[You take out 10,000 points of Spirit Essence and toss them to the Courier Mole Cricket as feed. It swallows the Spirit Essence in one gulp, lets out a happy chirp, and opens the flesh membrane at its abdomen…]

[Please choose your destination.]

[1. Audience Ravine]

[2. War Hatchery]

[3. Fuzzy Feather Altar]

Lin Xun presses the second option.

[You climb into the abdomen of the Courier Mole Cricket and sit down on the metal seat.]

[It chirps again, and the two flesh membranes at its sides close back up.]

[As constant tremors and the loud sound of segmented limbs digging through the ground come from outside, the entire abdominal cavity is plunged into darkness…]

[Currently heading to the War Hatchery…]

[…]

This time the trip is shorter, and he reaches the destination in just a few minutes.

According to Missionary Kim, the key locations he could explore are still within the bounds of the town, only deeply hidden underground.

Judging from the time spent riding, that seems to be the case.

[…]

[The tremors subside, and the flesh membranes on both sides of the abdomen open…]

[Familiar grayish light pours in. You are in yet another underground space. Above your head is still the same unchanging stone ceiling, but the scene before your eyes is completely different.]

[An arched, hemispherical building occupies the entire underground space. You see no one around. You know that this building is the so-called War Hatchery.]

[You leave the abdomen and walk toward the War Hatchery…]

[A chirp sounds behind you, and the Courier Mole Cricket burrows back into the ground and disappears.]

[You notice that the pit in the ground it excavated to enter and exit is slowly writhing as it heals.]

[It will not take long before, under a powerful vitality, these pits and the tunnels beneath will return to their original state.]

[You arrive before the vast arched building and slowly push open the main door…]

[What enters your sight is nothing but ashen gray. On both sides of the passage are huge containers filled with liquid, within which pale figures lie asleep.]

[The containers are not dead objects but some kind of unknown flesh tissue.]

[Through the transparent flesh membrane, you carefully observe the figures inside. Their appearance is the same as the Ascended Town Guards you saw before, except that their entire bodies are naked and they seem a bit smaller in build.]

[With no mask covering them, the compound eyes and mouthparts on their faces are clearly exposed before your eyes.]

[You continue forward along the passage. The containers on both sides are all filled with sleeping guards…]

[Suddenly, you notice that the figure in one container is somewhat different. It is not a half-insect, half-human creature like the guards, but a normal human without any insect organs.]

[Do you want to break the container and rescue the human inside?]

Lin Xun decisively presses ‘No’.

As a veteran Apostle, he can see at a glance that this is a trap set by the Cursed game.

[You continue along the passage and quickly arrive at a spacious hall.]

[Hanging from the dome at the center of the hall is a plump broodmother shaped like an ant queen. Its swollen abdomen is laying eggs into the pool of water beneath it…]

[You have discovered the Ascended Lesser War Broodmother!]

[The plump ant queen seems to have noticed your presence. Its huge compound eyes turn toward you, and it lets out a soundless howl…]

[From the passage on the other side of the hall, dense footsteps quickly approach…]

[Will you launch an attack or flee immediately?]

Lin Xun frowns slightly and immediately makes his decision.

[You possess the Shell of the Fire-Worshipping Heartless Ninja master!]

[You turn around lightly, open a pair of dim eyes, and your figure vanishes from the hall…]

[On the other side of the hall, numerous guards appear, crowding around a particularly tall gray-robed figure.]

[You have discovered the Ascended Hatchery Lord!]

[The lord briefly exchanges a few words with the ant queen, then speaks coldly, “A maggot-person? It must be some lowborn who escaped from an incubation pod.”]

[“A maggot-person is not worthy of living in the Wet Nurse’s realm. Find that damned maggot-person and exile it to the lowborn lands outside the borders!”]

[“If that lowborn dares resist, execute it on the spot!”]

[It waves a limb, and the many guards scatter into the various passages to search…]

[The lord then turns alone and leaves.]

[Do you want to quietly follow?]

[You walk with soundless steps, trailing far behind the lord…]

[Along the way, you see several hatching halls. The ant-queen-like War Broodmothers are laying eggs into the hatching pools beneath them.]

[The pipes in the hatching pools are connected to the nearby pod-shaped incubation sacs. Each guard is born from these…]

[At last, you follow the lord to the end of the hatchery and trail it into a separate room.]

[The room seems to be the lord’s place of residence, furnished with simple things like a table and a bed.]

