Chapter 105: Poison Gland (Part Two)

Chapter 105: Poison Gland (Part Two)

As Rong Mi's words faded, the starship abruptly accelerated. A silver energy stream burst from its rear thrusters, propelling the vessel forward swiftly.

With purple flames leading the way, they pursued Cecil's poison gland into the spatial wormhole. In the next moment, they were enveloped by countless scarlet threads of mental energy.

The starship, however, did not emerge from the AE sector.

Or rather... they hadn't been pulled by gravity to the exit of the wormhole!

They found themselves in a chaotic space, surrounded by turbulent energy flows.

The Ice Butterfly poison gland gathered from all directions, extending and intertwining with one another before connecting to unseen, diverse endpoints.

"Wow..." Rong Mi whispered softly, "This is bad."

"It seems that the resource planet we just visited was merely an appetizer..."

Things had become somewhat troublesome... They were situated at an intersection where countless spaces converged!

The moment the starship entered this region, it began to tremble violently, abnormally. Alarms blared in the cockpit, warning of excessive hull pressure as if unseen giant hands were gripping the ship from different directions, attempting to tear it apart.

"Pick a direction! Lu Yi!"

Staying here for too long would cause the ship's hull to rupture under the external forces.

Without hesitation, Lu Yi pushed the engines to their maximum capacity.

He didn't bother trying to change course, instead propelling the ship forward at its current trajectory with haste.

Amidst fiery sparks, the starship pierced through several venom gland barriers, racing towards the exit.

Exiting the wormhole, an intensely blinding flash of light streaked across the exterior. Rong Mi, observing the surroundings through his mental vision, froze momentarily.

Then, the young man blinked.

"Our luck seems almost too good, doesn't it? General." The youth glanced around, "Do you usually buy lottery tickets?"

Lu Yi: "..."

"No."

Rong Mi hummed in response and teased, "Then you've hit the jackpot without even trying today!"

This was a resource planet.

But not the original one. Instead, it was a crimson resource planet belonging to the Ice Butterfly Star Region.

Rong Mi was aware of this.

In his mental vision, vast swaths of thick Ice Butterfly venom glands stretched out from the void, entwining the planet and piercing into the minerals, absorbing energy while spewing out undigested mineral fragments. A layer of debris floated above the planet, resembling a foggy veil.

Above the mist, several high-level Ice Butterflies flapped their wings, seemingly serving as guardians of the planet.

The moment the starship was abruptly followed by a tentacle, the venomous tendrils on the planet ceased their movements.

The high-level Ice Butterflies in the sky descended, their human-like heads emerging from their lowered bodies, investigating the sudden appearance of an object on the planet they were guarding.

Rong Mi: "..."

Rong Mi extended his mental energy far and wide, sensing the situation around the starship, then he hissed.

"It's farther than we thought, General," he said, his tone somewhat relaxed. "We've probably crossed into the Ice Butterfly Star Region."

Rong Mi: "We're already here, might as well..."

"Why don't we just burn through Cecil's supplies completely!"

Rong Mi was a man of action.

The tentacles sprawled across the Energy Planet were similar to what they had seen on the Resource Planet – mere fragments of the butterfly's mental energy.

These tentacles stretched out from the void, feasting on various planets before connecting back to the actual fragment core through that spatial convergence point.

Rong Mi suspected that the AE Zone's mental energy fragment mentioned by Lu Tianxing was merely a cluster of poisonous tentacles indulging in gluttony on a planet. Cecil had long interconnected the Ice Butterfly Star Region with the warzone, planting seeds of danger everywhere.

If they weren't discovered in time, it would be like what Rong Mi knew from history...

On some fateful day, the human territories' safety line would suddenly collapse, leading to a complete invasion without warning.

"Buzzzz —— Buzzzz!"

Dealing with Cecil's venomous tendrils within the Ice Butterfly Star Domain was far more challenging than it had been on the resource planet earlier.

The high-ranking butterflies above sensed the sudden appearance of the starship as an intrusion. They immediately flapped their wings, calling out to their kin, and descended to attack.

The scene before them resembled a grotesque version of moths drawn to a flame.

Wave after wave of ice butterflies threw themselves into the fiery inferno surrounding the starship, attempting to bring it down and halt its assault on the feeding venom glands below.

Some of Cecil's venom glands also rose up, swelling and stretching, striking out at Rong Mi's starship.

