A Colossus rushes in at the start

Chapter 15 This bee colony has many friends

"Residents of Zander, please do not panic. The Zander government has been actively negotiating with the Beehive Biotechnology. The peace talks are currently proceeding smoothly. To protect the personal safety and property of Zander residents, all cities in Zander will be under temporary martial law. Anyone who goes out into the streets will be considered to be committing an illegal act and will be arrested immediately. Please stay at home and do not move around unnecessarily..."

The same words were repeated over and over on the radio. The young Diaz children lay blankly on the windowsill, staring at the object that blotted out the sky.

It was a planet inhabited by a large number of bee-like creatures. Just one day ago, this alien object, which did not belong to this star system, suddenly appeared near the industrial planet Sende, and the entire industrial planet immediately entered a state of full martial law.

The industrial planet Zander doesn't have satellites like the moon. Every night, when you look up at the sky, all you see are countless stars scattered across the heavens.

It's quite rare to see a 'moon' hanging high in the sky like this.

The young Diaz child seemed to have grown tired of watching, turned around and went downstairs, where he saw his father sitting in the living room, seemingly on high alert, ready to defend himself against something.

The Diaz children walked over, their little hands nervously grasping their fathers' strong arms, their four eyes anxiously looking at their silent fathers and asking questions.

"Father, we will be saved, won't we?"

"Yes, our government will protect us." A gentle expression appeared on the slightly tired face of the Diaz man as he patted his child's head.

This reassurance calmed the young Diaz children's anxieties.

In his little world, his father was always that reliable and dependable figure; if his father said it was okay, then it was okay.

However, when the child's gaze shifted to the gun his father was gripping tightly in his other hand, he couldn't help but ask in confusion, "...Father, why do you keep holding that weapon?"

"because……"

Just as the Diaz people were about to speak, a violent roar suddenly enveloped them.

boom!

The walls of the house shattered, and debris flew everywhere. The Diaz people only had time to shield their children behind them, as many shards pierced their flesh.

In just a moment, the Diaz man was seriously injured and rendered unable to move.

"Hahaha, robbery! Everyone living inside, get out here! Load all your valuables into my truck!"

There were voices outside the house. Through the gap in his father's arm, the child could clearly see two soldiers in outer armor, one of whom was holding a smoking heavy single-soldier weapon. Next to them was a heavy armored vehicle, on which the most conspicuous place was the imperial insignia, symbolizing the highest honor.

"You, you are Imperial soldiers?!" The child, who was being held tightly under his father's body, was shocked. His young worldview was shattered. He could not understand why soldiers who valued honor above all else and took it upon themselves to protect the people would attack him and his father.

"Why, why..." the child stammered, his expression filled with disbelief.

Seeing the child's expression, the soldier who had blasted open the wall with his weapon sneered and asked, "Kid, Sende is about to be destroyed, do you really think anyone still cares about you?"

As he spoke, the soldier stepped forward and, disregarding the other man's severely injured body, kicked the child's father without any mercy.

"Hey, stop playing dead! Tell us where the valuables are!"

"Otherwise, I can't guarantee his safety."

The soldiers pulled out their heavy-duty shooting rifles and aimed them at the child beneath the Diaz man, threatening and intimidating him without any mercy.

The child, sheltered beneath his father, stared blankly at the gun aimed at him, too frightened to speak, his breathing becoming rapid. For the first time in his life, he understood that even his great father had moments when he couldn't protect him.

Another soldier standing outside the house added persuasively, "We're only after your money, not your life. We hope you'll cooperate with us."

"In, cough, in the basement..." the child's father said with difficulty.

Guided by the Diaz man's words, the two soldiers entered the basement and carried out a large safe with sides measuring two meters. If it weren't for the support provided by the outer armor, the two Imperial soldiers wouldn't have been able to move it even a centimeter.

With his severely injured father pinned beneath him, the child could not see what the two soldiers were doing; he could only vaguely hear their conversation.

"Goodness, this stuff is so heavy. I didn't realize this family was so wealthy. It seems they've been plundering other civilians even during peacetime."

"This family has children, shouldn't we keep some?" One of the soldiers still retained the last shred of conscience.

"Why keep it! It's not like we're the only ones who need it! Once the negotiations with the bee swarm organisms are over and we accept the full-scale infection with bee spores, do you know how much the price of a flight to leave will skyrocket... Huh? Why are you floating?" The Imperial soldier's words revealed his panic at the unknown changes.

"You too, what happened?!"

Then, the child heard a series of crisp "snap" sounds, and the Imperial soldiers who were talking fell silent.

The father was already seriously injured and unconscious. The anxious child, though frightened, mustered his courage and crawled out from under his father.

When he looked in the direction of the Imperial soldiers again, he only saw two spheres made of flesh and metal.

Where the heavy armored vehicle was originally parked, there was no sign of the vehicle, only a larger metal sphere, as if it had been forcibly formed by some extremely terrifying external force.

"What on earth is going on?" the child muttered blankly to himself, his limited understanding unable to explain what he was seeing.

Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives of the Sunder administrative center, the Beehive Creatures said to the Governor of Sunder: "The rebel army in Asta City, Sunder has been completely wiped out. Our negotiations will continue."

"Thank you for your help. Let's continue."

……

The industrial star of Sand is one of the important industrial hubs of the Diaz Empire. It has been developed over three centuries, and its surface is dotted with factories of all sizes, from rough processing to fine processing.

Taking over this planet serves both a strategic purpose and a probing purpose.

If the Dias Empire failed to deploy a large fleet to stop the swarm's attack on such an important planet, it would indicate that the Dias Empire was indeed consolidating its power in more important areas, trading space for time to plan other important matters.

"Infection of the entire Industrial Star Sende is complete," the swarm reported to Lu Shang.

Lu Shang nodded and then said, "Okay, trade the warships you brought with you to them, and then head to the next administrative planet of the Dias Empire."

For each planet infected, Lu Shang would trade a portion of the warships captured during the Bogu Nebula campaign to the other party.

The purpose of this was to give these planets a certain degree of self-defense capability, so that they would not easily submit to the power of the Diaz Empire.

The Dias Empire has two options: treat the Dias Empire people infected by the bee spores on the planet in a mild manner, or lose some of its military strength and carry out a large-scale purge by armed seizure of the planet.

The latter would definitely suffer a greater loss, since nobody wants to die if nothing's wrong.

As long as the Diaz Empire leaves these infected individuals behind, then Lu Shang's goal will be achieved.

"Mastermind, we have questions about your decision." A swarm member, currently on its next mission, expressed its concerns to Lu Shang via the psionic network.

Lu Shang was taken aback, then said with great delight, "That's good, this is a very good sign. It shows that you have begun to understand how to think independently. It seems that the upgraded main brain we gave you is still effective."

He needs the creatures in the bee colony to think, even if they're just daydreaming about bizarre things.

This is not useless, but rather a manifestation of expanded thinking. Once the brain's thinking is expanded, it can break the rigid thinking of the bee colony.

This is an excellent sign!

Lu Shang was in a great mood. He gestured, "What's the problem? Go ahead and ask."

An individual member of the swarm asked, "Why are we going to all that trouble infecting enemy individuals on the planet?"

"And the infection is so strange? We can't understand the meaning behind the mastermind's decision."

In the past, when bee colonies infected other species, they would directly infect the other species into becoming bee colony creatures. How could they infect the other species and then make them stronger?

What's the point of this?

Not only do the individual bees in the swarm not understand Lu Shang's operations, but the swarm executing the task also doesn't understand them.

"Because my strategic thinking is 'the fewer enemies the better, and the more friends the better,'" Lu Shang replied.

"Friends? We're supposed to live in harmony with other species?" the individual bee asked in surprise.

The concept of "friend" was not something bees originally understood, but after learning about other species, they came to understand what "friend" meant.

However, compared to the tasks assigned by Lu Shang, the individual bees in the swarm had no sense of any connection between these tasks and making "friends".

"No, no, no, you've completely misunderstood what I meant by 'friend'."

Lu Shang shook his head and then explained, "There's a saying in my hometown: the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Why is he a friend? Because you can use the enemy of my enemy to achieve your own strategic goals."

"My purpose in having you infect the aliens on those planets is to win them over and use them to create a strategic advantage for our future military operations."

The individual swarm member who was asking the question briefly reviewed its memories and then asked in bewilderment, "...Win them over? But many of them are afraid of the swarm, and quite a few have even fled to other parts of the Star Alliance. Moreover, among the infected planets, there are basically none that are willing to stand on the same side as the swarm."

Lu Shang couldn't help but laugh for a moment, then said, "You've misunderstood."

"Why must winning someone over be a social act? Before becoming an intelligent individual, an intelligent being is first a mass of matter, then a living being, and only finally an intelligent individual with the ability to think."

"The essence of winning people over is exploitation."

"If we can't exploit the other party on a social level, we can exploit them on a biological level or on a material level, such as by infecting a planet."

"The aliens on the planet will definitely panic after being infected. Panic will inevitably lead them to want to escape to a safe place. All we need to do is find a way to unilaterally share all of these aliens' senses, and they will become living surveillance cameras deployed in the enemy camp like swarms of bees."

As long as these infected individuals on the planet escape to other planets or somewhere else, the swarms of bees that share their senses can expand their intelligence network to wherever they are.

Even if it's for building some kind of secret weapon, wouldn't engineers be needed? Wouldn't martial law soldiers be needed? Wouldn't workers doing complex tasks be needed?

Okay, AI can do all of these things, but what about leaders who don't have family and friends?

When talking about everyday family matters, don't you always accidentally let something slip?

Your vast civilization must need manpower to operate, right?

If enough people are infected, even passersby on the street can become intelligence monitors for the swarm. How can you hide what your civilization is trying to do?

(End of this chapter)