Chapter 603, Lord of the Swarm

Gu Hang heard a story from Moreau's narration.

In this story, the Iron Armor Chapter was not much different from many other loyalist Chapters in the Empire.

They are loyal, brave and wise. In the Queen's Star Territory, they united with the two battle groups of Raging Flame and Rock Shield to firmly lock the place known as the 'Insect Disaster Star Area'.

It was a star region originally named 'Ankaya', but it had been destroyed long ago. An insect plague broke out here. From the uninhabited void, the Zerg fleet appeared and destroyed this star area in a short period of time. The Iron Armor Chapter, whose home star was within the Queen's Star Territory, responded to the request for help and defeated this not-so-powerful Zerg fleet.

But the crisis has just begun, and what they fought back was only the outpost fleet.

In the 14 worlds in this insect-stricken star area, bugs appear continuously. It seems that there is an entire fleet of huge Zerg tentacles on the road, wave after wave of space navigation that does not pass through the astral tunnel, and wave after wave of space navigation, rushing towards the 'Insect Disaster Star Area'.

The Iron Armored Regiment is here to stay, working diligently.

They built a defense line in the 'Insect-Stricken Star Area'. When the enemies were not many and not strong, they were able to control the situation in this star area. But there are also times when the situation is bad, the defense in the star area collapses, and the enemy ravages the entire star area, and even expands to the universe.

First the Eternal Territory Government, and then the Imperial Central Government, gradually paid attention to the persistent ills in this region. All parties have begun to continue to increase investment in the defense of the insect-stricken star area. Naturally, the first priority to be supported is the Iron Armor regiment that has always been fighting on the front line.

In fact, the empire knew from the beginning that the number of people in the Iron Armor Chapter exceeded the limit. But they turned a blind eye to this because it was necessary.

First of all, people are always dying and sacrificing in iron armor, so the troops must be replenished at any time. Even the support provided by the empire includes the population support of all parties, allowing them to better screen new recruits and allowing them to recruit troops from every world in the Queen's Star Territory. There is no way to strictly control the number of people at 1,000. Otherwise, in a big war, hundreds of people will be lost, and it will not be possible to make up for it temporarily.

Secondly, if the number is strictly limited to a thousand people, the situation in the Queen's Star Territory cannot be controlled at all. Either the empire will invest more resources, more battle groups, and more fleets, or it will allow the Iron Armor troops to exceed the standard. You have to choose one. And the result is obvious, the empire chose the latter. Instead of pursuing Tie Kai's supernatural behavior, I will give him more support. I just need to stop the Zerg.

The reality was just as the empire expected. The Iron Armor Chapter itself, together with at most a few surrounding allied war groups and the power of the Queen's Star Territory, were able to withstand the insect plague.

For disasters of the same magnitude, the empire often has to pay a price that far exceeds this figure before it can be quelled. Not to mention, the insect-stricken star area is a continuous disaster. Unless a dark expedition is carried out towards the place where the insect fleet came from, targeting the dark outer realm that is not connected by the astral tunnel, to eradicate the problem, otherwise the insect swarm here will look like It is a place that is constantly refreshed, some big and some small.

It's great to be able to get it done at the current price.

It was also during this period that the Alfonzo Sect, paid by the empire, provided resources for the Iron Armor, and then established a very good trade relationship with the Iron Armor Chapter. Their lair, Alfonzo, is right next to the Queen's Star Domain, and they have to rely on the iron armor to block the bugs. In addition, the large number of corpses of void insect beasts and even living samples provided by Iron Armor are also things that the Alfonzo Sect wants very much.

These strange, powerful and instructive creatures were of great help to the Alfonzo cult in carrying out some special research. Even the corpses of some low-level Zerg species have strong biological material value when recycled.

Some of the armored units produced from the Alfonzo sect are reshaped and built using the Zerg's chitin shell, which is comparable to steel.

They have been cooperating for a long time in this way, and their relationship is getting better and better.

