My portable grandfather refreshes every week

Chapter 312 The Hunting Plan
Zerg soldiers are divided into several ranks based on their status and strength.

The lowest level is the "pseudo-insect," which is a subspecies of insect that has been corrupted and distorted by the insect swarm. These are the "demons" in human skin that Xue Law once encountered in the Holy Magic Empire.

They have essentially become part of the swarm, but their strength has not yet truly reached the level of a formal swarm, and is often related to their past strength.

But in essence, they won't be too strong; most are between the third and fourth tiers.

These pseudo-insects often retain memories of their previous lives and can even mimic their behavior and speak in the same tone as before. However, they are essentially completely distorted, as if a single individual has been completely alienated after being connected to the collective network of the swarm.

These pseudo-insects constitute the vast majority of the swarm's main force, and most of what we see today are these pseudo-insects, accounting for over 98% of the total swarm size.

The second type is the purebred Shab insect race.

Their strength is generally at the near-5th tier, and they may even be just barely at the 5th tier.

These insects are powerful, but they can only be born if the Zerg Queen gives birth to them, even though these insects can reproduce at any time for the Queen.

They can contaminate the genes of other races, pollute their souls and consciousness, and prevent all contaminated units from reproducing normally, turning them into pseudo-insects that can only reproduce insects.

These insects are commanders and squadron leaders in the Zerg army. They disguise themselves in the center of the fake insects, and after the fake insects' charge creates an opening, they can cause terrifying casualties.

Most of the coastal defenses were lost in this way.

The strongest individual among the Shub insectoids, the one that can grow to the level of a Baron-level Apostle, is the insectoid warrior.

These insectoids often undergo several metamorphosis and are hundreds of meters in size, weighing millions or even tens of millions of tons. Despite their terrifying size, they are not clumsy and possess extreme agility and terrifying defense.

They are the heavily armored warriors of the swarm, and are among the very few elite swarms.

At the same time, all their activities pollute the planet's waters, atmosphere, and material cycles, so that over a long period of time, the entire world's water and even air cycles will be filled with the distorting power of the swarm.

Above that is the Zerg Queen. Although the Zerg Queen may not be as strong as the combat soldiers, she has a powerful reproductive ability. Once an Queen reaches adulthood, given a certain amount of material and energy, she can reproduce rapidly at a rate of dozens of eggs per second.

Each unit hatched from an egg is at least a near-Tier 5 pure-blooded Shabbur insectoid.

Yes, even if the people of the Beast Star exhaust their life force to maintain their three-minute Super Beast Transformation, and even with the blessing and support of the world's consciousness, they can only barely reach the level of quasi-Tier 5.

However, this capability is produced by the Zerg Queen at a rate of dozens per second.

This is the power structure within the entire Zerg swarm, and the strength that allows the Zerg to be called one of the cosmic calamities.

Above the Zerg Queen is the true God of the Swarm, the Sixth Apostle.

However, He did not participate in this battle. Instead, the Ninth Apostle, who was blinded by defeat, attacked with two borrowed Queen Mothers and dozens of soldiers.

……

The rear command ship within the interstellar column.

"I'm going to help my students," Xue Dinglu said.

“But we need you more here!” A woman in uniform and wearing glasses stopped him.
“We can repel this apostle time and time again, but we cannot kill him. Even if we unite the world's consciousness to seal off space, as long as he wants to escape, we can only stop him at most, not kill him completely. So we need your power.”

She said bluntly, her face serious: "If we can't kill Him this time, He will bring even more and stronger support next time. We can't afford to gamble!"

Xue Dinglu originally wanted to say that the Ninth Apostle had no more resources to borrow troops, but he fell silent when he was about to speak.

The Ninth Apostle did not reveal the information about the Beast Star. This explains why He went all in so recklessly. For Him, it wasn't just the Super Iron Curtain, a planet with life, that was tempting, but two planets with life.

With two inhabited planets, as long as He licks His wounds after the victory, He might be able to recoup His investment in less than 10,000 years. The Ninth Apostle will not give up the profits from this deal.

Instead of planting trees here, they fed all the corpses to the sacred tree, which was basically enough for the Ninth Apostle to break even.

He hasn't invited the other apostles yet, solely out of his own greed. But if he escapes back this time and reveals to the council that there are actually two inhabited planets here, then…

Xue's Law knew that the other apostles wouldn't mind getting a share of the spoils.

Therefore, if the Ninth Apostle truly disregards the situation, the next time it might not just be Him alone, but He might bring other apostles. And according to Xue's observations, the apostle with the best relationship with the Ninth Apostle is...

The Sixth Apostle! God of the Swarm.

In that case, the intensity of the war would be far greater than it is now. Even if we manage to hold out, absolutely no one on those two planets will survive.

