Chapter 156: The Garden and the Pests

The wild little mine cart bumped along, plunging into the deep darkness.

But the underground world wasn't entirely dark.

Beyond the seemingly endless and interconnected tunnels, the cart passed by a deep blue underground lake. Huo Yuqing was certain that her spiritual detection had sensed some massive, terrifying soul beast lurking beneath the water. Then, they traversed a cavern lit brightly by glowing mushrooms. From the suspended tracks above, she could see large, robust soldier ants tending to luminescent plants unique to the underground world. Lastly, they passed a deep gorge, where a faint sliver of light could be seen between towering rock walls.

Huo Yuqing also keenly noticed that the marks on the excavated rock walls were growing older and older. The cart seemed to be approaching an even more ancient part of the ant nest.

After a few hours of this jostling journey, the cart finally screeched to a halt at the entrance of a forked tunnel.

Wen Qiang jumped off effortlessly, as if the rough ride had been nothing.

Huo Yuqing, however, had suffered terribly.

Trembling, she crawled out of the cart, moving only slightly more gracefully than an eighty-year-old grandma. Her empty stomach still churned violently as she dry-heaved a few times. Leaning against the wall, she slowly straightened herself and rubbed her wind-chilled face.

Wen Qiang hesitated for a moment, then, out of consideration for his disciple, decided against telling her exactly what that wall's coating was made of.

Seeing that she had more or less recovered, he led the way deeper into the tunnel.

For some reason, Huo Yuqing had an unsettling feeling about this place. The darkness here felt deeper, denser, sending a chill down her spine.

It was as if even their footsteps were swallowed by the darkness.

"This place… feels different from the tunnels before," she hesitated before speaking.

"That's because this is an older part of the ant nest," the Holy Scarab explained.

"When the Ant Nest Project first began, different colonies were connected, eventually forming a single entity maintained by the ants and other underground soul beasts."

Huo Yuqing hesitated again. "But… do underground soul beasts really cooperate that well?"

"Of course not. They were all beaten into submission." Wen Qiang spoke casually. "Ten thousand years ago, the Auspicious Beast saved the fierce beast, Queen Tianyu, of the ant clan. Afterward, Tianyu led her forces to 'physically convince' a total of twenty-eight ant nests in Star Dou that had each lasted for over a hundred thousand years—ah, I only know this from hearsay." He looked a little regretful. "If Sun-Moon and Douluo had clashed a little earlier, maybe I could have joined in on the fun."

"Star Dou… has that many hundred-thousand-year-old ants?" Huo Yuqing felt a chill down her spine.

How many ants would that even be?

"No, it's not counted like that." Wen Qiang chuckled at her reaction. "An ant nest's lineage isn't tied to the age of its individual members. The strength and potential of an ant-type soul beast colony primarily depend on their queen.

The queen's ordinary offspring reach roughly the same cultivation level as her in a short period, but their lifespans are much shorter than other soul beasts.

If the queen is strong, the nest is strong. If the queen is weak, the nest is weak. If the queen dies, her offspring die off as soon as the next queen's children mature. Likewise, if too many ordinary ants in a colony die, the queen suffers heavy damage. And since queen ants are naturally fragile, they have no combat abilities and are easy to kill. To this day, only Queen Tianyu has reached a cultivation level of over a hundred thousand years."

"This is an extremely complex system that we still don't fully understand, but individual ant-type soul beasts are far weaker than other soul beasts of the same level. Their soul rings are similarly weaker. The same applies to bees."

Here, soul beast cultivation levels were determined not by their actual lifespan but by the colors of their soul rings after death. Wang Rui had once considered that this could be a way to boost Star Dou's overall strength, but after learning more, he realized that insect-type soul beasts' growth mechanisms had no real value as a reference.

Their cultivation levels were heavily inflated, but the phrase 'many ants can bite an elephant to death' still held meaning. They simply weren't suited for individual combat, nor were they viable as soul ring donors. However, as laborers… they were perfect.

Just look at this vast underground labyrinth!

"And this place is one of the oldest ant nests," Wen Qiang knocked on the stone wall. "This tunnel has existed for over a hundred thousand years. Later, this area was converted into a growing chamber, but due to various circumstances, it was eventually abandoned."

His voice echoed through the tunnel, carrying a hollow resonance.

Perhaps due to the neglect, the glowing plants and mushrooms in this section were much dimmer.

Huo Yuqing frowned slightly.

"But… this place feels off. Unlike the previous tunnels, this one is… unsettling." She spoke softly, a hint of unease she hadn't even noticed creeping into her voice.

Wen Qiang gave her a thoughtful look.

"You're not wrong. This place isn't good. They dug too deep, and the land here is too ancient, bringing back things that modern intelligent beings can't comprehend…" He paused, carefully choosing his words. "With excavation, many such things reappear. But don't worry, we're still in the shallow layers. Nothing should happen, and my strength is enough to handle ninety percent of potential incidents."

Huo Yuqing was not reassured.

And what about that remaining ten percent that even a fierce beast can't handle?!

But Wen Qiang clearly had no intention of elaborating.

As they continued down the tunnel, Huo Yuqing began to hear wet, squirming sounds—something akin to soft-bodied creatures writhing through viscous fluids. But whenever she extended her spiritual detection toward the sounds, she found nothing.

All Wen Qiang said was, "We're almost there."

The oppressive darkness of the tunnel weighed on her, filling her with a vague sense of pressure. As Huo Yuqing's paranoia grew, her spiritual detection began scanning every crack and crevice in the walls. Finally, she heard voices ahead.

"Ahhh—when will this torment end—AHHHHHH!!!"

A voice wailed in despair. "I just want to go to school!!!"

Even with the layers of echoes, it sounded oddly familiar.

Wen Qiang led her through a narrow opening—inside were three young people who looked like they had been utterly beaten down by life.

A furious An Wen leaned on her martial soul, her full weight pressing down on it. She now had a second purple soul ring. A calm, indifferent He Caitou puffed out a row of cigars as he casually shouldered a cannon. Lastly, there was a gloomy-looking boy whom Huo Yuqing found somewhat familiar.

"You're here too." An Wen greeted her listlessly. He Caitou exhaled a smoke ring. The unfamiliar boy gave a weak wave.

"Long story short," He Caitou spoke in a voice drained of all hope and energy, "welcome to our pest extermination squad."

"And the living hell of anyone with trypophobia," the unfamiliar boy added.

An Wen lifted her gun and stabbed it into the ground.

What Huo Yuqing had thought was just a shadow suddenly writhed—no, it boiled.

Accompanied by the sickening squelch of slimy flesh shifting, the 'shadow'—a pool of black sludge—began to stir.

Countless eyes of varying sizes and colors blinked open within the seething mass, trembling as they turned in different directions.

"There, those are the pests."

(End of Chapter)