In this case, the empire is actually not very worried that the situation will get out of control. Although Iron Armor received tacit approval and even had additional support, a star field as its backing, and a powerful Mechanical Cult with three forging worlds as allies, the threat they faced from the Hive was always present. It exists, and it is very serious. Their strength is always being depleted, which should be about the same as the reinforcements they receive.

Compared with their growing strength, the empire was more worried for a long time about whether the iron armor would receive insufficient support to resist pests.

Tie Kai himself was also worried.

Of course, it is also possible that Humphrey Paul already had some ambitions at that time.

Things changed one hundred and eighty years ago, when they captured a... strange larvae.

Later, the Alfonzo Sect studied this and believed that it was a queen of the Void Zerg, or the larvae of a mother worm.

The birth of the Void Zerg mainly relied on the Insect Queen. She designed and produced all the Void Insect beasts in the entire Zerg Hive Fleet, including the living ships of the Zerg.

The Queen is also the core of the Hive Fleet. Once it is eliminated, it means that the Hive Fleet has lost the ability to reproduce. Whether it is on the living ship or the incubation pool dropped on the surface of the planet, it will no longer reproduce. effect.

At the same time, she is also the highest node creature of the entire hive fleet. Her death also means that the entire hive fleet has lost unified coordination and command at the macro level. The lower-level node creatures, such as the hive overlord, hive tyrant, and neuroprotozoan, can still command their troops, but they have directly lost their coordination ability. No longer able to support each other quickly, the swarm will be very easy to be divided and destroyed.

Of course, the swarm also has a reaction mechanism.

Before the queen, it will hatch multiple larvae. This is the only known Zerg creature that has a larval stage.

These larvae are inactive when the queen exists. Once the queen dies, they will be activated, and then fight and devour each other, and eventually grow into a new queen.

The lower-level swarm creatures will quickly reconnect with the new queen. At this stage, it means that the new queen takes over the entire swarm of the mother.

Iron Armor raided the core of an invading, small-scale hive fleet under the personal leadership of Humphrey Paul. They were very brave, even desperate, and boarded into the largest Zerg ship.

They were called ships, but in fact they were giant specialized creatures as big as starships, and they were alive. Boarding was like sending oneself into the belly of a giant beast.

They not only had to face the huge number of enemies that had hatched, but also the changes in the biological ship's internal structure. These changes were all aimed at killing them, such as suddenly spraying strong corrosive liquids, such as shooting bone nails...

No one knew how Humphrey Paul did it, but he completed this almost impossible task, beheaded and eliminated the queen of the Zerg swarm, and returned successfully.

Taking this opportunity, the Zerg hive fleet was completely annihilated, and humans once again won a glorious victory.

However, only a few people knew that Humphrey Paul brought back the larvae when he returned.

They killed all the other larvae and took this larva away before it grew up and took over the Zerg hive fleet.

After the swarm was destroyed, the larva had no one to command, and its development was severely slowed down due to malnutrition. There was no more biomass to provide her with insect beasts... She was imprisoned and sent to the Alfonzo sect.

They called her the "Princess".

The Alfonzo sect was overjoyed, but this was not a gift from Paul, but a top-secret mission: to study the queen in order to control the swarm.

...

So far, this is all Sebastian Moreau knows.

He is a senior member of the Alfonzo sect and one of the three casting generals, but even he only knows about this incident that happened 180 years ago.

In fact, except for the pictures he shared with Gu Hang, which he saw with his own eyes, many other things were investigated and even guessed by himself, and may not be completely reliable.

But that's probably it.

As for what happened later, he had no definite information and evidence at all.

The great sage Martin Varuk took over the research work personally, and only the sage Dubo was his assistant and participated in the project.

At the same time, the Great Sage also kept it as the sect's top secret. Among the people who accompanied him to receive the larvae, except for three forging generals and one main business sage, the rest had their self-consciousness and memory parts of the brain removed and were made into mechanical servants to ensure that the information would not be leaked.

In other words, in the entire Alfonzo sect, no one knew except the five of them - oh, now it should be four, Sage Dubo died when the sect attacked the Proud Claw Star Region before.

However, not knowing the exact situation does not prevent Moro from guessing.