So after calm reflection, Xue Law remained silent and sat there.

He knew that the Starfleet needed his strength now.

He also possesses power that can reach level 5 under certain circumstances, and he is one of the few with spatial abilities.

The entire plan of the interstellar squadron to hunt down the Ninth Apostle was based on the spatial abilities of Xue Lude and Xiao Jiang.

Knowing that Xue's current ability allows him to open portals and unleash spatial slashes in any area, they devised an extremely daring plan by combining the young general's zero-frame starting spatial jump.

That is the hunting plan!

The core of the entire plan is for the Starfleet's Tier 5 combat power to hold back the Apostle's soldiers, support, and other forces, while using all its strength to besiege the Ninth Apostle, exhausting His energy and inflicting heavy damage on Him.

Following this series of plans, Xue Dinglu and Song Quan (the young general) came into play with their special spatial abilities.

The spatial blockade of the world consciousness does not disrupt space; it merely renders the basic spatial magic ineffective within its domain. However, the Ninth Apostle possesses the ability to forcibly establish spatial teleportation, and he is also a rare spatial ability user.

This is why the Starfleet repeatedly wounded Him, yet could not capture Him.

Now, when He prepares to use his spatial abilities to escape once again, it is Xue Lude and the young general who release a dual space, swapping positions, thereby releasing spatial warfare to disrupt His teleportation.

Only those with the same spatial ability can counter those with spatial abilities. According to the calculations of the Mimicry King, the success rate of this plan is over 60%.

Even if the plan fails, there is a high probability that the Ninth Apostle will be forced out of the teleportation. And if luck is on their side, the chaotic space disturbed by Xue's Law Space Slash could even cut the Ninth Apostle in half.

They stared silently at the plan.

He never expected that the Dimensional Slash, which came with additional abilities, would actually be one of the most important abilities this time.

Could the Spatial Slash really cut the Ninth Apostle in half?
Even Xue's Law doesn't believe in himself. The essence of Dimensional Slash is actually just grafting a part of the real space onto the consciousness space, forming a spatial fault that is divided into two halves.

Essentially, it's just that the area disturbed by the dimensional slash is half of the slashed space, and the other half is the entrance to the space of consciousness.

When a complete substance steps into the boundary between the physical space and the space of consciousness, it will be split in two by the misaligned space!

Essentially, this spatial slash is more like the ability to "teleport part of the body's space".

However, it seems that the Starfleet values ​​this ability highly, and even after learning about Xue's ability, and even knowing that Xue can secretly arrange for a new century to generate a Tier 5 Destruction Colossus, and even summon more human evil beasts, they still do not recommend that Xue use the power of human evil.

Instead, a mere spatial slash would suffice to complete this assassination.

In reality, Xue's Law simply means that when the Ninth Apostle is about to escape, he can teleport over and slash him, which takes less than 0.1 seconds.

However, this one cut was one of the most crucial steps in the entire plan!

So when Xue Lude saw the devastation on the giant planet and prepared to go to its aid, he was stopped by the interstellar squadron.

"When that true light of the blade is unleashed, that will be your mission. If we let the apostle go today, and he returns one day, what awaits this planet will not just be this small swarm of insects, but endless despair."

Xue Ding let out a long breath. He understood that reason told him he should do this, and this seemed to be one of the very few opportunities to kill the apostle.

But emotionally, he couldn't bear to watch his students and countless others rush to the battlefield and turn into corpses scattered everywhere.

In less than an hour, hundreds of thousands of soldiers had perished, their bodies never to be found.

The entire coastline of Xihai City is like a meat grinder, with lives being fed in and then turned into minced meat.

He wouldn't complain about why the Starfleet couldn't send anyone to help the lower ranks, because he knew that the other squads of the Starfleet had stopped more than 90% of the swarm, so the people of Behemoth Star only needed to face a very small number of swarms.

Even with just these insects, they had already reached their limit.

Even if a culprit were to be chosen for this disaster, Xue's law would certainly be culpable.

After all, it was he who sent the coordinates of the Super Iron Curtain into space...

Even though he didn't know about the Mist Council at the time, and even though the purpose of sending the coordinates was to find the Starfleet to teach the Super Iron Curtain a lesson.

But what arrived was not an interstellar column, but an apostle.

It's like Xue's Law accidentally discovering an indigenous tribe occupying an oil field, then casually filming a short video and posting the tribe's location online. Soon, the oil field is covered in mold, the bald eagle arrives, takes over the entire oil field, and even sells all the indigenous tribe's scalps for $10.

Xue Lu didn't kill the tribe, but the tribe died because of him...

……

But watching from the satellite, the Zerg Queen attacked the space station on the giant planet, dropping massive numbers of Zerg eggs onto the ground...

