Astral Pet Store (WN)

Chapter 1241 Anomaly

A storm of attacks were launched towards Greeny and covered its body like venomous dragons. Greeny roared and flew out, Dao Patterns surfacing on its skin and revealing its seven small worlds. It was in its peak status, except for the reduced size.

A hundred golden worms were attacking, while another hundred were crawling quickly and interconnecting to make a strange formation.

“They even know formations…” Su Ping raised his eyebrows. It was true that everything could develop intelligence.

He didn’t underestimate the enemy. He summoned the Little Skeleton and the Dark Dragon Hound at the same time. The golden worms were just Star Lords, and would not pose a threat unless they were surrounded.

Hiss!

Due to the Void Bug’s interference, the subdued golden worms shivered and stood up again.

Exactly at that moment—the queen resting on the high platform seemed infuriated. It shrieked again, and the golden worms acted as if they had just received a royal decree; they instantly charged at the Void Bug despite the extreme pressure.

The Void Bug too became agitated. The order from the queen was ominous, scaring it deep down. However, it had grown alongside Su Ping, and was much smarter than normal Void Bugs. Since it had already seen the splendors of many worlds, it would certainly not succumb to a queen that easily. It could more or less suppress the fear deep in its blood.

However, the tremendous pressure was making it feel agitated at the moment.

Su Ping glanced at the Void Bug, seeing how it was fighting the queen’s control. He knew that his pet wouldn’t be useful for the moment. It was incredible enough that the insect had maintained an independent mind after enduring the queen’s pressure, especially considering the level gap.

“Stop howling.”

Su Ping didn’t just observe the battle. He wanted it to end as quickly as possible.

His seven small worlds were instantly unfolded. The Little Skeleton rushed toward him and attached itself to Su Ping’s body. The Chaos Beast did the same and quickly merged with him.

An intense chaos aura was instantly spread out.

In order to finish the battle as quickly as he could, Su Ping revealed his Primitive Chaos Clan form; his strength rose swiftly, along with his height which reached the ten meter mark. Ancient tattoos were spread all over his skin.

He suddenly stepped up, and all the ancient body’s internal organs seemed to be shaking. Su Ping dashed towards the insects like an arrow leaving the bow.

Many golden worms flinched, clearly frightened by him, but their charge continued, heeding the queen’s order.

Many strange worm techniques attacked him, but Su Ping wasn’t planning on dodging. He simply pushed forward. Some of the worm techniques were absorbed and transformed into energy, while others simply dispersed, without causing any damage.

In terms of bodily hardness, Su Ping was very close to the Celestial State.

The queen sensed the threat and shriek, noticing how he was charging like a furious dragon. All the worms made quick moves to place a defensive formation in front of their leader. The formation took shape and their accumulated energy reverberated, which swept out a powerful force. It was made of three Dao Patterns!

Those Dao Patterns were extremely thick; their form was close to the original power produced by Dao Glyphs.

Su Ping also noticed the threat. He suddenly started spinning, eyes turning cold.

“Path of Illusion! Path of Heavenly Tribulation!”

Su Ping wandered beyond time and space like a ghost in the nonexistent Source World. He passed right through the worms and reappeared in front of the queen.

He had fused Void Walking—which he once learned from the goddess Heather-with the laws of his seven small worlds to create that technique. It was marvelous.

The queen was shocked by such a development, even shrieking when it saw that Su Ping’s enormous body had just appeared up close.

It quickly swung its limbs and slashed at Su Ping as if they were scythes.

Su Ping snorted and punched, smashing away all those moves. He then kicked the queen in the chest with brutal abandon, breaking that part of the mother insect’s shell.

The queen was wounded, shedding golden blood. All the other worms were producing deafening shrieks as if gone mad.

Su Ping ignored them, simply laying his hand on the queen’s hideous head. He gathered sword auras on his wrist, and aimed them at the creature’s head.

“Calm down if you don’t want to die,” said Su Ping in a low voice.

He was speaking telepathically. The queen could understand him, even though their languages were different.

The man’s ancient and terrifying aura made the queen shiver, brutality quickly replaced by fear. It shivered, not knowing why that lowly creature could harness such a horrifying force. He was almost a devil.

Su Ping summoned the Void Bug remotely. It was possible for him to summon his pets via the contract bond within a certain range, as long as they weren’t fighting.

“Can you enslave it?” Su Ping asked his Void Bug telepathically.

The Void Bug had already calmed down. It realized Su Ping’s plan and quickly began to observe the queen.

The mother insect was clearly much more evolved, and thus induced a tremendous amount of bloodline pressure. The Void Bug would have prostrated before the queen as the other minions if he weren’t following Su Ping. However, it felt the strong urge of eating the queen!

Su Ping received the Void Bug’s reply. He slightly raised his eyebrows and looked at the entrapped insect, then thought for a moment and said, “Fine. It’s going to be a new food for

you.”

The sword auras around his wrist darted through the queen’s head as he spoke.

The Dao Patterns imbued in the sword minced its soul and consciousness.

All the worms were crying sadly and seething after the queen’s demise. The insect formation was also dispelled, and all bugs were in disarray.

The Void Bug became excited; it dashed forward and ate the queen’s body.

It chomped away, going through the shell, soon eating up the entire body.

The Void Bug transformed significantly while consuming the queen. Its silver shell was evolving slowly, gradually showing a golden light.

A crack also appeared on its head, gradually growing and opening further until a golden eye appeared.

A certain change took place inside the Void Bug as the eye turned, which emitted a strange pressure that soothed the uneasy worms present.

Su Ping also noticed how the Void Bug’s consciousness had also changed a bit; the former excitement gave way to calmness, like the growth from a naughty kid into a mature young man.

