Ch 23

Evolution Complete

Overmind Lvl 3

Health – 300/300

Mana – 2500/2500

Abilities:

Physical:

Spawn Hive (200 Mana) – Grows a Zerg Lair at your current location (12 hours)

Burrow (0 Mana) – Go underground; unable to move; can only be detected by sensors

Burrow Move (0 Mana) – Ability to move underground when burrowed

Transfusion (50 Mana) – Instantly transfer 125 health to biological unit or structure

Shapeshift (0 Mana) – Take on the appearance of any target similar in size

Adamantium Armor (Passive) – All physical type damage is blocked 100%

Photosynthesis (Passive) – Ability to obtain partial sustance from light sources

Psionic:

PSI Assault (1 Mana) – Casts a focused PSI attack at one enemy

PSI Storm (50+ Mana) – Casts a localized storm of PSI energy

Flight: Mind Over Matter (0 Mana) – Can propel yourself using only your mind, limited only by the mind

PSI Guantlet Lvl 2 (Passive) – Mana Above 0; Strength increased by factor of 20

PSI Armor Lvl 2 (Passive) – Mana Above 0; All attacks do 50% less damage

PSI Sensor (Passive) – Mana Above 0; Able to detect cloaked, burrowed, and hallucinated units

Magic:

Exploding Fireball (5 Mana) – Explodes on contact, not affected by gravity, spreads flame, deflected by opposing opposite force

Fire Charge (2 Mana) – Shoots rapid balls of fire in three round bursts after each charge

Self Combustion (1 Mana per second) – Wrap yourself in flames spontaneously

Lightning Lvl 3 (0 Mana) – Can cast a lightning bolt into any location, even without sky

Animation (10 Mana) - Give inananimate objects a limited form of life; enslaved

Reanimation (15 Mana) – Give limited life to the biological deceased; enslaved

Teleport Lvl 3 (0 Mana) – Can teleport any distance, into any solid, liquid, gas, or plasma, so long as you've been to the location before

Invisibility Lvl 3 (0 Mana) – Can become undetectable to any source, can choose to reveal yourself to individual sources

Flight: Flame Propulsion (1 Mana per second) – Fly using the thrust of conjured flame

Fire Immunity (Passive) – Mana above 0; 100% immune to heat, fire, lava, etc.

Celestial:

Creation Lvl 1 (500 Mana) - Able to build anything with your mind you already know how to build manually; size limited to ten times your own size

Adaptive Strength (Passive) – Base strength is set automatically to allow the ability to lift and throw any weight

Incorporeal (Passive) – Take on a non physical state automatically in reaction to any danger

True Sight (Passive) – Able to see through any limitation to vision (ie. Lack of light, solid matter)

Zerg Mana – 1,058,537,860/1,000,000,000,000

Evolution complete indeed. I'm starting to rack up quite a nice list of abilities aren't I? I'm still not sure what I was thinking when I decided to give every unit in the Swarm Lightning Lvl 3. Sending a swarm of Speedlings at an enemy would just result in them getting fried by lightning before the Speedlings even get close, and that's not even taking into account the fact that all my Zerg can fly now. The mental image of Zerglings flying through the sky shooting lightning bolts is so ridiculous as to be funny.

Speaking of that flying ability, that last line in the ability Mind Over Matter is very interesting. If Mind Over Matter flight is limited only by the mind, for all intents and purposes, so long as I believe I can do it, then I can in that case! Heck, if I believed myself capable of flying over the speed of light then I probably could! There's a small problem with that though. My body may be incapable of physical damage, but my insides aren't. If I suddenly accelerated to FTL speed, then my brains and organs would probably become mush within my own exoskeleton. So, in lieu of that, I probably won't be going retardedly fast until I've got some form of immortality set up. Still, I can now go pretty fast without spending any mana, along with the rest of my Zerg. I'm still not sure how it was possible to apply the ability to my buildings though. I honestly didn't expect it to work but it did. Asking the ZGA doesn't help either, since it doesn't know. Or more specifically, it just says Unknown.

