Li Xiaoya was naturally not afraid of such a spectacle. With so many Corpse Puppet Insects charging over, killing them and breaking through would have been easy, but the Steel-armored Beetles had now turned into eggs. Without them helping him devour the corpses, destroying every trace would consume far more magic power...
Tch! Retreat first! Li Xiaoya suddenly thought. Golden light surged over his hands, forming two enormous Golden Giant Hands that reached for the Steel-armored Beetle eggs on the ground. He had made up his mind: whatever else happened, he would let these two beetles evolve first before advancing. With two Heaven-and-Earth Realm helpers, he would naturally be much safer. He had a vague feeling that once these two Steel-armored Beetles successfully evolved to the Heaven-and-Earth Realm peak, their power might exceed his imagination. This was not a wild guess, but an intuition born of experience...
However!
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! Just as the two Golden Giant Hands were about to seize the Steel-armored Beetle eggs, gray light surged from the eggs, and they actually absorbed the golden hands reaching toward them...
"Hm?" Li Xiaoya froze at the sight, then suddenly remembered that something similar had happened not long ago, when the Steel-armored Beetles evolved in the Sixteenth Layer...
While Li Xiaoya was still marveling...
There it was!
Rumble!
Rustle, rustle, rustle! The entire sky suddenly darkened. The Corpse Puppet Insects had already approached within a dozen or so li of Li Xiaoya. These were clearly much higher-ranked than those in the Sixteenth Layer. There were scarcely any Golden Core Stage insects among them; even the weakest were at the Nascent Soul Realm. They were, however, just as hideous and revolting...
Screech, screech, screech!
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! Before Li Xiaoya could act, the Corpse Puppet Insects let out