"Okay, let's go!" Hu Yu was also eager to see how the biological warriors had turned out. He had hardly ever interfered with the biological ship, leaving the biology fanatics to do as they pleased.
Inside a Deep Blue docked with the biological ship, all the residential facilities had been cleared out. The entire inner surface of the ship had been converted into row upon row of cubicles, each a foot square. At a glance, there seemed to be hundreds of millions of them. One side of each cubicle was made of thick glass, allowing people to see inside.
"General, there are 500 million incubation chambers here, but we've only bred 100 million biological warriors so far. To conserve food, we left them hungry for several years and only reactivated them today."
Hu Yu looked around. There was a monster in every cubicle. They were only the size of a fist, with python heads, upright frog bodies, claws and spikes on their hands and feet, and eight octopus tentacles fanning upward from their backs like flowers. They were pitch-black and drooled from their mouths. Some attacked the glass desperately, while others tore at the food that had just been thrown in. Though small, they already showed how terrifying they were.
Academician Zeng opened a cubicle, and the biological warrior inside immediately jumped out. Its eight tentacles stood straight up as it opened its miniature, gaping maw and bared its teeth at Academician Xiao. Hu Yu immediately drew his sidearm and prepared to fire. A bite from the little creature surely wouldn't end well.
Academician Xiao waved to show Hu Yu there was no need to worry. Sure enough, after a few seconds of acting ferocious, the little monster underwent a complete change. It squatted by Academician Xiao's feet, its python eyes looking up at the academician almost pitifully.
Academician Xiao bent down, picked it up, and held it in one hand. The creature's octopus tentacles drooped completely, gently stroking the academician's palm. No matter how Academician Xiao squeezed or rubbed it, it offered no resistance. Its imposing, domineering manner from a few seconds ago was completely gone, and it was as docile as a pet kitten.
"General, want to play with it?" Academician Xiao asked with a smile.
"No, no, Academician. You keep it and play with it. I'm not interested."
"General, this is the product after several rounds of improvement. Its loyalty and offensive power have both increased. You could call it an improved version of the first-generation product."
Academician Xiao personally activated the master switch, which was protected by multiple layers of encryption. All the glass doors of the incubation chambers opened at once, and the fist-sized biological warriors surged toward Academician Xiao and the others like a flood breaking through a dam. The highest point inside the Deep Blue was more than 4,000 meters up, and a gravity device simulated Earth's gravity within the ship. This was technology they had already mastered back on Tau Ceti. The biological warriors showed no fear of the height or the accelerated impact caused by gravity, jumping straight down from the highest point. When they landed, Hu Yu could clearly hear the heavy thuds as they struck the Deep Blue's floor, a testament to the force of their impacts.
The biological warriors showed no sign of feeling the impacts. They turned, got up, and ran toward the biologists. Before long, the biologists were buried beneath the swarm of monsters, which climbed up their legs, bodies, and heads. As more and more biological warriors gathered, it looked as though the biologists would be crushed under their weight.
The din from their mouths filled the entire Deep Blue, nearly deafening Hu Yu. Strangely, the biological warriors did not surge toward Academician Xiao and Hu Yu. Academician Xiao watched the scene cheerfully, showing no concern at all. Hu Yu said nothing either. Since Academician Xiao had done this, the academician must have been confident it would be fine.
Suddenly, the little monsters that had surged in like a tide receded like one. The biologists buried beneath them finally emerged from the heap. The little monsters lined up neatly, one after another, and in less than five minutes, they had finished forming ranks on the Deep Blue's floor. The entire ship instantly returned to the silence of a few minutes earlier. Hu Yu had never imagined the little monsters would be as obedient as machines, and he couldn't help admiring the ruthless biology experts.
The biologists who had been mobbed by the little monsters were covered in slime from head to face, as if they had just taken a bath, leaving them not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Academician Xiao was already laughing with delight off to the side. The old academician had clearly known what was about to happen. Hu Yu had not expected even an old scholar like that to have such a side.
"General, what do you think?" Academician Xiao asked confidently.
"Not bad, Academician. But will the insect swarm really not attack them?"
"At the very least, low-tier insects won't recognize them. High-tier insects are intelligent, and once large-scale unrest breaks out, they'll definitely notice something unusual about the biological warriors. But we still can't determine exactly which tier of high-tier insect will notice."
"If these little monsters are discovered, I'm afraid they won't even be enough to fill the insects' teeth. Should we raise them to be a little bigger before deploying them?"
"It's all right. These little monsters have at least seventh- or eighth-tier combat strength now. Their small size is an advantage. The insects in the swarm already attack one another, so small disturbances won't attract the attention of high-tier insects. Besides, our main task this time is to test the biological warriors' combat strength. We'll produce more of them in the future. If small individuals can solve the problem, we can save a great deal of supplies and energy."
"All right, let's try it first, then. Make your preparations. I'll arrange for the Stealth Killers to deploy them right away."
To deploy the little monsters into the insect swarm as quickly as possible, Hu Yu mobilized a thousand Stealth Killers. Under the direction of several biologists, the little monsters boarded the Stealth Killers in an orderly fashion. Fortunately, ordinary civilians did not see the scene, or the more timid among them might have been badly frightened.
The Stealth Killers stopped 500,000 kilometers from the insect swarm and launched the little monsters using electromagnetic rails. Their body structures not only allowed them to be launched this way, but also enabled them to withstand enormous acceleration. In the past, no one would have believed such a scene possible. But after encountering the Insect Race, everyone's understanding of living creatures had risen several levels, and the little monsters' toughness was nothing remarkable.
A hundred million miniature biological warriors could hardly make a ripple in an insect swarm numbering in the tens of billions. Just like that, the miniature warriors quietly blended into the swarm.
One biological warrior found the mouthparts of a giant worm more than twenty meters long and forced its way inside. The giant worm immediately began writhing wildly. Clearly, the biological warrior had begun eating and wreaking havoc inside it. The rolling worm was in extreme pain, which drove it out of its mind. It began biting the other insects around it at random.
The biological warrior had grown noticeably larger after eating its fill. It bit a hole in the giant worm's abdomen and crawled out, then immediately entered the mouthparts of another giant insect.
The same scene played out in every corner of the planet. The insect swarm, which had been relatively quiet, was now in complete turmoil. The insects bit one another and struggled wildly. Their splattered bodily fluids formed streams across the planet's surface, and the remains of dead insects piled up into small hills. In less than an hour, the biological warriors had killed more than a billion insects.
By contrast, the biological warriors' losses were almost negligible. They were small and agile, weaving effortlessly through the swarm. Even if the insects wanted to catch them, they could only rely on luck.