Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

“Scratch, scratch, scratch…”

“Pa! Boom! Pa!…”

The unit production battle between the two Beetle Kings (Commander) had finally entered its final stage!

Red Bladed Beetles, black Steel Beetles, green Spray Beetles, Suicide Bombeetles, Energy Beetles…

Apart from the lack of Gatherer Beetles and Scout Beetles, both of which lacked combat ability, all the other types of beetles were biting, roaring, spraying, and attacking each other without regard to their lives!

Just as a Bladed Beetle pierced through the head of another Beetle with the hook on its tail, it was immediately struck by a sneak attack from a Suicide Bombeetle that emanated a red glow in its belly, blown to smithereens by a big boom!

As a green Spray Beetle’s poison finally broke through the white defensive shield that the Energy Beetle created, corroding the shell of an Energy Beetle until it fell to the ground, a Steel Beetle’s eyes would shoot out laser beams that burned a hole through the Spray Beetle’s poisonous sac!

…

Commands of the “King Beetle” were ranked above the soldier beetles. Even as they were engaged in a “Kamikaze” battle like this, they had no hesitation. Beetles fell one after another, covering the entire tunnel with green blood!

However, overall, the tide of the battle was leaning towards 24K’s side!

It was because the wormhole on the wall behind the Black Beetle Commander had already disappeared. This also meant that it had depleted all its psionic energy needed to maintain the wormhole, and it no longer had the ability to “produce units!”

As for 24K’s wormhole on the ground, it was still there!

“Bzzzt, bzzzt…”

Two Suicide Bombeetles with gray metallic wings flew out of the pitch-black wormhole, the red dot on their belly started to expand as they spun high into the air to join the other seven Level 35 mates of theirs that were waiting. Then, from different directions, they charged towards the Black Beetle Commander protected by three Elite Steel Beetles!

“Boom! Boom!”

Although during this time, two Suicide Bombeetles were blown apart by the laser beams of the Elite Steel Beetles, since the distance between each Suicide Bombeetle was far enough, they did not affect the others.

The remaining Suicide Bombeetles continued to flap their wings and charged towards the Black Beetle Commander as the red dot on their belly continued to swell.

“Roar!”

On the ground, the Level 45 Elite-Bladed Beetle that was in the lead roared and swung its large-sized”scythe” at an enemy Bladed Beetle blocking its path, slashing its head clean off!

After that, it brought its remaining five companions with reduced HP to charge towards the Black Beetle Commander that had already lost all its Bladed Beetles!

“Pa!” At the same time, new psionic shields appeared to surround their bodies thrice, blocking all sorts of damages!

As for the two large Elite Grade Steel Beetles standing beside the black hole, their laser beam targeting system also immediately switched their target to the Black Beetle Commander!

“It looks like I missed something. Although it can also cast ‘wormhole’, the system monsters aren’t that difficult to deal with.”

Feng Luo, who saw everything through the vision of the Scout Beetle, showed a glimpse of a smile.

“It’s because it doesn’t even know how to command the beetle soldiers to battle, it is almost relying entirely on the combat instincts of the beetle soldiers.”

“24K, on the other hand…”

Feng Luo’s vision switched back to his body. 24K was making squeaking noise on Feng Luo’s shoulder while commanding its remaining beetle squads to make a final center push through its mental link.

24K’s tiny eyes and claws were shrouded in psionic energy light. Through the mental link, Feng Luo could feel that 24K was feeling rather excited!

Pet’s AI in War could be increased!

Using the language of the official game, “Pets can learn and grasp all sorts of combat skills through interaction with their masters and battles, increasing intimacy with their masters to truly become the sidekicks of players!”

Of course, the higher the starting AI of the pet, the faster the growth and maximum limit!

As a Boss grade pet, as well as a King Beetle, 24K’s AI was naturally very high. However, in addition to that, it also had the skill called mental link, which made learning highly effective! That was why under two months of gaming, with Feng Luo’s intentional training and development methods, 24K had long obtained some common tactical combat maneuver skills to command normal beetles!

This was also the reason why 24K’s beetle army was capable of annihilating most of the enemy’s forces even as 24K’s forces had a numerical disadvantage. At that time, 24K even knew that the optimal strategy was to gather its forces and target the enemy leader!

Of course, 24K’s success was also dependent on the terrible commanding skills of the enemy Black Beetle Commander, at least to a certain extent.

The Black Beetle Commander did not even try to separate the Suicide Bombeetles in its squad, which took out their teammate when they exploded. In addition, even as it had a great number of Spray Beetles at its disposal, it kept having the Spray Beetles attack the Bladed Beetles that had poison immunity…

There was no way 24K would lose this battle that was like a Platinum grade player fighting against a Bronze level player!

In addition to that, the Black Beetle Commander had now depleted its psionic energy reserve. It no longer had anything left to turn things around!

In fact, though 24K was a Boss monster since it was a pet, its total psionic energy reserve was still lower than the commander monster which was the same species!

However, 24K had a wealthy master, so even though it had only a little bit of crystal shards left in its mouth, the psionic energy provided was enough to help it make the last push forward!

The victor had been decided.

…

However, in another location.

“What is that sound?”

When the Steel Beetle destroyed the six Suicide Bombeetles and a large exploding sound rang, many Nightless City players also noticed it!

Everyone seemed to have stiffened!

“This is bad!”

“A large number of monsters appeared in the tunnel in front of us, numbering over 60. Moreover, from the life signs, they are all stronger than the Elite Beetles earlier!” Mu Zi quickly cast the Detection skill.

The Expert Level Detection skill paired with the bonus from his talent made it so that the signals immediately appeared on his recon meter even though the distance was great and there were multiple metallic obstacles in the way. Through the recon meter, he noticed the odd development in the deepest spot of the ruin where only one Commander Grade monster was left!

“What?” Upon hearing his, the group, whose HP had only recovered to around half of their total, paled.

If they were to just face a Level 40 Commander Grade monster, with their current condition, they were still relatively confident.

However, if it were a swarm of monsters that were stronger than the Elite Grade Beetles they faced earlier, then wouldn’t that mean that they were going to fail the mission?

Did that mean that they would have to give up the fourth, and only remaining, Legendary equipment shard left?

There was no doubt that everyone was unwilling to accept that fate.

After all, it was a Legendary Grade item!

“I’ll head over to check things out,” said Rose Thorns with a solemn expression. She grabbed a backup alloy shield from her backpack and charged forward!

Her HP had recovered to two-thirds of its maximum, and as a Heavy Armor Warrior, even if she were to get hit by a high-damage skill of a Commander Grade monster, she would not die immediately.

“Ah?? This…”

However, just as she got past the corner in front of them and sneaked a quick peek at the situation in the tunnel ahead from behind her raised shield, her expression stiffened!

“What’s wrong?” Asked almost everyone apart from Feng Luo as they felt a chill down their spine.