Swallowed Star: The Zerg Overlord

Chapter 92: It Shouldn't Be Like This

"There are so many inherited memories that it took the entire swarm, with hundreds of Nests working at full capacity, ten whole days to absorb them all."

In the Bug Queen's Nest, Qin Mu's eyes were filled with surprise. Originally, he thought he would only gain the inheritance of a peak Sector Lord Zerg, or perhaps just a portion of the Zerg genes preserved in the Bug Queen's Nest. However, the Bug Queen's Nest contained a complete Zerg inheritance.

"I need to organize these inherited memories first. There are so many of them."

Although these inherited memories were now preserved in the swarm, they were just knowledge, a means of passing on knowledge. These memories were stored in the Nest, but to master them, one still needed to learn and understand them.

A cursory glance revealed that these inherited memories mainly consisted of secret techniques of the Bug race themselves, divided into special techniques and ordinary techniques. There were 68 special techniques and 12,231 ordinary techniques.

"These techniques are incredibly powerful! They can even launch soul attacks. This combined attack technique can focus the attacks of millions of Zerg on a single point, easily defeating stronger enemies. The Zerg Queens already have a strong advantage in soul power, and with these techniques, it's no wonder they can easily defeat equally strong opponents."

Just casually browsing through some of the technique descriptions, Qin Mu was astonished by their power. They were incredibly strong.

Compared to his previous rudimentary use of the swarm's power to attack enemies, any of these techniques was thousands of times more sophisticated than what he had developed. However, there were too many techniques to learn them all. He would need to select one or two that best suited him.

Besides the techniques, the biggest difference between the Bug race and other races was their ability to hatch a large number of units.

The inheritance included billions of genes and 108 Zerg gene modulation methods. These billions of genes could be further diversified through different modulation methods, creating the most suitable units for his needs.

The Zerg had too many classifications. Based on species, they could be divided into different orders such as Coleoptera (Beetles), Hymenoptera (ants, wasps and bees), Diptera (flies), and so on.

Based on abilities, they could be divided into categories such as detection, siege, assassination, long-range attack, and more.

Because there were so many units, each Bug Queen, in her early or adult stage, would select a few main types to focus on breeding and modulating. Some ordinary and weak units could be easily hatched by all Queens without the need for special research. Changing the type of units being bred required a significant cost.

"Is there really such a restriction?"

Qin Mu was puzzled. Shouldn't the Bug race be able to hatch any type of bugs as long as they had the genetic blueprint and sufficient resources?

With the Zerg's powerful evolution and mutation capabilities, a single battle could produce various types of units, potentially even stronger ones. The ability to modulate should allow for the adjustment of genes to develop new units. Changing the type of units being bred should be normal, right?

Since obtaining his Zerg clone about a year ago, Qin Mu had already developed several types of units. In battles, over a hundred types had evolved and mutated, with more than a dozen being quite powerful. For example, the first type of unit Qin Mu hatched, the Tiger Mastiff, had many variants such as the Single-Horned Tiger Mastiff and the Two-Headed Tiger Mastiff.

The Blade Mantis, which had been hatched in the billions, had evolved into over a hundred variants after numerous battles. Some of the more powerful ones included the Six-Armed Blade Mantis and the Flame Blade Mantis. Qin Mu had also developed a method to integrate metal into the Blade Mantis.

With such powerful evolution and mutation capabilities, why would changing the type of Zerg being bred require a cost?

Even if hatching some powerful Zerg required understanding different laws, it shouldn't be like this.

"Hmm?" Pushing aside his confusion, Qin Mu continued to organize the inherited memories.

"What's this? A Queen has only one Nest?"

Before long, Qin Mu found another oddity. Recalling the Bug Queens in "Swallowed Star," Qin Mu realized that they indeed had only one Nest each. Even the Undying-level Bug Queens had only one Nest, though the size varied. For example, a Sector Lord Bug Queen's Nest was only an 800-meter diameter sphere, and an Undying-level Bug Queen's Nest was only about ten kilometers in size.

"No wonder changing the type of Zerg being bred in this Bug Queen's Nest requires a significant cost. It turns out they only have one Bug Queen's Nest, and they don't hatch Zerg units through eggs. Instead, they use the incubation chambers of the Bug Queen's Nest. Ordinary Zerg units like the Green Mantis can be hatched freely, but for higher-level units like the Tiger Beetle, only specific incubation chambers can be used. To change to higher-level units, the incubation chambers need to be adjusted or rebuilt."

This method of hatching made Qin Mu frown. The limitations were too great. Once units were set, wouldn't they be easily targeted? If they encountered a special environment, like deep-sea combat, the Flame Mantis hatched by the Bug Queen's Nest would not be able to fight effectively.

