Chapter 336: Assembled Stronghold
"Not entirely impossible, but I don't like working for free. Give me some benefits, and I'll help you close the portal."
Lin Ye attempted to communicate with the entity before him.
"What do you... want..."
A voice emanated from within the mother bug's body.
"Do you have any unique local specialties? Common items don't interest me."
Lin Ye observed the mother bug but didn't spot anything particularly useful on its body.
"...Give you... close... portal."
The mother bug extended a slender tendril into its own body, pulling out a vibrant emerald-green insect. The bug trembled incessantly, emitting a series of high-pitched chirps.
Lin Ye used his spiritual energy to take the insect. He gave it a slight squeeze with his spiritual energy, and the bug let out a comical shriek.
"Alright, deal." Lin Ye placed the strange insect into his loot space, then activated the switch, closing the portal.
After the portal closed, two more semi-transparent white crystalline fragments appeared on the ground. Lin Ye casually collected them into his loot space.
"Hehe... portal... closed..."
A massive amount of pale yellow, web-like vegetation sprouted from within the mother bug's body. The plant network tore through the mother bug's form, transforming it into a colossal scaffold of flesh and blood.
The lush, net-like plants wantonly stretched their bodies, displaying the various organs within the mother bug now thoroughly permeated by the web-like flora.
A horde of insects, their bodies sprouting the same web-like plants, crowded outside the incubation chamber. They tore open their own intact forms, blossoming forth like flowers.
"I helped you close the portal. Now I want to leave this place. I hope we can part on good terms."
Lin Ye held a blood-red Cross Scepter. The Blood Sphere that had been floating beside him had already vanished.
The reason he was willing to close the portal was that once it was shut, he could slowly and thoroughly clean up the remaining insects here at his leisure.
"Your... body... I like... very much..."
The web-like plants used the mother bug's organs to produce sound.
"Are you sure about this? I'm not really keen on fighting you. After all, you don't seem to be allied with those monsters that came through the portal. We could work together to turn the other monsters into your body. How about cooperating with me?"
Lin Ye rarely cooperated with such monsters, but considering the red circles on the map, he thought having an ally would make things easier.
"You... unworthy... cooperate... I want... your... body..."
After the mother bug finished speaking, the insects outside the incubation chamber began emitting restless, agitated noises. They were growing impatient.
"Fine, then I'll just have to use you all to test my new skill. Since it's still in the development phase, I'm not entirely sure what will happen."
Just as Lin Ye was about to act, he sensed something intruding into the insect nest from afar. The insects outside were dying at an astonishingly rapid rate.
Lin Ye had felt the aura of this intruder not long ago.
"Apologies, it seems it's here for me."
Lin Ye swiftly stabbed several insects to death with the Cross Scepter, then found a passage and fled outward. The mother bug and the majority of the insects were distracted by the juvenile beast rampaging through the nest, leaving them no time to pay attention to Lin Ye.
Web-like plants thrust toward Lin Ye from various corners of the passage, but their main bodies weren't particularly tough. Lin Ye controlled his spiritual energy blades, slicing them into fragments.
The juvenile beast wasn't in a hurry to pursue Lin Ye, who had escaped via another tunnel. For now, it was far more interested in these nutritionally rich meals.
Lin Ye quickly exited the insect nest. Along the way, he dealt with some blocking insects and casually collected some decent spiritual energy materials.
"Good thing they didn't cooperate, otherwise I'd have had to help them deal with the enemy."
Lin Ye happily ran toward the next red circle base, leaving the insects' agonized shrieks behind him.
Perhaps because he was moving away from the main battle zone, he encountered very few enemies on the road.
Lin Ye found the third red circle base without much trouble.
This base was constructed from various materials stitched together.
Flesh, metal, stone, plants... all kinds of materials were harmoniously spliced, slowly undulating as if breathing.
Before Lin Ye could even get close, he was detected by the Stitched Creatures inside the base.
A large number of Stitched Creatures poured out from the base, charging toward Lin Ye's location.
Lin Ye turned and ran. Those Stitched Creatures detached various components from their own bodies and hurled them near Lin Ye. These components then reassembled into new Stitched Creatures.
"Damn! It can do that?!"
Lin Ye dodged a metallic stitched object that suddenly changed direction mid-air. It seemed these Stitched Creatures could control their stitched organs from a certain distance.
Several Stitched Creatures surrounded Lin Ye. They threw various aggressive stitched organs toward him, then remotely manipulated those organs to attack.
Lin Ye deployed his spiritual energy shield and charged at full speed toward the Stitched Creatures blocking his path. The vital point of these creatures was the stitching core they used to control their stitched organs. They typically hid this core in a location not easily attacked.
Therefore, by carefully sensing areas that were less vulnerable to attack, one could quickly locate their hidden stitching cores.
Lin Ye happened to be quite good at finding things.
Moreover, he was a Backstab Master. No matter where those Stitched Creatures hid their stitching cores, he could execute a precise backstab.
Using backstabs with his Compressed Spiritual Energy Blade to deal with the blocking Stitched Creatures, Lin Ye quickly broke out of the encirclement.
If surrounded by a large number of Stitched Creatures, even Lin Ye could be overwhelmed here, especially since the stitched base was right next door and likely contained a portal as well.
"This is a bit troublesome."
Since dealing with each Stitched Creature required carefully sensing its stitching core, Lin Ye could only handle them in small groups. Dealing with large numbers was more problematic.
But this didn't stump Lin Ye. He moved away from the stitched base and set up an ambush along the path the Stitched Creatures would take to the main battle zone. As long as he eliminated a certain number, he could storm the stitched base and close the portal.
It wasn't a particularly brilliant strategy, but it was effective.
Lin Ye began setting up rune traps along the road. His loot space still contained some spiritual energy materials. Once he dealt with the first wave of enemies, he could dismantle their corpses to use as materials for more rune traps.
Just as Lin Ye expected, it wasn't long before the stitched base dispatched a batch of Stitched Creatures toward the main battle zone.
When this batch passed through the area with the rune traps, Lin Ye activated the traps and seized the opportunity to backstab the Stitched Creatures from the side. This group offered little resistance before Lin Ye eliminated them all.
Lin Ye used the corpses of this batch to create a large number of compound rune traps. With these traps, he could easily handle the next batch of Stitched Creatures.
Not long after, the stitched base dispatched another batch of Stitched Creatures. This group was noticeably stronger than the previous one, and their numbers were double the last batch.