Day 4 - Crimspur
“I knew it, your dream-path attainment wasn’t low after all. Among the seven original Magi of Holy Terra, your combined breadth and depth is probably the third after the Emperor and Chaos Nemesis!” Takemikazuchi commented.
“Rank 2 dream-path killer move, [Dream Projection]!” Crimspur finished setting up the killer move, and the wall became some sort of monitor that replayed the scene of Mordred’s memory. Crimspur didn’t dare digging Mordred’s memory too deep as it would trigger his passive soul-path defenses, “Shut up, just watch Mordred’s battle.”
Takemikazuchi smiled, not taking Crimspur’s rude retort to heart. And so, the two watched the scene of Mordred’s battle with Lord Erebus.
The scene started with Mordred’s entrance to Lord Erebus’ micro-plane.
“Mecha-werewolves…” Crimspur’s heroic ant frowns. “So he wanted to take the route of [Supreme] like Intelligent Metal instead of [Harmony] like his big brother or [Purity] like Chaos Nemesis or Sword Seigneur.”
“The tripartite-philosophy of our Human Imperium that you’ve theorized?” Takemikazuchi inquired.
“Yes. Before his departure from Holy Terra, he might’ve been the most murderous magus of all time, but he always had restraints on modifying his human soul. In a sense, he can be considered as a subscriber of [Purity]. It seems like the reason why he was after your soul and Intelligent Metal’s true inheritances was because he wanted to switch from [Purity] into a [Supreme]. I can’t deny that I’m a bit disappointed because I’m the only magus of [Harmony] now, but let’s just see what happens next.”
The scene goes on as the battle escalates. Each time Mordred made a move, the two made a light comment, but both didn’t talk too much.
“Terraforming-class killer move of snow and ice-path… Was his attainment that high?” Takemikazuchi wondered.
“Maybe traveling in the cold Boundless Astral Realm allowed him to comprehend snow and ice-path… or maybe it’s been a few thousand years since his arrival in Morgen World. We might never know.” Crimspur explained.
After the terraforming-class killer move, Mordred’s actions were scrutinized heavily by the two magi, until the point where he used Lupusrazor as an explosive to kill Erebus. The scene ended with Lord Erebus dragging Mordred into a dream world.
Takemikazuchi was flabbergasted. “The most genocidal magus of all time… A man specialized in killing, the scholar of death, and the man who was once encircled by four Sovereign Magi of Holy Terra at once and survived… well, he died back then and revived himself, but was he this weak?”
Crimspur did not react to the shogun’s accusation. There must be an explanation regarding why Mordred isn’t as aggressive as when he’s back in Holy Terra. “He’s too… hmm, what’s the word?”
“Conservative.” Takemikazuchi completed his sentence. “Grimsong Specter-sama’s soul-path killer moves are renowned throughout the Milky Way Galaxy as the most lethal, his mere name is a symbol of death, a bedtime horror story that would strike fear into the hearts of Paragons and Epics, even Germans. However, we could not see his ferocity and lethality at all… he’s been using his primary path as mere support, unbelievable…”
“Hahaha!” Crimspur laughed wholeheartedly as if he heard the funniest joke in his entire life. “Mordred never went ‘all-out’!!! I’m going to have so much fun reprimanding him when he wakes up.”
…
Day 16 - Takemikazuchi
‘Intelligent Metal-sama wanted to construct the Manufactorium Primaris on the metal-rich Crimson Mars during the initial stage of our space exploration age, whereas Myriad Overlord-sama wanted to feed the planet to his Plantae Overlord. There was a brief civil war where the Supreme Commander of Astrales Militär and the Grand Archmagos of the Machine Cult were fighting against each other.
Although he was eventually driven away by Intelligent Metal-sama’s von Neumann self-replicating machines, Myriad Overlord-sama gained quite a bit of her information-path attainment in that war. Perhaps, his original goal wasn’t Crimson Mars in the first place, but to steal some of her attainment.’
‘As Myriad Overlord-sama once said, victory or defeat isn’t too important. The important thing is the benefit behind them.’
‘Fortunately, the Astrales Militär and the Machine Cult is part of the Human Imperium. Our Emperor forbade Myriad Overlord-sama from escalating the battle to more than 2 Overlords at once, stopping the civil war from reducing the Human Imperium’s foundation further.’
Takemikazuchi recalled the past as he took a deep look at the army of ants which were scurrying about. Most of the ants are as big as a horse, but they weren’t mere beasts. These formic lifeforms are as intelligent as humans. As proof of that, almost all of them held weapons ranging from close-range weapons such as sword, spear, and bow-and-arrow, to weapons less suited for the underground like machine guns, autocannons, and mini-howitzers strapped to their rear carapace.
…perhaps, intelligence isn’t a good metric to calculate the power level of Crimpsur’s ants.
In any case, a few select ants carried railguns on their backs, and what makes them special is that the railgun is moving by itself, as if there’s an AI controlling it. Information-path profundities are specialized in informatics, allowing technological tools to be semi-self aware.
Takemikazuchi realized that Crimspur must be advancing his tech trees right now. After all, unlike the vampire lord, both Magi can’t use magic. They have to find other ways to compensate for their lack of understanding of magic.
‘Yesterday, the ants were barely armed with gunpowder weapons. It seemed like Myriad Overlord-sama had found rich mineral veins underneath the mountain…’ As Takemikazuchi had those thoughts, a human arm tapped his shoulder, disrupting his absentmindedness.
“Takemikazuchi, it’s time.”1 a very human-like ant spoke in Japanese.
This ant looks literally like Mordred, or Crimspur, if that even matters, with the exception of its black compound ant-eyes, carapace, and ant feelers on his forehead.
“You twin brothers really look alike.” Takemikazuchi muttered, “Did you find what I need?”
“We are not twins.” Crimspur’s Heroic Ant unit denied. “We are waiting for you down below.”
The shogun did not react to Crimspur’s denial. “Let’s go.”
The two went further down in the ant’s hive, navigating through the labyrinthian corridors which were filled with traps and all sorts of ants with various mutations and sizes. As they traveled down further, Takemikazuchi noticed that the soil started to change into granite or other types or heavier minerals. It was a long way down, with occasional near-vertical terrain that the shogun struggled with more than the ant.
“This is no longer the metallic soil of the mountain, have you expanded so far already?” the Shogun inquired, curious..
“The worker-caste found quite a bit of rare metal deposits down below. They are currently mining them while the intellectual-caste is deducing their properties. They should be usable in the next phase.” Crimspur replied as they reached a large metal door, “We’re here.”
Even before opening the door, Takemikazuchi could smell the deep stench of sulfur. From the heat radiating off of the door, it wasn’t that hard to guess what’s behind it. Crimspur’s heroic unit pushed the heavy door open and a wave of extreme heat washed upon the two of them. Seeing the spectacle inside, the Shogun can’t help but be impressed.
Inside was a humongus ant the size of a football stadium.
Naturally, an ant being this big is a unique sight, but what made the Martial Magus raise his eyebrows was the sight of the ant constantly gorging on magma. The door was actually connected to a giant magma lake, Crimspur’s Formic Overlord currently feeding off of the magma. While half of the ant’s body is submerged in this magma lake, the rest of its body, which was the breeding organ, is actually embedded in another room. That made it two football fields long.
Seeing the magma waterfall feeding the chamber with constant supply of magma, the Shogun inwardly praised Crimspur for his prudent arrangement.
“With the magma river tributary supplying your Formic Overlord with a near-limitless amount of raw resources, there’s no need for your giant-class true body to move around.” Takemikazuchi nodded. “I never would’ve thought that you’d let me get close to your true body, considering our past…”
“Mordred seemed to have lost his star-path attainment, probably because he died multiple times without having the chance to recoup his attainment. You know he always loses some of his attainment everytime he revives himself, such is the price of his indestructible soul. Due to his lack of star-path attainment, his natural country of delusions has no sun, so this is the location with the highest heat. If it was up to me, I wouldn’t want you to get too close to my true body either.” The humanoid ant muttered.
It took Takemikazuchi a few seconds to inspect the ant’s giant-class body, which now even showed signs of draconic scales. “Your gain from consuming the vampiric blood dragon’s corpse was not low, I see.”
“What a fucking joke.” Crimspur’s heroic unit instantly denied. “The vampire’s attainment in blood-path is not even Legendary, and his memories of the vampiric dragon blood is not whole. The corpse was literally a forceful alteration of a reptilian lifeform being enlarged and injected with whatever the fuck the ‘magic’ of their main world was. If it was brought into the real world, the fake dragon would instantly collapse under the weight of its own body. Even if it can endure its own body weight, its genetic structure is unbelievably unstable, that thing is a genetic mess. It was able to exist in this dream world because the vampire used a significant amount of spiritual force to alter a portion of the dimensional laws to make it work. That thing is a failure, I can’t use them as a stepping stone! This is why we are at a disadvantage.”
