Position

As the first Zerg in the Zerg region to join the Star Sea Alliance, the Riken Race enjoyed a period of great prosperity. Their main products were Life-Extending Serum of various grades.

Although they lost their main production area due to issues with the yield of Life-Extending Plant, their trading city, thanks to the advantage of having the Epoch Clan Laboratory located within its borders, remains the largest market for Life-Extending Serum in terms of trading volume.

Although Life-Extending Serum are precious, their production materials are relatively easy to obtain, and the Alliance has mastered the complete production technology. With large-scale cultivation, the selling price of Life-Extending Serum has maintained a steady downward trend.

It can be said that for those civilizations above the Mid-Ring Civilizations, each individual has a chance to obtain a bottle of Life-Extending Serum with just a little effort. And as the scale of Life-Extending Plant cultivation continues to expand, sooner or later everyone in the Outer-Ring Civilizations will also have a bottle.

Therefore, Life-Extending Serum can be considered a very affordable product, and are loved by the general public.

As the Zerg, the good neighbors of the Riken Race, after joining the Star Sea Alliance, the two sides enjoyed a honeymoon period under Humins' leadership. The Zerg also opened a trading city, and although the goods were not plentiful, everything was in high demand.

The personal Biological Armor, in particular, is extremely rare and highly sought after. Once brought back to the heart of the Alliance, it always fetches a high price at auction, making it highly prized by high-end individuals and even setting a trend.

Both of these products were used by the Zerg to infiltrate the Star Sea Alliance. To date, no one has discovered their secrets. If it weren't for the outbreak of war, perhaps tens of thousands of years later, Rowan could have taken over the entire Star Sea Alliance without firing a shot.

Unfortunately, the outbreak of war caused the Life-Extending Plant production area located in the Riken Race to change hands. Even the production area that was later expanded by the Koya Alliance and the Locke Mutual Aid Society fell into the hands of the Zerg.

The shortage of materials for the Life-Extending Serum slowed down the Zerg's infiltration. This greatly troubled Humins, who was in charge of the matter, and Rowan as well.

If he could, Rowan would gladly pack up those Life-Extending Plant and the surrounding land and mail them to the Star Sea Alliance, and even want to help them expand their production capacity.

But this is something you can only dream about; if you actually did it, it would definitely backfire.

However, in the nearly one hundred years before the start of the Zerg war, both races had already sold a large amount of goods. As a result, the Zerg gained many "own people," but the number of these "own people" only accounted for a small fraction of the total qualified population.

There are two reasons for this. First, Rowan does not want to rashly increase the number of Intellect. After all, once they are converted into Intellect, they will no longer have a lifespan limit and can live indefinitely as long as there are no accidents or Rowan's interference.

Therefore, Rowan's vetting process for Intellect is extremely rigorous. First, only outstanding researchers have the opportunity to be converted. Second, some high-ranking generals from the Alliance are also considered, as they can, to a certain extent, allow the Zerg to know their Zerg and themselves, giving them an advantage in the war.

However, although Life-Extending Serum are not expensive to produce, they are still relatively scarce resources due to production limitations. Compared to researchers, people with a certain degree of power often have easier access to them.

Rowan didn't want to convert too many of these individuals because their intelligence often overlapped significantly. If they were converted and lost their current identities later, they would lose most of their value. Without command and research capabilities, they would only be able to pollute the Intellect team.

Although Rowan could annihilate their consciousness after using them, turning them into pure spiritual entities to be absorbed, Rowan didn't want to do that psychologically.

Rowan could also absorb only the spiritual bodies of these people from the very beginning, without converting them into Intellect. While this would have less of a psychological burden, it would lead to widespread deaths within the Alliance.

This would cause panic and hinder the promotion of the Life-Extending Serum. Rowan would not do something so foolish as to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

The second reason is the constraint of the Swarm Network, or rather, the constraint of Rowan's strength.

The connection between the Rowan body and the universe is a connection beyond dimensions; it transcends space and cannot be defined by the original distance.

Therefore, if Rowan wants to find a certain region and locate a certain unit in this universe, he must have the cooperation and support of the universe itself.

Currently, the Swarm is essentially divided into two types of marker units. One type is a very special Anchor Unit, which evolved from Rowan's original self in this universe. Thanks to this special connection, regardless of size or volume, it acts like a flare in the night sky in this universe, allowing Rowan to easily find them from outside the universe.

After Rowan mastered the Warp Skill, the Anchor Unit took on the responsibility of expanding the Swarm's territory, allowing the Swarm's branch bases to flourish throughout the universe.

Another type of marker is the Node Unit. Whether it's Worker Bee, Insect Empress, Creep, or Space Octopus, whether it's a small, Ancient Class original species, or a large, Desolate Class, or Megastructure, they are all Node Unit.

Perhaps because the Node Unit are products of secondary production, their positioning capabilities are not as strong as those of the Anchor Unit. Relying solely on individual strength, Rowan would be unable to locate them if they left the coverage area of Swarm Network.

In short, they've lost contact, but this won't lead to a loss of control. These units will continue to execute or remain dormant according to the orders given before they lost contact, until Rowan finds them again and they are Swarm Network.

When the Zerg first infiltrated the Star Sea Alliance, a large number of Node Unit went missing. For example, most of the sold personal Biological Armor were out of contact because they were taken to very distant locations.

For example, Life-Extending Serum sold to various places, and Intellect dispatched to distant places, are all prone to losing contact.

However, Node Unit only have weak location capabilities, not a complete lack of them. When their numbers in a certain area reach a certain value, they can achieve an effect similar to Anchor Unit. They will re-illuminate their positions in the Swarm Network, helping Rowan find them.

When Rowan's strength was not yet strong, this number was very large. The number of Node Unit within a light-year range had to reach tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, to mark their positions.

This makes it difficult to gather enough Node Unit, which are already scarce in the outside world, and even the areas that were originally illuminated can easily be lost again in the dimensional turbulence. For example, the Zerg and Riken Race researchers who were the first to be converted into points were constantly fragmented during transportation due to different assigned locations or other reasons, causing Rowan, who could originally locate them, to lose the location of most of the Intellect.