Chapter 583 - 388: Slaughter Beneath the Sun and Moon (Part 2)

His body slipped like a phantom into the ubiquitous rifts of the Dream Realm.

At the same time, the Cosmic Subconscious Fragments he had previously obtained formed a faintly glowing barrier around his Soul, perfectly shielding all fluctuations.

Barely a second after he vanished.

HUMMM!!!

A vast, cold Will swept in from the void, engulfing the entire region like an invisible tsunami.

The Will of the Void Nest descended once more, this time even more furious.

It had again sensed the complete disappearance of a Nest, along with the Annihilation of all the Insect Race units and the Mother Insect’s consciousness within.

Such a method was far beyond the capabilities of any native Esok creature.

An outsider had infiltrated the Esok World and was hunting its children!

The Will, like a raging sea, scanned the space, analyzed the Energy, and penetrated the bedrock, again and again.

But Ian was long gone from that spot, no longer in the current dimension.

From the Dream Dimension, he quietly watched the Nest’s Will rage impotently, as if observing a reflection in water.

After thirty seconds, the Will retreated unwillingly back into the void.

Ian stepped out from another Dream Realm Rift, appearing above the second Nest.

The same process played out once more...

A Gravity Tide swept up the swarm, a Coronal Storm vaporized them into Annihilation, a quick dive underground to collect the Crystal Core Insect, and a switch to Crescent Form to escape into the Dream Realm.

The Nest’s Will descended for a second time. The search window shortened to twenty-five seconds.

The third nest, the fourth, the fifth...

Ian moved across the lands of Esok at high speed, like a precision harvesting machine.

Every time he appeared, an Insect Nest was turned to ash.

Of course, a fair number of Summoners within his Domain were "accidentally" caught in the crossfire as well.

Within the 15,000-kilometer radius of his Domain, no Insect Race unit could hide; they were reaped in swathes like stalks of wheat.

The Nest’s Will reacted faster each time, the search window shortening from thirty seconds to twenty, then fifteen...

On the final run, just as Ian pocketed the Crystal Core Insect from the ninth Nest, in the very instant he switched to Crescent Form...

That cold Will descended a moment early!

Invisible Tentacles grazed the very edge of his Soul, demonstrating a precise prediction born of "learning."

Ian felt a slight chill. ’The Nest is learning my operational patterns. If I continue, I’ll probably be truly locked onto next time.’

But his eyes held no fear, only a deeper, more profound killing intent.

This wasn’t merely about his interests in this world being threatened; it was the inherent understanding that their two civilizations were mortal enemies.

’No wonder they’ve fought the Wizard Civilization several times without being annihilated. This rate of evolution and procreation is truly bone-chilling.’

’One more big job. I have to delay the arrival of the main Nest.’

By combining information from the memories of numerous Summoners with his own Dream Realm Perception, Ian had locked onto the gathering point of the Soul-Devouring Insects.

「The far north of the Esok World—the Frozen Plateau.」

It was shrouded in icy fog year-round, the Earth covered by a layer of permafrost harder than steel. Even the Insect Race was reluctant to venture there, with only a few scattered Shadow Wing Insects patrolling its periphery.

But within Ian’s Perception, a vast and eerie Soul fluctuation was hidden deep beneath the plateau.

It was the resonance created by a large gathering of Soul-Devouring Insects, and it was now exerting a mutual pull with the Cosmic Subconscious Fragments in his mind.

"So this is the place." Ian tore space and stepped onto the frozen plains.

A bone-chilling wind, thick with ice shards, rushed toward him, only to silently melt away three meters from his body. The Thermal Energy Rule circulated faintly, insulating him from the extreme cold.

He crouched down, placing his right hand on the surface of the ice.

His Gravity Perception seeped invisibly into the ground, penetrating thousands of meters of ice and rock crust to "see" the scene below.

A colossal, spiraling Nest, the likes of which he’d never seen, was embedded deep in the earth’s crust like an inverted gyroscope.

The structure was not the typical purplish-black flesh of an Insect Nest, but rather a kind of translucent, crystallized material, its surface flowing with interwoven patterns of dark silver and deep violet.

At the Nest’s core floated a massive golden crystal, a full meter in diameter!

Light and shadow flowed within the crystal as if it contained a miniature galaxy, and the Rule Fluctuation it emitted far surpassed all the fragments Ian had previously acquired.

Ian’s eyes widened. This was, by far, the largest Cosmic Subconscious Fragment he had ever seen.

Even more frightening, densely packed around the crystal, were at least two thousand Soul-Devouring Insects!

They were only the size of a hound, with translucent, dark-purple Shells and wings that vibrated without a sound.

They all floated in midair, their Tentacles aimed at the golden crystal, emitting a Soul Resonance invisible to the naked eye.

With each resonance, the crystal trembled slightly, emitting silver ripples that flowed into the bodies of the Soul-Devouring Insects.

They were using the fragment’s Power to undergo a collective evolution!

’If I’d arrived a few days later, you would have truly turned this world upside down.’ Ian’s eyes became utterly cold.

If these two thousand-plus Soul-Devouring Insects were allowed to complete their evolution, all the survivors on the Esok World, including the Summoner Council, would face utter annihilation.

At that point, even he would find it difficult to confront them head-on.

Attacks on the Soul level were simply not something conventional defenses could withstand.

’All the better. I’ll just wipe you all out in one go.’

His body sank downwards as the Gravity Rule opened a passage at his feet, the hard ice and rock layers parting silently.

A few moments later, he had infiltrated the periphery of the spiral Nest.

The Nest was filled with a viscous Soul-fog that strongly interfered with and corroded Spiritual Power.

But for Ian, who had switched to his Crescent Form, this was actually the perfect cover.

The Dream Rule was in its element here. He strolled among them, and the Soul-Devouring Insects remained completely oblivious.

Ian silently approached the core area, stopping when he was still a thousand meters from the golden crystal.