As for my Teleport, as a quick test, I focus on the mental image of that summit at the top of the Aether, and activate the teleport. Next thing I know, I'm at the summit, and my Queens are freaking out a little bit since I disappeared from the vision of the Swarm entirely. Suddenly they appear by my side. Huh. Evidently they can teleport to where I am by simply focusing on myself and activating their teleports. They also look kinda mad.

"What did I tell you about testing out things without letting us know!? What if you're hurt?" I smiled and said, "Well it's a good thing we now know that you can teleport directly to me even if you don't know where I am in the unlikely case that ever happens!" Asura threw up her arms in a huff and teleported back to the Hive, along with the other Queens, some of which gave me the stinkeye, though the look of heartbroken misery on Joy and Cuddles' faces were far worse. I'm not an idiot though. I remember what I did the last time this happened, so before they could get anywhere, I teleported to them all and gathered them in a big group hug, thanking them for caring and promising that I'd try my best to tell them when I'm about to do any tests in the future. This seemed to mollify them a bit, though I had to hug Asura and Rose for extra long before they calmed back down.

Crisis averted, I settled down with my Queens, enjoying a meal with them, then taking them out to test our new Lightning ability. I must say though, having a spammable, zero cost lightning attack is a little ridiculous. So long as you can think of activating the ability fast enough, you can literally fill as far as you can see with lightning bolts almost instantaneously. I have to wonder if, in the end, this attack can do more damage than my PSI storm ever could. Considering if you keep up the casting of the lightning bolts near instantaneously, you can keep up a literal field of lightning almost indefinitely, so long as you don't get distracted from casting.

The only thing that could make it even more overpowered would be if we did travel over the speed of light. If we also found an ability to increase our perception to that speed, then theoretically we could keep up a field of lightning even larger than just our current range of vision. Speaking of which, I tried using my mental map to target the casting of the lightning, and it worked. Even the field of lightning attack could cover the entirety of the vision range of the Swarm that way. The sheer possibilities available with this attack are beyond ridiculous.

I also tested out the ability to teleport into solid matter, making sure to warn my Queens of my actions first. Doing so, I found that in conjunction with incorporeal and true sight, being inside anything that would normally block my vision makes the world look like what you see in a video game if you turn clipping off and move outside of the rendered space. That's not all though, but the closest I could possibly describe it as would be playing Minecraft, turning clipping off, flying through the wall, then turning X ray mod on so you can see what's in the walls too. I have to think of it as flying though. Being incorporeal means that I'm basically free floating inside solid matter, so if I don't move as if I'm flying with Mind Over Matter, I just fall towards where gravity takes me, until I pop back out of the walls. The whole experience was kind of surreal.

Doing further tests with True Sight by diving into lava and water proved that my sight is no longer hindered by either. Unlike the lava though, while I was in the water, the image of seeing through the water, and seeing as if there's no water in the way superimposed themselves, kind of like if you unfocused your eyes and you get double images, if you focus, the images rejoin back together. It's the same concept here, only seeing both is the normal state. It's kind of disorienting, so I forced myself to practice so I could get used to it, which my Queens did the same, since they had pretty much given me the ultimatum that any test I do, would be one they would do, so if any test would be one I wouldn't want them to be doing, then they sure as heck wouldn't want me doing it either! I'm just glad I've not yet thought of a test I wouldn't want them to do or else I'd be a bit annoyed at the limitation.

While in the midst of all these tests, my Queens went about the usual actions of the day as well, creating 1,602,330 Drones to turn into Hives, and then spreading the lot evenly in expanding the Creep in the Overworld, the Void, the Nether, and even sending a drone up to that mountain summit in the Aether. Once that one's done, it's entirely possible my Queens and I will move our home Hive to that one.

Also of note is that my Queens and I are about to hit a rather big mark in our history. At the current rate we're going, it'll probably only be two more days and two more times creating drones to spread the creep until the entire Overworld is covered. I'm not sure what we'll do to commemorate the occasion. Maybe have another glass of apple juice? I still can't believe it's not even been that long to cover the entirety of this planet. It's almost hard to believe. What's even harder to believe though is that if The Void and the Overworld are equal in size, which from first glance it very well might be, then the amount of area able to be covered with Creep has just about doubled, then add the fact that I can now cover the outer shell of the Nether with Creep too?

