mining a small Living Ore vein led to an overflow situation. This continued until noon that day, when mining stopped because the vein had been completely emptied.
Faced with this situation, Su Xiao chose to move. After deducting the cost of cultivating worker scorpions, the total profit was 4,310 units of Living Ore.
This was just a starting point. With their number of worker scorpions, the theoretical mining data was 17,000 units of Living Ore per day, which meant a daily profit of 170,000 points of biological energy.
This foundation was sufficient. Once the base camp mother nest settled on a large mineral vein, they could consider letting Jila advance to the Mother Queen level.
Even if the insectoid mother queen, Kara, attacked, they would have the ability to wage war. The Jila Insectoids always grew stronger through battle.
The base camp mother nest completed its retraction. After being wrapped by the super giant Spore Tank, the main force set out.
Su Xiao stood on top of the super giant Spore Tank, looking out. As far as the eye could see, there were worker scorpions. What did 340,000 worker scorpions mean? Even from a high vantage point, there was no end in sight. All that could be seen were the dark red carapaces and cylindrical long tails of the worker scorpions.
Su Xiao pressed the wireless earpiece in his ear. This was a secret channel that Bubu Wang had hacked into the Third Fleet. This channel didn’t involve war zone secrets, but the communication information was still valuable. The voice encryption issue had been resolved, but the translated electronic voice was very stiff and sometimes had grammatical errors. For example, translating ‘two monkeys’ might become ‘monkey second,’ a typical case of artificial stupidity.
After listening for a while without hearing anything important, a message suddenly caught Su Xiao’s attention. The inspection unit of the Third Fleet sent a message to the Empire’s home planet. General Sand of the Third Fleet had compromised and agreed to let the other fleets gradually station on Pandora Star.
This was big news. Once other fleets stationed there, the Empire’s forces would show overwhelming superiority, causing the insectoids here to huddle together, unlike now where they only formed a loose alliance.
Ssss~
Signal interference sounded, and the eavesdropping was cut off. It seemed the Third Fleet’s technicians had been driven nearly bald by Bubu Wang’s intrusions recently. These intrusions, though not very damaging, were highly insulting.
Su Xiao had Bubu Wang keep an eye on the insectoid mother queen, Kara, since last night. Up to now, the Kara tribe hadn’t made any moves.
After their main force crossed a dense forest, they arrived near an oxbow lake. The smell of water and grass wafted over. This was the original location of the Raging Beetle Hive.
The Raging Beetle Hive had long been leveled. Their mother nest gradually unfolded. It didn’t settle on the large Living Ore vein but beside it. Given their brutal mining method, it was better to keep the base camp away from the vein.
The mother nest quickly settled down. Jila stood at the entrance, looking at the oxbow lake diagonally opposite, breathing in the air by the water. She had moved to a new home. Even if she was a homebody, she would stand at the door and look, but that was all.
The worker scorpions continued mining. This large mineral vein wouldn’t be emptied so easily. It would be enough to plunder for a while.
Throughout the afternoon, Su Xiao was ready to fight enemies at any time. But the insectoid mother queen, Kara, didn’t come. The Empire’s reconnaissance air force didn’t come. Even the company forces, who were most eager to meddle, didn’t come. It seemed this large Living Ore vein had lost its former appeal.
A warm breeze blew. Su Xiao, wearing a long leather coat, looked at the setting sun on the horizon. The early development had been too smooth. Apart from Raging Beetle, no one had attacked. In fact, Raging Beetle had only attacked because its subordinates were killed.
Interestingly, the insectoid queen, Spider Girl, had always seemed indifferent to life and death, ignoring everyone. But after Raging Beetle became her cellmate, Spider Girl’s mentality underwent a huge change. Her attitude was that she deeply distrusted Su Xiao but was willing to cling to Jila’s thigh from the Jila Insect Star.
After mining all afternoon, the mother nest’s biological energy reserve reached 85598/85000, meaning Jila could advance to the Mother Queen level at any time.
With 340,000 worker scorpions accumulated, this foundation was sufficient. Su Xiao walked into the mother nest and came to the central nest chamber where Jila was. This was the safest place in the mother nest.
Jila was lying on a bed made of biological tissue, her calves crossed, barefoot, her chin resting on a pillow, holding a handheld game console. She looked like she might bite the console at any moment. She was playing a fighting game with Bubu Wang. Bubu Wang had finally found someone worse at the game than himself, so he was definitely going to beat her mercilessly.
“It’s time.”
Su Xiao spoke.
“Huh?”
“...”
Su Xiao didn’t say anything. Jila on the bed panicked a bit. Seeing this, Baha teased from the side, “You’ve been beaten silly by Bubu.”
“Life energy is full. Now?”
Jila sat up seriously.
“Yes, begin.”
Su Xiao took out a can of Primordial Demon Force. The concentration of demon force in this can was so high that it had become a black liquid.
Seeing the can, Jila’s small face gradually put on a painful expression. She wanted to say something, but noticing Su Xiao’s gaze, she quickly took the can, gulped it down a few times, and drank the demon force inside. Her main concern was the taste. The stuff was indescribable.
After drinking the demon force, Jila stood up. Her body leaned back, and a large number of tentacles spread from the wall behind her, enveloping her.
The entire mother nest sealed shut. 12,053 Demon Beasts guarded the surroundings. Bubu Wang, who had just returned, sat crouched on the wooden shed roof, constantly sensing the surroundings. Amu was on top of the mother nest.
Inside the mother nest, Su Xiao sat on a crystal seat. Behind him was Jila, wrapped in mother nest tissue, undergoing transformation. She was within his perception range. If an assassin approached, they would be decapitated in the next instant.
Jila had swallowed [Abyss Stone] earlier and just drank a lot of Primordial Demon Force. This advancement was a natural progression. As long as she wasn’t assassinated, there would be no trouble.
After reaching the Mother Queen level, advancing to the Dominator level would be the real challenge. At this stage, there were no Dominator-level insectoids in this world.
Su Xiao took out a piece of oak wood. This was [Sacred Oak], which he had obtained in the Treeborn World. It had a total of 10 durability points. Using it once reduced it by 1 point, leaving 9 points. Moreover, this equipment’s durability could not be repaired.
[Sacred Oak: Sacrifice 5 points of your own body attribute to gain 1 Golden Skill Point...]
Su Xiao activated the [Sacred Oak] in his hand, sacrificing his Charm attribute. After half a day, he felt nothing. This [Sacred Oak] wasn’t very effective. He had used it twice, and his Charm attribute was still -12 points, not dropping at all.
[You have gained 1 Golden Skill Point.]
Time passed minute by minute. The sky darkened. When the stars filled the sky and the time reached midnight, the base camp mother nest began to change.
Gurgle gurgle~
Like the sound of water boiling, the entire mother nest began to increase in volume. Its height broke through 80 meters, gradually surpassing 100 meters, and finally stopped at around 110 meters. Its footprint was twice as large as before.
The dark purple armor layer on the mother nest’s surface transformed into a black-purple color. Its thickness increased from 50 centimeters to nearly 1.2 meters, greatly boosting its defense.
[Prompt: Your permanent summon, Jila, has advanced to Insectoid Mother Queen.]
[Due to Jila’s advancement to Insectoid Mother Queen, the mother nest she established has evolved to Stage 8.]
[The mother nest has awakened a new gene fragment: Elite Demon Beast (Compared to existing Demon Beasts, enhanced in all aspects).]
[The mother nest has awakened a new gene fragment: Jellyfish (Detection, early warning insectoid unit).]
[The mother nest has awakened a new gene fragment: Research Lab (A Fusion Host Insect will be cultivated in the research lab. The Fusion Host Insect will use the existing gene library to perform gene fusion, thereby creating new insectoid buildings. This research will continuously consume biological energy).]
[Prompt: The Fusion Host Insect is extremely fragile. After leaving the sealed research lab, it will die within a short time. It must be ensured that the research lab is not attacked. Once this insectoid building is attacked, the activated solution inside will leak, causing the Fusion Host Insect in the solution to die.]
[The mother nest currently has the following insectoid building gene groups.]