Foreign Land Reclamation By a Vegetable-growing Skeleton

Ange stepped forward, activating the Instant Death Halo.

Insects and beetles all around him keeled over dead, their bellies up in the air. Some of them started madly gnawing on their deceased brethren. Some would bite into the carcass and suddenly die themselves, their remains becoming a meal for another bug.

The perplexed Tribbla people watched, screaming in confusion, “Children! Children! What’s wrong with you? Why this madness?”

In the midst of this mutual carnage, a new change emerged. One of the beetles stood out as being excessively fierce; it quickly grew in size as it consumed the others around it, its shell then cracking open. A larger beetle emerged, shaking as it unfolded a pair of wings.

Ange and his companions had seen this winged beetle once before, near the edge of the Fallen Dragon Lake. The one that had escaped them back then was the same kind.

They didn’t think anything of it initially. It was just a beetle with wings, which Ange had promptly squashed on the spot.

But this beetle now fascinated the Tribbla people, who had been shrieking in confusion just moments before. They suddenly rushed forward yelling, “Winged Emperor! Winged Emperor! My God, the Winged Emperor has been born!”

Negris was faster and flew in to scoop up the Winged Emperor with his stubby hands.

This larger beetle, the size of a small fist, appeared to have no neck. After Negris seized it, however, it stretched out its neck and bit hard into Negris’s claw.

Crack! Negris’ scale was torn!

Negris’ eyes bulged in shock, “Torn? It tore it? These are dragon scales!”

He’d dared to directly handle the insect because he’d relied on his thick skin and tough scales. He hadn’t anticipated that the Winged Emperor would have such powerful jaws, able to tear through them. These were dragon scales!

The escaping humans stood frozen, watching the scene in shock and confusion. But the sight of Negris’s claw reminded them of his previous advice: ‘when you get hungry, you may eat’. They promptly grabbed the beets and started stuffing their mouths.

Now only the insect in Negris’ hands remained. Since its jaws had already broken the claw, Negris simply pushed his claw into its mouth, blocking its mandibles.

While the Winged Emperor had strong jaws, it clearly could not gnaw through dragon claws. It made desperate gnawing sounds, managing only to scrape a few flakes off the claw before the Instant Death Halo left it at death’s doorstep.

Ange, after turning off the Instant Death Halo, cheerfully started harvesting the bodies of the insects. He used the Wind Element to gather them up and then used the Fire Element to burn their remains to ashes. Throughout the process, he didn’t pay attention to the Tribbla people.

The Tribbla people now realized they had overestimated their situation. What scared them even more was that they didn’t understand how their children had died.

Once Ange finished collecting the insect ashes, Negris flew over to the Tribbla person, curiously inquiring, “What hereditary significance does the Winged Emperor have?”

“It’s… it’s an evolved form of the Earth Emperor beetle,” the Tribbla person cooperatively answered.

“What are its traits?” Negris queried.

“It can fly, live long, has strong jaws, and breeds well,” the Tribbla person obediently responded.

“Indeed, it does live long,” Negris nodded. Under the influence of the Instant Death Halo, other insects had perished instantly. But this Winged Emperor was still alive, albeit barely, likely due to starvation.

“How long can it live?” Negris interrogated until he had gathered a detailed account of the Winged Emperor. It can live for a month, ten times as long as a regular beetle, breed ten times as much, and travel at far greater speeds and distances.

So, given the same amount of food, before its life ends, a Winged Emperor can breed over a hundred times as many offspring as a regular beetle. If a swarm of them got out of control, the damage would be far worse than with regular beetles.

An infestation of a hundred times the scale was terrifying to contemplate. However, the silver lining was that the evolutionary mechanism of the Winged Emperor was unclear. The Tribbla people couldn’t figure out how the transformation had occurred, which would explain their excitement at encountering one.

The only certainty was that gnawing on the Dead Branch of the World Tree increased the chances of a regular beetle evolving into a Winged Emperor.