Perhaps due to their sheer numbers and distribution across various planets, this fragment of Cecil's ice butterfly consciousness, having not found a "host," had remained in its most primitive form in hiding. As a result, its intelligence, which had initially evolved, had regressed significantly, leaving it completely oblivious to the fact that the starship before it had just forced another cluster of venom glands to flee.

Not until the flames, which had never truly subsided, intensified and engulfed the entire surface of the mineral deposit did they stir.

The flames seared the descending swarm of butterflies and the wildly thrashing venom tendrils. When the sparks came into contact with the red energy mines, they burst into an instant blaze.

Under Rong Mi's control, the high concentration of mental energy ignited the energy mines one after another. In an instant, the entire mining area was engulfed in tongues of fire, with energy smoke billowing everywhere. Countless ice butterflies were shredded by the purple glow.

Amidst a cacophony of noise, Lu Yi witnessed Cecil's venom sacs retract once more into the wormhole.

The Admiral's expression remained composed as he manipulated the starship's control stick, following the venom sacs' trajectory forward.

Behind them, the ignited mines on the Ice Butterfly planet continued to burn. Chaotic energy collided, triggering an earthshaking explosion.

Great chunks of the planet's outer layer imploded. The ice butterflies that had yet to be consumed by flames were caught off guard by the sudden blast, howling as they perished alongside the remaining minerals in an instant. Rong Mi and Lu Yi's starship had already re-entered the space wormhole.

The Admiral pushed the acceleration lever to its maximum, propelling the ship forward through the energy currents tearing at it, heading for the next exit.

Exiting the wormhole, the starship abruptly decelerated, as if it had entered some thick, viscous liquid.

Rong Mi glanced outward and saw vast expanses of bright red fluid, with butterfly eggs floating within.

Rong Mi: "…We're still quite fortunate, Admiral."

"Today seems to be a day of good fortune."

They had arrived at the cocoon where the young butterflies were born.

It was an exceptionally peculiar cocoon site.

The eggs of ordinary low-level Ice Butterflies were the size of a fist, with transparent sacs containing vermilion, wingless caterpillars inside.

Yet, the eggs suspended in this cocoon site were the size of a human.

Inside each egg, a humanoid form was curled up.

They had faces resembling Seiko's, their eyes closed, with their butterfly wings folded tightly against their backs.

The "people" within the eggs varied in age. Some had youthful features, akin to twelve- or thirteen-year-old adolescents, while others were still infants. The one closest to the starship had matured features, almost identical to Seiko's appearance.

In the very moment Rong Mi looked at it, it opened its eyes.

Through the metal glass on the side of the starship, it locked eyes with Rong Mi and then stretched out its arm, touching the sac around it before forcefully tearing it apart.

Rong Mi saw hunger in its eyes.

This was a newly born, high-level Ice Butterfly with abilities incredibly similar to those of an Arachne. It opened its maw wide, but didn't bite into Rong Mi's starship.

Due to the countless crimson mental energy sacs swimming from all around, funneling into its mouth like force-feeding, its body swelled rapidly within just a few seconds.

Rong Mi: "......."

Those were Cecil's mental energy sacs.

They moved about in this bizarre ice butterfly cocoon field like sentinels, as if they were nurturing parents, awaiting the maturity and awakening of the butterfly eggs.

The sacs surged beneath the skin of the newborn ice butterfly, causing its body to bulge and recess in irregular patterns. However, it didn't take long for the newborn to fully digest the energy, returning to its human-like appearance. It unfurled its wings and poked its head out of the cocoon, preparing to leave the nest.

At that moment, Rong Mi made a decision without hesitation.

Burn it down.

Though their original intention was merely to explore and assist the military in sealing the butterfly's fragmented mental energy...

But... plans often couldn't keep up with unforeseen changes!

Here he was, and he intended to set the heavens ablaze! He had to make this conflagration grand, or it would be a disservice to Cecil's spatial wormhole!

The moment the starship appeared, the venom glands within the cocoon also sensed the intruder.

As the unique high-level Ice Butterfly completed its metamorphosis, a vast swarm of Cecil's venom glands surged towards the starship, like an ocean tide converging on a single point.

Rong Mi was fearless. Supporting his operational helmet with his right hand, he mimicked the sound of a lighter by snapping his left fingers.

