26: Chapter 26 The Gift of Byproduct Venom and the Queen's Epic Advancement
The ultimate fortress standing between heaven and earth remained silent.
That ancient demon god that crawled out from the abyss had thoroughly transformed Su Chen's divine domain into a true death zone.
With the birth of the "Abyssal Virulent mother tree" Rott, the air around the entire entrance to the divine domain was tinged with a faint, eerie purple hue.
Light passing through its immense canopy was twisted and filtered, casting bizarre, mottled shadows upon the ground.
The air was no longer pure gas; it grew thick, carrying a strange, sweet-metallic scent mixed with decay.
Every breath meant inhaling trace amounts of virulent poison into one's lungs.
For mortal life, this place was already a dead end.
"Overlord... Rott... Swears to protect unto death..."
A heavy, ancient, psychic ripple, as if transmitted layer by layer from deep within the earth's crust, connected to the Zerg Swarm's exclusive psionic energy network.
This torrent of consciousness was vast and immense, yet devoid of any complex thought.
It did not possess the precise logic akin to a super bio-computer, like Zaz.
Nor was it like Sarah, sharp and exposed, her will like a blazing star.
This newborn consciousness was more like an ancient, unyielding boulder—silent, weighty, bearing only a most primitive, most pure core: loyalty.
A slow, yet absolutely reliable guardian.
Su Chen hovered in mid-air, level with one of the crimson compound eyes on the massive canopy.
He could clearly sense the waves of virulent poison emanating from within the mother tree, potent enough to make even a deity shudder.
It was poison at the level of laws, the conceptual "withering" and "termination."
Its mere existence warped reality.
"Using it only for defense is too wasteful."
Su Chen's gaze shifted from the towering mother tree to his side.
The Queen of Blades Sarah hovered there quietly, purple psionic energy flames rising around her, cutting through the poison-infested air, creating a small, absolutely pure domain.
As the Zerg Swarm's strongest individual combat unit, Sarah possessed terrifying combat power at the sixth tier.
But her power attributes leaned more towards the ultimate "cutting" and "burst" of psionic energy.
She was the sharpest blade on the battlefield, an assassin capable of instantly tearing through a deity's defenses.
However, when facing large-scale, high-intensity sustained battlefields, she lacked a means to blanket the entire area and continuously inflict devastating damage.
Su Chen's thought flashed through the psionic energy network.
No words.
No commands.
Just a notion.
*Rustle—*
As if sensing the unspoken thought in the Overlord's mind, the sky-obscuring canopy of the Abyssal Virulent mother tree suddenly shook violently.
Countless branches rubbed together, producing thunderous roars.
One of the thickest branches, covered in purplish-black chitin, slowly, visibly, extended toward Su Chen and Sarah.
The front end of the branch cracked and peeled away layer by layer, revealing the writhing flesh tissue within.
*Squelch.*
A soft sound.
A drop of liquid was slowly squeezed out from the gory fissure.
It was a viscous liquid, green to the point of being almost black.
Only the size of a fingernail, yet immeasurably heavy, as if condensing the weight of an entire world.
Light striking its surface did not reflect; it was entirely swallowed, giving it an absolute, all-consuming "black."
The droplet did not fall.
An invisible psychic field held it steady, like a most devout believer offering a sacred relic, floating slowly toward the Queen of Blades Sarah.
A line of small golden text with an Epic-Tier luster appeared before Su Chen's eyes.
[Item]: Abyssal Symbiotic Venom Essence (Epic-Tier)
[Description]: Life essence condensed from a seventh-tier mother tree, containing fragments of the "Primordial Venom" law.
"This is its gift to you."
Su Chen's voice was faint, betraying no emotion.
"Sarah, consume it."
"Yes, Father."
Sarah's response held no hesitation.
Her gaze did not linger on the venom essence radiating terrifying aura for more than a second.
For the Overlord's commands, the Zerg Swarm offered only absolute obedience.
She slightly raised her elegantly shaped chin, parting her red lips.
The "Abyssal Symbiotic Venom Essence," containing law fragments, slid silently into her mouth.
*Boom—!*
Not a sonic boom.
It was a violent explosion at the genetic level, from the depths of her soul!
In an instant, the purple psionic energy flames burning around Sarah, as if doused with the highest concentration of catalyst, violently expanded outward!
Immediately after, a bizarre, ink-green color, as if from the netherworld, began to madly seep upward from the roots of the flames.
Purple represented pure psionic energy.
Ink-green represented the Primordial Venom.
Two ultimate forces waged a fierce war and fusion within Sarah's body!
"Urgh—!"
An uncontrollable cry of pain burst from the depths of Sarah's throat.
She threw her head back in agony, her slender neck arching into a breathtaking curve.
The bone wings on her back trembled uncontrollably and wildly, each flap creating sonic booms that tore through space.
Her purple hair stood on end, each strand like a living serpent writhing chaotically in the air.
Beneath her skin, bluish-black vascular networks bulged, emitting ominous glows, as if something sought to burst forth.
Genes were fracturing!
Chains were collapsing!
Then, under the forceful intervention of the Primordial Venom, they began to restructure in a more domineering, more perfect manner!
Power was sublimating!
Life level was ascending!
This painful process lasted several minutes.
For Sarah, it felt as long as an epoch.
Finally, all the turbulence gradually subsided.
The wildly dancing hair slowly settled, the violently trembling bone wings stabilized once more.
The ink-green venomous flames that had suffused her entire body began to retract inward, ultimately fusing completely with the original purple psionic energy, transforming into a deep, ominous purple-green.
When Sarah opened her eyes again, those originally pure purple pupils had undergone a dramatic change.
Purple-green double rings slowly rotated within the depths of her eyes, forming a pair of cold, inhuman vertical pupils.
With every breath, visible, deadly venomous mist exhaled from between her lips and teeth, only to be drawn back into her body.
She simply hovered there quietly, yet emanated a destructive aura several magnitudes stronger than before.
"Ding! Your hero unit 'Queen of Blades' has advanced!"
[True Name]: Sarah (Venomous Form)
[Tier]: Seventh Tier (Epic-Tier!)
[New Trait]: Venomous psionic energy (All attacks inflict Legendary Rank corrosive effects, can detonate toxin accumulation within enemies).
Seventh Tier!
Another Epic-Tier unit!
Su Chen looked at this perfect creation before him, radiating destruction and decay.
She combined the sharpness of a blade with the insidiousness of venom, becoming a true queen of the battlefield.
The corner of his mouth lifted in a cold smile.
"One for attack, one for defense—two Epic-Tier combatants."
His gaze seemed to pierce through the crystal walls of the divine domain, looking toward the distant void.
"God of Corrupt Corpses, is your nightmare ready?"