Chapter 3: Immortal Rank · Insect Gene · Frenzied Beastman (To cultivate this unit, requires 5400 Bio Energy, 100 units of Special Steel, and 1 × Wrathful Soul.)
...
A treasure chest larger than normal, but less refined, appearing rough and rugged, materialized in Su Xiao's hands. Along with it was a 5-centimeter-thick glass tube, inside which a spiral-shaped fleshy sprout was immersed—this was the gene sequence of the Frenzied Beastman.
Upon examining the item's information, Su Xiao learned that the Frenzied Beastman was overall humanoid, standing over 5 meters tall, a genetically mutated "monster" formed by combining the genes of a half-human race, a rage beast, and an insect unit.
This thing resembled an enraged Hulk, except its skin was gray, its muscles were knotted and bulging, and its internal skeleton was composed of steel. To put it simply, if it caught you, tearing apart a Solar Flame Dragon with its bare hands would be no problem. Of course, if distance was maintained, the Frenzied Beastman would be burned to death by dragonflame.
The Frenzied Beastman was good in every way, except that it required a "Wrathful Soul" to cultivate, and there was no telling where to get that.
Su Xiao stored the Frenzied Beastman's gene sequence. Half an hour later, 150 Solar Flame Dragons flew back, each clutching a Spore Tank. The subsequent transport process was simple: the Spore Tanks were filled with Living Ore, then the Solar Flame Dragons grabbed them again, using them as "bags" to transport the Living Ore back to the base camp.
From Su Xiao's arrival to the end of the war, and packing up all kinds of loot to take away, the entire process took just over five hours, so fast that the other Insect Race Mother Queens didn't have time to react.
Not only that, but their own Mantis Armors and Worker Scorpions had also arrived—500 Mantis Armors and 300,000 Worker Scorpions. The former were responsible for establishing a sub-nest, while the latter immediately began mining.
Su Xiao left 200 Demon Flame Dragons as a defensive force, then leaped onto a dragon's back and headed back toward their own base camp.
This time, having arranged for Gai, they had obtained a total of 170,000 units of Living Ore, which was 1.7 million points of Bio Energy, enough to cultivate 472 Solar Flame Dragons. At first glance, it seemed like a loss, but if the subsequent profits were factored in, it would gradually become an enormous gain.
First, the sub-nest was built on a super-large mineral vein. If they mined it violently without regard for the vein's depletion, it could support at least 600,000 Worker Scorpions in mining operations.
Thanks to the improvements made by Insect Race Scientist · Ploss, and the continuous expansion of the Worker Insect Race gene pool, each Worker Scorpion could mine 0.16 units of Living Ore per day.
Thus, the sub-nest's daily yield would be 96,000 units of Living Ore. If they could capture all five super-large mineral veins, the daily yield would reach 480,000 units of Living Ore.
If that was too slow, they could resort to even more violent open-pit mining, which would multiply the mining speed several times over, but the loss rate of Living Ore would be alarmingly high, reaching 50% to 60% of the total mineral reserves.
The return journey was uneventful. When Su Xiao stepped onto the fungal carpet, the transported Living Ore and the fragments of the enemy Mother Nest had already been converted into Bio Energy. A total of 2.4 million points of Bio Energy was in hand—the enemy insect nest was also rich in Bio Energy.
Su Xiao walked into the Mother Nest, with Amu following behind, carrying Gai. They entered the main passage and then a branching passage leading to the lower levels of the Mother Nest. Before long, Su Xiao arrived at several cells made of biological tissue.
Cell No. 1 housed the Spider Girl, and Cell No. 2 housed Rage Armor. At that moment, Rage Armor was gripping the bars with both hands, glaring at Su Xiao with defiance written all over his face, and the words "I hate this" practically carved on his forehead.
"Amu, give him a beating."
Baha spoke.
"Moo."
Hearing this, Amu opened the cell door and walked inside. Rage Armor looked like a tough, iron-blooded man at first glance, but unfortunately, he was an Insect Race leader, a psychic type. In close-quarters combat, he was thoroughly beaten by Amu.