Crimspur’s complaints were a bit cute from Takemikazuchi's perspective. It was rare to see the Sovereign Magus of Evolution’s scheme to fail. But, the man is still a frightening being. As far as he’s concerned, the last time he saw Crimspur’s Formic Overlord, it wasn’t that big. Having it grow to this size and evolve to have great heat resistance in a couple of week’s time is truly a testament of Crimspur’s capability. Unfortunately, even the Supreme Commander of the Astrales Militar can’t defeat the vampire army without sufficient accumulations.
“I see.” Takemikazuchi started undressing himself and passed his clothing and three swords which were made from rank 2 tamahagane steel to the heroic unit. “Please keep them safe.”
The humanoid ant kept them and asked him before he was able to enter the magma lake chamber, “How long do you need?”
“Depends.” Takemikazuchi started to elaborate. “Grimsong Specter-sama focused on recalling my attainment and personality. He cut corners with my physique and weapons. Compared to a martial magus back in my Lightning Sword Manor, my body is comparable to a rank 3 outer disciple, not even an inner or core disciple. I cannot use my methods freely like when I was a rank 3.”
“Give me a brief estimation.” The ant inquired once more, impatience contained with its tone.
“The surface of the magma lake reached three thousand degrees, but the lower layer should be higher. With this heat, it’ll take me around two years to reforge my flesh and blood into an acceptable level… a level of which I wouldn’t be exhausted after using Instant Sword once.”
There was no error in his words. As a martial artist’ body became stronger, it was extremely difficult to improve it further. Two years to increase his body spec’s by a few percent is already a great result, considering his body is as powerful as a rank 3 martial artist (despite being considered as the weakest rank 3).
“Too long, my Labyrinthian Ant’s Hive only has 16 floors right now. With this limited amount of vertical space, I can only extend it to 100 floors. It would probably take the vampire less than two years to reach this location.” Crimspur’s heroic unit quickly denied. “If I provide you cultivation resources, can that process be accelerated?”
Hearing Crimspur’s reply, Takemikazuchi’s electric blue eyes gleamed in expectation. He can’t contain his calm after hearing Crimspur’s offer! Cultivation resources for martial artists are usually food or special items that can be consumed. If it was an offer from any other Magi, he wouldn’t be too interested, but Crimspur is different!
“I’ve only tasted your food-path product once within my lifetime. If I can experience it again….”
“Don’t push your luck.” The heroic ant interrupted Takemikazuchi’s fantasy.
“With the exception of Grimsong Specter-sama, you’ve never handed down your food-path true inheritances to anyone else. Not only me, other Magi are also interested in your true inheritances… even Chaos Nemesis-sama highly covets them!”
The heroic ant shook his head, ignoring what the shogun had said. “Three months. I’ll supply you with my food-path product. If you can’t…”
“Rest assured, Myriad Overlord-sama. With your support, even an idiot can become a Martial Legend.” Takemikazuchi instantly switched his behavior.
“Hmm. I’ll have to breed some ants that can endure this heat first. Tsk, what a hassle.” The ant clicked its tongue. “They’ll be periodically providing you with my special food.” The ant then closed the door, locking Takemikazuchi with the Formic Overlord.
“As expected. Myriad Overlord-sama’s appetite is endless.” Takemikazuchi lightly commented at the Formic Overlord who never stopped eating magma. All this time, Crimspur spoke through the heroic unit because the Formic Overlord’s mouth is being used to gorge molten minerals. After all, not everyone was like Mordred who can practice ventriloquism casually. “Food-path… is truly profound.”
Throwing these useless thoughts behind, the martial magus started his round of cultivation by submerging his body in the magma lake. His body was like a geothermal reactor. Soon, lightning sparks began accumulating on the surrounding magma.
…
Day 29 - Lord Erebus
Thud! A large ant with the size of two horses finally stopped moving after Lord Erebus personally threw a blood spear. The ant’s corpse was at the point of which it was questionable how it could still stand in the first place. This was because not only does it have no head, its chest-equivalent is also filled with holes which were caused by blood arrows. Of course, the blood arrows were not only corrosive and toxic, it is also semi-self aware, capable of destroying the target’s body from the inside. Any other lifeforms would be dead if they got hit by one of these blood arrows, but the ant managed to survive almost ten minutes without a head.
“Take this away, we might be able to use them later. The enemy’s rank 2 elite units are far stronger than mine, but we still outnumbered them.” Lord Erebus commanded some of his warrior-slave.
The warrior-slave is a burly vampire with 2.2 meter tall body and wide frame. The blood-path radiation from his body is weaker than rank 1 mages, but the warrior-slave is a dual cultivator of strength and blood. His primary path is strength, and strength-path cultivation techniques don't usually nurture their body’s radiation in the first place.
The vampire slave nodded to Lord Erebus order and began mobilizing his thralls to collect the ant’s corpse.
“Master, the vanguard team reported a surge of ants 2 minute from our position.” One of the vampires beside Erebus reported. From a glance of his caped robe, it was clear that the vampire is a mage. “They are well-equipped with advanced weaponry, two squads have fallen victim to their chemical bombs!”
The report made Lord Erebus frown. He thought it would be an easy win since the undead machine’s dream world does not offer strong retaliation towards his invading army. The ant army that blocked his path wasn’t too strong, they were easily slaughtered. Even if they have homefield advantage, a dragon breath carpet bombing can easily push back any resistance in the open field.
However, everything changed when the vampire lord’s army reached the last bastion of the undead machine.
At the core of the undead machine’s dream world, this metallic mountain is a massive natural fortress. Just a spoon of metallic soil in this place could weigh a few kilograms at least. From a glance, it looks like a normal metallic mountain, but after assaulting it for weeks and failing to fully penetrate the ant’s hive, Erebus realized that the mountain itself is special, the labyrinthian ant’s hive was made in this location with a deeper scheme in mind.
The metallic mountain seemed to be a combination of all sorts of resource points from several paths. For example, the corridors which were dug by the ants are long and connected to several rooms. In each room, the gravity differed, objects might be heavier or lighter with no clear pattern, or the timeflow of the said room would similarly differ. In addition, the metallic mountain of the soil is extremely good at dissipating raw force or vibration. Bombarding the ant hive from outside is not a good idea because of the inefficiency. At the very least, the mountain wouldn’t collapse even if Lord Erebus bombarded it for decades.
Thus, the only solution is to capture each room and each floor of the ant’s hive one by one because digging is not effective due to the formic compound reinforcing the walls.
Naturally, this also bought a problem that Lord Erebus couldn’t easily solve. Originally, the ants are weak as they have no magic nor martial training. His quick progress to attack the undead machine’s dream world was proof. They were like the lowest level of beast cannon fodders used by low-rank enslavement-path masters who just started their cultivation journey.
As time goes by and they exchange a couple of battles, the ants are starting to transform not only in shape and sizes, but also quality of equipment.
At first, they were using their own body. Then, parts of other ants as spear, arrows, shields or other weapons. After the first encounter, the equipment of the ants is improving even if it was barely. A few days ago, the ants that wield gunpowder-based weapons are extremely rare, and each of their projectile weapons would typically bounces off of Erebus’ blood-slave’s skin.
The guns are weak enough that the Erebus’ army can literally ignore them.
Now however, there are some captain-level ants that wield railguns, with the rest holding ‘hot weapons’ that could pose a threat towards Erebus blood-slaves.
This was unprecedented! The rate of improvement made Lord Erebus frightened of his enemy. Furthermore, the mountain seemed to be imbued with enslaving will, just like Erebus own’s world. Although barely, this would disrupt Erebus’ control upon his blood-slaves.
Thus, he was forced to participate in the frontline to ensure no mishaps happened.
“Dispatch two squads as reinforcement, prioritize killing them and retrieve their corpses. Don’t let them survive any battle as they would be problematic later.” Erebus commanded.
One thing that he learned during weeks of assaulting the ant’s hive, is that the ant that survives any battle would evolve to become a greater species in their next encounter. It is best if they are killed, even if that means using up his blood-slave to exchange cannon fodder. There’s no problem in this because Lord Erebus has been using cannon fodder wave tactics to exhaust the enemy’s battle resources.
“Slowly and steady. We’ve reached the 2nd floor after a week. Even if this ant’s hive has a thousand floors, it’ll be fully conquered sooner or later.” Lord Erebus encouraged his blood-slaves.
