End of the World: My Items Can Be Upgraded Infinitely.

Chapter 156 Hatching Nest, Second-Level Insect Eggs in the Meat Tower

Just as everyone was ready to take care of the six or seven tiger-spine worms in front of them in one fell swoop, another group of second-order tiger-spine worms suddenly appeared in front of the entrance to the insect nest.

Lin Feng immediately raised his hand to signal the team members behind him to stop aiming their guns.

Six or seven tiger-back worms are easy to deal with, but once the number doubles or even more, the fierce attack of the crowd will inevitably cause vibrations, and then disintegrate the wormhole structure here.

If the top of the building collapses and the mud and rocks fall, covering the entrance to the target insect nest...

All the efforts made before that were in vain.

The wormhole tunnel where everyone is located is far less solid than the large insect nest that is like a cave.

Moreover, the collapse of the tunnel means that the escape route will be completely blocked.

So in the current situation, we must wait for two waves of tiger-backed worm patrols to leave first, or until all of them leave, and then enter the worm nest before launching an attack.

Two waves of tiger-backed worm patrols met each other.

Just like before, they used their giant jaws to touch and communicate with each other and exchange information.

After confirming that everything is safe, they will take over the shift.

Always ensure the safety of the underground insect nest.

However, just as Lin Feng and others were waiting patiently, a tiger-backed worm suddenly left its team, walked into the group of red beetles, and began to use the pincers on both sides of its huge jaws to gently hit the giant red beetles under its feet.

The red beetle seemed to have received some kind of signal and excreted a pile of beige fluid substance directly from the excretion outlet behind the tail abdomen.

It was the food that Lingyi had spit out before and transported to the queen mother!
However, the fluid pulled out from the tail is naturally not as good as the one spit out from the mouth, especially after passing through the digestive tract, it is mixed with many impurities and toxins.

But for the second-level tiger worm, it is still delicious.

Because the red beetle lifts its tail up like an aphid squeezing out sugar solution, the nutrient solution pulled out from its excretion outlet will gradually form a semicircle the size of an iron pot.

The tiger worm then lies sideways and sucks using the mouthparts inside its huge jaws.

Normally, they eat like low-level black-spined worms. They just need to enter the biological nest, and the delivery pipeline will automatically insert it and fill it up like filling up gasoline.

But those foods can only maintain basic survival needs and have no beneficial effect on one's own advancement.

Therefore, apart from devouring the corpses of their own kind, or attacking humans and other insect swarms under the leadership of the queen mother, the black-spined worms have no other channels for advancement.

But the tiger-backed worms, which have higher IQs, will secretly absorb these concentrated nutrient solutions, thereby slowly but safely improving their own levels.

Although the Queen Mother knows this, she will not interfere too much as long as it does not affect the overall interests of the Zerg.

After all, the strength of the second-order Zerg also determines the upper limit of the Zerg's combat strength.

Under the premise that the Queen Mother does not act rashly, dealing with the powerful awakened humans depends entirely on the second-level Zerg.

However, the tiger-backed worm's stealing at this moment made Lin Feng and others who were following the group of red beetles really sweat.

Lin Feng and Shen Jie, who were lying in the front, didn't even dare to breathe, for fear that the tiger spine insect would use its sharp claws to pierce their back shells.

Both of them are wearing armor made from the giant jaws of the tiger-backed worm. With a light tap, you can find the obvious difference.

What's more, the few of them don't have the ability to squeeze out so much nutritious food for the tiger-backed worm.

Fortunately, when this tiger-backed worm that had left the team just sucked in the third red beetle, its companion that had already walked away turned back and let out a few sharp screams, urging it to catch up as soon as possible.

The tiger-backed worm, still not satisfied, let out a strange cry of dissatisfaction and then hurried away.

Everyone's hanging hearts slowly settled down.

After the two waves of tiger-backed insects had left, Lin Feng turned around and looked at Long Yi, asking for her opinion.

Because in telepathy, in this second-level insect nest, which is suspected to be the second-level insect egg hatching nest, there are also tiger-backed insects guarding on both sides of the entrance.

And there are more than two.

There are as many as five in total.

Equivalent to the number of a squad.