III d

Hiss!

The Void Bug rolled the eye on its forehead and turned to look down at the worms, and let out a loud cry.

The densely packed worms on the ground were suddenly moving uneasily. Then, the golden worms adopted a meek posture, as if kneeling in submission.

The silver worms even lay still on the ground in fear, not even daring to raise their heads. Once noticing this, Su Ping instantly asked the Void Bug via telepathy, “Can you control them?”

The Void Bug shook its body, as a way of nodding. Su Ping realized what the Void Bug meant and felt relieved. He could relax and save most of his strength if this were true.

“They’re all yours. Save some of them to explore the way, and store the rest in your small worlds. Let’s keep going.”

The Void Bug looked at the worms, finding them familiar, while also feeling superior than the whole lot. Its new organ allowed it to feel the consciousnesses of each insect and manipulate them directly.

That was why the queen could control them.

A purple and black vortex appeared, leading to one of the Void Bug’s Ascendant worlds. A lot of golden worms flew in; the silver worms and the weaker ones followed closely.

Only a dozen golden worms remained in the end. They flew and set themselves as the Void Bug’s vanguard, waiting for commands.

“Can you sense whether or not there are other nests here?” Su Ping asked the Void Bug.

The Void Bug shook its head.

Su Ping felt slightly regretful. The Void Bug’s group would grow even more if he could subdue similar-sized nests. It currently lorded over two hundred golden worms; it was like having two hundred Ascendant cultivators.

That was already the size of a six-star organization.

It was only short of Heavenly Lords in its ranks.

None of the golden worms were as strong as Heavenly Lords, and that was also their weakness. They would surely be eliminated if they ever had a conflict with the Loulan family.

“Do you know how they came here?” Su Ping asked.

The Void Bug tilted its head to ponder, nodding a moment later. It transformed into a young man; its silver hair had turned golden and its body had already reached the Ascendant State. Its only shortcoming was that it had yet to attain a deeper understanding of laws.

Once in human form, the Void Bug pointed in a certain direction.

Su Ping checked the map in his watch for reference and noticed that was where the universe’s crack was found.

“They came out from there?” Su Ping was dazed.

The Void Bug nodded and waved a hand; a hologram was projected in the void, showing a foreign scenery!

The place was absolutely dark, with nothing but a vertical shimmer. Once the point of view got closer, it was clear that it was the universe’s crack.

Next to the crack was an enormous corpse whose skin was gray and rough, contaminated by cosmic rays and dust.

Su Ping then saw the queen moving toward the ancient corpse with dozens of golden worms. They then entered the body through a certain opening

The insects consumed the corpse’s blood and left mucus as markers. They marched on and established their channels and nests, eventually setting up a base in the stomach.

“They came from a place beyond the universe’s crack?”

Su Ping’s eyes glittered. He remembered that the Void Bugs in the Demigod Burial had originated from another world.

Did the worms live in a place beyond the universe?

Su Ping’s eyes glittered, thinking about exploring the space beyond the universe’s crack if the chance arose. However, it was very dangerous; it would be great if he could find a similar place among the listed cultivation sites, as he would really be gone for good if he died in the real world. That was a risk he was unwilling to take; might as well rely on the system to level up.

“Let’s go somewhere else…”

Su Ping summoned the Dark Dragon Hound and hopped to its back after the holographic depiction ended.

Just like Su Ping, the Void Bug also jumped to the back of a golden worm.

Its new presence imposed greater pressure than the golden worms, allowing it to rein them in however it wanted.

The Dark Dragon Hound growled at the Void Bug, noticing that it was imitating Su Ping.

The Void Bug rolled its eyes and grimaced at the other.

Su Ping canceled the merging and sent both the Little Skeleton and the young Chaos Beast back into the storage space. He then asked the Void Bug to lead the way and search for valuable items inside the corpse.

Right when they were about to leave the digestive organ-the ground trembled loudly, and Su Ping saw that the Dao Patterns in the walls of flesh seemed to be awakening.

The shimmering Dao Patterns removed the accumulated filth in the flesh, making the internal organs look newer than ever. It seemed to have come alive.

Su Ping narrowed his eyes. Is the ancient corpse reviving?

Su Ping quickly noticed that the Dao Patterns in the flesh were quickly combining and forming a Dao Glyph, shining in the flesh like stars.

Waves of power arose from the Dao Glyph and drifted in a certain direction, as if something were absorbing said power.

Su Ping saw that it was the direction they came from. Did something happen in the heart?

Su Ping couldn’t wait any longer. He asked the Void Bug and the Dark Dragon Hound to move toward the heart at full speed.

Whoosh!

After making their way back, Su Ping saw that the channel he had used to get there had been renewed. The sticky worm mucus had been removed by the Dao Glyphs’ power in the flesh. All visible flesh was new and fragrant.

It’s been brought back to life? Wait. It’s possible that the ancient being didn’t die and was only sealed by the sword. Did they finally pluck the sword out?

Su Ping was shocked and suspicious.

They reached the heart, but nobody was around. His senior brothers and sisters were gone, and so were the Heavenly Lords of the other star zones.

The sword remained plunged into the black heart.

Su Ping used his chaos eyes to see where the Dao Glyphs’ power was still drifting toward. IT was clear that the source was not there.

He felt dazed as his eyes followed the power flow. There was a moment’s hesitation before he asked the Dark Dragon Hound to go there.

He moved through the channel and soon encountered Ascendant cultivators of other organizations, who were also moving in a certain direction. They tried stopping Su Ping as he passed by, but their faces turned pale when they noticed the dozen golden worms escorting him. All of them fled in a hurry.