…
Day 41 - Lord Erebus
“Hahah…” A humanoid infiltrator unit of the ant swarm chuckled as he sprayed rifle fire towards the group of vampires. The two assault rifles in its hand have two different architectures. The right one seemed to be made out of streamlined metal, with a railgun as the core reference. As for the left one, it was made purely out of biological material, shooting bone spines coated with anti-vampire chemicals.
The railgun projectile isn’t that harmful towards the vampire, the most dangerous ones are actually the caustic spines shot by the bio-rifle. A lot of vampires have fallen victim to the anti-vampire chemical as they were designed to react to vampire bloodlines.
“Bastard!” Lord Erebus’ eyes are glowing red with fury. This humanoid ant has ambushed his personal guard fourteen times in the last two days, not giving them any respite. Although Erebus’ personal guards aren't idiots that would fall into traps multiple times, the ant would turn invisible and leave before Erebus could offer effective retaliation. The ant isn’t even focused on dealing damage, it was focused on disturbing Erebus.
What made Erebus more vexed is that… this is the core formation of the vampire army!
The vampire army has penetrated and almost subjugated this 6th floor. The army upstairs are maintaining logistics in exploring this labyrinth, with checkpoints erected in every important path. This progress was made after arduous battle, slaughtering almost a hundred thousand ants in a slow war of attrition. However, it seems like they were a joke in front of this humanoid ant who knows the ant’s hive as if it was the back of its palm.
“You’re not that strong, after all…” The infiltrator unit always maintains its smug smile, not forgetting to hurl insults at Lord Erebus.
Clack! The rifles emptied their clips and the humanoid ant simply tossed them aside as soon as he realized he was out of ammo, not afraid of his weapons being deciphered by the enemy later on. It rummaged through the military bag behind his waist and started to throw grenades at the vampire army, not even using defensive methods to defend against the incoming blood spears or blood arrows.
Stab! Stab! Stab! Multiple blood arrows hit its body and a blood spear was sent after the humanoid ant’s heart. The blood arrows began taking root in the ant’s body, poisoning it with toxic blood and interrupting the normal operation of the body. Unfortunately, the internal workings of the ant’s body is not that simple.
Crimspur has altered most of his ants so that they can be fully functional without blood. This level of damage is negligible as they can barely penetrate the ant’s exoskeleton. The blood arrows and spears were trying to latch to the infiltrator ant’s body, but they were having difficulties. The ant simply took out another weapon that was holstered on its back. It was a pair of broadswords, but not a simple ‘cold weapon’. The left broadsword can vibrate in high frequency while the other one is capable of producing scorching heat. Not really a ‘cold weapon’ after all.
Swoosh! A vampire brute with a 2 meter tall body rushed at Crimspur’s infiltrator ant. The brute was a vampire that dual cultivated blood and strength, its raw power is nothing to scoff at. Just as it was about to ram Crimspur and pin it to the ground, a dark silhouette approached Crimspur from the shadows.
“Hahah, that wouldn’t work on me twice!” The ant ignored the brute as it stabbed its two swords behind him. “Dark-path magic spell, was it? Truly a wonderful experience to fight against a mage.”
The infiltrator ant was pinned down by the vampire brute, but its swords have sliced the shadowy creature. Unfortunately, physical damage is rendered useless in front of this magical being. With a loud thud, the ant was pummeled down by the brute, with other vampires following suit.
“Foolish!” The ant simply stopped the brute’s fist with his own. “Ants are one of the strongest insects in the world. When their size is escalated to human size, do you think I’m that weak?”
The ant crushed the brute’s throat with its sheer grip strength. The ant might be light, but it’s not weak at all. Its insectoid physique is far superior to the vampire when it was elevated into human size.
Following the death of the vampire brute, the ant and vampire army entered a brutal melee, especially the shadowy creature whom the ant just tried to cut. However, the ant is alone whereas the vampire army is endless. Furthermore, the vampires have magic spells that the ant cannot counter at the moment, it can only allow them to accumulate damage.
“I guess this is it for this time…” Crimspur smiled through the infiltrator ant, but the vampire lord guessed what he wanted to do.
“Rank 2 blood-path killer move, [Murder in Cold Blood]!” The vampire lord has prepared his countermeasure from days ago. He wouldn’t let the infiltrator ant, which was extremely hard to deal with, to suicide bomb itself like the previous two times.
In an instant, the infiltrator ant froze in shock as its bloodless body became frozen. “I see. It’s not the blood of my body that was used to freeze me, but the blood of your own vampire slaves…” Crimspuir muttered before the infiltrator ant died, its body frozen solid.
“Haah…” Lord Erebus coughed blood. The anti-vampire chemicals are truly effective. If injected to a vampire’s bloodstream directly, it would be lethal, but if inhaled, it suppressed rank 1 vampires by 50%. Although it has limited effect on rank 2 vampires like Lord Erebus himself, the smoke produced by the chemical weapon was able to disrupt spell casting sequences. This ant is truly skilled in antimage tactics.
“This isn't merely an assassin unit… but an elite assassin ant.” After calming down and expelling the anti-vampire chemicals in his system, Lord Erebus was able to briefly analyze the ant with just a short time. “I’ll need some time to research this. For now, fortify this floor.”
“Yes, my lord!” The vampire army naturally followed his arrangement.
…
Day 42 - Lord Erebus
“I see…” Erebus sighed, his hand dirty from dismantling insect corpses. His eyes are currently shining in an eerie dark red light which was dwindling by the second. “My [Bloodline Inspection] has limited effectiveness towards the ants, but I can still at least get some clues…”
Erebus sat down on a rock. After cleaning his hands, he massaged his temples while processing the intel he plundered from the ant’s corpse. As a Lord Inquisitor, one of his best methods of investigation is to plunder information through blood. Naturally, this is not the first time he had activated Bloodline Inspection towards the ants, but the results are never fulfilling.
Unlike Erebus’ method of rearing vampiric beast slave by using a vampiric disease onto beast or even cultivators, these ants are being born from their queen. Now, what’s noteworthy about the ants is that almost all of their muscle fiber is made out of metal.
These types of lifeforms which should be considered as biological machines aren’t unique. The Morgen World is vast, and it contains all sorts of unique lifeforms with special characteristics. According to his experience during his time in the Land of Sand and Fire, the Kaissereich is plagued by a type of armored beast called Gepanzerte Bestie. Each of them are literal biological machines with extremely high metallic content on their flesh. And so, he isn’t too surprised by the ant’s body structure as they were quite similar in a way.
What makes him vexed is the rate of advancement the ants possess.
A natural advancement would be long and arduous. For martial cultivators, it would be like practicing body tempering technique or other cultivation techniques, accumulating small progress through a lengthy process until the eventual advancement. For arcane cultivators, it would be spirit meditation techniques, understanding magical phenomena, incorporating magical theory, spell catalyst refinement and many other aspects.
Beasts too, can advance, but they mostly depend on their strong physique and powerful bloodline or racial traits. In fact, the reason why intellectual lifeforms stole beast bloodlines and incorporated them into their own are caused by this.
However, the ants, which should be considered as beasts, have broken this convention.
They don’t have any bloodline ability worthy enough to be plundered. Each of them are simple, yet have specialized functions. This is, of course, commonly seen when one gets used to fighting against enslavement-path experts as their cultivation revolves around the usage of resources. They have to maximize the amount of resources they have to exhaust the opponents. One of the methods is to create simple units for one particular purpose and make a variety of them for different goals.
For example, a unit specialized for brute strength wouldn’t take too many resources compared to an all-rounder commander unit. But what makes the ants break the normal convention is that they can evolve rapidly through devouring.
“When one or two army ant survive a battle, their spoils of war would be the corpse of the fallen, ally and foe alike. By devouring and inheriting their genetic sequence, the ants have the ability to evolve according to their need. If the ants ate a defense-focused beast, its chitinous exoskeleton might evolve to gain heavier mass and density, if it ate agile beasts, it might have several traits that allow them to move faster… and if they are allowed to devour a vampire…” Erebus sighed.
He had seen some special ants that evolved to take on human physique. They were one of the most problematic ants that he had ever encountered. For example, the elite assassin unit.
One of his vampire units is the Blood Assassin. Having rank 2 martial cultivation foundation, the Blood Assassins could fine-tune their body’s radiation to reflect or twist light, allowing it to render themselves invisible not only from sight, but also most investigative methods.
And, he has seen the Blood Assassin’s ability in the hands of an elite assassin ant.
He knew the essence of war is to learn the opponent’s ability and take countermeasures as the book ‘The Art of War’ that the Great Archmage released centuries ago has said so. However, isn’t this too overbearing?
Erebus wanted to complain, but where to? Whining is useless when things have progressed to this point. After all, he was the one who brought this situation.
“You’ve called me, master?” A vampire bride entered the makeshift laboratory filled with ant corpses.
“The vampire craftsmen, have they found ways to utilize the ant corpses?” Lord Erebus asked.
The labyrinthian ant’s hive environment is strange, although the vampire army was Lord Erebus blood-slaves, he felt their connection is limited as he went deeper underground. To solve this issue, he adapted his chain-of-command through his vampire brides, but that was just fixing a hole with flex tape. His investigative killer moves that connected his senses with his blood slaves are greatly restricted, so he has to use primitive ways of communication even with his own slaves.
“Yes, my lord.” The vampire bride took a leave and returned with a group of vampire thralls using weapons and armor made out of ant body parts. Starting from blades made out of ant pincers, shields out of ant carapace, or even bows with strings made from ant tendons, there wasn’t only quality, but also variety.
The vampire lord’s eyes glimmered with hope.
…
Day 692 - Takemikazuchi
“You want me to do what?” Takemikazuchi opened his eyes, looking at the pair of dog-sized red ants that spoke in japanese. The two ants brought a pair of sushi that would make even Takemikazuchi drool. The sushi, as well as the ants for that matter, was designed not to melt in the heat.
“It wouldn’t be hard. I’ve designed humanoid Paraponeras, they are capable. It’s a win-win solution that would alleviate the pressure that the vampire lord is giving me in the frontline.” The red ant replied, shoving the sushi on Takemikazuchi.
The shogun instantly devoured the sushi and his lightning-path radiation instantly surged, his body producing electric sparks that jumped around like lightning snakes. He has to sit down and use his body nurturing techniques so that his body does not explode from overnutrition. “Good food!” He praised as he felt his cultivation progressed visibly.
“Takemikazuchi, don’t play dumb. Think of my offer just now.” The red ants spoke once more.
The shogun sighed. “Are they heat resistant? I’m comfortable in this place, I don’t want to move around.”
If the two ants can replicate the human-equivalent of rolling their eyes, it must be the expression what they showed right now. “You’re… fucking joking, right?”
“Fine.” Takemikazuchi stood up and urged the ants to move. After leaving the room, an ant provided his clothing once more and they moved on to another room.
“This is…” the Shogun frowned.
“I’ve tried to replicate your courtyard before my little brother destroyed your homeland…” Crimspur’s heroic unit has been waiting for Takemikazuchi’s arrival.
The man in question traced his finger on the red torii and couldn’t help but reminisce about the past. His gaze instantly scanned the small bamboo forest, gray concrete floor, and the minimalist Japanese wooden house. A bead of tear leaked from Takemikazuchi’s eyes before he sighed once more. “Unneeded, but I appreciate the thought of it. Now then, where are they?”
“Follow me.” The heroic ant leads Takemikazuchi to a training ground where a hundred humanoid ants have been waiting for him. They were very similar to one another, even having the same face, body shape, and posture of sitting on crossed legs. “My true body has been watching and deducing your cultivation. I tried to replicate them, but in the end, my ants are not human even if they looked like one.”
The shogun nodded. His cultivation techniques are made for humans, not beast or artificial lifeforms like the ants.
“Let’s cut to the chase and begin.” Takemikazuchi took a katana which was presented by an ant. “Just follow my movements as I explain each step. This is called the Blackwing Sword True Inheritance. It consists of thirteen sword stances, each connected to one another. The first three stances are the Nurturing Techniques, the next three are Investigation Techniques, 7th to the 9th stances are Movement Techniques, while the last four are the Killing Techniques.”
“Wait!” Crimspur’s heroic unit stopped Takemikazuchi’s explanation. “I thought we agreed that you’re going to impart me the true inheritance that contains the Instant Sword?”
Takemikazuichi frowned, “Dimensional Blade True Inheritance requires extremely high requirements in sword-path attainment. Although you can accommodate the requirement of time-path and space-path with your own attainment, it is primarily a sword-path technique. It’s easier for you to create a time machine to stop time than learning any killer move from my Dimensional Blade True Inheritance.”
The heroic unit paused, pondering. Takemikazuchi’s argument made sense. “That’s disappointing, but I shouldn’t have expected to so easily replicate such a powerful sword-path technique in the first place. Let me choose what kind of inheritance you can impart me with.”
Takemikazuchi made the decision to give Crimspur Blackwing Sword True Inheritance because it was one of the best inheritance to impart to those with low sword-path attainment. Since Crimspur wanted to choose his inheritances, then the shogun could only follow.
“My true inheritances are split into three levels: paragon-tier, epic-tier and apex-tier, but just because they are paragon-tier, doesn't mean they are less useful than the epic-tier ones. For example, Blackwing Sword True Inheritance is considered as a paragon-tier but its Nurturing Techniques allows one to gain sword-path attainment rapidly up to a certain point. Other than Blackwing Sword, there’s also Swordwave True Inheritance that I’ve deduced from fighting Grimsong Specter-sama, it contains the profundity of sound-path. There’s also the epic-tier Sword of Doubt and Hesitation True Inheritance…”
Takemikazuchi uttered more than two dozen true inheritances, each one extremely powerful in their own. Each of the true inheritances are specialized in one aspect or derived from his understanding of the world or a specific path when he was still alive. Although Takemikazuchi wasn’t as influential as Crimspur back in Holy Terra, he was still a powerhouse, a Magus Sovereign of Sword and Lightning!
“What about the Sword Genesis True Inheritance?” Crimspur asked one of the inheritances the man had listed.
“An army breaker-type true inheritance, specialized in dealing with an enslavement-path expert like yourself…”
“Oh, it contains that move where swords suddenly grew from the ground… Then, what about Excalibur True Inheritance?”
“Anti-planet sword art…”
After half an hour of conversation, Crimspur grasped Takemikazuchi’s overall condition. “You are sure these aren’t your full list of true inheritances?”
“That’s right. Grimsong Specter-sama’s attainment in sword-path should be transcendent, but as you said, he must’ve lost his attainments after multiple imperfect resurrections. Since he can’t recall my transcendent-tier true inheritances, how can I?”
“Alright. Give me some time to ponder.” Crimspur’s unit in the presence of Takemikazuchi ceased all movement, contributing all their computational power for the main body to think.
After six hours, the heroic unit spoke, “It seems like your Blackwing Sword Inheritance is truly the best for my current situation.”
It was Takemikazuchi’s turn to roll his eyes. Still, he wouldn’t insult Crimspur. He’s been maximizing the time waiting to cultivate. “The Blackwing Sword True Inheritance has four killing techniques, but it was actually three killing techniques that combined into one killer move. Originally, a Sword Physique such as Innate Sword Bones or Body of Thousand Blades is the basic requirement, but since you’ve made 100 Paraponeras as backup, I’m sure one or two of them will succeed without their bodies exploding to bits.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Crimspur was prepared.
“Then, the core of the true inheritance is actually quite simple, if you did the sequence correctly, you’ll be able to perform the killer move Blackwing Sword…”
…
Day 91 - Lord Erebus
“What the fuck is this?” Lord Erebus grasped the corpse of an ant. He held it up by the head, its corpse sheared in multiple pieces by his attacks. This particular ant was special, in a sense that it has a sword for its mouth instead of pincers.
The sword ant was able to use sword arts, as if they were martial artists instead of beasts, and they aren’t mere imitations either. Each of their movements comprises excellent body-and-limb coordination that doesn’t seem to be trained at all but rather, instinctual, as if they were born with that knowledge. The sword ant was able to kill almost a hundred vampires of the same rank before being killed by long-range snipe from Erebus.
Since Erebus is not an idiot, he was able to grasp the overall condition. “Did the queen ant eat the swordsman?”
Before the vampiric blood dragon he created was slain for the first time, Erebus saw the undead machine recall two beings: an ant queen and a swordsman.
If the ant can grow rapidly and evolve according to their diet, then it wouldn’t be impossible for the ant to eat the swordsman and develop sword ant and its variants. Although Erebus has no idea how that works, he had somehow expected this. Since it has come to this stage, it means Erebus successfully put heavy pressure on the queen ant.
“Of course, it’s not like the swordsman teaching the queen ant is an impossibility, but there’s no way the queen ant could rapidly gain sword-path attainment…”
His deduction wasn’t wrong. Unfortunately, he only has a limited amount of information. The two Magi couldn’t be measured by the normal standards of average cultivators, especially since it was Crimspur.
So, given the information he had, Erebus made a mistake. More specifically, he took a risk. A very costly risk.
“The swordsman who protected the ant queen should be gone. It’s time to double down the war effort.” Erebus’ decision was to send more of his slave army, sufficient to drown the labyrinthian ant’s hive with their blood.
Day 4 - Crimspur
“I knew it, your dream-path attainment wasn’t low after all. Among the seven original Magi of Holy Terra, your combined breadth and depth is probably the third after the Emperor and Chaos Nemesis!” Takemikazuchi commented.
“Rank 2 dream-path killer move, [Dream Projection]!” Crimspur finished setting up the killer move, and the wall became some sort of monitor that replayed the scene of Mordred’s memory. Crimspur didn’t dare digging Mordred’s memory too deep as it would trigger his passive soul-path defenses, “Shut up, just watch Mordred’s battle.”
Takemikazuchi smiled, not taking Crimspur’s rude retort to heart. And so, the two watched the scene of Mordred’s battle with Lord Erebus.
The scene started with Mordred’s entrance to Lord Erebus’ micro-plane.
“Mecha-werewolves…” Crimspur’s heroic ant frowns. “So he wanted to take the route of [Supreme] like Intelligent Metal instead of [Harmony] like his big brother or [Purity] like Chaos Nemesis or Sword Seigneur.”
“The tripartite-philosophy of our Human Imperium that you’ve theorized?” Takemikazuchi inquired.
“Yes. Before his departure from Holy Terra, he might’ve been the most murderous magus of all time, but he always had restraints on modifying his human soul. In a sense, he can be considered as a subscriber of [Purity]. It seems like the reason why he was after your soul and Intelligent Metal’s true inheritances was because he wanted to switch from [Purity] into a [Supreme]. I can’t deny that I’m a bit disappointed because I’m the only magus of [Harmony] now, but let’s just see what happens next.”
The scene goes on as the battle escalates. Each time Mordred made a move, the two made a light comment, but both didn’t talk too much.
“Terraforming-class killer move of snow and ice-path… Was his attainment that high?” Takemikazuchi wondered.
“Maybe traveling in the cold Boundless Astral Realm allowed him to comprehend snow and ice-path… or maybe it’s been a few thousand years since his arrival in Morgen World. We might never know.” Crimspur explained.
After the terraforming-class killer move, Mordred’s actions were scrutinized heavily by the two magi, until the point where he used Lupusrazor as an explosive to kill Erebus. The scene ended with Lord Erebus dragging Mordred into a dream world.
Takemikazuchi was flabbergasted. “The most genocidal magus of all time… A man specialized in killing, the scholar of death, and the man who was once encircled by four Sovereign Magi of Holy Terra at once and survived… well, he died back then and revived himself, but was he this weak?”
Crimspur did not react to the shogun’s accusation. There must be an explanation regarding why Mordred isn’t as aggressive as when he’s back in Holy Terra. “He’s too… hmm, what’s the word?”
“Conservative.” Takemikazuchi completed his sentence. “Grimsong Specter-sama’s soul-path killer moves are renowned throughout the Milky Way Galaxy as the most lethal, his mere name is a symbol of death, a bedtime horror story that would strike fear into the hearts of Paragons and Epics, even Germans. However, we could not see his ferocity and lethality at all… he’s been using his primary path as mere support, unbelievable…”
“Hahaha!” Crimspur laughed wholeheartedly as if he heard the funniest joke in his entire life. “Mordred never went ‘all-out’!!! I’m going to have so much fun reprimanding him when he wakes up.”
…
Day 16 - Takemikazuchi
‘Intelligent Metal-sama wanted to construct the Manufactorium Primaris on the metal-rich Crimson Mars during the initial stage of our space exploration age, whereas Myriad Overlord-sama wanted to feed the planet to his Plantae Overlord. There was a brief civil war where the Supreme Commander of Astrales Militär and the Grand Archmagos of the Machine Cult were fighting against each other.
Although he was eventually driven away by Intelligent Metal-sama’s von Neumann self-replicating machines, Myriad Overlord-sama gained quite a bit of her information-path attainment in that war. Perhaps, his original goal wasn’t Crimson Mars in the first place, but to steal some of her attainment.’
‘As Myriad Overlord-sama once said, victory or defeat isn’t too important. The important thing is the benefit behind them.’
‘Fortunately, the Astrales Militär and the Machine Cult is part of the Human Imperium. Our Emperor forbade Myriad Overlord-sama from escalating the battle to more than 2 Overlords at once, stopping the civil war from reducing the Human Imperium’s foundation further.’
Takemikazuchi recalled the past as he took a deep look at the army of ants which were scurrying about. Most of the ants are as big as a horse, but they weren’t mere beasts. These formic lifeforms are as intelligent as humans. As proof of that, almost all of them held weapons ranging from close-range weapons such as sword, spear, and bow-and-arrow, to weapons less suited for the underground like machine guns, autocannons, and mini-howitzers strapped to their rear carapace.
…perhaps, intelligence isn’t a good metric to calculate the power level of Crimpsur’s ants.
In any case, a few select ants carried railguns on their backs, and what makes them special is that the railgun is moving by itself, as if there’s an AI controlling it. Information-path profundities are specialized in informatics, allowing technological tools to be semi-self aware.
Takemikazuchi realized that Crimspur must be advancing his tech trees right now. After all, unlike the vampire lord, both Magi can’t use magic. They have to find other ways to compensate for their lack of understanding of magic.
‘Yesterday, the ants were barely armed with gunpowder weapons. It seemed like Myriad Overlord-sama had found rich mineral veins underneath the mountain…’ As Takemikazuchi had those thoughts, a human arm tapped his shoulder, disrupting his absentmindedness.
“Takemikazuchi, it’s time.”1 a very human-like ant spoke in Japanese.
This ant looks literally like Mordred, or Crimspur, if that even matters, with the exception of its black compound ant-eyes, carapace, and ant feelers on his forehead.
“You twin brothers really look alike.” Takemikazuchi muttered, “Did you find what I need?”
“We are not twins.” Crimspur’s Heroic Ant unit denied. “We are waiting for you down below.”
The shogun did not react to Crimspur’s denial. “Let’s go.”
The two went further down in the ant’s hive, navigating through the labyrinthian corridors which were filled with traps and all sorts of ants with various mutations and sizes. As they traveled down further, Takemikazuchi noticed that the soil started to change into granite or other types or heavier minerals. It was a long way down, with occasional near-vertical terrain that the shogun struggled with more than the ant.
“This is no longer the metallic soil of the mountain, have you expanded so far already?” the Shogun inquired, curious..
“The worker-caste found quite a bit of rare metal deposits down below. They are currently mining them while the intellectual-caste is deducing their properties. They should be usable in the next phase.” Crimspur replied as they reached a large metal door, “We’re here.”
Even before opening the door, Takemikazuchi could smell the deep stench of sulfur. From the heat radiating off of the door, it wasn’t that hard to guess what’s behind it. Crimspur’s heroic unit pushed the heavy door open and a wave of extreme heat washed upon the two of them. Seeing the spectacle inside, the Shogun can’t help but be impressed.
Inside was a humongus ant the size of a football stadium.
Naturally, an ant being this big is a unique sight, but what made the Martial Magus raise his eyebrows was the sight of the ant constantly gorging on magma. The door was actually connected to a giant magma lake, Crimspur’s Formic Overlord currently feeding off of the magma. While half of the ant’s body is submerged in this magma lake, the rest of its body, which was the breeding organ, is actually embedded in another room. That made it two football fields long.
Seeing the magma waterfall feeding the chamber with constant supply of magma, the Shogun inwardly praised Crimspur for his prudent arrangement.
“With the magma river tributary supplying your Formic Overlord with a near-limitless amount of raw resources, there’s no need for your giant-class true body to move around.” Takemikazuchi nodded. “I never would’ve thought that you’d let me get close to your true body, considering our past…”
“Mordred seemed to have lost his star-path attainment, probably because he died multiple times without having the chance to recoup his attainment. You know he always loses some of his attainment everytime he revives himself, such is the price of his indestructible soul. Due to his lack of star-path attainment, his natural country of delusions has no sun, so this is the location with the highest heat. If it was up to me, I wouldn’t want you to get too close to my true body either.” The humanoid ant muttered.
It took Takemikazuchi a few seconds to inspect the ant’s giant-class body, which now even showed signs of draconic scales. “Your gain from consuming the vampiric blood dragon’s corpse was not low, I see.”
“What a fucking joke.” Crimspur’s heroic unit instantly denied. “The vampire’s attainment in blood-path is not even Legendary, and his memories of the vampiric dragon blood is not whole. The corpse was literally a forceful alteration of a reptilian lifeform being enlarged and injected with whatever the fuck the ‘magic’ of their main world was. If it was brought into the real world, the fake dragon would instantly collapse under the weight of its own body. Even if it can endure its own body weight, its genetic structure is unbelievably unstable, that thing is a genetic mess. It was able to exist in this dream world because the vampire used a significant amount of spiritual force to alter a portion of the dimensional laws to make it work. That thing is a failure, I can’t use them as a stepping stone! This is why we are at a disadvantage.”
