Edge of the Apocalypse

Chapter 169: Reconnaissance

Halfway through the journey, the Saber Ant suddenly stopped. The first two antennae of his head touched the ground, and he could feel the ground shaking regularly. This kind of vibration was obviously not something of the same kind. The Saber Ant immediately turned around and saw that a pair of eyes were filled with grey arcs.

The canine bone knife cut through the ant's lower jaw, tearing open its mouth, head, brain, and nerves along the way. Eventually, the tip of the knife broke through the shell above his head, bringing with it flying bits of meat and ant blood, sprinkling a straight mark on the ground. Alan put away his saber and held the corpse of the Saber Ant on the ground, dragging it to the back of a dirt bag. He reached out his hand into the knife ant's wound and smeared the blood on his face, armpits, and a few exposed parts of his body. In this way, the aura he emitted was no different from that of a saber ant. Coupled with the smell of scorched earth on their bodies, as long as they weren't directly exposed to knife ants, those dangerous species would only treat them as their own.

It was less than a hundred meters away from the nest, which was only two breaths of time under Allen's feet. He arrived at the left side of the hill where the nest was located. This hill was almost perpendicular to the ground, and there were two holes in it. The entrance of the cave was deep and there was a faint red light. Allen used the bulge of the mountain as a point of borrowing and climbed up like a gecko.

However, he had already arrived at a cave about fifteen to sixteen meters away from the ground. Alan carefully poked his head out and looked into the cave. The cave stretched a few meters inside, and a turning point appeared. It was unknown where it would lead to. The faint red light was coming from the turning point. The temperature in the cave was obviously higher than outside the cave, and it didn't feel the slightest bit cold. Seeing that there were no knife ants around, Alan sneaked into the cave.

The cave was very dry and the rock wall felt warm. Alan took a deep breath. Apart from the unique sulphur-like pungent smell of Nether Domain Star, there was no other odor in the air. The air was dry and hot, making Alan's throat burn. He used both hands and feet to climb down the cave passageway. After climbing seven or eight meters, the passage had reached its end. Looking down from half of his head, it was a complicated space.

The saber ant seemed to have hollowed out the mountain, presenting a complex structure of spatial passageways. At first glance, he was unable to see the entire scene. He could only see a relatively wide mountain belly, about several dozen square meters long, surrounded by acupoints leading to other places. The belly of the mountain was filled with saber ants, and there were forty to fifty of them. Ants overlapped, forming a small mountain. The knife ants swarmed about, and the scene made one's scalp go numb.

A sharp bug cry came from a certain acupoint. Alan remembered where he had heard it, but he couldn't remember it for a moment. He held his breath and stroked towards the source of the voice. There was a flame below the mountain belly. The flame shone up through the cracks in the mountain wall, as if there was a volcano below the mountain. This was not the case, but the Blood Hawk Highland was adjacent to the Flaming Wrath Abyss. Although this place was not within the Fire Abyss, it was hard to guarantee that no lava had flowed underground. If the Saber Ant dug deeper and made the ground thinner, it was not impossible for the temperature of the underground magma to rise through the rocks.

Alan borrowed the dim flames in the mountain's abdomen and smoothly entered the acupoint where the bug's cry came from. After climbing dozens of meters, they passed through two large curved slopes like roller coaster tracks before arriving at the exit. There was a fishy smell in the air at the exit. Alan quietly poked his head out and a strange head suddenly flashed in front of his eyes. He hurriedly retreated, his hand already touching the handle of the fangs.

That's an earth-boring worm.

There were no eyes or noses, only a large mouth full of broken teeth. However, the Earth Drilling Bug did not seem to have noticed where Alan was. However, he let out a mournful cry and fell powerlessly. Alan scanned again and saw that the cliffs under the acupoints were actually covered with worm blood. The Earth Drilling Insect fell to the ground more than ten meters below. Looking at the situation, it wanted to escape desperately just now. Compared to the size of the Earth Drilling Bugs, Alan suddenly felt that these complicated tunnels might have been dug out by these bugs.

Looking at the giant bug that fell to the ground, its body twisted and it didn't die immediately. At this moment, a few smaller, dark-skinned ants with sickle-like forefoot blades crawled out of the acupoints on the ground. These black ants should also be one of the knife ants, but their Origin Energy aura was much thicker than that of ordinary knife ants. Those two compound eyes emitted a dark red glow that was terrifying to look at.

Dozens of these black ants used their mouths or sickle feet to attack the Earth Drilling Insect, but they didn't seem to want to kill it, but they stimulated the giant insect to struggle desperately and drill into one of the passages. During this period of time, when the giant insect was about to charge in another direction, a black ant quickly blocked it. Judging from the situation, it was actually intentionally letting the Earth Drilling Insect enter their designated passageway.

What's going to happen behind the passageway?

After the Earth Drilling Insect and the Black Ant entered the tunnel, Alan waited quietly for a moment to make sure that no other knife ants appeared before swimming down the ground and entering the acupoint chosen by the giant black ant. This passageway didn't have much twists and turns. After walking for about seven to eight meters, it had already reached its end. The fire at the end was even more intense, and Alan approached the exit following the shadow in the path. The short stature stuck its head out and looked out. It was originally an open space.

