56: Chapter 56 The New Ant-Man of Scientific Research

Teacher Qin Lin crossed her arms and reviewed the battle that had just taken place. "I underestimated your strength just now. If I had fully stretched out the Orcs' formation and avoided a positional battle with you, it wouldn't have been so easy for your believers to take advantage."

Gu Han was also very clear that the MVP of this match, which allowed him to wipe out the Level 2 Orcs while punching above his weight class, was definitely the venom of the Giant Ice Toad.

Although the defense of the Shield-Armored Ant-Men was abnormal, their attack power was still lacking. If they had really fought a protracted, head-on battle against the Level 2 Orcs in their prime state, even if they could have won in the end, the Ant-men army would have suffered heavy losses.

Teacher Qin Lin took a step forward, lowered her voice, and spoke with a hint of teasing in her tone.

"Tell your friend to cultivate this batch of believers well. If they continue to develop at this rate, they might soon be able to touch the threshold of becoming a Transcendental Believer."

Gu Han coughed twice; it seemed Teacher Qin Lin had already guessed that his previously mentioned "friend" was made up.

Teacher Qin Lin waved her hand, her expression returning to seriousness. "The city-wide professional league is in two months. Chu Yue, you also need to hurry up and improve the strength of your Orcs."

Chu Yue nodded repeatedly from the side; the impact of the battle just now had been too great for her. Now, her mind was full of simulations on how to counter Gu Han's Ant-men.

Teacher Qin Lin continued, "In the annual Jiangcheng University league, there are always a few freshmen from wealthy backgrounds. Their families pour massive resources into them before they even enroll, and many possess Level 2 believers in their freshman year. The last batch even had a monstrous genius who brought Level 3 believers."

Hearing this, Chu Yue was stunned for a moment; she had invested so much, yet she only had Level 1 believers.

"Level 3 believers? Since they are so rich, why don't those big families just buy their juniors a few Level 5 believers? Wouldn't it be easier to just steamroll everyone?"

Teacher Qin Lin held up a finger and shook it.

"Transcendental Believers that are bought are only loyal to their original God. The ultimate goal of cultivating our Divine Kingdoms is to obtain the power of faith from Transcendental Believers. Only the heartfelt faith of believers can nourish the God, allowing the God to also become transcendental, transforming from a mortal into a demigod or a true god. Hired thugs won't give their all for you, let alone generate the power of faith."

Gu Han rubbed his chin.

"Big families only spend their money on Divine Kingdom construction and species cultivation to improve the quality of their own believers."

"Correct." Teacher Qin Lin nodded. "Besides, the competition officials aren't stupid. Once the Divine Kingdom scanning system scans them, high-end combat power that was bought doesn't belong to the God's original species and is treated directly as cheating."

Hearing this, Gu Han felt somewhat relieved; there had to be a limit to "pay-to-win," otherwise the competition would be meaningless.

After leaving the Combat Training Hall, Gu Han went straight to the library.

Having defeated Teacher Qin Lin's Level 2 Orcs, he was not complacent because of it.

The combination of different races and different innate skills results in vastly different combat effectiveness.

Teacher Qin Lin's Orcs relied on bloodline Berserk. If they were replaced by a flying race, or believers skilled in long-range magical bombardment, the Ant-men's ground tactics would suffer greatly.

The biggest shortcoming was that their attack methods were too monotonous.

The Ant-men currently relied entirely on instinctive melee combat, with only crude weapons and their mandibles. If they encountered a Transcendental Believer above Level 1, it would truly be like doing negligible damage.

Ant-men are born with two pairs of arms, so they can carry one more type of weapon than others.

Gu Han opened the trading software.

He entered "weapons and equipment" into the search box.

A dazzling list of products immediately popped up on the light screen.

The top row prominently featured firearms and artillery of various calibers, and even individual rocket launchers.

Gu Han gulped as he looked at them.

"If I equipped the Ant-men with AKs, why would I even need to cultivate immortality!"

But when he saw the price tags below, that thought instantly cooled down.

A standard, most ordinary automatic rifle cost 10,000 credit points. And that didn't include bullets! Bullets were consumables and required even more credit points.

More importantly, the Divine Kingdom theory class in middle school made it very clear that purchasing thermal weapons first required application and registration.

Moreover, these firearms were just okay for dealing with ordinary creatures. Once enemy believers stepped into the transcendental realm and their physical fitness underwent a qualitative change, ordinary bullets would at most cause minor injuries. If the opponent also wore bulletproof vests or armor, the cost-effectiveness of firearms would be extremely low.

Of course, this didn't mean firearms were useless. High-explosive armor-piercing rounds capable of penetrating the defenses of Transcendental Believers carried an astronomical price tag.

For now, cold weapons were more practical.

Gu Han scrolled to the cold weapons section, browsed for a long time, and finally placed an order for a batch of heavy equipment.

Ten thousand greatswords, ten thousand double-edged battle axes, and ten thousand sets of steel knives and shields.

In order for the Ant-men to master the use of these weapons as quickly as possible, Gu Han spent another sum of money to purchase a group of Sapiens proficient in specialized weapon combat to serve specifically as instructors for the Ant-men.

The equipment problem was solved, but the sense of urgency in his heart had not faded.

After all, the Ant-men were a new species he had created. What if the Ant-men could never step into the transcendental realm?

Gu Han was used to preparing for the worst.

"If the transcendental path doesn't work out, then I can only push their biological advantages to the extreme. At that time, I will raise another batch of Sapiens and make other plans."

He closed his eyes, his mind constantly reviewing the current unit configuration.

Shield-Armored Ant-Men could resist damage and defend, but their shield armor was heavy and not flexible enough.

Hidden-Armor Ant-Man were small in size and hard to detect; they could only scout and cooperate with the Giant Ice Toad's venom to ambush people.

Black-Armored Ant-men were the main force, but they lacked the ability to decide the outcome on a frontal battlefield.

He had to research a new type of heterogeneous Ant-man with absolutely terrifying destructive power!

Gu Han worked with his smart assistant to find suitable candidates, his hands quickly flipping through various biological encyclopedias.

Suddenly, his gaze rested on a picture of a colorful deep-sea creature.

Gu Han looked at the introduction in the book, and his eyes instantly lit up.

It was a strange-looking arthropod with forelimbs like two heavy iron hammers—the Peacock Mantis Shrimp!

It was a type of mantis shrimp.

Using the smart assistant to make a rough calculation, if this thing were combined with the Ant-men, the moment its two heavy hammers struck, their speed should be able to exceed the speed of sound, comparable to a bullet leaving the chamber, and the striking force would be a hundred times that of an ordinary pistol.

"It's basically One Punch Man!"

The smart assistant even recommended three types of ants with values higher than the Peacock Mantis Shrimp: distorted termites, Dracula ants, and trap-jaw ants.