“The Dead Branch of the World Tree? You didn’t register for the Teleportation Array and receive disease-infected offshoots from the elves, did you?” Negris asked.

“Yes, exactly! We got it from the elves,” the Tribbla person confirmed.

“…I hope the elves’ mass giveaway doesn’t lead to any uncontainable issues,” Negris murmured to himself.

Upon seeing this, the Du Pong man hurriedly said, “Can I go now, sir?”

“Go? When did I say you could leave?” Negris asked in surprise.

The Du Pong man’s voice almost broke into a sob, “But… but I’ve been so cooperative, answering anything you ask, please let me go.”

Negris sighed and said, “What’s the point even if I let you go? I’m not holding you hostage, just leave.”

“Thank you, thank you, sir.” Overjoyed, the Du Pong man repeatedly expressed his gratitude and was ready to run away.

But as he turned around, he saw Rogge wielding the Shadow Blade. The mysterious Dark Warrior somehow managed to sneak behind him unnoticed. If not for Negris’ questions, he would have been dead by now.

The Du Pong man stiffened, and suddenly Rogge swung his blade, severing the man’s head entirely. The headless body lunged forward, stumbling past Rogge, who countered with a backhand swing.

He retrieved the Du Pong witch’s soul, looked at Negris, then at Ange who was picking up the Insect Ash.

With a tone of resignation, Negris said, “It’s your turn.”

Rogge fumbled, embarrassed, “I… I don’t know how to soul search.”

“What? You can’t? You’re the Dark Knight Emperor,” Negris exclaimed in shock.

“Well, you know my personality. The memories of others carry too many sentimental emotions that can easily affect me. So, I had Piero erase this skill from me,” Rogge explained.

Well, can’t have the Dark Knight Emperor getting depressed from searching memories. In the end, Ange had to do it.

The Du Pong man that Ange had searched before in the village did not have the location of the Chaos Temple in his memory. This Du Pong man didn’t have it either, but he did know how to get to the temple.

“Follow the bugs, crawling traces, into the Gray Rock cave, straight to the temple door,” Ange summarized the memories he retrieved from the Du Pong man’s soul.

The group followed the insect tracks into the Gray Rock cave. Dark City was located within a stratum of red earth, where Gray Rock caves were few, a very noticeable feature. They just had to follow this feature, with no fear of getting lost, worst case scenario they could just turn back.

Negris decided to go take a look first, if there was a risk of getting lost, they would immediately turn back.

“We should get some teleportation scrolls, the ultimate tool for exploring underground caves or mazes. Even if we do get lost, we can return home immediately by tearing a scroll. Ange can copy these, it’s a pity we don’t have any blank scrolls. Let’s go take a look first. If it doesn’t work, we’ll go copy a bunch of scrolls and come back,” Negris said.

“Find bugs,” Ange stated, his objective had shifted from killing Hermorthos to finding bugs.

“Yes, yes, good, good. Kvada, a god is not even as useful as a heap of fertilizer. Hermorthos would die of anger if he knew,” Negris said snappishly.

Soon, by following the Gray Rock Cave and insect tracks, they arrived at a huge underground space. The entire space was oval-shaped, with the middle part being the widest, and the two ends spanning a distance of two to three thousand kilometers.

They entered from the higher end, and far away at the other end, they could faintly see a stone building that looked like a door.

“Is that the temple door?” They arrived in front of the stone door, about two meters tall. Negris murmured: “This is too shabby, even the Purple Corpse couldn’t squeeze through.”

Lightning walked over and gestured, “I can’t squeeze through either, I think I’ve gained weight.”

Negris was about to poke fun when he felt a violent spatial fluctuation behind him.

Turning back, a sudden flash of light erupted about ten meters away from them. A female mage wielding a thick magic wand appeared screaming, throwing her wand away and desperately tearing at her robe.

While tearing and slapping at herself, she quickly stripped naked, screaming in horror, “Ah, ah, ah! Bugs! Bugs! Bugs!”

Negris looked left and right, then lunged at Lightning, covering its eyes.