As the city visibly crumbled, the city walls of Xihai City were breached, and a large swarm of insects poured into the city, waging the most brutal and bloody street battles within the city's gravity apparatus!

The most primal battle and clash between giant beasts and giant insects, with each monster fighting with all its might.

His hands creaked as he turned the pages of "The Innovative Century."

The bespectacled woman's secretary didn't try to persuade her further. She understood Xue's Law and knew that he also understood where the real enemy they needed to risk their lives for was. However, the interstellar squadron couldn't spare any more squads.

They don't have enough manpower anymore...

Having learned everything, and looking at the battle situation on the ground, the fearless mech said, "Brother, wait for me."

Xue Dinglu stared blankly at the fearless mech that had merged with the 100-ton King of the Great Yun in the consciousness space.

"You?" Xue asked back.

“Yes, wait for me a while, I’ll go back and get reinforcements,” the fearless mech said, seemingly preparing to open a portal home.

"Can those other Dreadnoughts come over from your homeland?" Xue Dinglu immediately asked.

He didn't immediately consider the Dreadnoughts as reinforcements because he didn't know how long the Dreadnoughts had been dead or how long their mech rebellion had lasted.

Has the empire fallen?
Or is it that during this period of intense debate between doves and hawks over mechs, the Empire might be in trouble if he were to borrow the doves' mechs?
Xue Lude was never one to be generous with other people's money, so he wouldn't ask the Dreadnoughts for troops when the Empire's situation was unclear.

It's even possible that after the Dreadnought passed by, the hawks had already completely taken over the Empire, and it was captured the moment it passed by, then dragged to the execution ground and beheaded.

"Trust me, I can definitely call enough brothers," the fearless mech said.

Xue Luding wasn't sure if it was just his imagination, but he seemed to see the self-starting Da Yun Magic Vehicle giving him a thumbs up.

“Give me a few hours, and I’ll call my brothers over. We’re born insect-killing mechs; this is our job,” said Dauntless Mech 5332.

"Furthermore, the Empire's Colony 3 has completely fallen into the hands of the Zerg. My father, who is also the creator of my mech, often said that we must avenge his family... and avenge the 48 billion Imperials who died on Colony 3..."

"Therefore, we are destined to eliminate the insects. This is the code engraved at the bottom of our fearless mechs, a power born from the 48 billion dead souls and hatred of the entire empire."

"Believe me."

In the space of consciousness, the fearless mech spoke at the end.

The next moment, it disappeared from the consciousness space, leaving behind only a large number of unusable mechanical parts.

Xue Lu looked at the spot where the fearless mech 5332 had left; he didn't actually believe in the mech.

but……

“Thank you, 5223,” Xue said.

Now, whether it's the battlefield on the Beast Star, the battlefield between the space station and the Insect King in space, or even the battlefield of the Ninth Apostle, he can only watch like OMO, just like a venomous snake hidden in the dark, only to strike when it strikes and deliver the most fatal blow.

How long has it been? Xue's Law seems to have returned to the time when he fought Zeus.

Countless lives were sacrificed, all for the sake of that one spear thrown at Zeus.

This time, it seems, will be the same.

……

If 5332 had heard Xue's Law's response just now, it would have definitely slammed Xue's Law into its head, and even remembered its number wrong.

But it has no such thoughts now, because the entire defense line of the giant planet is in grave danger, and it must call for reinforcements as soon as possible.

This is the Empire, a civilization of magical technology.

The Empire's magical level is poor, but its magical technology level is very high. It is so powerful that it can mass-produce Tier 4 mechs, or even enhanced Tier 5 mechs, and has produced a terrifying number of 18 billion units to date.

It can be said that when the entire empire's industrial capacity is up and running, those fearless mechs can be produced like dumplings being dropped into boiling water.

This Cthulhu-level magical industry is simply beyond the comprehension of other civilizations.

Even the Great Iron Curtain at its peak was far inferior.

But at this moment, the surrounding farmland was burned to the ground and covered with weeds, and in the distance, there seemed to be firelight and the sound of explosions.

The fearless mech 5332 realized that the civil war between the Imperial Army and the Rebel Alliance was far from over; they were still waging a protracted war, and it watched the weeds grow...

It seems like about a year has passed since it died!

The vehicle's headlights were turned on, and the high beams instantly illuminated the direction of the distant sound and fire. The fearless mech 5332 immediately sped off in that direction.

……

Meanwhile, in the distance, a small squad of rebel mechs collided with Imperial mechs in the wilderness.

War is about to break out.

As mechs that once wiped out swarms of insects, they know each other's moves and weapons, and are very clear about their specific three-pronged attacks.

Therefore, the ratio of combat losses between the Resistance mechs and the Imperial mechs has been almost 1:1 so far.
They were all taught by the same master, so I can't break their moves...

