The Interstellar Queen of Scavengers

How to use the other Star Beasts to kill off the Viper Worm—that’s the question.

Ji You and He Bi hid inside a Star Beast’s corpse, tugging at their hair as they thought.

He Bi suddenly said, "How’s your shooting?"

Ji You said, "So-so. Just your average Hundred Shots Hundred Hits level."

He Bi: "..."

He Bi felt this one was useless, so he said, "You handle defense, keep watch all around. I’ll stir things up."

Ji You asked, "How are you gonna stir?"

He Bi said, "That Viper Worm can use Invisibility, but it’s carrying a Crystal Core. The Crystal Core’s presence is way too strong—no matter how it hides, it can’t completely vanish. So it can only crank up its speed, keep itself running at super high velocity. Those few Star Beasts are all scattered sand, each just wants to act solo, grab it and run... so we need to find a way to get them aligned on the same enemy."

"I get the logic, that’s what I wanted to do anyway." Ji You frowned, thought for a moment, then her eyes lit up. "You mean, while the Viper Worm’s moving, we secretly ambush the other Star Beasts, pretend it’s the Viper Worm doing sneak attacks, help the Viper Worm stack up its anger value?"

"Mm." He Bi glanced at Ji You’s pair of big dark eyes peeking out from the corpse. Say what you will, this kid looks shifty as hell, perfect for this kind of job—brain’s nimble.

He Bi continued, "The Viper Worm has a kind of deadly venom on it. Even a 12th-level mosquito that gets some on it is in deep trouble. So to make the play more convincing, we’ve gotta add some venom."

"Where are we gonna get venom?" Ji You had barely asked when she saw He Bi pull out a vial of liquid from his person.

He Bi said, "Use this."

Ji You: "???"

He Bi said, "For you, one sip and you’re dead."

Ji You immediately shook her head. "I’m not interested."

After getting the Mecha, He Bi had already taken a bow and arrow from the Mecha’s storage room. This was a purely cold weapons setup, no heat source reaction, so Star Beasts’ senses couldn’t pick it up.

Then He Bi took ten arrows, dabbed a bit of venom on each arrowhead, and nocked the bow.

Ji You was on full alert.

Even without anyone piloting it, affected by the battle up ahead, this Star Beast corpse was slowly moving. Ji You had to make sure the corpse’s movement didn’t mess up Senior He Bi’s performance.

And then.

He Bi loosed an arrow, fast!

This arrow’s spearpoint was aimed straight at the 11th-level Fierce Thunder Beast.

Whoosh—

The faint sound didn’t draw any attention from the other Star Beasts, and the Fierce Thunder Beast was locked onto the Viper Worm charging at it, not noticing a thing.

Then—

The Fierce Thunder Beast’s "guard the stump and wait for the rabbit" tactic failed. The Viper Worm darted left and right, nimbly dodging the Fierce Thunder Beast, and when it broke away, it even deliberately spooked it, flicking a venomous spine at the Fierce Thunder Beast’s butt!

The Fierce Thunder Beast narrowly dodged, then suddenly felt an arrow hit its ass!

Rip~

A bit painful, a bit numb, a bit itchy...

And then, the Fierce Thunder Beast got mad!

It had tried so hard to dodge, and still got schemed against by this treacherous little bug!

Rip~

Hit by another arrow!

The Fierce Thunder Beast was furious!

This little bug is doing it on purpose! It’s using this to slip out of its pursuit, and it’s even trying to use venom to poison and numb its senses...

One sting at a time doesn’t hurt enough, but a few more and even the Fierce Thunder Beast wouldn’t dare bet it could tough it out.

Damn it!

The Fierce Thunder Beast hadn’t planned to kill the Viper Worm. With its strength, killing the Viper Worm would cost it a lot of blood.

But!

That won’t do anymore.

It has to crush this little bug to death.

...

"...Awesome!" Two hits in a row—Ji You was genuinely impressed. "Senior, did you already have your eye on the Fierce Thunder Beast’s big butt?"

He Bi: "..."

The hand He Bi was holding the bow with almost swung over and smacked her. Then he said nothing, sank his breath to his core, and loosed another arrow!

This time, the target was the Dragon Qilin’s horn!

The horn was one of its weak points—

Obviously, the Viper Worm thought so too. When the Viper Worm ran into the Dragon Qilin’s interception, it pretended to fire a spine, just to scare the Dragon Qilin off.

The Viper Worm’s body was covered in countless spines, serving as both armor and weapon. But not every spine was highly offensive; on the contrary, only the ones the Viper Worm had carefully tended and infused with concentrated venom were truly deadly. The rest—soft hairs, fine hairs, or ones not hard enough—were non-toxic.

And whether it’s humans or other Star Beasts, they all assume the Viper Worm is covered head to toe in lethal toxin. That’s actually a blind eye method deliberately crafted by the Viper Worm swarms. They’re good at spreading the poisonous spines across different parts of their bodies, so once an area gets attacked, they can instantly fire off toxic spines from there—which is what led other creatures to that misconception.

Quite possibly, in one patch of spines—thousands of them—only two or three are truly venomous.

This time, what the Viper Worm fired at the Dragon Qilin was a non-toxic spine.

It wasn’t the real showdown yet; it had to save its venomous spines.

And then—

The Dragon Qilin had been watching closely, so of course it dodged. It flicked its tail a little smugly, then suddenly its head froze!

Got hit by an arrow?!!!

The next second, the Dragon Qilin saw that Viper Worm twist its head around, looking over at it with smug satisfaction!

The Dragon Qilin was very angry!

The consequences were very serious.

It was going to get serious!

...

The 12th-level mosquito was the fiercest Star Beast chasing the Viper Worm! Its companion was dead, the corpse dropped to the side, not worth much—but the Crystal Core generated in its companion’s body had to be taken.

Mosquitoes aren’t communal creatures. On the contrary, they prefer solo runs. But—the reason this mosquito had teamed up with the dead one wasn’t that the two mosquitoes were close, and definitely not love. They got together for the Crystal Core.

The living mosquito was also 12th level, but it didn’t have a Crystal Core in its body. It had to rely on a Crystal Core to safely pass through the Space Rift corridor.

Now its companion was dead and the Crystal Core had been snatched, which put it in an extremely passive spot. Even if it abandoned everything and rushed into the Space Rift, the threat it faced in there would still be enormous.

It didn’t dare gamble. Rather than that, it might as well fight one more round.

The mosquito darted around, searching for a chance to strike, but the Viper Worm was ridiculously sly, constantly darting east and west. Even the mosquito couldn’t lock onto its position in real time.

Plus, the mosquito still had to guard against the other Star Beasts, and the humans.

You could say this was a mosquito riddled with concerns.

Right then, the mosquito felt an arrow hit the root of its wing!

It froze for a beat, and saw the Viper Worm just happen to dart past! The mosquito instantly stopped holding back and unleashed a frenzied assault!

In a heartbeat, the Viper Worm felt the mood change—the Star Beasts that had been fighting their own battles suddenly all converged toward it, launching a joint attack!

The Viper Worm ran for its life!

It dodged left and right, but still couldn’t get out of the encirclement of several Star Beasts. It was getting anxious—and a little confused.

These Star Beasts had formed a temporary alliance centered on the 12th-level mosquito. Clearly, they all agreed that for now, taking out the Invisibility-capable Viper Worm came first—that was the proper business.