Crimspur’s complaints were a bit cute from Takemikazuchi's perspective. It was rare to see the Sovereign Magus of Evolution’s scheme to fail. But, the man is still a frightening being. As far as he’s concerned, the last time he saw Crimspur’s Formic Overlord, it wasn’t that big. Having it grow to this size and evolve to have great heat resistance in a couple of week’s time is truly a testament of Crimspur’s capability. Unfortunately, even the Supreme Commander of the Astrales Militar can’t defeat the vampire army without sufficient accumulations.
“I see.” Takemikazuchi started undressing himself and passed his clothing and three swords which were made from rank 2 tamahagane steel to the heroic unit. “Please keep them safe.”
The humanoid ant kept them and asked him before he was able to enter the magma lake chamber, “How long do you need?”
“Depends.” Takemikazuchi started to elaborate. “Grimsong Specter-sama focused on recalling my attainment and personality. He cut corners with my physique and weapons. Compared to a martial magus back in my Lightning Sword Manor, my body is comparable to a rank 3 outer disciple, not even an inner or core disciple. I cannot use my methods freely like when I was a rank 3.”
“Give me a brief estimation.” The ant inquired once more, impatience contained with its tone.
“The surface of the magma lake reached three thousand degrees, but the lower layer should be higher. With this heat, it’ll take me around two years to reforge my flesh and blood into an acceptable level… a level of which I wouldn’t be exhausted after using Instant Sword once.”
There was no error in his words. As a martial artist’ body became stronger, it was extremely difficult to improve it further. Two years to increase his body spec’s by a few percent is already a great result, considering his body is as powerful as a rank 3 martial artist (despite being considered as the weakest rank 3).
“Too long, my Labyrinthian Ant’s Hive only has 16 floors right now. With this limited amount of vertical space, I can only extend it to 100 floors. It would probably take the vampire less than two years to reach this location.” Crimspur’s heroic unit quickly denied. “If I provide you cultivation resources, can that process be accelerated?”
Hearing Crimspur’s reply, Takemikazuchi’s electric blue eyes gleamed in expectation. He can’t contain his calm after hearing Crimspur’s offer! Cultivation resources for martial artists are usually food or special items that can be consumed. If it was an offer from any other Magi, he wouldn’t be too interested, but Crimspur is different!
“I’ve only tasted your food-path product once within my lifetime. If I can experience it again….”
“Don’t push your luck.” The heroic ant interrupted Takemikazuchi’s fantasy.
“With the exception of Grimsong Specter-sama, you’ve never handed down your food-path true inheritances to anyone else. Not only me, other Magi are also interested in your true inheritances… even Chaos Nemesis-sama highly covets them!”
The heroic ant shook his head, ignoring what the shogun had said. “Three months. I’ll supply you with my food-path product. If you can’t…”
“Rest assured, Myriad Overlord-sama. With your support, even an idiot can become a Martial Legend.” Takemikazuchi instantly switched his behavior.
“Hmm. I’ll have to breed some ants that can endure this heat first. Tsk, what a hassle.” The ant clicked its tongue. “They’ll be periodically providing you with my special food.” The ant then closed the door, locking Takemikazuchi with the Formic Overlord.
“As expected. Myriad Overlord-sama’s appetite is endless.” Takemikazuchi lightly commented at the Formic Overlord who never stopped eating magma. All this time, Crimspur spoke through the heroic unit because the Formic Overlord’s mouth is being used to gorge molten minerals. After all, not everyone was like Mordred who can practice ventriloquism casually. “Food-path… is truly profound.”
Throwing these useless thoughts behind, the martial magus started his round of cultivation by submerging his body in the magma lake. His body was like a geothermal reactor. Soon, lightning sparks began accumulating on the surrounding magma.
…
Day 29 - Lord Erebus
Thud! A large ant with the size of two horses finally stopped moving after Lord Erebus personally threw a blood spear. The ant’s corpse was at the point of which it was questionable how it could still stand in the first place. This was because not only does it have no head, its chest-equivalent is also filled with holes which were caused by blood arrows. Of course, the blood arrows were not only corrosive and toxic, it is also semi-self aware, capable of destroying the target’s body from the inside. Any other lifeforms would be dead if they got hit by one of these blood arrows, but the ant managed to survive almost ten minutes without a head.
“Take this away, we might be able to use them later. The enemy’s rank 2 elite units are far stronger than mine, but we still outnumbered them.” Lord Erebus commanded some of his warrior-slave.
The warrior-slave is a burly vampire with 2.2 meter tall body and wide frame. The blood-path radiation from his body is weaker than rank 1 mages, but the warrior-slave is a dual cultivator of strength and blood. His primary path is strength, and strength-path cultivation techniques don't usually nurture their body’s radiation in the first place.
The vampire slave nodded to Lord Erebus order and began mobilizing his thralls to collect the ant’s corpse.
“Master, the vanguard team reported a surge of ants 2 minute from our position.” One of the vampires beside Erebus reported. From a glance of his caped robe, it was clear that the vampire is a mage. “They are well-equipped with advanced weaponry, two squads have fallen victim to their chemical bombs!”
The report made Lord Erebus frown. He thought it would be an easy win since the undead machine’s dream world does not offer strong retaliation towards his invading army. The ant army that blocked his path wasn’t too strong, they were easily slaughtered. Even if they have homefield advantage, a dragon breath carpet bombing can easily push back any resistance in the open field.
However, everything changed when the vampire lord’s army reached the last bastion of the undead machine.
At the core of the undead machine’s dream world, this metallic mountain is a massive natural fortress. Just a spoon of metallic soil in this place could weigh a few kilograms at least. From a glance, it looks like a normal metallic mountain, but after assaulting it for weeks and failing to fully penetrate the ant’s hive, Erebus realized that the mountain itself is special, the labyrinthian ant’s hive was made in this location with a deeper scheme in mind.
The metallic mountain seemed to be a combination of all sorts of resource points from several paths. For example, the corridors which were dug by the ants are long and connected to several rooms. In each room, the gravity differed, objects might be heavier or lighter with no clear pattern, or the timeflow of the said room would similarly differ. In addition, the metallic mountain of the soil is extremely good at dissipating raw force or vibration. Bombarding the ant hive from outside is not a good idea because of the inefficiency. At the very least, the mountain wouldn’t collapse even if Lord Erebus bombarded it for decades.
Thus, the only solution is to capture each room and each floor of the ant’s hive one by one because digging is not effective due to the formic compound reinforcing the walls.
Naturally, this also bought a problem that Lord Erebus couldn’t easily solve. Originally, the ants are weak as they have no magic nor martial training. His quick progress to attack the undead machine’s dream world was proof. They were like the lowest level of beast cannon fodders used by low-rank enslavement-path masters who just started their cultivation journey.
As time goes by and they exchange a couple of battles, the ants are starting to transform not only in shape and sizes, but also quality of equipment.
At first, they were using their own body. Then, parts of other ants as spear, arrows, shields or other weapons. After the first encounter, the equipment of the ants is improving even if it was barely. A few days ago, the ants that wield gunpowder-based weapons are extremely rare, and each of their projectile weapons would typically bounces off of Erebus’ blood-slave’s skin.
The guns are weak enough that the Erebus’ army can literally ignore them.
Now however, there are some captain-level ants that wield railguns, with the rest holding ‘hot weapons’ that could pose a threat towards Erebus blood-slaves.
This was unprecedented! The rate of improvement made Lord Erebus frightened of his enemy. Furthermore, the mountain seemed to be imbued with enslaving will, just like Erebus own’s world. Although barely, this would disrupt Erebus’ control upon his blood-slaves.
Thus, he was forced to participate in the frontline to ensure no mishaps happened.
“Dispatch two squads as reinforcement, prioritize killing them and retrieve their corpses. Don’t let them survive any battle as they would be problematic later.” Erebus commanded.
One thing that he learned during weeks of assaulting the ant’s hive, is that the ant that survives any battle would evolve to become a greater species in their next encounter. It is best if they are killed, even if that means using up his blood-slave to exchange cannon fodder. There’s no problem in this because Lord Erebus has been using cannon fodder wave tactics to exhaust the enemy’s battle resources.
“Slowly and steady. We’ve reached the 2nd floor after a week. Even if this ant’s hive has a thousand floors, it’ll be fully conquered sooner or later.” Lord Erebus encouraged his blood-slaves.