[The lord bends over the table, picking up a fur quill and writing away. It appears to be dealing with paperwork.]

[You are very familiar with the paper used to make the documents. It is the same gray-white shed skin you have seen before…]

[Do you want to launch a sneak attack on the Ascended Hatchery Lord?]

It is unclear whether the lord in front of him counts as an elite monster or a small boss. Judging from the strength of the guards, this lord cannot be that strong.

Although Lin Xun looks down on opponents in strategic terms, he is still very cautious when it comes to concrete tactics.

[Maintaining your stealth state, you open one pale eye…]

[The special skill Weak Point Insight activates!]

[You successfully perceive the enemy’s weak point. Your next attack will have an extremely high chance of striking the target’s vulnerable spot!]

[The energy in your body called Qi surges rapidly, and your right hand grips the sword hilt tightly…]

[A brilliant sword light flashes past!]

[The lord’s body suddenly stiffens, and the act of writing comes to an abrupt halt.]

[A crack appears at the center of the pale mask’s brow, and a streak of blood seeps out.]

[The lord collapses forward onto the table. Its limbs twitch repeatedly and only after a long while does it stop struggling in weakness…]

[You have defeated the Ascended Hatchery Lord. Your experience value increases slightly.]

[You have obtained Fading Chunk Spirit Essence of Insight *1.]

[You look toward the corpse lying dead on the ground…]

[Shell of the Ascended Hatchery Lord: The lord in charge of the hatchery. Its main job is to allocate the soldiers produced by the War Broodmothers according to the needs of the front line. It died under a sharp sword light that destroyed the nerves in its brain. Compatibility: 83% (+55%).]

[Do you want to possess this Shell?]

“Compatibility is only three percent above the passing line, huh…”

In general, as long as a humanoid monster is not too huge in size, he can possess it even if it looks a bit abstract.

But the monsters in this chapter really defy description. They only look remotely humanoid after putting on a gray robe. Once they take off their clothes, even Picasso would scream that this is abstraction.

Lin Xun feels his soul talent still needs to be raised. Otherwise, when he encounters slightly larger bosses or monsters that have undergone more complete Ascension, he will not be able to possess them.

[You possess the Shell of the Ascended Hatchery Lord!]

[The fragmented memories remaining in the Shell gradually revive…]

[…]

[You are one of the many hatchery lords in the Divine Kingdom, managing the lowest-level hatchery at the distant border.]

[Although the hatchery’s level is not high, your duty is incomparably important. In fact, every hatchery lord’s duty is extremely important.]

[The war between the front line and the demons is fierce and deadlocked. Every day, large numbers of soldiers must be mobilized from all over the Divine Kingdom and sent to join the brutal war against the demons.]

[The hatchery you manage is an important location for producing lower-tier soldiers.]

[It is rumored that the war against the demons has reached a white-hot stage. Large Courier Mole Crickets that transport soldiers to the front line every day have already been worked to death in great numbers…]

[The demons are truly damnable!]

[Today, you receive a document sent from the Sacred Nest Center…]

[The document clearly states that recently, the rate of loss of control among Scytheblade Soldiers’ consciousness has been high, and incidents of soldiers turning on one another often occur in the front-line war.]

[The Sacred Nest Center orders you to adjust the hatchery’s breeding targets to Carapace Shield Guards. The next time soldiers are transported, at least 500 Carapace Shield Guards are required…]

[…]

[The fragmented memories end here.]

“A war against demons… In other words, on the front lines of the Divine Kingdom, Ascended monsters are fighting aberrant monsters.”

Lin Xun takes note of the words ‘loss of control of consciousness’ in the memories and cannot help recalling the crazed guards he encountered in Tentacle City.

When he obtained the special trait Hive Consciousness before, there was a description of black-and-white webs of consciousness devouring one another.

He suspects that this ‘loss of control of consciousness’ might be related to that.

He opens the panel to check the lord’s stats.

The lord’s panel stats are stronger than the guards’, but in Lin Xun’s view, it is just a trash Shell.

What draws his attention is a skill he has never seen before, Initial Ascension Tuning.

[Initial Ascension Tuning (Rare skill): An extremely profound propagation and allocation skill. With this skill, you can control War Broodmothers of the corresponding grade and mass-produce Ascended creatures.]

[Please note that there is a small probability of mutation occurring during the breeding process.]

Lin Xun’s eyes light up.

“Hiss… This place seems like a perfect spot for farming monsters!”

The Cursed game normally has an iron rule that once a monster has been killed three times, it will no longer respawn, but the War Hatchery seems able to break this rule.

