Beast Taming Immortal Clan

Chapter 282 The Human-Insect War [Please Subscribe]

The nests of the demonic insects are all located deep underground, similar to rat nests.

However, the structure of the demon insect's nest is much more complex than that of the rat's nest.

Like an overturned honeycomb underground, it is divided into countless tiny cells where larvae hatch and are born, and adults also have a separate cell as their habitat.

At the same time, there are also water ditches dug at the bottom of the nest, which can divert the water seeping down from above to other areas to prevent it from being flooded.

This unique structure makes it difficult to destroy the demon insect's nest.

The larvae inside can grow very well as long as they have enough food, without having to worry about external threats.

The nest of demonic insects that Zhou Chun and his group discovered was not very large, and there were not even any second-tier demonic insects inside.

This appears to be a newly built nest.

According to their previous investigations, these demonic insects have now spread throughout Yang Kingdom, and in order to cope with the food crisis, many large demonic insect groups have had to split their nests.

This can be considered a scheme by human cultivators.

By implementing scorched earth tactics to block the insect swarm's access to food, and then surrounding and trapping the insect swarm within the territory of Yang Kingdom, preventing it from overflowing.

However, the insect plague has already become a significant threat. If they concentrate their forces to break through in a certain direction, the human cultivators will likely still be powerless to stop them.

At this moment, after observing the situation of the insect nest underground, Zhou Chun and Zhou Mingde immediately began to catch the insects.

Zhou Mingde raised his hand and waved, and a crimson-gold flying sword shot towards the location of the insect nest.

This third-tier magic weapon flying sword was incredibly sharp; ordinary rocks couldn't withstand its power at all, and it quickly drilled a hole in the ground.

Before long, the flying sword arrived at the location of the insect nest, and directly traversed the nest, turning it into a complete mess.

This enraged the demonic insects, and soon they rushed out of the burrow and attacked Zhou Chun and Zhou Mingde.

If it were a demon beast, it certainly wouldn't have the courage to attack a cultivator at the Purple Mansion stage and a cultivator at the Foundation Establishment stage.

However, the demonic insects are fierce and know no fear; they will only attack any enemy that provokes them.

Although there were no second-tier demonic insects, the attack, led by hundreds of first-tier demonic insects and accompanied by thousands of ordinary demonic insects, was still quite impressive.

Just as the intelligence report stated, most of those first-tier demonic insects possessed relevant magical abilities.

The demonic insects that attacked Zhou Chun and his group were mostly fire-elemental. Once they got close to the enemy, they could spew out a high-temperature venom that burned and corroded the target.

Let alone flesh and blood bodies like humans and demonic beasts, even ordinary first-tier magic artifacts would be corroded and have a gap if hit by that high-temperature venom.

Furthermore, these demonic insects can band together to form insect arrays, enhancing their overall defensive capabilities, and even transferring their meager magical power to a particular demonic insect to forcibly increase that insect's strength.

Therefore, even if there are only a few hundred first-tier demonic insects, once they form an array and launch an attack, they still have the strength to threaten ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivators.

However, the enemy they encountered this time was not someone that could be dealt with by such simple tricks.

After briefly testing the strength of the insect swarm, Zhou Chun and Zhou Mingde killed most of the demonic insects. Then, using a special magical artifact they had prepared beforehand, they put more than twenty live first-tier demonic insects and hundreds of ordinary demonic insects into it and brought it back to the market.

Upon returning to the market, the two handed over the captured demonic insects to Zhou Jiawei for experimentation.

In the following days, Zhou Chun and Zhou Mingde would still occasionally travel to Yang Kingdom to try and capture a second-tier demon insect.

However, as it turned out, their ideas were simply not feasible.

Those second-tier demonic insects are violent in nature. Once trapped, if they find there is no way to escape, they will desperately charge forward until they are exhausted and die.

Zhou Chun and his team have not yet found an effective way to prevent this from happening.

Meanwhile, Zhou Jiawei's experiments also made little progress.

Although a few days is not a long time, it was enough for him to test all the low-cost poisons he had brought, and the results were terrible.

The demonic insects are incredibly resilient. Of the low-cost poisons Zhou Jiawei brought, almost none could kill them, and even those that could take half their lives were rare.

"Fourteenth Uncle, I think your research direction should be changed, and you should focus on studying toxic smoke. Given the scale of the insect plague, only large-scale toxic smoke fumigation can achieve the desired effect of eradicating the disaster!"

"If we can develop a poisonous smoke that can kill ordinary demonic insects, it will be worth it even if it requires some rare materials."

"After all, the materials that our Zhou family finds difficult to collect may not be so difficult to obtain compared to the various factions in Yang Kingdom and other countries!"

Inside the room, after Zhou Chun inquired about the current status of the poison research from Zhou Jiawei, he whispered his opinion.

However, after hearing his words, Zhou Jiawei sighed helplessly and said, "How could I not know that toxic smoke is the best way to kill insects!"

"However, compared to poison water and powder, poison smoke is inherently less toxic. Moreover, the physical structure of demonic insects is different from that of humans and ordinary beasts. Poison smoke that is effective for humans and ordinary beasts may not be effective for them."

"Therefore, developing a poisonous smoke that is effective against the demonic insects is extremely difficult and cannot be done in a short period of time!"

As a drug expert, Zhou Jiawei certainly knew better than Zhou Chun how to use drugs to kill a target.

He also understood the complexity and difficulty of preparing poison better than Zhou Chun.

After hearing the inside story from him, Zhou Chun realized that she had been thinking too simply, so she didn't say anything more, just offered a few words of encouragement, and then left.

A few more days passed, and suddenly a piece of news spread throughout the market where Zhou Chun and his group lived.

It is said that all countries and factions that have received Yang Kingdom's "humanitarian appeal" have sent reinforcements to Yang Kingdom.

Meanwhile, the insect swarms within Yang Kingdom are showing signs of a concentrated migration due to the food crisis.

Therefore, the reinforcements from various countries and the cultivators from Yang Kingdom, Dayun Kingdom, and other countries prepared to concentrate their forces to intercept the migrating insect swarm and fight a direct battle with the insect swarm.

"It's said that the swarm is migrating towards Rong Kingdom. Hundreds of thousands of cultivators have already gathered at the border between Rong and Yang Kingdoms, effectively sealing off most of the border area. Furthermore, Nascent Soul stage cultivators are constantly monitoring the swarm's movement to ensure they don't use diversionary tactics!"

Inside the market, Zhou Jiapeng vividly described the information he had gathered, his expression slightly excited.

An army of hundreds of thousands of cultivators—this is indeed a very awe-inspiring force!

Even in the great war between Jingguo and Hualong Sect, and the war to resist the beast tide, the actual number of participants was only tens of thousands.

However, the number of cultivators gathered in Rongguo now is in the hundreds of thousands, and among them are experts from various countries and sects.

The mere thought of such a scene is enough to shock ordinary cultivators.

But Zhou Mingde had seen a lot in his life, and he was not shaken by Zhou Jiapeng's words.

After a moment of calm reflection, he said in a deep voice, "We've actually been forced into a direct confrontation with the insect swarm. It seems this insect plague is even more devastating than we anticipated!"

"Whether we win or lose in this head-on battle, the number of cultivators who fall will certainly be considerable, and the insect swarm cannot possibly be completely wiped out due to a rout!"

At this point, he added, "Perhaps the purpose of this direct confrontation is to try again to see if we can eliminate the Insect King. If we can eliminate the Insect King, even if the insect swarm isn't completely wiped out, it will greatly curb the scale of the insect plague!"

A swarm of insects that forms a plague must have an insect king.

Once the Zerg King is killed, the Zerg swarm's primary task is to elect a new Zerg King.

At this time, in order to compete for the throne of the insect king, the high-level demonic insects in the insect swarm will fight and devour each other. The lower-level demonic insects will also split into many groups due to the loss of the insect king's leadership, and even kill each other.

This chaos will continue until a new Zerg King ascends the throne and reorganizes the swarm.

Therefore, if a way to completely eliminate the swarm cannot be found, killing the swarm king to curb its expansion is a feasible delaying tactic.

"This junior agrees with what you said, Elder. The purpose of this direct battle is mostly to kill the Insect King."

Zhou Chun nodded, agreeing with Zhou Mingde's statement, and then said, "Let's wait and see what happens next!"

Judging from his words, he had no intention of participating in that war that was recorded in history.

Upon seeing this, Zhou Mingde nodded with a satisfied expression and said, "Yes, let's do it that way. We just need to wait here for news."

The Zhou family members' judgment was correct.

The sniping battle on the border between Rong and Yang Kingdoms soon broke out.