Speaking of the Nether, I'm reminded of that crack that I wanted to try and close up in the shell of the Nether. Bringing my Queens with me, we each grab the crack and quite easily close it back up. I probably could've done it on my own, but having more hands made the whole process far easier. I've only got two arms after all. With that finished, I told my Queens of my plans to spread the Creep in the new spaces available. I noticed Joy wasn't really listening though. She'd turned to look up and she hadn't turned away from whatever it is yet. Curious, I turned my gaze up to see what she's looking at and just about froze in wonder myself.

I remember seeing pictures of what the Earth looked like from orbit. This… this is kind of like that. The entirety of the void is laid before us. No matter where you look. It's like standing on the Halo ring world and looking up, only the sight is all around you. Most of the landscape still has that creepy inverted black and white look, but the sight of the start of the Hive is like looking at a city lit up at night, so long as you can ignore that the night sky is white instead of black. It doesn't look normal except for the area that's lit up. I can't wait to finish filling this place up. As amazing as it looks now, this inverted empty Overworld lookalike will look incredible once finished. The only thing marring it a little is that the Nydus Network still has a few bodies stretching from the ground to the Nether. I'd removed most of them to travel solely through the crust, but if I want any Nydus Worm openings in the Nether at all, then I have to have a few of the bodies stretching out to the center.

Unless… why didn't I think about that before? Putting out the orders quickly, I had the Nydus worms retract back into the ground of the Void, filling up the holes as it went just as it had with all the other holes in the Void. Then I commanded the hundred drones I'd all but forgotten about to create more Hives in the lava and elsewhere, but one of them I ordered to build a Nydus Network. Now I can have Nydus Worms in the Nether without those bodies stretching through the sky in the Void.

Doing this broke my million mana base line, but that'll be ok since I don't really have any more plans for evolving at the moment. The only place left to assimilate new strains on this world is the End, and I haven't even gotten there yet.

Faye turned to me and asked me, "Why did you build a Nydus Network in the Nether? We don't need their transportation abilities anymore."

I nodded in agreement to this and explained, "I want the Nydus Worms for excavation work. If I can make multiple levels in the ground, then I can have multiple layers of creep, multiplying my mana input by practically ten fold if not more!"

Faye seemed to gape for a moment at this, then shut her mouth and nodded smiling, "As to be expected from you Matthew. You'll never cease to amaze." I think I blushed at that because my face felt a bit warm at her compliment.

With the events of the day basically over and night coming, my Queens and I spent the night hours playing tag with our new teleport abilities. I also tested my invisibility, and while it did prevent my Queens from seeing where I am, they knew through our connection where I was anyway.

After a while of this I settled down to test the final ability, Creation Lvl 1. My Queens settled down with me, forming a circle inside the Hive.

"What are you going to create?" Asked Asura.

I shrugged and answered, "I haven't decided yet."

Of course, the main reason I hadn't decided yet is because thoughts kept flying through my head of what I want to create, but all of the ideas were things I don't actually know how to make. That limitation is really getting to me, since I don't actually know how to make very much. All I know is what I do make, I want it to be something from my old home, Earth.

That thought actually startled my thought processes to a halt. I just referred to Earth as my old home. Thinking about it, I realized that at this point, I consider this my home now, with my Queens. I suppose it makes sense. Home is where the heart is, and while I do miss my family on Earth, my Queens here are far more important to me. Still, Earth is my old home, so it'll always have a place in my heart and I do hope to see it again someday.

Now, what do I actually know how to make? Is this ability limited to what I've seen made, or is it something that I actually have to be able to construct with my hands? If it's the latter, than the most I'll be making things from is paper machete. If it's the former though, I've got a rough idea of how a lot of things work.

Then I hit upon an awesome idea. What if I can make something in my mind that I should be able to make with my hands? In that case, I have just the idea to try. First and foremost, I'm tired of laying on the floor with my Queens. I want a bed. Focusing on my mind's eye, I form a solid wood bedframe that interlocks together to become solid. The bed is extremely large and just slightly concave. Next comes the mattress. This is the part where I flounder a bit, until I imagine sewing together a mattress case, then shove it full to the brim with feather down, then I place it between two presses and flatten it, then stuff it full of down again. I complete the process five times until the bed is a bit firm, but very soft. Unfortunately, that's when I realize that wouldn't work for this ability since I don't know how to make the material needed to create a mattress case. Hopefully that won't matter though, since if I have to know how to make every single piece that goes into anything I could make, then I doubt I'll be able to use the Creation ability at all.