…
Day 41 - Lord Erebus
“Hahah…” A humanoid infiltrator unit of the ant swarm chuckled as he sprayed rifle fire towards the group of vampires. The two assault rifles in its hand have two different architectures. The right one seemed to be made out of streamlined metal, with a railgun as the core reference. As for the left one, it was made purely out of biological material, shooting bone spines coated with anti-vampire chemicals.
The railgun projectile isn’t that harmful towards the vampire, the most dangerous ones are actually the caustic spines shot by the bio-rifle. A lot of vampires have fallen victim to the anti-vampire chemical as they were designed to react to vampire bloodlines.
“Bastard!” Lord Erebus’ eyes are glowing red with fury. This humanoid ant has ambushed his personal guard fourteen times in the last two days, not giving them any respite. Although Erebus’ personal guards aren't idiots that would fall into traps multiple times, the ant would turn invisible and leave before Erebus could offer effective retaliation. The ant isn’t even focused on dealing damage, it was focused on disturbing Erebus.
What made Erebus more vexed is that… this is the core formation of the vampire army!
The vampire army has penetrated and almost subjugated this 6th floor. The army upstairs are maintaining logistics in exploring this labyrinth, with checkpoints erected in every important path. This progress was made after arduous battle, slaughtering almost a hundred thousand ants in a slow war of attrition. However, it seems like they were a joke in front of this humanoid ant who knows the ant’s hive as if it was the back of its palm.
“You’re not that strong, after all…” The infiltrator unit always maintains its smug smile, not forgetting to hurl insults at Lord Erebus.
Clack! The rifles emptied their clips and the humanoid ant simply tossed them aside as soon as he realized he was out of ammo, not afraid of his weapons being deciphered by the enemy later on. It rummaged through the military bag behind his waist and started to throw grenades at the vampire army, not even using defensive methods to defend against the incoming blood spears or blood arrows.
Stab! Stab! Stab! Multiple blood arrows hit its body and a blood spear was sent after the humanoid ant’s heart. The blood arrows began taking root in the ant’s body, poisoning it with toxic blood and interrupting the normal operation of the body. Unfortunately, the internal workings of the ant’s body is not that simple.
Crimspur has altered most of his ants so that they can be fully functional without blood. This level of damage is negligible as they can barely penetrate the ant’s exoskeleton. The blood arrows and spears were trying to latch to the infiltrator ant’s body, but they were having difficulties. The ant simply took out another weapon that was holstered on its back. It was a pair of broadswords, but not a simple ‘cold weapon’. The left broadsword can vibrate in high frequency while the other one is capable of producing scorching heat. Not really a ‘cold weapon’ after all.
Swoosh! A vampire brute with a 2 meter tall body rushed at Crimspur’s infiltrator ant. The brute was a vampire that dual cultivated blood and strength, its raw power is nothing to scoff at. Just as it was about to ram Crimspur and pin it to the ground, a dark silhouette approached Crimspur from the shadows.
“Hahah, that wouldn’t work on me twice!” The ant ignored the brute as it stabbed its two swords behind him. “Dark-path magic spell, was it? Truly a wonderful experience to fight against a mage.”
The infiltrator ant was pinned down by the vampire brute, but its swords have sliced the shadowy creature. Unfortunately, physical damage is rendered useless in front of this magical being. With a loud thud, the ant was pummeled down by the brute, with other vampires following suit.
“Foolish!” The ant simply stopped the brute’s fist with his own. “Ants are one of the strongest insects in the world. When their size is escalated to human size, do you think I’m that weak?”
The ant crushed the brute’s throat with its sheer grip strength. The ant might be light, but it’s not weak at all. Its insectoid physique is far superior to the vampire when it was elevated into human size.
Following the death of the vampire brute, the ant and vampire army entered a brutal melee, especially the shadowy creature whom the ant just tried to cut. However, the ant is alone whereas the vampire army is endless. Furthermore, the vampires have magic spells that the ant cannot counter at the moment, it can only allow them to accumulate damage.
“I guess this is it for this time…” Crimspur smiled through the infiltrator ant, but the vampire lord guessed what he wanted to do.
“Rank 2 blood-path killer move, [Murder in Cold Blood]!” The vampire lord has prepared his countermeasure from days ago. He wouldn’t let the infiltrator ant, which was extremely hard to deal with, to suicide bomb itself like the previous two times.
In an instant, the infiltrator ant froze in shock as its bloodless body became frozen. “I see. It’s not the blood of my body that was used to freeze me, but the blood of your own vampire slaves…” Crimspuir muttered before the infiltrator ant died, its body frozen solid.
“Haah…” Lord Erebus coughed blood. The anti-vampire chemicals are truly effective. If injected to a vampire’s bloodstream directly, it would be lethal, but if inhaled, it suppressed rank 1 vampires by 50%. Although it has limited effect on rank 2 vampires like Lord Erebus himself, the smoke produced by the chemical weapon was able to disrupt spell casting sequences. This ant is truly skilled in antimage tactics.
“This isn't merely an assassin unit… but an elite assassin ant.” After calming down and expelling the anti-vampire chemicals in his system, Lord Erebus was able to briefly analyze the ant with just a short time. “I’ll need some time to research this. For now, fortify this floor.”
“Yes, my lord!” The vampire army naturally followed his arrangement.
…
Day 42 - Lord Erebus
“I see…” Erebus sighed, his hand dirty from dismantling insect corpses. His eyes are currently shining in an eerie dark red light which was dwindling by the second. “My [Bloodline Inspection] has limited effectiveness towards the ants, but I can still at least get some clues…”
Erebus sat down on a rock. After cleaning his hands, he massaged his temples while processing the intel he plundered from the ant’s corpse. As a Lord Inquisitor, one of his best methods of investigation is to plunder information through blood. Naturally, this is not the first time he had activated Bloodline Inspection towards the ants, but the results are never fulfilling.
Unlike Erebus’ method of rearing vampiric beast slave by using a vampiric disease onto beast or even cultivators, these ants are being born from their queen. Now, what’s noteworthy about the ants is that almost all of their muscle fiber is made out of metal.
These types of lifeforms which should be considered as biological machines aren’t unique. The Morgen World is vast, and it contains all sorts of unique lifeforms with special characteristics. According to his experience during his time in the Land of Sand and Fire, the Kaissereich is plagued by a type of armored beast called Gepanzerte Bestie. Each of them are literal biological machines with extremely high metallic content on their flesh. And so, he isn’t too surprised by the ant’s body structure as they were quite similar in a way.
What makes him vexed is the rate of advancement the ants possess.
A natural advancement would be long and arduous. For martial cultivators, it would be like practicing body tempering technique or other cultivation techniques, accumulating small progress through a lengthy process until the eventual advancement. For arcane cultivators, it would be spirit meditation techniques, understanding magical phenomena, incorporating magical theory, spell catalyst refinement and many other aspects.
Beasts too, can advance, but they mostly depend on their strong physique and powerful bloodline or racial traits. In fact, the reason why intellectual lifeforms stole beast bloodlines and incorporated them into their own are caused by this.
However, the ants, which should be considered as beasts, have broken this convention.
They don’t have any bloodline ability worthy enough to be plundered. Each of them are simple, yet have specialized functions. This is, of course, commonly seen when one gets used to fighting against enslavement-path experts as their cultivation revolves around the usage of resources. They have to maximize the amount of resources they have to exhaust the opponents. One of the methods is to create simple units for one particular purpose and make a variety of them for different goals.
For example, a unit specialized for brute strength wouldn’t take too many resources compared to an all-rounder commander unit. But what makes the ants break the normal convention is that they can evolve rapidly through devouring.
“When one or two army ant survive a battle, their spoils of war would be the corpse of the fallen, ally and foe alike. By devouring and inheriting their genetic sequence, the ants have the ability to evolve according to their need. If the ants ate a defense-focused beast, its chitinous exoskeleton might evolve to gain heavier mass and density, if it ate agile beasts, it might have several traits that allow them to move faster… and if they are allowed to devour a vampire…” Erebus sighed.
He had seen some special ants that evolved to take on human physique. They were one of the most problematic ants that he had ever encountered. For example, the elite assassin unit.
One of his vampire units is the Blood Assassin. Having rank 2 martial cultivation foundation, the Blood Assassins could fine-tune their body’s radiation to reflect or twist light, allowing it to render themselves invisible not only from sight, but also most investigative methods.
And, he has seen the Blood Assassin’s ability in the hands of an elite assassin ant.
He knew the essence of war is to learn the opponent’s ability and take countermeasures as the book ‘The Art of War’ that the Great Archmage released centuries ago has said so. However, isn’t this too overbearing?
Erebus wanted to complain, but where to? Whining is useless when things have progressed to this point. After all, he was the one who brought this situation.
