Ant Lord in the Star Realm-Chapter 557 - 536: Scorching

The Dominating Throne carried Black Peach straight up, rising until just below the white clouds.

"Black Peach, over there, in a straight line about 200 kilometers away—Molan Mountain. You get what I mean?"

"I understand! Great King!"

"Try to see if you can spot it."

"Okay! Great King!"

Black Peach shuffled to the edge of the throne, craned their head, straightened up, aligned with the direction, and focused all attention, eyes locked on the approximate location of Molan Mountain.

Vision ability activated, an ellipse-shaped, purple-black concave Primordial Energy Barrier unfolded, gathering light information.

Lasted around four seconds; the ability collapsed.

"Great King! I saw it!"

Black Peach cheered excitedly, reporting: "Senior Orchid, Junior Orchid, Thunder Ridge, Northern Chief, Purple Poppet, Purple King—not a single one missing, I saw all of them!"

"Very good!"

Dragon Cypress praised, "Black Peach, you did great!"

The Dominating Throne plummeted down, landing atop the mountain peak.

Black Peach immediately reported: "Second King! This ability can see all the way to Molan Mountain, even the Divine-Given Seed of Great King Molan; I can see the leaf veins on each leaf clearly."

That far!

The insect crowd was shocked and delighted.

Ink Orchid: "Good!"

This ability is good!

This is an invincible scouting ability!

Fragrant Cypress lamented, "You can only see far with this ability if you look down from high up, right? What a shame! In our Kingdom, apart from the Great King and Second King, no one else can fly."

Black Birch: "This ability is very useful! Most Insect Clan Warriors have wings. The difference is just in whether they’re good fliers. Whether they’re skilled or not, they can all get to high altitudes to use this scouting ability."

Silver Cypress exclaimed joyfully: "This is a scouting vision ability on par with the Soul-Setting Ability! A Divine-Grade Molan Seed is really valuable!"

Spiked Cypress hopped and shouted: "Second King is mighty!"

Black Cory raised a claw, asking: "Great King, how much can a Divine-Grade Molan Seed sell for? Three million Source Stones?"

Dragon Cypress: "Roughly. Too bad it’s a vision-type perception ability—compared to soul system abilities, it’s still a bit inferior."

Ink Orchid: "Three million for one? Then twelve would be..."

Spiked Cypress quickly answered: "Thirty-six million, Second King."

—That’s a lot too!

—We’re rich!

—No wonder it takes 51 years to mature!

—Turns out it’s just that the ability is too strong!

Another round of cheering and celebration.

"Quiet! Quiet!"

Dragon Cypress pondered, raised a claw and pointed at the sun above, saying, "Inherited memory says that the Natural True God sits high atop the sun, giving off light and heat, shining on the whole land, nurturing all things."

Dragon Cypress: "Black Peach, activate your ability and try looking at the sun."

Black Peach: "???"

Black Peach: "...Alright, Great King."

Black Peach: "Great King, Second King, is this not dangerous?"

Dragon Cypress: "There’s no danger. It’s separated by an infinite distance, you’re only gathering light information. The Natural God shouldn’t notice."

Makes sense!

Black Peach thought it over and gazed up at the sky.

Dragon Cypress quickly stepped backward.

Ink Orchid’s gaze flickered, body shimmering as he ran off in the opposite direction.

The other bugs all turned and scrambled to escape.

No danger? Tie Bush hesitated, then scrambled away as fast as possible.

Black Peach drew back their gaze, looking left and right, "Great King, Second King...what are you all...?"

Dragon Cypress: "Less yakking, just try it."

Ink Orchid: "Give it a shot, just look once."

Dragon Cypress: "Don’t be scared, Black Peach, there’s nothing to worry about."

Black Peach: "Then Great King, Second King, what are you two...?"

Dragon Cypress: "Just in case. The Great King has to be cautious—if something happened to me, the Kingdom would collapse. If something happens to you, you’ll be fine. Hurry up."

Black Peach: "..."

Black Peach, reluctantly, looked up again, focused, and fixed their gaze on the sun in the sky, activating the ability.

Purple-black Primordial Energy Barrier unfolded.

Purple-black Primordial Energy Barrier collapsed.

Ah~

Black Peach screeched, antennae flailing, rolling all over the ground.

"What happened?"

Dragon Cypress rushed forward.

"My eyes! Great King, my eyes~"

"What’s wrong with your eyes?"

"The sunlight is too strong, I gathered too much light at once, it’s too dazzling. Great King, I can’t see."

"Blinded?"

"...No... Just blurry."

"Then why the tragic shrieking?"

Dragon Cypress checked closely and guessed it was probably temporary vision loss from the intense light—no other problems. Antennae waved, five blasts of Lightspeed Healing fell upon Black Peach.

Black Peach crawled back up from the ground, "Great King, you’re amazing, it’s healed in an instant."

Dragon Cypress replied grumpily: "Look at you, such a coward!"

Ink Orchid came over and asked: "Black Peach, did you see the Natural True God?"

Black Peach: "The light was too strong, I couldn’t see anything at all."

Makes sense!

The Natural True God should be living inside the sun.

And this ability only sees the outer, blinding layer of the sun.

No way to see through.

"Forget it. Black Peach, don’t just use your new ability recklessly."

Dragon Cypress waved their antennae, saying: "Alright, that’s enough. Disperse. Go about your own business."

Ink Orchid: "Wait, one more thing!"