Pushing ahead, I put the mattress on top of the bedframe, then I imagine deep red satin bedsheets fitted to the bed with down filled pillows and deep red maroon blankets. I imagine how soft such a thing must be and how the firmness must feel in case that has anything to do with the process of creating such a thing, then I cast Creation.

Nothing happened.

I sighed, slumping. It looks like I can only make things that I know how to make for real. Going for something simple, I imagine carving a hunk of wood into a round ball, then sanding the wood and then polishing it with… crud, I can't polish it with resin. I don't know how to make resin! I don't know how to make varnish either. Leaving the ball in its smooth sanded state in my mind, I cast Creation. Energy flowed out of me, dropping my mana to 2000/2500, and in my hands is the coconut sized wooden ball.

I held it up, regarding it slightly disappointed. "Well… that's something I guess." I contemplate whether I should've painted the thing until I remembered I don't know how to make paints either. I realize with disappointment that all of the things I know how to make are mainly just things that need assembly. I don't have a clue how to really make anything from scratch. I don't even know how to make glass! The best I could do would be to have an Overlord melt the sand and hope for the best. Maybe experiment a lot until… until…

My eyes widened. Tools! That's the answer! Normally I wouldn't be able make a round ball of wood unless I had the tools to do it! Well, so long as I can imagine the tool, even if said tool doesn't actually exist, then wouldn't that let me create something more unique? What if I imagined entering the information for my bed into an advanced 3D printer? In that case, I imagine typing into the machine the specs for my bed, including size, shape, texture, relative softness and the materials it's made from, using samples from my own mind, even if I don't know how to actually make the stuff directly. That finished, I hit the mental 'print' button, creating out of thin air my ideal bed! I technically made it with my hands that way! Let's hope this mental trick works. Concentrating on my fabricated bed, I activate Creation.

...Nothing happened.

Where did it go wrong though? Was it the imaginary tool? Does it only work if I imagine tools I've actually used before? In that case I'm even more limited than I thought! In pure frustration, I imagined one of my Overlords setting itself on fire to melt down a slab of Adamantium then pressing it into a slab like form as big as it could make it, and considering the size of an Overlord, that's not very much, probably something like 8x8x1 or something. Thankfully, that's below ten times my size. Still though, imagining setting an Overlord on fire to pull it off is satisfying, and just for the heck of it, I cast Creation.

Blinking, there's suddenly a huge slab of Adamantium standing on end in front of me. Two of my Queens have gone corporeal as soon as it appeared since it pretty much appeared inside of them. Standing up, and rushing back a bit, I eye the slab in surprise, while the Queens express surprise of their own. "Did you mean to create this?" Asura asked. I shook my head answering, "Not exactly. I was trying to make things in my mind and bring them out with Creation, but none of my ideas were working, so I… kinda got mad and mentally created this, knowing the process would probably set an Overlord on fire. I didn't think it would actually work though, since this isn't exactly something I created with my own two hands. Heck, it's not even anything I've made before."

I stepped up to it, and grabbed with both hands, testing if I could pick it up. Unsurprisingly I could, so I took it outside and put it in the Hive with all of my other mined stuff. I shake my head, lamenting the waste of 500 mana on such a thing. It's not like I could even use it for flooring for the multiple levels I want to try, since it's far too small, and the plates of Adamantium would have to be far bigger than this if I don't find a way to somehow make it solid. It is good to know that my Overlords are capable of melting Adamantium though, and even if it does catch the Overlords on fire it hardly matters since the Zerg are fire proof. Maybe… if I got a number of these plates and put them in a mold, then had the Overlords pour the melted Adamantium into the cracks, I could form larger plates of the stuff that way. And, if I did that inside of the hives, which can also control their internal temperatures, then the Adamantium could be properly cooled too! But then again, it still might not be structurally sound to do such a thing though. Solid slabs of Adamantium artificially cooled in a press are one thing, but to have it cooled while it's in a glue like state might not be good. If only I had something like the Zerg equivalent of a factory or something! Like a giant version of the insides of an Overlord would be nice.

