The atmosphere was tense to the extreme. Ashley held her breath and waited for a long time with no movement. She stole a glance at her teacher and found the girl’s gaze fixed on the jade embedded in the Bug Lolita’s abdomen.
It was a piece of warm, lustrous white jade with an oily sheen, half-buried in its body.
Perhaps because both sides had just displayed their abilities—and they were both spatial types—neither made a rash move.
On the Bug Lolita’s head shell, its antennae trembled lightly, as if detecting something.
“Don’t you think this jade has shrunk a bit compared to before?” Letisia suddenly said.
Ashley jolted in surprise and blurted out, “It’s absorbing it?!”
“I’ve never seen the ‘Lord of Insects’ metamorphose into a humanoid form. Human historical records are blank on this. If it’s unrelated to the King Insect in the Lost City and happens right in front of us, it’s too much of a coincidence.” Letisia rested her chin on her hand in thought. This seemed more important to her than the fight.
“You mean the King Insect’s ability is to create this ‘jade’ that causes the ‘Lord of Insects’ to metamorphose?” Ashley immediately understood.
She also noticed that her teacher’s posture was overly relaxed.
“The possibility is high. According to records, after summoning the Lord of Insects, the King Insect uses unique King Insect Technology to reinforce it, transforming it into a ‘Venerable King Knight.’ But in the records, Venerable King Knights have never appeared in humanoid form. So, I suspect this is the King Insect Technology itself.” Letisia continued her analysis.
“Then… then isn’t that terrifying? It should be much stronger than a normal Lord of Insects, right? Teacher, maybe we should retreat?” Ashley’s hairs stood on end. Her eyes bulged as she warily watched the Bug Lolita.
“If a mere Lord of Insects could trouble me, humanity would have gone extinct long ago.”
Letisia suddenly stepped forward!
Faced with the unheralded explosive attack, the Bug Lolita reacted with extreme speed. Its body flowed, and the purple crystal blade extending from its forearm vanished in an instant!
Ashley only saw a blur. This level of combat had exceeded her dynamic vision capture ability.
In a split second, the two figures overlapped and then stopped. The sharp, gleaming crystal blade pierced the girl’s shirt but couldn’t advance an inch! It snapped on her fair skin, ricocheted away, and embedded deeply into the blood-flesh wall!
Meanwhile, the afterimage of the girl’s hand chop had already severed the Bug Lolita’s neck. Its head flew high, the cross-section of its neck shimmering with crystalline light…
Ashley stared in stunned silence and swallowed hard with difficulty. The Time Bird had no records—her teacher hadn’t used any ability just now…
This was already beyond her comprehension. Or rather, this wasn’t a battle between human and monster, but between monsters.
Her teacher dealt with the Lord of Insects as easily as Bear Grylls—chop off the head, crisp and done.
The [Nether Queen] fell silent. Since it had been crawling on the ground anyway, its death didn’t make much noise.
However, the Bug Lolita wasn’t dead. The antennae on its head were still wriggling—its vitality was remarkably tenacious.
The girl and the loli emerged from the centipede’s body. At that moment, a group arrived at extreme speed.
Leading them was a short-haired elder with hair standing straight up, his body upright and imposing, wrapped in a white robe embroidered with gold patterns—exceptional bearing.
The Tribunal’s second-in-command, the second-ranked Trial Judge, Meroi Nico.
The Tribunal’s support team arrived, taking the Bug Lolita for containment. The method was one Ashley was familiar with—dismember and freeze.
No time for greetings; they gathered briefly and then dispersed to carry out their tasks.
Ashley followed her teacher on foot to the Tribunal’s field camp, her heart slightly settling.
In the command post, Letisia sat at a long table, flipping through a document stamped with a bright red “Top Secret” watermark. A cup of coffee on the table steamed faintly.
“Since it’s King Insect Technology that uses ‘Insect Jade’ to reinforce the Venerable King Knight’s own abilities, let’s name it the ‘Jade King.’ This changes our approach.”
“Okay, dear…”
Before she finished, the loli’s little mouth was pinched into a pout by a hand.
“Don’t play around during serious moments.” The girl gave her a warning glance.
Letisia released her hand. The Blue-Haired Loli nodded like a chick pecking rice, straightened her attitude, and analyzed seriously:
“If we change our approach, all the abilities the King Insect has shown so far might belong to the Venerable King Knight—that is, the Lord of Insects Pro Max version. The Lord of Insects doesn’t appear out of thin air; they have long lifespans, accompanying human history. We might investigate from this angle: look for historical Lord of Insects with similar abilities.”
The girl nodded approvingly. “If you were a direct descendant of Union City, the kind raised like Amber from childhood, you could be entrusted with heavy responsibility, leading humanity down a bright path. Unfortunately…”
“I… I’m still young! It’s not too late to cultivate me now!” Ashley hurriedly said.
“You’ve been spoiled rotten by the Jenkins Family—untamable wildness, no moral shackles in your heart. There’s no guarantee you won’t go mad one day and capsize humanity’s great ship.” Letisia stared at her with a gaze that pierced the ways of the world.
“Wouldn’t Amber go mad?” As soon as she said it, Ashley froze and sighed. “Yeah, she wouldn’t. She can even resist the ‘Hunger Key’—like a pigeon, with a magnet in her little head that always knows the direction.”
The girl stopped flipping pages and ran her fingertip over a line of records.
“Found it—a historical Lord of Insects: [Lost Corridor].”
Ashley leaned in to look.
The [Lost Corridor] first appeared a thousand years ago, during the exploration of the First Great Stratum ‘Miracle.’ It was encountered and discovered by the team of the Hundred People Assembly’s second seat at the time, the famous cave explorer Paire Pu’er, resulting in 46 team members’ deaths.
According to the description, its ability formed a long, space-warping corridor like a Möbius strip, where no one could cross to meet their companions.
After trapping the powerful extraordinaries in the cave-diving team with its ability, the [Lost Corridor] mercilessly slaughtered the rest and departed.
To this day, humanity had encountered the [Lost Corridor] five times with survivor records, totaling 179 deaths. Not even anyone who had seen its true face and lived remained.
“The [Lost Corridor], reinforced by Insect Jade, expanded its spatial domain to cover an entire city?” Ashley said in horror.
“Look at this.” The girl flipped to the previous bookmarked page.
Ashley’s gaze swept over it.
[Wind Traveler], a Lord of Insects discovered in the Second Great Stratum ‘Dark Surge.’ Once it targeted a lone member of a cave-diving team, it created a copy, killed the original, and replaced it. The copy returned to the team, misleading teammates into traps…
“Copy ability…” Ashley murmured.
“‘Lord of Insects’ aren’t all super-large like the [Nether King]. Their abilities aren’t all area destruction either. The [Wind Traveler] was rated as a Lord of Insects because it can copy abilities—much like you. But its copy limit is only one person. After Insect Jade reinforcement, the limit might increase.” Letisia said.
“I think I get it. The people in Rift City were isolated by the [Lost Corridor] into multiple parallel spaces—the weak grouped together, the strong isolated alone. Then the [Wind Traveler] made copies to deal with them.”
Ashley had a sudden realization. As the brainstorming continued, her eyes grew brighter, and she continued:
“Sasha could escape perhaps because the [Wind Traveler]’s thinking organ lacked the computing power to control all copies simultaneously. It could only make them act autonomously somehow. Coincidentally, in Sasha’s space, the copy of Little Cousin let it leave out of action inertia. And the partial authority the [Lost Corridor] granted to the [Wind Traveler] allowed Sasha to exit—this is a small BUG in a vast, complex system.”