The swarm Qin Mu led was different. Although he also selected a few main combat units, he could always hatch different Zerg units based on the changing battle conditions to defeat opponents. For example, in desert battles against monsters, if the Blade Mantis was not suitable for the environment, they would switch to units like the Desert Scorpion.

"In this universe, the Zerg's evolution and mutation capabilities, their ability to absorb the genes of other races, and even their hatching capabilities seem to be restricted."

Through the inherited memories, Qin Mu discovered that once a Bug Queen selected her main units, she would primarily rely on the genetic structures in the inherited memories and her own research to enhance the units' strength. In the later stages, understanding laws was necessary to further enhance the units.

Despite his many questions, Qin Mu continued to organize the inherited memories. Organizing the classifications of these units alone would take a significant amount of time.

After a rough organization, Qin Mu noticed some strange aspects again. Recalling the units that appeared in the original timeline of the Swallowed Star, Qin Mu finally pinpointed what felt off.

In this universe, the units were generally small in size. Very few exceeded 100 meters in size; most were around 30 meters or smaller. Even Undying-level units were only about 100 meters in size.

When facing gigantic opponents, like the Sector Lord Golden Horned Beast, which was kilometers in size, they could only rely on numbers to kill the enemy. They lacked the ability to confront such opponents head-on, relying solely on a combined attack technique.

The reason for this was simple and related to the way the Bug Queen's Nest incubated units. Since the Bug Queen's incubation chambers were within the Bug Queen's Nest, and the Nest itself was not very large, how big could the units be?

Qin Mu couldn't help but recall what the Bug Queen had said after Luo Feng enslaved her. The Bug Queen, upon seeing the Golden Horned Beast, mentioned that the larger the size, the more resources it would consume. Even creating a Sector Lord unit legion would not produce units as large as the Golden Horned Beast.

This statement was strange. Just because it consumed more resources, they gave up on large-sized units and focused solely on small ones? If it were just one Bug Queen, it might make sense, but for all Bug Queens to do this was peculiar.

In warfare, there are many situations where large-size is needed. When Qin Mu commanded his swarm in the war at City 003 against the monsters, he mobilized a large number of massive Mammoth Beasts, which broke through the enemy's defenses. If it were only small Zerg, they would be at a significant disadvantage against gigantic monsters.

Resources? When one becomes powerful, how could they lack resources? The universe is abundant with resources.

In the universe, the Bug race place their units inside their inner worlds, relying on the Bug Queen's Nest or other treasures to do so. After building a massive army, the Queen places them in her inner world, continuously increasing their numbers, and summons them during battles. However, unlike the Golden Horned Beast, which has an inner world at the planetary level, the Queen can only do this when it reaches higher cultivation realms.

Someone as powerful as Luo Feng had an inner world of 100 trillion square kilometers. How many Zerg could fit in such a small space?

A hundred billion? A trillion? Ten trillion?

Is that a lot?

These are Zerg we're talking about. In just over a year, Qin Mu's Zerg on Earth alone, including oceanic species, exceeded 100 billion.

In Qin Mu's initial plan, he intended to cover all planets within a 1,000 light-year radius of Earth, covered by Hu Yan Bo's secret technique, with Zerg. By then, the scale of Qin Mu's swarm would be immense. These Zerg would not all be elite units, but they would collect massive resources to hatch more powerful Zerg.

Why was Qin Mu eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Golden Horned Beast? He was planning to capture it upon its arrival, obtain its genes, and use it as the core to build an invincible Zerg swarm. Not just the Golden Horned Beast, Qin Mu also looked forward to entering the vast universe and the extraterrestrial battlefield to capture more beasts and special life forms to create a truly invincible swarm.

Inner world is just a place to keep some powerful elite units, a last resort, a desperate measure in battle. How could the entire swarm be contained in the inner world of a single Bug Queen?

Moreover, the reason this Queen fell into a deep sleep due to Hu Yan Bo's secret technique was that her units were exhausted during the extraterrestrial battlefield war, facing life-threatening situations. Before she could summon the remaining units from her inner world, she was hit by the secret technique and fell into a deep soul sleep.

This is so wrong. The Bug race in this universe have almost all their talents focused on the soul. Their various soul secret techniques are incredibly powerful, and their combined attack techniques are terrifying.

The Bug Queen's own talents are also heaven-defying, possessing 10,000 soul origins, each a natural soul master. But the units themselves are too weak. The Queens are indeed powerful, as they should be, but the units shouldn't be like this.

Units can be much stronger. They should spread across the stars, as large as the Golden Horned Beast, easily hatched, able to evolve and mutate, and freely modulated to absorb the advantages of other races.

The Zerg shouldn't be like this, with so many restrictions.

At the very least, this is not the Zerg that Qin Mu envisions.

***

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