Because a Nascent Soul stage cultivator was monitoring the swarm, the movement direction of the main swarm was impossible to hide.

Furthermore, in order to take care of the lower-level demonic insects, the swarm will not move too fast.

This gave the human side ample time and space to move their 100,000-strong army directly in front of the Zerg swarm's main force.

Above the scorched earth of Yang Kingdom, countless demonic insects gathered into a vast, continuous cloud, stretching for dozens of miles as they moved forward.

The sound of their wings flapping when they fly is deafening, like thunder, and their momentum is extremely frightening.

Fortunately, the land below Yang Kingdom has now become a scorched wasteland, devoid of people and animals.

Otherwise, such a display of force could scare people to death!

But just as this overwhelming swarm of insects arrived at the border region between Yang Kingdom and Rong Kingdom, less than two hundred miles apart, they encountered a massive army of over ten thousand human cultivators who had been waiting for them.

On the ground, cultivators stood at intervals ranging from tens of feet to hundreds of feet, densely covering an area of ​​over a hundred miles.

Meanwhile, the cultivators at the Purple Mansion stage and the Golden Core stage floated in mid-air, forming an aerial defense line.

When the overwhelming swarm of insects approached within dozens of miles, Golden Core cultivators and Purple Mansion cultivators took the lead, unleashing various powerful spells to attack the swarm.

A Golden Core cultivator waved a banner, and bursts of crimson-gold flames emerged from the banner, transforming into hundreds of crimson-gold firebirds that swooped down on the swarm of insects.

Another Golden Core cultivator made a hand seal and rubbed his hands together, and a hurricane tornado with a diameter of over ten feet, reaching from the sky, swept across the swarm of insects.

Setting fire, blowing air, spraying water...

A variety of powerful spells and magical abilities were blasted at the insect swarm from a distance.

Every spell or magical power that lands within the swarm of insects will annihilate tens of thousands of demonic insects, even those of the third tier!

However, compared to the massive swarm of insects stretching for dozens of miles, this loss was negligible.

Moreover, the swarm responded quickly after encountering a powerful attack.

Suddenly, the massive swarm of insects split into smaller groups, with the larger demonic insects flying to the front and collectively accelerating forward.

These are all second- or third-tier demonic insects, which are highly evolved and possess not only powerful attack methods but also defensive capabilities.

They formed insect arrays and charged forward, their magical energy connected together. Even an attack from a Golden Core cultivator could not cause much damage to a single insect array.

Soon, the vanguard of these insect swarms rushed to the front of the human cultivator army and launched a counterattack.

Some of them collectively spewed out fiery red, high-temperature venom, which rained down on the cultivators on the ground like a meteor shower.

Some of them collectively spewed out black and silver-white light blades, like a volley of arrows, aimed at the cultivators in the air.

Others spew out bluish-green venom, raining it down on the enemy.

Compared to the dazzling array of magical spells and supernatural abilities of cultivators, the insect swarm's attack methods seem somewhat simplistic.

However, no one dares to underestimate their offensive power.

Soon, cultivators with lower cultivation levels perished in the insect swarm attack.

At this moment, the swarm of insects began to close in and launch a melee attack on the army of cultivators blocking their way.

Meanwhile, the cultivators who stood like wooden stakes on the ground in various places also took out their magical artifacts or cast spells, and launched an attack on the approaching demonic insects.

In this war, everyone has their own mission, and cultivators at every level know what they should do.

Those Qi Refining and Foundation Establishment cultivators were tasked with dispersing the insect swarm's power as much as possible, while simultaneously killing as many of the insect swarm's living forces as possible.

The cultivators at the Purple Mansion stage and the Golden Core stage were responsible for intercepting the main force of the insect swarm and trying their best to divide the swarm so that the power that the insect king could mobilize would be reduced.

As for the Nascent Soul stage cultivators who have not yet shown themselves, they bear the most important task: to kill the king of the insect swarm.

Finally, when the overwhelming swarm of insects completely entered the human cultivators' territory and engaged in a fierce battle with the intercepting human cultivators, the Nascent Soul stage cultivators finally made their move!

Suddenly, colorful rays of light rose in the sky, and torrents of pure and powerful spiritual energy surged from all directions toward the swarm of insects, instantly crushing and killing millions of demonic insects!

The insect king, which had been hiding in the center of the swarm, was now forced to reveal its true form, as it could no longer conceal itself.

There will only be one update today.

(End of this chapter)