In addition, the entrance was small and there were not many red beetles to help provide cover.

As long as we rush in, a fight is bound to break out.

In order to deal with the front and back attacks, Lin Feng and Shen Jie must separate from the ten people to block the swarm from the front and back, and Ling Yi will also be used to interfere with the swarm's actions.

After finalizing the plan, Lin Feng briefly explained it in a low voice. However, a man standing beside him gave another plan:

"Don't rush to act."

"We are already 350 meters underground. We haven't smelled the scent of the Queen Mother from the tiger-backed insects coming from deeper underground, nor from the red beetles that are delivering food. This means that the Queen Mother of the insect swarm here..."

“It’s not underground in the county town, but hidden in other northern urban areas.”

Lin Feng was a little confused:
"So? Our operation time has been extended?"

Long Yi hummed, and continued:

"Not only that."

"If the Queen Mother wasn't here, I could use my power to control the second-order tiger-spine insects in the hive, so that we could enter safely without worrying about being attacked from both sides."

Lin Feng's eyes immediately lit up.

The members of the second-order legion team behind him also showed shocked expressions, and then gradually understood why the commander had to bring this seemingly fragile woman into the dangerous underground insect nest.

If the other party has supernatural powers and can control a second-order swarm of insects, wouldn't he be able to come and go freely in the swarm?

After all, it was her ability that helped the group conceal their disguise and go deep underground.

Lingyi coughed lightly and explained in detail:
"It's not very useful. The conditions for use are too harsh."

"Currently, I can only control seven second-level tiger spine insects at most. The distance cannot be too far. Each time it can only last for half an hour, and the cooling time is also half an hour. It is not as powerful as your direct combat power."

"And it must be used in a place far away from the Queen Mother. Otherwise, not only will the control be taken away, but it will also be sensed by her mind, and it will be completely exposed."

Lin Feng smiled and pointed to the entrance of the insect nest:

"fine."

"Then let's start quickly."

"Half an hour is enough for us to work!"

Long nodded slightly, and under the protection of Lin Feng and others, he slowly walked towards the entrance of the insect nest. At the same time, a golden light flashed in his eyes, and his spiritual power, with the help of the artistic conception, spread out in waves.

Although she is only level 20, her mental attributes have broken the limit and reached the upper limit of 390 in the early stage of the second stage, which is far beyond the reach of ordinary awakeners and second-level Zerg.

After Ling Yi launched mental control, the second-order tiger-backed insects guarding on both sides of the entrance had a bright yellow flash in their eyes, and then they retreated one after another.

The Queen Mother's mental control is like an invisible net covering the entire insect swarm, and it is obviously unable to take care of every individual insect.

Although the Queen Mother's spiritual attribute value is as high as thousands, on average, even if it is dispersed among the second-order Zerg, it is not as good as the centralized control of Lingyi.

In addition, as the Queen Mother's clone, she is already familiar with how to control the second-order tiger-spine worm.

It only took a dozen seconds for Lingyi to seize control of the queen mother and successfully control the five tiger-backed insects in front of him.

Then, under the leadership of Longyi, the second-level legion team carefully stepped into the insect nest.

Then I saw tiger-backed worms on both sides of the entrance, standing there like dumbstruck creatures, like lifeless sculptures.

However, the ferocity they exuded still made the team members raise their shotguns and aim.

Long turned around and said lightly:

"Don't worry, they have eliminated the threat."

As he spoke, he issued an order to the tiger-backed insect swarm: "Go, block the entrance to the cave for me!"

The entrance to the insect nest is only about fifteen meters wide, and a tiger-backed worm can completely block and fill it up. As long as the entrance can be blocked, everyone will have enough time to collect resources.

As soon as he finished speaking, the controlled tiger-backed worms began to move, curling up their bodies one after another and squeezing into the relatively narrow entrance.

Seeing the tiger-backed worm being so obedient, the team members no longer had any doubts and instead showed expressions of great admiration.

Killing tiger-spine worms is not a difficult task for them, but in the underground insect nest, the mental power of control is obviously more effective than simple force.

For example, now everyone has enough time and energy to explore the entire insect nest.

