Ahead, in a relatively open depression filled with giant mushroom caps and glowing moss, a fierce battle of offense and defense was drawing to a close.

“Hiss—! Hiss hiss hiss—!”

Sharp, piercing insect chirps intertwined, filled with despair and madness.

Tens of thousands of giant insects, resembling magnified dozens of times a mix of stag beetles and mantises, formed a defensive line that was constantly torn apart and desperately replenished.

Their hard chitinous carapaces glowed with a ghostly green or dark red luster, and their massive chelipeds waved, spitting highly corrosive acid bombs.

However, their opponents possessed an absolute crushing superiority in strength and technology!

One Venerable-level pet beast led the charge, while five Saint-level pet beasts held the line.

More than a dozen figures in fully sealed black combat suits, their surfaces flowing with dark energy patterns, were steadily constructing a defensive line, relying on several quickly deployed rhomboid energy shield props.

Their weapons were not conventional firearms, but rather attack props that fired high-energy particle beams and oscillating force field waves.

Their power was no less than that of Si Jinling! 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

Each concentrated volley was like the Grim Reaper's scythe sweeping through the insect swarm; carapaces shattered, and limbs flew everywhere.

Dark green insect blood and visceral fluid splattered everywhere, corroding the ground and the giant mushroom caps with sizzling sounds, and acrid white smoke billowed.

But what truly made Mingxi's pupils constrict was the colossal object in the center of the battlefield that was currently charging!

It was a ferocious-looking metal base, with a dark purple, multi-faceted crystal, over three meters in diameter, suspended above it, constantly collapsing and rotating inward.

Countless thick energy conduits, like blood vessels, connected the base to the crystal, and a heart-pounding, dark energy flow, as if it could swallow all light, surged within the conduits!

At the core of the crystal, a point of incandescent light that made one's soul ache was frantically condensing and compressing!

“This is... the forbidden prop Annihilation Star Dust!”

Mingxi’s dark pupils unconsciously contracted and expanded, more shocked than seeing a planet explode before her eyes.

Guangguang's strained voice simultaneously sounded in her mind: “Target confirmed!

Forbidden-level prop ‘Annihilation Star Dust’!

Energy reading has exceeded the threshold.

Core charge level 87%.

Estimated two minutes and seventeen seconds remaining until full charge.

In fully activated state, target area covers a radius of 30 kilometers! All life forms will suffer high-dimensional energy-level obliteration!”

Good heavens!

Mingxi didn't expect Descent to even deploy forbidden props.

And it was Annihilation Star Dust, a prop with destructive power comparable to a Venerable-level Transcendent creature completely self-destructing!

This was completely out of line.

What exactly did these people want to do?

One must know that Annihilation Star Dust could not distinguish between friend and foe with markers; once activated, it treated everyone equally, all beings were equal.

And in front of this destructive prop, at the core of the insect swarm's defensive line, a Transcendent creature, relatively smaller than the other insects, was protected in the very center.

“That is...”

Upon clearly seeing the Transcendent creature's appearance, Mingxi's usually well-controlled heartbeat instantly pounded like a drum.

It was a beautiful yet strange Transcendent creature.

Its entire body was like the most magnificent purple-gold casting, surrounded by faint gold and light purple patterns that seemed to be composed of countless pollen grains, and a pair of huge compound eyes were like the purest amethyst.

On either side of its head grew a pair of elegantly drooping spiritual antennae, their form retaining the softness of a lop-eared rabbit's ears, but made of translucent pink crystal material.

The main body was a gigantic crystal bud, layer upon layer, not a plant, but composed of countless stacked, translucent purple-pink chalcedony-like petal-shaped energy crystals.

The outermost petals were wide and expansive, like a protective skirt, with faint golden patterns flowing along their edges.

The inner petals gradually became smaller and more delicate, and their color transitioned from deep pink to a soft, vibrant hue.

From the elegant “axillae” of the crystal bud, four long, flat, silk-like yet light-band-like limbs naturally hung down.

They were both the arthropod limbs of an insect and pure, flawless moon-white tassels.

These arthropod limbs looked soft and powerless, swaying gently in the wind, like the finest gauze or a fairy's ribbon.

When still, they hung naturally, their tips gently touching the ground, in a serene and noble posture.

But when they needed to move, they could instantly straighten like the sharpest energy light blades.

Its entire body exuded a warm, jade-like luster, and its layered structure was exquisitely intricate to the extreme, as if it were the masterpiece of the universe's greatest craftsman.

It looked fragile and delicate, yet it exuded the immense vitality and defensive power unimaginable for a Saint-level Transcendent creature.

But at «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» this moment, its massive body was covered with scorched marks and huge lacerations, and blood flowed like a small stream.

Most critically, its purple-pink shell was rapidly shedding.

Those crystalline jade petals, which should have been dazzling, were like wilting flowers, rapidly becoming covered with cobweb-like cracks at a visible speed!

Quickly decaying, falling apart into mud.

Each loss of a shell was accompanied by a violent convulsion of its body and a shriek more desperate and mournful than the last!

Its limbs vibrated frantically, stirring up violent air currents, trying to prevent the attacks that penetrated the insect swarm's defense from landing on it.

Every time it forcibly invoked its power, the speed at which its shell decayed and shed deepened by a degree, and the light around its body dimmed by a degree!

It was using its own life essence and energy essence to buy its subjects one last sliver of hope for survival!

“Abyss!”

Golden Yuanbao's suppressed and urgent low cry.

Indicating that the insect queen was the Nanluo it was looking for!

Mingxi let out an “Ah.”

Her eyes widened like a manga heroine's.

She looked at it in shock, “You mean... that insect king is the Nanluo we’re looking for? But it’s clearly a Mother Nest!”

A Mother Nest, which is a collective Transcendent creature among insect races.

Just like the Virus Mother Nest they had encountered before.

But she had never heard that the Nanluo race could evolve into a collective Transcendent creature.

“Abyss.”

Golden Yuanbao also didn't know why Nanluo had become like this, but it could absolutely not mistake the other party's aura.

That insect king was indeed Nanluo.

“Master, since Nanluo is an insect type, it’s not impossible for it to evolve into a collective Transcendent creature due to fate.

Think about it, even a very ordinary plant-type Transcendent like Jin Sui Sprout can awaken to become a Jinlan Asura of the Ashura type, so what’s so surprising about Nanluo evolving into a collective type?”

Guangguang didn't find it surprising.

It thought that the most important thing now was— “You should think carefully about how to save it!

Its shell is both its energy core, the source of its power, and the container for nurturing and cultivating its subjects.

Once all its shells shed, even if Luo Yi Nine Heavens and Jinlan Asura simultaneously tried to heal it, they wouldn’t be able to save it.”