“You’ve called me, master?” A vampire bride entered the makeshift laboratory filled with ant corpses.
“The vampire craftsmen, have they found ways to utilize the ant corpses?” Lord Erebus asked.
The labyrinthian ant’s hive environment is strange, although the vampire army was Lord Erebus blood-slaves, he felt their connection is limited as he went deeper underground. To solve this issue, he adapted his chain-of-command through his vampire brides, but that was just fixing a hole with flex tape. His investigative killer moves that connected his senses with his blood slaves are greatly restricted, so he has to use primitive ways of communication even with his own slaves.
“Yes, my lord.” The vampire bride took a leave and returned with a group of vampire thralls using weapons and armor made out of ant body parts. Starting from blades made out of ant pincers, shields out of ant carapace, or even bows with strings made from ant tendons, there wasn’t only quality, but also variety.
The vampire lord’s eyes glimmered with hope.
…
Day 692 - Takemikazuchi
“You want me to do what?” Takemikazuchi opened his eyes, looking at the pair of dog-sized red ants that spoke in japanese. The two ants brought a pair of sushi that would make even Takemikazuchi drool. The sushi, as well as the ants for that matter, was designed not to melt in the heat.
“It wouldn’t be hard. I’ve designed humanoid Paraponeras, they are capable. It’s a win-win solution that would alleviate the pressure that the vampire lord is giving me in the frontline.” The red ant replied, shoving the sushi on Takemikazuchi.
The shogun instantly devoured the sushi and his lightning-path radiation instantly surged, his body producing electric sparks that jumped around like lightning snakes. He has to sit down and use his body nurturing techniques so that his body does not explode from overnutrition. “Good food!” He praised as he felt his cultivation progressed visibly.
“Takemikazuchi, don’t play dumb. Think of my offer just now.” The red ants spoke once more.
The shogun sighed. “Are they heat resistant? I’m comfortable in this place, I don’t want to move around.”
If the two ants can replicate the human-equivalent of rolling their eyes, it must be the expression what they showed right now. “You’re… fucking joking, right?”
“Fine.” Takemikazuchi stood up and urged the ants to move. After leaving the room, an ant provided his clothing once more and they moved on to another room.
“This is…” the Shogun frowned.
“I’ve tried to replicate your courtyard before my little brother destroyed your homeland…” Crimspur’s heroic unit has been waiting for Takemikazuchi’s arrival.
The man in question traced his finger on the red torii and couldn’t help but reminisce about the past. His gaze instantly scanned the small bamboo forest, gray concrete floor, and the minimalist Japanese wooden house. A bead of tear leaked from Takemikazuchi’s eyes before he sighed once more. “Unneeded, but I appreciate the thought of it. Now then, where are they?”
“Follow me.” The heroic ant leads Takemikazuchi to a training ground where a hundred humanoid ants have been waiting for him. They were very similar to one another, even having the same face, body shape, and posture of sitting on crossed legs. “My true body has been watching and deducing your cultivation. I tried to replicate them, but in the end, my ants are not human even if they looked like one.”
The shogun nodded. His cultivation techniques are made for humans, not beast or artificial lifeforms like the ants.
“Let’s cut to the chase and begin.” Takemikazuchi took a katana which was presented by an ant. “Just follow my movements as I explain each step. This is called the Blackwing Sword True Inheritance. It consists of thirteen sword stances, each connected to one another. The first three stances are the Nurturing Techniques, the next three are Investigation Techniques, 7th to the 9th stances are Movement Techniques, while the last four are the Killing Techniques.”
“Wait!” Crimspur’s heroic unit stopped Takemikazuchi’s explanation. “I thought we agreed that you’re going to impart me the true inheritance that contains the Instant Sword?”
Takemikazuichi frowned, “Dimensional Blade True Inheritance requires extremely high requirements in sword-path attainment. Although you can accommodate the requirement of time-path and space-path with your own attainment, it is primarily a sword-path technique. It’s easier for you to create a time machine to stop time than learning any killer move from my Dimensional Blade True Inheritance.”
The heroic unit paused, pondering. Takemikazuchi’s argument made sense. “That’s disappointing, but I shouldn’t have expected to so easily replicate such a powerful sword-path technique in the first place. Let me choose what kind of inheritance you can impart me with.”
Takemikazuchi made the decision to give Crimspur Blackwing Sword True Inheritance because it was one of the best inheritance to impart to those with low sword-path attainment. Since Crimspur wanted to choose his inheritances, then the shogun could only follow.
“My true inheritances are split into three levels: paragon-tier, epic-tier and apex-tier, but just because they are paragon-tier, doesn't mean they are less useful than the epic-tier ones. For example, Blackwing Sword True Inheritance is considered as a paragon-tier but its Nurturing Techniques allows one to gain sword-path attainment rapidly up to a certain point. Other than Blackwing Sword, there’s also Swordwave True Inheritance that I’ve deduced from fighting Grimsong Specter-sama, it contains the profundity of sound-path. There’s also the epic-tier Sword of Doubt and Hesitation True Inheritance…”
Takemikazuchi uttered more than two dozen true inheritances, each one extremely powerful in their own. Each of the true inheritances are specialized in one aspect or derived from his understanding of the world or a specific path when he was still alive. Although Takemikazuchi wasn’t as influential as Crimspur back in Holy Terra, he was still a powerhouse, a Magus Sovereign of Sword and Lightning!
“What about the Sword Genesis True Inheritance?” Crimspur asked one of the inheritances the man had listed.
“An army breaker-type true inheritance, specialized in dealing with an enslavement-path expert like yourself…”
“Oh, it contains that move where swords suddenly grew from the ground… Then, what about Excalibur True Inheritance?”
“Anti-planet sword art…”
After half an hour of conversation, Crimspur grasped Takemikazuchi’s overall condition. “You are sure these aren’t your full list of true inheritances?”
“That’s right. Grimsong Specter-sama’s attainment in sword-path should be transcendent, but as you said, he must’ve lost his attainments after multiple imperfect resurrections. Since he can’t recall my transcendent-tier true inheritances, how can I?”
“Alright. Give me some time to ponder.” Crimspur’s unit in the presence of Takemikazuchi ceased all movement, contributing all their computational power for the main body to think.
After six hours, the heroic unit spoke, “It seems like your Blackwing Sword Inheritance is truly the best for my current situation.”
It was Takemikazuchi’s turn to roll his eyes. Still, he wouldn’t insult Crimspur. He’s been maximizing the time waiting to cultivate. “The Blackwing Sword True Inheritance has four killing techniques, but it was actually three killing techniques that combined into one killer move. Originally, a Sword Physique such as Innate Sword Bones or Body of Thousand Blades is the basic requirement, but since you’ve made 100 Paraponeras as backup, I’m sure one or two of them will succeed without their bodies exploding to bits.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Crimspur was prepared.
“Then, the core of the true inheritance is actually quite simple, if you did the sequence correctly, you’ll be able to perform the killer move Blackwing Sword…”
…
Day 91 - Lord Erebus
“What the fuck is this?” Lord Erebus grasped the corpse of an ant. He held it up by the head, its corpse sheared in multiple pieces by his attacks. This particular ant was special, in a sense that it has a sword for its mouth instead of pincers.
The sword ant was able to use sword arts, as if they were martial artists instead of beasts, and they aren’t mere imitations either. Each of their movements comprises excellent body-and-limb coordination that doesn’t seem to be trained at all but rather, instinctual, as if they were born with that knowledge. The sword ant was able to kill almost a hundred vampires of the same rank before being killed by long-range snipe from Erebus.
Since Erebus is not an idiot, he was able to grasp the overall condition. “Did the queen ant eat the swordsman?”
Before the vampiric blood dragon he created was slain for the first time, Erebus saw the undead machine recall two beings: an ant queen and a swordsman.
If the ant can grow rapidly and evolve according to their diet, then it wouldn’t be impossible for the ant to eat the swordsman and develop sword ant and its variants. Although Erebus has no idea how that works, he had somehow expected this. Since it has come to this stage, it means Erebus successfully put heavy pressure on the queen ant.
“Of course, it’s not like the swordsman teaching the queen ant is an impossibility, but there’s no way the queen ant could rapidly gain sword-path attainment…”
His deduction wasn’t wrong. Unfortunately, he only has a limited amount of information. The two Magi couldn’t be measured by the normal standards of average cultivators, especially since it was Crimspur.
So, given the information he had, Erebus made a mistake. More specifically, he took a risk. A very costly risk.
“The swordsman who protected the ant queen should be gone. It’s time to double down the war effort.” Erebus’ decision was to send more of his slave army, sufficient to drown the labyrinthian ant’s hive with their blood.