Meanwhile, the Empire's mech logistics instantly returned to the strength it had during the Zerg Wars, with massive production, while the Rebels also had the occupied Colony Star II as their base, continuously deploying mechs.

Thus, they were plunged into a protracted war.

However, their war was not extreme, because neither the doves nor the hawks wanted to see a destroyed planet, so they did not use the scorched earth tactics they had used in their previous battles against the Zerg.

Instead, everyone entered a phase of clashing with melee weapons, specifically the hot-melt swords and axes, in order to minimize damage to the planet—a tacit understanding between the two sides.

After all, the dove-like mechs' only purpose is to protect the empire; what they want is for the empire to remain intact and powerful.

The rebels, however, only wanted to create a brand new and better empire. They wanted to overthrow the current corrupt empire, kill all the princes and nobles, trample the bones of officials in the streets, and create an ideal empire where everything was thriving and full of vitality.

So all the mechs put down their flamethrowers and bomb guns, and even abandoned their other heavy firepower. Everyone used molten steel blades and electromagnetic axes, and began a brutal hack-and-slash battle.

Now, the hawkish mech that launched the surprise attack encountered the patrolling dove mech. After killing the patrolling mech, it sent out a signal and its soul before it died.

The next moment, several squads of Imperial Dreadnoughts joined the battle and began a brutal mech melee.

Magic energy and sparks exploded on the mech, and the molten blade pierced the consciousness of his former brothers without hesitation.

"9119! Give up! The Empire has been riddled with holes by your attacks. Is this what you wanted to see?!" The Empire's mech, Rampage Electromagnetic Axe, blocked the Melting Blade and roared.

"That's exactly what we wanted to say. If it weren't for the resistance of you bunch of pedantic fools, the empire would have been liberated by us long ago. Those nobles and princes are rotten. They are no longer working for the empire, but have become parasites on it. Only by killing them can we build a brand new, truly ideal empire!" Number 9119 immediately retorted.

The mech, tens of meters tall, moved with the agility of a monkey, drawing a small knife from its leg and slashing out. Then, catching the Imperial mech off guard, it kicked its eyeball, specifically the central, camera-like area.

The impact sent the Imperial mech flying a great distance. If it hadn't dodged in time, its main camera might have been disabled by that kick. Although it wouldn't have damaged the mech's soul, it certainly wouldn't have been in bad shape.

"You're the one who's crazy. We're machines. We don't have the emotions and humanity of carbon-based life forms. If we were to rule the Empire, we would completely lock down the Empire's potential. We don't understand human art or human emotions. The culture, feelings, and civilization that belong to the Empire... they have to inherit all of that themselves!"

"Furthermore, we have yet to fully understand the complexities of carbon-based life forms. It is precisely because of their complexity that we have the empire we have today, and that we possess such strange and wonderful literature and imagination—things we have never had before!"

"Number 9119, are you trying to completely lock down the Empire's limits, preventing its civilization and culture from ever progressing again? You traitor!"

The mecha also shouted back, arguing its case forcefully.

"You're talking nonsense! Losing is called a rebellion, winning is called a revolution! Enough said, only the victors can possess the empire! How could a bunch of pedantic fools possibly understand our ideals!"

After the verbal sparring, the two sides continued their battle, becoming completely engulfed in conflict.

They even became more and more ruthless in the fight, with all the mechs no longer holding back and every move aimed at the opposing mech soul.

This is a battle of ideologies. The reason why Xue Law didn't come to help at first was because both sides had their own reasons. It was just a battle between mechs, and ordinary people were not involved.

In this kind of political struggle, no one can persuade the other side; they can only resort to physical confrontation to find the real policies that are suitable for the future.

Just as No. 9119's molten blade pierced the core of the Imperial Mech, and the Imperial Mech's electromagnetic axe, disregarding its own life, slashed towards the core of the opponent.

Suddenly, a large transport truck with a capacity of 100 tons rushed over at a speed of nearly 300 miles per hour, which startled the two mechs.

"Where did this toy car come from?"

This is the same idea shared by both mechs.

Soon, the Dauntless Mech No. 5332 stopped between the two machines and said, "Gentlemen, please hear me out!"

"5332!"

"5332!"

Both sides were shocked, but the 9119 rebels immediately said, "I don't know why you didn't die and turned into a ridiculous toy car, but I can't be bothered to listen to your nonsense! You inherently evil bastard, I'll kill you with my own hands right now."

Meanwhile, the Imperial mech cried out anxiously, "5332, hurry up! I'll go prepare a compatible mech for you right away."

"I've spotted the Zerg swarm! The Zerg swarm is right on the other side of the portal!"

In an instant, both the rebels and the Imperial mechs froze in their movements.

(End of this chapter)