Then I wondered, why can't I? I'm the Overmind aren't I? Can't I create new strains and buildings through the ZGA? Not everything the Zerg have must be something adapted from something else that already existed right?

Welcome to the Zerg Genetic Archive

Input Command

:Do I have the requirements necessary to create a new Zerg building?

Negative. Cerebrate or Cerebrate geneticist required.

:This is ridiculous! Anything a Cerebrate can do is just an extension of what I can do! Why would I require a Cerebrate to create a new Zerg building if they can only do what I can do?

Logic error. Zerg Cerebrates are creatures of the Swarm designed to perform specific tasks by the Overmind. The Overmind itself does not need to know how to do everything the Zerg can do, otherwise none of the Zerg would have any abilities the Overmind did not already start with.

Touché ZGA. That's a very good point. The original Overmind did start out much the same way I did, absorbing all it could on Zerus, discarding and keeping mutations and abilities as it went. If it absorbed a creature that could fly, it didn't necessarily need to know how to fly itself in order for that minion to fly. I'm just lucky that I've already got a large base to work with in the original Overmind's Zerg Swarm. If I was stuck absorbing only what I found here on this planet, then I'd have been screwed if I planned to go off world. My Zerg are already developed enough to survive in space though, so I don't have to worry about that.

I guess I'll just have to wait till level five till I can truly start advancing the Zerg then. Something tells me I'm going to need it. With the Adamantium slab put away, I wandered back over to the Hive and settled down with my Queens once more. Just a few minutes more and…

Zerg Mana – 2,291,863,550

Bingo! With the new deposit, we can finally get back to the old schedule of creating drones at midnight! I'm really glad this is the case since it's so much easier to get more mana in the long run this way. Now we just need to keep up this schedule, rather than getting distracted from it like last time, even if we didn't have much of a choice in getting distracted by Herobrine.

My Queens immediately set about creating more Drones. Not even half an hour later and I've got 3,524,405 Hives in the making. It seems I've miscalculated though. By the time this group of Hives is done, the entire Overworld will be covered with a grand total of roughly 6 million Hives.

I chuckled seemingly out of nowhere and Asura asked, "What's funny?" I replied, "Hehe, it just occurred to me that this planet doesn't even have a name. We've been referring to it by the different areas for so long that I'm almost starting to think this world's name IS Overworld." Asura smiled indulgently and said, "You could always name this planet, Matthew. It is yours now after all."

I nodded thoughtfully, "It is isn't it? Notch said as much. Hmm… fans of the game Minecraft usually call their different worlds their own names, but the official world, if there ever was one, always seems to be Minecraftia… I think I'll stick with the majority on this one. I name this planet, Minecraftia." My Queens smiled at this, and through the use of another Overlord, I got some apple juice for us to commemorate the occasion. Between the naming of this world and having the Overworld covered with Creep by this afternoon, it's a pretty momentous day.

With nothing left to do for the time being, I took a drink from the Mana pool, refilling my stores, and lowering the Zerg Mana to 1,000,100. After that I spent the rest of the night flying through the sky with my Queens. As expected, it was only a few hours into the night when yesterday's batch of Hives completed. It's amazing how thrilling and relaxing flying is. Before I knew it, midday had come and my latest batch of Hives completed as well, bringing the total number of Hives up to 10,309,082, thus completing the coverage of the Overworld with Creep. The view of the planet from my Overlord in space is pretty amazing. Thanks to the creep coverage, Minecraftia is now a ball of blue and black, with speckles of green from the trees that hadn't been knocked over, and glows in the dark. It's quite the amazing sight.

Unfortunately, at 10 million Hives, I'm finally starting to run out of space to spread the Creep. With the Overworld covered, most of the space available in the Nether covered, a chunk of the Nether's outershell covered, and a large portion of the void covered, it wouldn't really surprise me if this time tomorrow, all space will be taken up and I'll have Drones left over. I haven't really started to spread into the Aether yet, but I really need to start that excavation project now. Before I can do that though, I set my Overlords to searching through the crust of the planet for the gateway to the End. It doesn't even take them an hour to find it with their new speeds and 360 degree eye sight. The Overlords are really showing their worth as gatherers. I might just have them treasure hunt at each planet we come across from now on.