Ink Orchid: "What should we call this ability?"

Dragon Cypress: "..."

Ink Orchid: "I have it! Let’s call it ’Scorching.’"

Black Peach: "???"

Black Peach: "Second King, that doesn’t seem right?"

Ink Orchid: "Why not? We need to remind whoever buys the Divine-Grade Molan Seed not to use the ability to look at the sun, or it’ll burn their eyes."

"..."

The insects all stared speechless.

...

The ability granted by the Divine-Grade Molan Seed is a bit beyond expectations.

Great King Molan would bring tremendous profit to the Kingdom.

Dragon Cypress ordered preparations for a grand banquet to celebrate.

...

Night.

Beside the Shanxi Reservoir.

The bugs gathered in a circle around a super-sized metal pot, eating, drinking, and chatting merrily.

As they chatted, the topic circled back to the Divine-Given Seed of Great King Molan.

Black Cory asked: "Great King, Second King, after evolving to Lord-Level, the cycle for producing Divine-Grade Molan Seeds will shorten, right?"

Dragon Cypress: "Of course."

Ink Orchid: "Yeah! At Lord-Level, Senior Orchid Mantis’s blossom-fruit cycle would be how many years?"

Dragon Cypress: "First of all, we can confirm Senior Orchid’s fruit set per batch is a constant 12. The granted ability also won’t change, and the strength of the ability won’t increase much."

Dragon Cypress: "So, after evolving to Evolution Lord Level, the main improvement will be the fruit’s maturation time, which should reduce by about one-third."

Dragon Cypress: "The first time fruit expansion still takes the same fixed time—this is the critical initial transformation period for Origin Force Energy, namely three years. The second, third, fourth, and fifth expansions, the time should reduce from twelve years to eight years each."

Dragon Cypress: "So, during Lord-Level Stage, the production cycle for Divine-Grade Molan Seed should be thirty-five years."

Ink Orchid: "..."

Black Cory: "Still feels really long!"

Dragon Cypress: "Based on this, we can further deduce: after evolving to King-Level, the first fruit expansion is three years, second to fifth is four years each, for a total blossom-fruit cycle of nineteen years."

Ink Orchid: "That’d be the same cycle as Moon Peach? Once every nineteen years, that timeframe is at least barely acceptable."

Ink Orchid looked at Black Peach: "You’re smart, do the math for us—19 years, 12 fruits, worth thirty-six million, what’s Senior Orchid’s annual yield?"

Black Peach: "Second King, this one’s too tricky for me, I can’t calculate that off the top of my head. Great King will have to do the math."

Ink Orchid looked at Dragon Cypress.

Dragon Cypress: "Black Birch."

Black Birch: "Ignoring input costs, rounding, about 1,894,737 Source Stones per year."

This income...

—That’s higher than the Great King’s White Poplar Divine Seed!

—Senior Orchid is awesome!

—Second King is amazing!

—Second King is mighty!

—Is there a reward for Second King?

...

The group gathered around Ink Orchid with a round of flattery.

The quiet Black Persimmon suddenly raised a claw, pointed at the full moon in the night sky and said, "Great King, Second King, I have a question. If the Natural True God lives on the sun, then on the moon..."

On the moon?

In inherited memory, there’s no mention of anyone living on the moon.

"Yeah!"

Ink Orchid was struck by the thought: "Black Peach! The moon shouldn’t be dazzling, right? Hurry and check what’s up there on the moon."

Black Peach grew anxious and helpless, looking to Dragon Cypress for help.

Dragon Cypress: "The moon is just a small sphere. It emits invisible attraction; tides in seas and lakes are caused by the moon’s gravitational pull."

Black Peach: "Great King, does the moon have Origin Force? Are there Insect Clan Warriors up there?"

Dragon Cypress: "I don’t think so?"

Dragon Cypress was just as curious and urged: "Black Peach, just take a look!"

Black Peach hesitated, then gazed up at the night sky, focused, and activated the ’Scorching’ ability.

An ellipse-shaped, purple-black concave Primordial Energy Barrier unfolded, collecting moonlight...

All of a sudden, a terrifying beam of Primordial Energy fell from the sky, crashing straight onto Black Peach’s head.

Ah~

Black Peach screamed, flipping and rolling all over.

The wailing abruptly stopped; Black Peach lay motionless on the ground.

After two seconds of blankness, Black Peach wailed again, "Great King! My eyes! My eyes..."

Dragon Cypress, who’d bolted away, halted and looked back; Black Peach’s antennae were flailing wildly, shrieking nonstop.

Black Persimmon hadn’t run, instead, they checked carefully, then gingerly touched Black Peach’s eyes with an antenna.

Dragon Cypress asked, "Black Peach? What’s up with your eyes?"

Black Peach shrieked, "Great King! I can’t see!"

Black Persimmon: "Great King! It’s High-Level Primordial Energy! Shaped like a blade of grass, covering Black Peach’s eyes!"

"???"

Dragon Cypress’s spiritual power swept out—Black Peach’s eyes were covered with a layer of emerald green...

A blade of grass?!"

This particular blade looked oddly familiar.

Dragon Cypress jumped up: A Luoli Grass leaf!

That terrifying primordial energy just now, which flashed from above and struck Black Peach’s head, transformed into a Luoli Grass Leaf-shaped Primordial Energy Imprint, covering both their eyes.

—Who did that?

—Natural God?