His Shell quality and equipment grade are far higher than those of Apostles of the same difficulty, but his Shell level lags far behind.

This is not surprising. Ordinary Apostles remain at the same difficulty for a long time, clearing chapters several times, a dozen times, or even dozens of times. The experience value and levels they accumulate far exceed his.

However, the growth curve of high-quality Shells is absurdly strong. Even if they lag behind by a large margin in level, they can still surpass ordinary Apostles in actual combat power, not to mention that he also has a full set of divine gear and divine skills.

Crushing Apostles of the same difficulty is something that is entirely commonplace for Lin Xun.

Leaving aside the experience from farming monsters, there is also the Spirit Essence he can get from it.

If he did not use the Star Lord’s Crowned Diadem, judging from the drop rates in previous chapters, he would generally have to farm more than a dozen or even several dozen small monsters for Spirit Essence to drop once.

On the second wave of farming, only junk would drop, and on the third wave nothing at all would drop.

After using the Star Lord’s Crowned Diadem, the drop rate of Spirit Essence is roughly between one third and one half.

And on the second wave of farming, there is still a small chance for Spirit Essence to drop.

Previously, in Tentacle City, Lin Xun killed a single guard and it dropped 10,000 points of Spirit Essence.

If the War Hatchery produces 500 guards, even if only one third of them drop Spirit Essence, the Spirit Essence he can obtain will be a huge figure.

“I am rich!”

He searched the lord’s room, and when he saw that there is nothing much to be found, he began carrying out his monster-farming plan…

Once he operated the lord Shell, all the guards in the hatchery obeyed his every command.

He spent a long time and finally managed to fully explore every corner of the hatchery.

There are a total of five Lesser War Broodmothers in the entire hatchery. When he approaches a War Broodmother, he can use the Initial Ascension Tuning skill to control it.

This skill not only allows him to change the type of soldiers that the War Broodmother breeds, it also lets him adjust the breeding speed of the War Broodmother.

However, the breeding speed of the War Broodmothers is not the real limitation. The real limitation is the incubation sacs.

There are only one hundred incubation sacs in the hatchery, and it takes around one week for a guard to go from birth to full maturity.

In other words, he can only farm one wave of monsters every seven days.

It sounds like the efficiency is not very high, but do not forget that Tentacle City is only a border town in the Divine Kingdom. There must be other large towns in the Divine Kingdom.

If every town has a War Hatchery, anyone can imagine how astonishing the profits would be.

“Phew, I should clear out all the monsters here first!”

The hatchery itself has more than thirty guards on duty. These guards all wear carapace masks and should not be cannon fodder that is about to be sent to the front lines.

Using the lord’s identity, Lin Xun quickly disposed of all the guards in batches.

Just these guards alone bring him over 100,000 points of Spirit Essence in income.

He then attempted to tear open the flesh membranes and kill the not-yet-mature guards inside the incubation sacs.

Violently breaking the sacs’ membranes triggered a blaring alarm throughout the hatchery, but at this point there are only a few immobile War Broodmothers left in the entire hatchery, so naturally no one comes to stop him.

After Lin Xun killed several sleeping guards inside the sacs in a row, he only got a tiny bit of experience and no Spirit Essence.

It seems you still have to wait for the ‘leeks’ to grow before cutting them; you cannot harvest them early.

After using the lord Shell to control the War Broodmothers, he learnt that there is less than one day left before this batch of guards matures.

And that human called a maggot-person is the result of a failed mutation from Initial Ascension Tuning.

With a small probability, a successful mutation can produce guards of elite-monster grade, but unfortunately, no elites have appeared in this batch of guards.

Lin Xun decided that after finishing off this wave of guards the next day, he will try cultivating a different type of soldier.

In the options for low-level soldiers within the War Broodmothers, apart from the current guards’ Scytheblade Soldiers, there are several other types. Perhaps other monsters will drop higher amounts of Spirit Essence.

After finishing his exploration of the hatchery, it is already late at night.

He logged out of the game, deciding to come back online early the next morning.

By then, the guards in the hatchery should more or less have matured, and that distinctive maggot-person will also burst out of its sac.

He does not know whether, when faced with a fellow human maggot-person, a special event will occur.

“Why does it feel like I have turned a perfectly good level-up-and-grind game into a farm-management sim?”

“Looked at another way, it is rare for the Cursed game to let me harvest crops, so I have to seize this opportunity properly!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep