359: Chapter 360 An Even Deeper Conspiracy

“Pfft—!!!”

A torrent of deep green energy, as thick and opaque as ink, suddenly erupted from the sliced wound! This energy torrent was not a simple impact; it contained violent mental pollution, strong corrosive energy, and a bizarre power of laws that attempted to assimilate and decompose all matter!

The torrent exploded outward in a spherical shape centered on the egg sac. Everywhere it passed, even the dark red fleshy walls of the cave emitted a sizzling corrosive sound. Several nearby Zerg ice sculptures were instantly eroded and melted, leaving not even a trace of residue behind!

“Watch out!” Shen Muyao cried out, subconsciously raising an ice shield in front of her. Feng Ling's wall of fire also shook violently under the impact of the energy torrent, its light dimming by more than half. Even Gui Wanwan and Tashalin, perched high above, felt a heart-palpitating evil Aura rushing toward them.

Lin Muyang bore the brunt of it! However, the layer of pale gold divine radiance on his body displayed astonishing defensive power at that moment. The deep green energy torrent slammed against the radiance like waves crashing against a reef, producing muffled booming sounds, yet it could not shake him in the slightest, let alone penetrate. Lin Muyang even used the force of the impact to suddenly increase the power in his wrist!

“Open—up!”

“Chila—!!!”

The dark gold blade light suddenly flared, forcibly tearing the opening that was spewing the energy torrent further downward and to the sides! A massive wound, large enough for several people to walk through side-by-side, appeared on the surface of the egg sac, and deep green mucus poured out like a waterfall.

However, the sight inside the wound caused the pupils of everyone who saw it through the gaps in the blade light and energy torrent to contract sharply.

The interior of the egg sac was not the single chamber nurturing a lone terrifying entity they had expected. What met their eyes were dense, layered, and countless translucent insect eggs emitting a faint life fluorescence!

Each of these eggs was the size of a basketball with a crystalline outer wall. Inside, the silhouettes of various larvae could be seen curled up—some looked like miniature Worker Bees, some like Assault Bugs, and they could even see some with even stranger appearances that seemed to combine multiple traits into hybrids.

“These are all unhatched Zerg units?!” Shen Muyao gasped. She finally understood that this egg sac was not just a command center, but a massive hatchery! It was continuously producing a Zerg army!

“Master! They must be completely destroyed! Not a single one can be left!” Gui Wanwan's voice carried a hint of solemnity. “If these eggs hatch, even if only a small portion escapes, they will form a new, hard-to-eradicate swarm in a very short time! The future trouble would be endless!”

Lin Muyang's gaze was as sharp as a blade as he swept it across the tens of thousands of eggs emitting an ominous life Aura. Without any hesitation, the light of the long blade in his hand brightened again, and he prepared to swing it into this sea of eggs to crush and purify them along with the entire internal structure of the egg sac.

But, as if sensing the descent of an existential disaster, the largest concentration of vitality and energy deep within the egg sac finally completed its final metamorphosis.

“Roar—!!!”

A low, raspy roar filled with endless tyranny and majesty exploded from the deepest part of the egg sac! This roar was not a sound but a mental shock that acted directly on the soul, causing everyone except Lin Muyang to feel a bout of intense dizziness and heart palpitations.

Immediately after, surrounded by countless eggs, a tall black figure slowly stood up from the depths of the viscous nutrient fluid!

It stood over five meters tall, its entire body covered in an incredibly thick, pitch-black carapace that shimmered with a cold metallic luster. The carapace was covered in savage barbs and energy circuit patterns.

Its head resembled an enlarged insect but was far more hideous, with six crimson compound eyes arranged in a fan shape, coldly locked onto Lin Muyang. As its mouthparts opened and closed, they revealed dense, spiral-shaped sharp teeth.

Its upper limbs were two pairs of extremely thick claws whose ends had transformed into giant sickle-shaped bone blades. Its lower limbs were reverse-jointed structures filled with explosive power. A hooked scorpion tail swayed slowly behind it. Even more unsettling was the faint, constantly twisting deep green energy field surrounding it, emitting a terrifying pressure far exceeding any Zerg encountered before.

“A Zerg... Commander? No, it's a Hive Guardian, or perhaps the ultimate weapon bred by this hatchery itself!” Feng Ling felt a hint of a threat. The energy level of this thing was likely close to or even at the peak of mythic grade.

That pitch-black Zerg Guardian seemed to have just awakened, still carrying a trace of sluggishness from its egg state, but its hostility toward Lin Muyang was etched into its very core.

Without any probing, it let out a violent hiss. Its massive body displayed an incredible speed that defied its size. The giant bone blade on its left forelimb tore through the air with a shrill whistle, hacking down toward Lin Muyang's head! The power of this strike was enough to cut a small warship in half!

