"This thing is quite extraordinary. It looks like a legacy that brute left behind in its final moments. Could it be a new mother queen larva?"
After returning, Li Chen did not publicly announce that he had slain the Centipede Heavenly Dragon. Instead, he secretly sealed away the great insect's corpse and left a batch of worker bee puppets in the Underground Palace to expand the caverns and reshape the terrain.
Nor did he consult Wizard Ze, Wushi Yan, or the others. He retrieved the Shaman King's dossiers and the texts the Centipede Daoist had left behind to study on his own. Sure enough, he discovered that this was indeed a colony leader, much like those of ants or bees.
It turned out that this spirit companion of the Shaman King had originally possessed only first-level Foundation Establishment cultivation, barely reaching the threshold of a true demon. After the Centipede Daoist and the others descended upon this place, it had undergone a comprehensive transformation.
The Centipede Daoist had mastered the mysteries of life. By seizing the blood essence traits of other insects and fusing them into a new bloodline, he had endowed it with characteristics similar to those of a bee queen's Mother Empress.
Centipedes were not originally social insects with vast colonies, but beneath the Centipede Daoist's uncanny craftsmanship, worthy of gods and ghosts, this one had mutated into an entirely new species.
Through the texts they had left behind, Li Chen even began to discern the Centipede Daoist's intentions.
He had wanted the Shaman King to rear gu insects in his stead and, when necessary, produce a powerful larva possessing an innate Dao body, which he could then refine into an external incarnation.
With that method, he could become a "Centipede Daoist" in the truest sense!
"How should