Otherwise, the larvae breeding failed, but this possibility now seems extremely low.

Where did the imprisoned neuroprotozoa on Alfonzo II's war ark come from? Where did the technology to enslave and control it come from?

I'm afraid it's all the research results of the Queen.

But did they just use the Queen for the development and application of these technologies?

Moro didn't believe it.

He believed that the Great Sage did not reject Humphrey Paul's request and task. The relevant technologies of the Void Zerg, including the neuroprotozoa, may be just by-products of research. The ultimate goal of this project is to produce and control the swarm of insects.

Not one or two insects, but a whole swarm of insects.

It is natural for Humphrey Paul to want this!

This will directly solve the problems his warband is facing now.

If you can control the queen of insects, it means that you can raise a swarm of insects to fight against the invading Zerg; when facing the invading Zerg, if you have a queen of insects, you can even compete for the control of the opponent's lower creatures.

Going further, how can solving the current problems of the warband be the limit?

Mastering the queen of insects and a swarm of insects that can be expanded at will, there are too many things you can do in the future.

Combined with the current situation, Varuk's research is likely to have been successful.

Based on this premise, the questions that Gu Hang had thought about before can be explained.

There are swarms blocking the north line, the "mortal" troops that are different from ordinary people on the west line, and the enslaved neuroprotozoa encountered on the south line...

And why Humphrey Paul wants to attack the Magre universe in an all-round way.

According to normal logic, he really couldn't quickly transform the production capacity and population of the Magre Universe into his own war potential. But if he could control a swarm of Zerg, it would be completely different: if he let the swarm of Zerg go and let them eat a few waves of big ones, how powerful would the swarm of Zerg be?

Gu Hang didn't even dare to think about it!

Why didn't Tiekai come up with this trick before? The possible reason is that this matter is still too ridiculous. Letting the swarm of Zerg eat the world will shake Tiekai's basic base, or they may still have some bottom line.

But as the war situation worsens, if Tiekai does nothing and relies on their own original strength, it will obviously not work.

Defeating and crushing the Phoenix on the Western Front is obviously an act of breaking the bottom line. The power of the Zerg has definitely intervened.

But the degree of intervention may not be strong, and it may even be only invested in key battles. Many survivors of the Empire in the battle can only say some ambiguous information after the war, and they themselves have not witnessed it with their own eyes.

However, the bottom line will not be broken only once.

After defeating Phoenix, they will face the fiercer wrath of the high lords, the alliance of the Ortopis and other warbands, and the attacks of the Imperial Solar Star Army and the Solar Fleet, which will bring greater pressure.

On the contrary, Iron Armor suffered a lot of losses after the victory.

With one side gaining and the other losing, why did they fight Magre? Fighting for fun?

Gu Hang could already imagine the scene of countless digestion pools and hatching pools being set up on the worlds of Magre, the world of the Empire falling into a dead silence, and the Zerg being born from it.

...

With a long sigh of relief, Gu Hang sent Sebastian Moreau away.

He sorted out these materials by himself. Which ones are confirmed intelligence and which ones are speculations should be clearly written.

He will distribute these as detailed reports to the Imperial Center and the northern front.

You can do whatever you want.

The sky falls, and the tall people will support it.

So you tall people, you have to be mentally prepared.

Although Gu Hang had warned them before, it was only a guess and a possibility. But now, it is basically confirmed, and we can also roughly estimate the means they may use and guess their strategic goals in the Magre Universe.

The persuasiveness is much stronger.

Another thing to do is the war of public opinion.

Humphrey Paul and Martin Varuk are not afraid. Does every Iron Armor warrior know it?

Do the other war groups that follow Paul know it?

Does every world controlled by Iron Armor know it?

Bugs are eating people.

Now, how will the big boss you follow feed his bug swarm when the war is difficult to fight?

The intelligence organization of the alliance will start to exert its strength.

At the same time, Gu Hang must also consider whether he should continue to stick to his plan of waiting for a year and a half.

The information brought by Moro is of extraordinary value.

————

This chapter makes up for yesterday.

There will be more in the evening.