Opening Cell No. 3, Su Xiao threw Gai inside. Just as he closed the door and was about to leave, he noticed that the Spider Girl in Cell No. 1 seemed to have undergone a significant change.
Initially, when the Spider Girl first arrived, she appeared emotionless, as if saying she had no feelings, that any threats or torture against her were useless, and she would never yield.
But ever since she got Rage Armor as a neighbor, Su Xiao discovered that the Spider Girl wasn't emotionless at all—she had been faking it before. Not only did the Spider Girl have emotions, she had quite a rich range of them.
Ever since Su Xiao captured Rage Armor, the Spider Girl's attitude toward Jila had been improving day by day, almost to the point of saying, "Big shot of the Jila Star, I'll follow you from now on. Do you need a sidekick or not?"
Jila ignored this. It wasn't that she didn't want to deal with it; she simply couldn't be bothered.
Just now, Su Xiao had thrown Gai into Cell No. 3, and the Spider Girl had witnessed it all. Her gaze had become clear.
Su Xiao didn't communicate with the Spider Girl. He was well aware of the effect his Charm Attribute would have, as could be seen from Rage Armor, who, despite being beaten, still looked utterly defiant.
Leaving the Mother Nest, Su Xiao had just entered a two-story wooden building nearby when he saw Bubu Wang and Kaisa huddled together, scheming. Approaching, he saw that Bubu Wang had established an audio and video channel, like an encrypted chat room that only six IDs could enter.
First was Su Xiao, the room owner, who had all permissions for this video chat room. Then there was the administrator, Bubu Wang, who also had considerable authority.
Kaisa, also an administrator, would serve as the auctioneer for this auction.
The last three slots were reserved for representatives of the Empire faction, the Company faction, and the Crimson Queen's camp.
The purpose of this chat room was to auction off the "C5N2 Superconductor." The 150 kilograms of "C5N2 Superconductor" that Su Xiao had hijacked yesterday were now ready for auction. The starting bid was 200,000 units of Living Ore.
The preliminary work was already done. Upon hearing about this yesterday, the Empire and the Company were both extremely angry. In their extreme anger, they fumed all night and decided this morning to proceed with the auction. That batch of "C5N2 Superconductor" was very important to them.
The Empire and the Company participating together actually meant the Empire was giving the Company a chance to buy their way out of trouble. The Empire now knew that Su Xiao had hijacked the spaceship, but that was useless. Su Xiao was already a Level 3 wanted criminal of the Empire, with high bounties on his head across over a dozen colony planets. Finding him on Pandora Star was as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack.
The Empire's stance was: if they couldn't find Su Xiao, they would go after the Company. If the Company managed to win the bid for this batch of "C5N2 Superconductor," the matter would be dropped for now. If they didn't, unless the Company could hold it in tight, the Empire would beat them until they shit themselves.
The Company was now panicking. This batch of superconductors was what they had sold to the Empire. Since it was a highly scarce resource, the Empire had paid in full upfront. Unfortunately, the goods were hijacked before crossing the border line, making it entirely the Company's fault.
Therefore, even if it cost them dearly, the Company had to secure this batch of superconductors. The Crimson Queen's involvement was purely to make the Empire suffer.
Directly turning against the Empire was unwise, but the Company was the Empire's lackey. The Crimson Queen had long despised the Company. Now that she could both make the Company bleed and annoy the Empire, she was naturally happy to participate. Kaisa had already promised her a reward afterward.
"My dear friend, it's all settled. When it starts is entirely up to us."
"Mm, then..."
Before Su Xiao could finish his sentence, Baha suddenly flew in and said, "Boss, the Crimson Queen is here."
Hearing this, Su Xiao signaled Kaisa to temporarily withdraw. Kaisa had no objections and went to a private room upstairs.
A figure entered the insect nest. She wore a gorgeous red dress, clearly an avatar or incarnation of some kind. The Insect Race Mother Queens of this world all liked to create humanoid clones or avatars, since they had been at war with humanity for so long.
The Crimson Queen's expression was cold. Her crimson eyes fixed on Su Xiao. After a moment, she said in a cold tone, "The Spider Queen pleaded for you, asking me to settle accounts with you later."
The Crimson Queen's attitude was normal. After all, Gai was a member of the Insect Race Alliance, and a very important one at that. Compared to Brutal · Kara, the low-key Aisea, or the Spider Queen, Gai was the one who most supported the Crimson Queen.
Now that her supporter had been eliminated, and with Brutal · Kara constantly eyeing the leadership position after the ceasefire, the Crimson Queen was already showing restraint by not directly going to war with Su Xiao's side.
Calling it restraint, it was actually because the Crimson Queen always felt that this matter was not simple. The threat from Brutal · Kara was growing, and the Empire's attitude was becoming more arrogant. A full-scale war seemed to need only a spark. That was why she didn't directly start a war with Su Xiao but instead came with her avatar to take away the still-living peace faction leader, Gai. She had already sensed his life force.
"Crimson Queen, instead of going to the Spider Queen, why are you coming to us?"
Baha spoke, a hint of confusion in his tone.
"You know the answer."
"Wait a minute. You just said the Spider Queen pleaded for us? What the hell? Let me sort this out. First, the Spider Queen hired us to eliminate Gai, with the loan as payment, on the grounds that Gai had stabbed her in the back. Specifically, it was about the time the Spider Queen tried to infiltrate the Empire's high ranks but was exposed in just two days."
"..."
The Crimson Queen furrowed her delicate brows slightly. She knew about the Spider Queen being backstabbed. At the time, it had become a laughingstock. However, that had been Aisea's doing. Aisea had always kept a low profile but struck ruthlessly when acting in the shadows.
Now, without evidence, the Crimson Queen didn't believe Baha's explanation. Just as she was about to speak, Su Xiao pulled a contract promissory note from his chest.
After the Crimson Queen took the Contract Parchment, she first felt the contract force emanating from it. The power of this contract was the strongest she had ever seen. Continuing to read, the Crimson Queen found that the contract's content was indeed that the Spider Queen had used the loan as payment for Su Xiao to eliminate Gai. The spider-shaped imprint on it was unmistakably the Spider Queen's.
This made the Crimson Queen recall that, before she came, the Spider Queen had unusually come to plead, meaning that she should wait a few days before demanding an explanation.
Originally, the Crimson Queen thought the Spider Queen was afraid of not recovering the loan. Now, it seemed that wasn't the case. It appeared that the Spider Queen had orchestrated all of this behind the scenes. This Contract Parchment was irrefutable evidence, impossible to deny. Such strong contract force was truly the first time the Crimson Queen had encountered it.
This was a contract notarized by Reincarnation Paradise, so of course, the contract force was strong.
Where did the Contract Parchment in the Crimson Queen's hand come from? Simple. The Spider Queen had indeed signed a promissory note with Su Xiao before. That note was fine—it was a contract item made by the Spider Queen herself, intended to trap Su Xiao.
The problem was that when the note was signed, Su Xiao had laid down a layer of contract force underneath it, using that layer like carbon paper.
The situation when signing that note was: the note was on the table, the contract force was spread on the underside of the table, and below that was the Contract Parchment that Su Xiao had already prepared.
When the Spider Queen imprinted her personal mark on the note, the layer of contract force pressed against the underside of the table acted like a sheet of carbon paper, "copying" the spider imprint onto the contract Su Xiao had prepared.
Thus, the Spider Queen had unknowingly signed a contract she didn't even know about.
No, not just one. This Contract Parchment could be peeled open into 23 layers, each with different content.
The Crimson Queen was silent for a few seconds. Finally, she took the Contract Parchment and turned to leave. If the Spider Queen couldn't explain this contract today, the Crimson Queen would make her understand why she was the leader of the Insect Race Alliance.