The dragonfly took the brunt of the attack and entered the interior.

Lin Feng signaled to Shen Jie to divide the seven team members into groups of two to explore everywhere.

Although there is also that kind of green slime mold in the insect nest, emitting a faint light, but just like below the first line of defense, due to the huge space of the insect nest cave, only things within ten meters can be seen clearly with the help of sporadic weak light sources.

But in Lin Feng's telepathy, there was only a large light source in the darkness ahead.

There is no way to find the location of the second-order insect eggs.

Therefore, we need to separate them temporarily, expand the search range and speed up the search.

The seven members plus Captain Shen Jie were divided into four teams, and Lin Feng naturally had to follow in the footsteps of Long Yi and form the fifth team to prevent this guy from taking all the spoils for himself.

Long Yi turned his head slightly, seeing all of Lin Feng's thoughts, and just smiled slightly, introducing as he walked:
"This second-level insect nest is used as a hatching nest. It is about four or five square kilometers. Most of it is a biological nest that looks like a mountain of meat. It is used to extract nutrients and inject them into second-level insect eggs. It also stores second-level giant jaws to help the tiger spine worms finally take shape."

"The area where the second-level insect eggs are placed is in the innermost hidden corner."

"And there are some small wormholes over there, which only the black-spine worms know about. When they advance to the late stage of the first stage, they pass through these small holes and come to the incubation room to shed their shells for the last time, remove their armor and form cocoons, giving birth to new life."

Lin Feng frowned slightly. If that was the case, then wouldn’t a lv19 black-backed worm be able to become a lv20 tiger-backed worm without the need to obtain the energy for a cross-level upgrade?
Ling Yi walked in the muddy insect nest and continued to move in a certain direction. He noticed Lin Feng's confusion and started to explain:
"Don't think too much. It's impossible for all first-stage late-stage perfect black-backed insects to become second-stage tiger-backed insects. First of all, it takes ten cocooned black-backed insects to fuse into a second-stage insect egg. Secondly, only less than half of the second-stage insect eggs can successfully metamorphose and develop into tiger-backed insects."

"If there are 10,000 black-backed insects and 1,000 of them can reach the peak of the first stage, then there will be about 50 second-stage tiger-backed insects in the end."

"And the first stage of the third stage queen mother probably only has two to three hundred second stage tiger spine insects, and no more than a thousand at most."

"It is also limited by the synthesis of the second-order giant jaw."

"With limited resources, the construction and production arrangements of biological nests are also limited and need to be allocated reasonably."

“Unless we enter an environment like Taihu Lake, where we have abundant biomass resources, we will go all out to produce.”

Hearing this, Lin Feng suddenly realized:
"Wait, if the egg tissue liquefies..."

"When a first-level black-backed worm is promoted to a second-level tiger-backed worm, will everything in the past be forgotten? Are tiger-backed worms that hatch from eggs newborn worms?"

Ling Yi shrugged and didn't care:
"Of course. This is a shortcut to evolution without killing high-level creatures. It uses the biotechnology conquered by the Zerg. From low-level life to the second stage, it can be directly synthesized through biotechnology. The cost is a little higher, but the advantage is that it fixes the evolutionary model and compresses the time it takes to become stronger."

At this moment, the two of them, like other team members, have found a large biological nest in the insect nest.

Seeing the huge biological factory that looked like a mountain of meat, its still wriggling surface, and the scattered red beetles nearby, they were injecting the nutrient solution in their stomachs into it.

An inexplicable sense of strange horror...

Emerge in everyone's mind.

What we see before us is a giant living organism!

Just like bacteria colonies and jellyfish, they have no thinking consciousness and just mechanically execute certain fixed behaviors that are engraved in their genes.

The genes on the Blue Planet are mainly inherited, and all evolution is for the purpose of giving birth to better offspring and continuing the genes themselves. The Zerg use advanced biotechnology to write codes like the genes of living organisms, giving them new functions and tasks.

For example, there are biological devices for purifying and evolving nutrient solution.

The culture medium it injects into the second-order insect eggs provides energy for the metamorphosis and evolution of the first-order black-spined worms.