I had the Overlords literally suck up the entire contents of the room and the gate from where they found it and had them set it up next to the Nether portal. It's quite interesting how the blocks seem to float above the edge of the lava. While in Minecraft, most blocks seem to blatently disregard gravity, these are the first blocks I've seen on this planet to actually do so. A wild idea starts to form in my head. If these blocks are capable of disregarding gravity, if I absorb them into the Swarm, then have the Creep develop this stuff on the bottom layer of it, then the Creep could freely float!

Plus if such stuff is unaffected by gravity, then maybe they'll be able to hold up a Hive! Then this can be the stuff that supports each level of the Creep! But what if extra weight cancels out their ignoring gravity? Well, there's one way to find out! I climbed up onto the floating square ring. It didn't budge. I jumped up and down on it with no effect. Next I had an Overlord sit on it. Still no effect! Only one test left to go, though this could be awkward. I ordered the Overlords to dismantle the ring and rebuild it up in the sky. Once finished, I had a Hive teleport itself to sit on the ring. While the edges of the Hive sagged around it, it didn't lose a single bit of elevation! Brilliant!

Having the Hive teleport back to its original spot, then having the Overlords rebuild the ring above the lava, I contemplated what to do. Until I'd gotten to the end, I can't absorb any of this new material yet, but the slots in the top of the rings are mostly empty, displaying that I need seven Eyes of Ender to get to the End. While I don't really know how to make Eyes of Ender, I do know that the ingredient list for such a thing is limited, and it somehow involves Blaze Rods and Ender pearls, both of which I have quite a few already stockpiled along with the rest of the stuff I'd collected in the Storage Hive. After teleporting to grab a bunch of the things, I bring it back to the End Gate.

Scratching my head, I wondered if having a crafting table would help at all? Figuring it couldn't hurt, I had an Overlord collect a chunk of wood from one of the trees not producing Apples. With my chunk of wood available, I called over a Speedling from the Nether. Taking control while simultaneously using my body, a feat that I had never tried before and resolved to practice from now on, I held the block still while I had the Speedling carve the it into a block with the grid pattern on top with the open box off to the side.

That finished, I dropped a blaze rod and an Ender Pearl into the grid squares. As expected, nothing happened. Scratching my head, I removed the Ender Pearl. Interestingly, as soon as I did, the idea popped in my head that I could turn the Blaze rods into Blaze powder. How interesting! I wonder if I dropped planks of wood into the grid squares, would I get the idea of how to build a crafting table from it?

Esoteric thoughts aside, I picked up the Blaze Rod and crushed it into a fine powder with my hands. After depositing it back into the grid, I dropped an Ender Pearl into the mix. To my surprise, the Ender Pearl absorbed the Blaze Powder and took on an almost creepy glow with an eye not unlike that of Sauron from Lord of the Rings. Picking it up, I slotted it into the ring. It settled into the opening and its glow dimmed.

Luckily enough, I found the Ender Pearl had only absorbed half of the powder, so I dropped another pearl into the stuff. Three Blaze Rods and five Ender Pearls later, and I slotted the seventh Eye of Ender into the ring. As soon as it finished, an image of the night sky appeared within the ring, blocking the sight of the pool of lava below it.

Turning to my Queens, I said, "Time to finish this." They nodded with various degrees of seriousness. Rose and Snow opted to go first. I agreed on the provision we all went through invisible. From now on any foray into enemy territory will be done invisibly unless morale needs destroyed beforehand. Agreeing, we all jumped through the End Portal.

-END CHAPTER-

Overmind mana – 2500/2500

Zerg Mana – 1,000,600/1,000,000,000,000

Zerg Supply – 1,298/33,923,385 (17,622,025 pending)

Units:

1 Overmind

1079 Overlords

2 Drones

11 Speedlings

6 Queens

100 Hydralisks

Structures:

6,784,677 Hives (3,524,405 pending)

1 Spawning Pool

2 Evolution Chambers

1 Hydralisk Den

1 Roach Warren

1 Baneling Nest

1 Nydus Network

1 Spire

1 Infestation Pit