Lin Muyang's expression remained unchanged. With a light shift of his feet, his figure moved laterally several meters like a phantom, narrowly avoiding this heavy blow. The bone blade missed, hacking into the viscous tissue and eggs inside the sac, instantly causing fluids to splatter as several unlucky eggs were sliced apart.

While dodging, Lin Muyang followed through with an upward slash of his long blade. The dark gold blade light accurately struck the joint connection of the Zerg Guardian's right bone blade!

“Clang—!!!”

An ear-piercing sound of clashing metal echoed through the cave, sending sparks flying! Lin Muyang felt a slight vibration in his wrist. The feedback from the blade was harder than he could have imagined! Only three shallow white marks were left on that pitch-black carapace; he hadn't managed to cut it off! This defensive power was more than a hundred times stronger than the heavy Assault Bugs he had encountered on the warship!

“This guy's carapace hardness is ridiculous!” Lin Muyang's heart chilled slightly. He instantly judged that if he wanted to resolve this quickly, he couldn't strike its hardest parts head-on.

“We’ll help you!” Seeing that Lin Muyang had met a tough opponent, Shen Muyao and Feng Ling did not hesitate to pull away from the outer battlefield. They leapt into the opened egg sac, one on the left and one on the right, forming a triangle with Lin Muyang to surround the Zerg Guardian in the middle.

“Frost Imprisonment!” Shen Muyao was the first to act, pressing her hands against the ground. Extremely cold mana spread along the viscous floor, quickly climbing up the Zerg Guardian's lower limbs to freeze them and restrict its movement. Frost condensed rapidly, but the deep green energy field on the Zerg Guardian's surface fluctuated violently, actually repelling most of the cold. Only a thin layer of ice covered its ankles, having a negligible effect on its actions.

“Flame Lash!” Feng Ling shouted. With a wave of her hand, she whipped out several fire whips condensed from Nirvana Fire, which coiled toward the Zerg Guardian's upper limbs and scorpion tail like spirit snakes, attempting to bind its attacks. The fire whips sizzled upon touching the energy field, causing it to shake violently, but they couldn't break through for the moment.

Besieged by the three of them, the Zerg Guardian let out an angry roar, its six crimson compound eyes flashing with murderous light. With a sudden surge, it shattered the thin ice on its ankles. Simultaneously, its massive bone blades swung wildly, cutting most of Feng Ling's fire whips apart.

It seemed to have identified Lin Muyang as the greatest threat. Ignoring the harassment from Shen Muyao and Feng Ling, it launched another fierce attack on Lin Muyang! Both blades struck out together, one high and one low, sealing off Lin Muyang's space to dodge, while its scorpion tail lunged like a poisonous dragon emerging from its hole, silently stabbing toward Lin Muyang's heart from behind!

The battle instantly reached a fever pitch! The narrow space inside the egg sac became a ring for their intense confrontation. Lin Muyang's movement was as agile as the wind, weaving through the deadly gaps between the bone blades and the scorpion tail. His long blade struck out from time to time, searching for gaps in the carapace and weak points in the energy field.

Shen Muyao's frost and Feng Ling's fire provided constant interference and weakening from the side, creating opportunities. The temperature inside the cave plummeted to freezing one moment and soared to lava-like heat the next. The chaotic energy turbulence turned the interior of the egg sac upside down, and countless fragile eggs shattered and were annihilated in the aftershocks.

Time passed minute by minute. Although the Zerg Guardian had amazing defense and terrifying power, under the coordinated cooperation and continuous attacks of Lin Muyang's trio, the deep green energy field on its body grew dimmer and dimmer. More and more cracks and scorched marks appeared on its carapace. Its movements began to grow sluggish due to the continuous injuries.

“Now!” Lin Muyang's eyes flashed with brilliance. At the moment the Zerg Guardian leaned back slightly after blocking one of Feng Ling's heavy fireballs—revealing a tiny old wound on its chest carapace—he lunged forward like a leopard that had been gathering strength! His long blade no longer sought to slash; instead, he concentrated all his power of Penetration and destruction into a single point at the tip of the blade, turning it into a shrill light that pierced directly toward that old wound!

“Puchu!”

This time, the tip of the blade was not bounced back! The blade, carrying the full force of Lin Muyang's strike, sliced into the carapace gap like a hot knife through butter and then plunged deep into the Zerg Guardian's chest cavity!

“Hiss—!!!” The Zerg Guardian let out an earth-shaking hiss of pain. Its massive body suddenly stiffened, its six crimson compound eyes instantly lost their luster, and its wildly flailing bone blades and scorpion tail hung down powerlessly.