There are also some second-order Zerg outer armor synthesis factories that collect the shells of first-order late-stage black-backed insects, then add other metal minerals to decompose and rebuild them, and finally condense the solid outer armor of tiger-backed insects.

Although not as strong as the second-order giant jaws, it can also withstand the attack of individual missiles.

Even if a level 19 shotgun can destroy a building with one shot, it can only seriously damage the outer armor of a second-level tiger-back worm.

The second-order tiger-spine worm is a basic combat unit among the second-order Zerg and also a melee elite. Its birth process no longer relies on self-growth.

Instead, after countless years of iterations, it has evolved into an efficient assembly based on division of labor, cooperation and modularization.

As he walked, the dragonfly introduced himself with a sense of pride. This was the strength of their Zerg civilization:
"The biggest advantage of mass production is that it ensures that the minimum limit of the second-order tiger spine worm can always be maintained above the passing line."

"And this is extremely fast. It is several times faster than the Queen Mother directly synthesizing second-level insect eggs."

"This is also the reason why the Queen Mother does not directly produce second-level insect eggs. Second-level insect eggs can only breed about twenty or so per day, so producing ordinary insect eggs is more cost-effective."

"As for the new second-order Zerg, they were directly synthesized and hatched after they were promoted and broke through, receiving more inheritance and additional biological fusion technology in their state of mind."

“There is no such thing as a larval stage.”

Seeing that there were no other humans around Lin Feng, Long Yi no longer concealed anything and told him everything about the Zerg's operating mode.

And along the way, the two finally arrived at the final destination of this trip.

Not far ahead, there appeared a giant pyramid-shaped meat mountain. Its base was five hundred meters wide and it emitted a faint glow all over.

It looks very solemn and dignified.

If it weren't for the brown-red fleshy layer on the surface that was still slowly contracting and wriggling, Lin Feng would almost have mistaken it for some kind of relic of civilization.

And on the surface of this glowing meat mountain, the second-level insect eggs that everyone has been longing for are embedded in it!
Half of these insect eggs are wrapped in a mountain of meat, with more than a dozen nutrient delivery tubes inserted on the top and around the edges; the other half are exposed in the air.

The faint light comes from the blood vessels that transport nutrient solution and connects to the transparent biological film on the surface of the second-order insect eggs.

They also illuminate the internal structure of the insect eggs.

Therefore, it can be clearly seen to what extent the second-order insect eggs have developed.

Some are still a pot of thick organic liquid, while others have gradually developed into the appearance of tiger insects.

It's like shining a light on a hatching egg and observing the developing chick inside the shell.

At this moment, the number of second-order insect eggs embedded in the surface of this mountain of meat, on Lin Feng's side alone, has reached 210. If the four sides are counted, there are a total of 840!

There are twenty second-order insect eggs in the bottom row, and the number decreases upwards, forming an arithmetic progression.

Lin Feng only took a glance and calculated the sum.

However, it is impossible for a queen mother in the early stage of the third stage to possess so many second-stage insect eggs.

Firstly, there are only tens of thousands of low-level black-backed insects under its command, and within a certain period of time, at most five hundred second-level insect eggs can be produced.

Besides, so many second-level tiger-backed worms are far beyond its control.

This also confirms the speculation of Ling Yi...

The Queen Mother of Haicheng is transferring all the production tasks of the second-order tiger-spine worms in her hands to the allied Queen Mother of Jiangbei, while she herself is concentrating on hatching and synthesizing new second-order Zerg.

At that time, the two groups of Zerg will cooperate again to defeat and annex the human defenders blocking the way.
Then rush into Taihu Lake to complete further expansion!
The invincible fleet in Lin Feng's hands is about to face the most difficult challenge.

Thousands of tiger spine insects were chasing and blocking them.

And the bombardment of hundreds of new second-level Zergs!
Just when everyone saw so many second-level insect eggs and their hearts were surging...

Suddenly, Ling Yi's face changed, and he looked nervously at the back of the hatching nest pyramid, and his footsteps began to approach Lin Feng's back...

At the same time, he reminded:
"Be careful! There are other guards!"

At this moment, the faint light from the meat tower could not illuminate the depths of darkness...

A humanoid creature walked out.

(End of this chapter)