In that instant, the surrounding cocoon fluid, butterfly eggs, and the newly emerged Ice Butterflies all ignited together.

Flames shot up into the sky, painting vibrant purple flares against the crimson planet.

Just like before, the purple rapidly spread across the planet, replacing the mental energy of the Ice Butterflies with Rong Mi's flames.

Rong Mi didn't linger. After setting a massive blaze, Lu Yi's starship re-entered the wormhole.

After passing through these two planets, Rong Mi was uncertain whether he should return to the Third War Zone's AE sector or seek another wormhole leading to the Ice Butterfly territory.

On one hand, judging from the strength of the venom gland tendrils, they weren't the cores of Cecil's mental energy fragments. Hence, Rong Mi could torch the stars with ease. If he were to encounter the fragment cores, matters would become immensely complicated.

On the other hand... they were causing massive destruction in key locations within the Ice Butterfly Galaxy! This was of great assistance to humanity.

After a few seconds of hesitation, Rong Mi promptly gave up on thinking too much.

That's because they couldn't determine where their next teleport would land either. Everything depended on Lu Yi's luck!

As Rong Mi jokingly put it, Lu Yi was definitely on a winning streak today.

When they reappeared once more, they were still within the Ice Butterfly Galaxy.

The same happened the next time!

As one Ice Butterfly planet after another ignited with flames, more and more people in the battlefield began to notice the unusual phenomenon occurring in the distant Ice Butterfly Galaxy.

The Military Assessment's galaxy was located deep within the warzone, very close to the Ice Butterfly Galaxy. The assessment starships were all suspended in mid-air, and the bored examinees gazed into the distance, gradually revealing expressions of disbelief.

"I... I saw... light in the distant Ice Butterfly Galaxy?... Right in the middle of the red Ice Butterfly energy cloud... It doesn't seem like the color of Ice Butterfly spiritual energy. What's going on?! Did a planet just explode?!"

"I saw it too. It flashed several times, and there's more and more of that strange colored energy light. It can't be that so many planets are exploding at the same time, right?!"

"Look closely, at that... purple energy aura... does it remind you of anyone?"

The examinees responded with silence.

Each of them had a candidate in mind.

It was the most renowned individual among their batch of examinees. The one who, while all the other candidates were instructed to stay put during the exam suspension, accompanied the military supervisors to the resource planet, seemingly on equal footing with the official military members.

...Even as the other proctors utilized their mecha's ejection systems to flee the warship and return with news, this formidable competitor remained on the resource planet alongside Commander of the First Legion, Lu Yi, to eradicate the sudden swarm of Butterfly Shards.

Everyone: "..."

"Yet... shouldn't Rong Mi and the others be on the Resource Planet?" Gu Ming muttered to himself, lost in thought as he hovered outside the orbit of the Resource Planet. "How did they suddenly end up so far away, in the Icy Butterfly Galaxy?"

"Wow... I get it now." Next to him, Hua Oulo's pilot friend murmured to himself. "Back then, Brother Rong stopped Brother Hua from going to the Ice Butterfly Star Region because he didn't approve of Hua Ge's plan."

"Harassing a couple of Ice Butterfly squads on the outskirts of the Ice Butterfly Galaxy and luring a few Butterfly Crafts to engage in battle is hardly a remarkable feat!"

"True skill lies in breaching the Ice Butterfly Galaxy and blowing up their planets!"

The other candidates affiliated with Hua Oulo on the starship expressed their sudden realization with exclamations.

Phil looked at this group of teenagers with a complex expression.

Among these candidates, Phil was one of the few who felt both vindicated and extremely nervous.

Because... it was impossible for the Ice Butterfly to idly watch Rong Mi ignite their galaxy. The longer Rong Mi and his group remained in the Ice Butterfly territory, the more perilous it would become!

Rong Mi was well aware of this fact.

He had even more in mind.

The starship traversed another wormhole.

As Rong Mi continued setting fires, he glanced at the outer rim of the planet through his mental perception.

The vast flames expanded his field of view, and Rong Mi caught sight of a multitude of Butterfly Vessels hurtling towards the planet like a galactic nebula.

"Lu Yi," Rong Mi turned to look at Lu Yi, "our actions today were quite substantial."

The young man smiled, his eyes twinkling with mischievousness, yet his tone was earnest, "Can the General handle the repercussions in the warzone?"