There were over a hundred square meters in the belly of the mountain, and the surrounding mountains were hollowed out. The walls of the mountains were filled with large holes about a meter long and wide, so it was unknown what use they had. The ground in the center of the mountain was extremely thin. Scorching magma would occasionally emerge from the center and flow around. When it encountered air, it would gradually cool down and turn into black mud with a flaming light. At the end of the mountain, there was a huge monster lying on the ground.

His body was as tall as a hill, and he had an extremely disproportionate head. The structure of the head was 70-80% similar to that of an ordinary saber ant, except that there was a compound eye in the center of its forehead. This big fellow was lying on the ground, as if he was warming himself with geothermal heat. Occasionally, two pairs of wings that were as thin as cicada wings would flap. However, those wings were small and thin, so their decorative significance was probably greater than their actual use.

The front foot did not look like an ordinary saber ant with a blade. Its limbs were no different from an ordinary ant. The three pairs of feet were all in the first segment of its body, making it look stupid and ridiculous. Especially since it was still dragging a round belly. Alan had just bet that this thing would never climb out of the belly of the mountain, so he didn't know how it got in.

A miserable bug cry caused Alan to retract his attention from the strange ant. He swept his gaze through the mountain and saw the Earth Drilling Bug. The insect was driven to the front of the big fellow by the black ant. At this moment, the black ant was no longer courteous. A dozen or so black ants rushed up, moving their mouths and feet together, biting and tearing, tearing the Earth Drilling Insect into pieces in three or two strikes.

The bugs' grease, blood, and minced meat fell to the ground. At this time, the antennae on the big ant's head moved, and its three compound eyes rolled up. Then, he opened his mouth, and an organ that looked like a straw extended out from his mouth. When that thing landed on the ground, it began to suck up the oil and blood of the Earth Drilling Bug. There were even black ants that tore off the bugs' flesh and skin into pieces and sent them to the big fellow's side, as if they were feeding it food.

Without a doubt, that was the queen ant. As for the black ants, they should be the personal guards after the discussion. From the fact that not a single ordinary saber ant could be seen in the belly of the mountain, it could be seen that the status of these black ants in the ant colony was not low.

Having a general understanding of the situation of the nest, Allen did not want to stay for long and retreated at a lighter pace. Just as he was about to climb onto the rock wall, two spots of scarlet red suddenly appeared in the shadow ahead. A black ant's sickle feet rubbed against each other, making a creaking sound. It moved out of the shadows and stared at Alan.

Alan took a deep breath. Just as his hand touched the hilt of the sharp-fanged knife, the black ant rushed over at high speed.

The gray light flowed, and the sharp fangs were unsheathed, forming a graceful arc of light that slashed towards the black ant's head. To Alan's surprise, the black ant suddenly slid sideways, allowing him to slash through the air with a single saber. Allen exclaimed. The black ant's agility and speed were better than ordinary knife ants. He snorted, turned his wrist, and sliced his fangs again, pulling out a grey crescent wheel that stretched across space.

This time, the Black Ant could not avoid it, but it bent its sickle foot and forcefully shook Allen's blade.

With a loud sound, the black ant slashed him backwards. Allen's mouth trembled violently, but the black ant also trembled heavily. He was shocked. At this moment, he heard the sound of insect feet rushing from the abdomen. He knew that it wouldn't take a few seconds for the other Queen Ants' personal guards to keep an eye on him.

It had to be decided quickly!

With a thought, the Origin Energy within his body rumbled, and Allen's eyes lit up with an abnormally attractive light. He shouted softly and closed his saber to pounce. With a pull of his sharp fangs, the crescent moon instantly fell, and the saber force covered most of the black ant's body, causing bursts of explosive sounds to resound. The black ant was instantly struck by countless slashes, but apart from the crack at the insect node, there was only a crack left in the rest of the area after the slash, but it did not injure the vital part.

These Queen Ants' personal guards' insect shells were extremely hard, so even ordinary machine guns wouldn't be able to do anything to them. Fortunately, there was no black armor covering the Insect Festival, so it was exceptionally soft. Even ordinary swords could be easily torn apart, let alone second-grade magical weapons like Sharp Fang. Grasping the weakness of the black ant, Alan stepped on the slippery steps to avoid the black ant's sickle-foot attack. At the same time, the dragging saber slashed out, and a gray light flashed between the black ant's two bodies.

The black ant immediately spat out cyan-yellow blood and fell to the ground. The wound on the ganglion was large and deep, and Alan's body and nerves were cut off. Although he died immediately, he was unable to chase after Alan. Alan immediately retreated and climbed onto the rock wall. At this time, the other Black Ant Guards rushed out of their acupoints and chased after Alan. Allen used both hands and feet to quickly drill into the passageway. He casually removed a hand/lightning from his waist and threw it back without looking. He threw himself forward with all his might.

In an instant, an ear-splitting explosion sounded from behind him, and the shock wave carried a scorching hot air current as it whistled past his back and above his head. When Alan raised his head, the flames behind him rolled backwards. Several black ants were burned to the point where their bodies curled up and their feet rolled backwards. They were already dead.

He took the opportunity to leave.

In a short moment, the place was already filled with knife ants, but Alan had already left, and his body was covered with the ant blood and lime that concealed the smell. This made the Saber Ant want to chase after him, but in the end, it dispersed.

After Alan left the nest, he quickly rushed back to the hill where the squad was. Several other teams had already gathered on the slope. They saw Nazi's signal and rushed over. When they heard that Alan was scouting the ant nest alone, they couldn't help but be worried. Only Hubble looked indifferent and sneered at the direction of the nest from time to time.

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