Expansion

Rowan knew exactly what these guys were looking for, but now wasn't the right time to make his grand entrance.

Two days later, several insects, each more than ten centimeters long, crawled up from deep underground. Their sturdy shells and powerful Pincer Limb revealed them to be insects of the fighting genus.

When the Scout Bug went out to work last time, they discovered some native creatures hidden under the mud and sand. The shape of these bugs was modeled after one of these creatures. However, these high-imitation bugs were only superficially similar; their internal structure was completely different. Once dissected, they would definitely be exposed.

Rowan, of course, would not allow such a flaw to exist.

These high-quality insect replicas were created specifically to extract genes from native organisms.

Rowan didn't add any poisoning methods to the high-imitation insects because the ecosystems of each planet are different, and many toxins, except for those that are highly corrosive, are not universally applicable. Furthermore, highly corrosive toxins would damage the genetic sequence of a species, which did not meet Rowan's requirements. Therefore, in such cases, physical attacks were the most suitable method of attack.

Soon, an insect discovered one of its "kin" under the mud and sand. Although they looked similar, the native creature was even larger, but actual combat strength cannot be judged solely by stats.

The insect didn't rush into a one-on-one fight; instead, it lay in ambush. Soon, two more insects arrived to provide support. They surrounded the creature from three sides, and the native creature also noticed its hostile "fellows," raising its Pincer Limb in a threatening gesture.

In its understanding, everyone usually just showed off their size and stopped short of causing a ruckus. However, it never expected that these three "kindred spirits" would be so utterly devoid of martial ethics. Two insects seized the opportunity when its Pincer Limb were raised high, and with a lunge, each took control of one Pincer Limb. The native creature was suddenly caught in an awkward situation, torn between two men. Meanwhile, the third insect took advantage of the situation, raised its Pincer Limb, and pierced through its forehead carapace, cleanly and decisively ending its life.

Afterwards, two insects dragged their spoils back to the underground base, while the remaining one continued its search.

In just half a day, Rowan obtained genetic samples of several native organisms, but since he was in the deep sea, they were all marine reptiles. However, the original high-quality imitations could be completely recovered, while another group of "real" organisms were released.

With a genuine "local identity," reconnaissance and hunting operations that were previously too risky to even attempt became much bolder.

A large number of armored creatures quietly spread outwards, then gathered at a location far from the wormhole. By setting a trap, they jointly hunted down and killed a fish-like creature...

With the genes of this fish-like creature as a foundation, the efficiency of the Swarm's reconnaissance and hunting teams increased several levels, and their range of activity also expanded significantly.

Complementing this, Rowan's gene harvesting speed has reached a new level, with a wide variety of marine organisms constantly enriching the Swarm's gene pool, giving Rowan more choices.

A sample of a small, ferocious fish came into Rowan's view. It was a creature similar to the Strange-Headed Fish on Origin Star. It was small in size but possessed extremely powerful biting abilities. It was also very fast and traveled in groups, making it very suitable for the current situation of the Swarm.

With the help of these fish samples, the Swarm's range expanded further. Moreover, their templates, which were originally food for large marine organisms, were completely reversed under the Swarm's command. Thus, the Swarm began harvesting genes from large marine creatures.

Meanwhile, under the cover of the fish, the Swarm began to build branch bases, and some Insect Empress Egg were carried away by the fish to distant places, causing the Swarm's strength in the ocean to grow wildly.

During his expansion, Rowan discovered many ships belonging to indigenous intelligent beings, and even found a floating platform near the sea area where the wormhole was located. Judging from the constantly taking off and landing aircraft on it, this platform was for military use, probably for close monitoring of the wormhole.

However, judging from the design of the aircraft, they still follow a retro style. But after observing them for a few days, Rowan found that in terms of performance indicators such as takeoff, landing, load, and speed, they were indeed old relics.

A bold idea popped into Rowan's mind: perhaps the indigenous intelligent races on this planet weren't as technologically advanced as he had imagined. But further verification was needed to confirm this.

But there was one thing Rowan couldn't understand. As the Swarm's forces gradually increased, he had found almost all the natives' monitoring devices in the surrounding waters. They were all old and somewhat inefficient, yet they were more than capable of detecting the Flesh Sac emerging from the wormhole. Considering the proximity of the surface base to the wormhole, their initial reaction was far too slow. Rowan wondered if they had done it intentionally. Was everything he was seeing now a deliberate illusion created by the enemy?

Rowan's penchant for outsmarting the air resurfaced. He racked his brains but couldn't figure out the key issue. If the natives' technology was inferior, then what about this wormhole? Could such a small, controllable wormhole that could be opened on a planet be a natural phenomenon? This was beyond Rowan's comprehension.

If the natives were technologically advanced, why would they put on a show for him? Such meticulous planning couldn't have been accomplished in a day or two. Rowan hadn't even known beforehand that the Flesh Sac would land here; could the other side possibly foresee the future? Rowan thought it impossible; this was even less plausible than a small, controllable wormhole arising naturally. Besides, there was no need. What merit did the Swarm possess to warrant such a grand scheme from an advanced civilization?

Unable to figure it out, Rowan could only put these thoughts aside for the time being. He decided to proceed step by step at his own pace; at worst, he would just have to keep running. With his long-range Warp Skill, Rowan didn't care about the gains or losses of individual cities or territories. In critical moments, he could even abandon territory in the Origin Star System.

Before giving up, Rowan could have used the resources within his territory to make hundreds of remote random teleportations. He refused to believe that he could coincidentally encounter intelligent life every time.

Rowan didn't want to touch the indigenous military facilities for the time being, but on the sea, in addition to military platforms and those military ships, there were also many civilian deep-sea fishing vessels that could be identified at a glance.

Rowan decided to take action against them.

After careful preparation and planning, a 20,000-ton civilian ship was selected as the target. The intrusion process was several times easier than expected. Some insects made from templates of native marine organisms that are good at climbing and crawling crawled along the hull and into the cabin. While the native intelligent creatures were resting, their genetic samples were collected.

Meanwhile, they also thoroughly explored the ship, gathering a wealth of intelligence for the Swarm.