Lin Muyang showed no mercy. He twisted his wrist, causing the long blade to churn inside its body, completely destroying its core life force! At the same time, he launched a kick infused with boundless power, slamming it hard against the Zerg Guardian's massive body!

“Boom!”

The Zerg Guardian's broken body flew backward, smashing heavily into the inner wall of the egg sac and crushing countless eggs before sliding to the ground. After a couple of twitches, it went completely still.

With the death of this ultimate guardian, the deep green light that had been pulsing inside the egg sac suddenly went out like a lightbulb losing power! The surface life fluorescence of the remaining undestroyed eggs also faded quickly, and the larvae inside instantly lost their vitality.

Inside the cave, the Zerg reinforcements that had been attacking frantically suddenly froze like puppets whose strings had been cut. The crazed red light in their eyes went out, and then they collapsed to the ground in heaps, losing all signs of life.

The entire underground cave fell into a dead silence, broken only by the slight vibrations from the energy aftershocks and the “drip-drop” of falling mucus.

“Is it... over?” Feng Ling asked somewhat uncertainly, panting heavily as she looked at the mess inside the lifeless egg sac. The continuous high-intensity combat had also heavily depleted her mana.

“The primary consciousness is dead, the hatchery has stopped functioning, and the Zerg units directly controlled by its mental network have perished along with it.” Gui Wanwan leapt down from above and landed on the edge of the egg sac, reaching a conclusion after careful perception. “But just to be safe, it's best to perform a thorough purification.”

Lin Muyang withdrew his long blade, and the dark gold light on the blade slowly receded. He glanced at the corpse of the Zerg Guardian, then swept his gaze over the countless dead eggs and nodded. Although the mastermind had been slain, the pollution in this hive was too severe and had to be cleaned up.

“Mu Yao,” he turned to the pale-faced Shen Muyao, who was nearly unable to stand. “Use your remaining strength to deeply freeze the entire interior of the egg sac, along with these eggs and corpses. Feng Ling, once the freezing is complete, use your flames to burn it from the outside for a secondary purification to ensure no life remains and no energy pollution is left.”

“Alright.” Shen Muyao forced herself to focus, once again gathering her meager remaining mana. This time, it was not a violent attack but a meticulous, slow, yet utterly thorough freezing. A cold current spread out from her, and everywhere it passed—mucus, eggs, corpses, and even the tissue of the egg sac's inner wall—was covered and frozen by crystal-clear Profound Ice emitting extreme cold. A few minutes later, the entire interior of the opened egg sac had turned into a massive, deep blue ice cavern.

“World Purifying · Flame Burial.” Feng Ling took a moment to adjust her breathing and then released relatively gentle but sustained gold-red flames toward the frozen interior of the egg sac. The flames licked the ice, not to melt it, but to perform a kind of purification and annihilation, incinerating and purifying even the tiniest Zerg cells and residual energy within the frozen matter.

After doing all this, Lin Muyang personally scanned the entire cave several times with the Eye of Creation. Only after confirming there were no more hidden signs of life or energy sources did he finally relax.

“Return to the shuttle. Evacuate immediately.” Lin Muyang gave the final order. This place was not suitable for a long stay; although the Zerg had been temporarily dealt with, this star sector was still fraught with danger.

The group, dragging their exhausted but victorious bodies, quickly returned to the surface along the frost path they had come by and boarded the long-waiting shuttle. The engines started, and the silver-white ship slowly rose into the air, leaving behind this moon that had been occupied by the Zerg and was now a place of dead silence.

Inside the cabin, the atmosphere was somewhat silent. Though they had won, the memory of the thrilling battle—especially that terrifying Zerg Guardian born from the egg sac—left everyone with lingering fears. This decapitation strike had been far more dangerous than expected.

Lin Muyang sat in the pilot's seat, maneuvering the shuttle back toward the holy radiance. His gaze was calm as he watched the starry sky ahead, but his mind was rapidly replaying the battle. Specifically, he recalled how, when the Zerg Guardian died, there seemed to be some extremely subtle mark—different from a mental fluctuation—that tried to attach itself to him but was blocked and annihilated by the Absolute Stillness Aura.

“Zerg... Hive... Command network... and that method of trying to leave a mark...” Lin Muyang's fingers unconsciously tapped the control stick. This encounter had given him a deeper understanding of the danger and organizational nature of this race. This was by no means a simple space disaster; behind it, there might be even deeper darkness and conspiracy hidden.

“I must obtain more intelligence about this star sector and the Zerg as soon as possible.” Lin Muyang made a silent resolution. At the same time, he needed to help Elena increase her strength quickly and find a way to secure a stable source of tears of the angels. The challenges of the future would only become more severe; he needed greater power and more reliable angel allies.