Law of the Swarm

Chapter 125 Pupation

Sitting quietly in the empty room 80 meters deep underground, System shook his head.

There are still many things to worry about, System decided not to think about it, and strengthened the already stored experience bar to his [chrysalis] talent.

After these days of strengthening, System's [Pupation] talent has reached 16% of level 99. System has only used very little experience, and [Pupation] talent has naturally reached the third level. Level 17 of the second metamorphosis.

System did not wait quietly, and began to devour the surrounding food continuously, and System's abdomen also swelled rapidly.

Ten minutes later, some cracks appeared in System's swollen abdomen due to the food, and some blood flowed out. System began to use [Super Speed ​​Regeneration] to repair the ruptured abdomen, and stopped eating at the same time.

经验条99%、饱食度120%、精神力98%、生命力99%、特殊能量98%……

The various values ​​of System's body have basically reached their peak state, which can be said to be the most perfect time to pupate.

Not long after, a unique rhythm from the blood appeared.

System knew that his pupation was about to begin.

Similar to the feeling of itching all over the body during [Degeneration and Growth], System's body became very itchy, and the exoskeleton of his body gradually became softer.

However, unlike the last time when his body twitched like a disorder when he pupated for the first time, System can still control his body very well at this time, whether it is the tentacles or the chest and abdomen of the body, he can control it with his will.

Soon following the rhythm of his blood, System retracted his tentacles one by one into his body, and at the same time the glands in his throat [Plague Mucus] secreted a unique active mucus.

According to System's will, these active mucus gradually covered his whole body. His eyes and tentacles were quickly melted by the mucus, and he lost his sense of sight, hearing, and smell.

The active mucus gradually became hard and formed the appearance of a chrysalis due to the wriggling of the mucus. System's body also completely softened and gradually turned into a liquid.

System waited quietly, waiting for the unique fluctuations in the bloodline during the process of [molting growth] or [chrysalis] to allow him to strengthen an ability. This time, System still intends to choose to strengthen the [numerical code 】.

But after waiting for a long time, that unique fluctuation did not come.

"The time for the third pupation is very long, maybe it will take a long time."

System thought to himself, and at the same time opened the [Tools Menu], and bored watching past video materials to pass the time.

But before he kept System waiting for long, System felt dizzy, and he felt that the whole world was spinning.

Once again, System felt as if he was drunk and had a drink.

He once again felt himself transformed into a whirlpool of slime, and at the same time, the nearly half-meter-high chrysalis formed by System also spun like a top.

The power of this rotation is far greater than that of System's first pupation. The pupae were spinning in the empty room non-stop. Because of the irregular soil in the empty room, the pupae that System transformed into were bouncing up and down in the empty room. Flying and bouncing, the sound of impact is continuous...

If the chrysalis shell that System had turned into was not strong enough, he might have died long ago.

The spinning chrysalis lasted for more than ten hours before it stopped, and System also passed out.

System, who was in a coma, naturally didn't know that the reason why the chrysalis had been spinning for so long was because he ate too much.

It's not that it's bad to eat more food, but that System's body will turn into liquid after pupation, so these incompletely digested food must be completely digested and converted into energy in System's body.

But no matter how you say it, even if System didn't eat so much during this pupation, he would still fall into a coma.

……

System, who was in a coma, seemed to have a dream, an extremely real dream.

In the dream, he seemed to have turned into a familiar yet unfamiliar green-tailed grasshopper, usually eating grass and leaves, and occasionally eating rotten fruits that fell from trees, and had escaped countless times from predators of insects and birds .

In the end, the dream ended with him mating with a beautiful female green-tailed grasshopper, and at the end of the dream, his fangs were still shaking slightly, as if to say something.

"Even if the grasshopper opens its mouth, it can't speak. It thinks day by day and dreams at night. Could it be that I have this dream because I have lost the ability to mate?"

System realized that he was dreaming, but soon he reappeared in a new dream, still the dream of the green-tailed grasshopper.

In the dream, he seemed to be a female green-tailed grasshopper. Before she was born, all her siblings were eaten by a little mouse, and only she survived.

Her luck did not stop, praying mantises, spiders, scorpions...

She encountered more than a dozen fatal crises, but escaped all of them. In the end, she turned into an adult grasshopper and selected the strongest one among the three male green-tailed grasshoppers for mating.

This time, the dream ended completely after she laid eggs, and at the last moment of the dream, the fangs in her mouth trembled slightly, as if she also said something.

Before System could think in the gap between dreams, the next dream appeared immediately.

This time, he was still a green-tailed grasshopper, and she was still a female. This time, after she hatched from the eggs, she went smoothly without any hostile creatures, because her beautiful shape attracted dozens of people. There are only male green-tailed grasshoppers, and she finally chooses the most beautiful male green-tailed grasshopper for mating.

But her luck seemed to run out just before laying eggs, when a sudden sting appeared, her body was clamped by the legs of a piebald mantis, and the mantis began to eat her head.

But before she died, two grasshopper eggs flowed out of her abdomen, and the fangs on her head trembled slightly, as if she was saying something before she died.

One dream after another.

This time, System turned into a male green-tailed grasshopper who was born deficient, and no other grasshopper sisters were born with him.

Perhaps the eggs were released too early. System was so fragile after birth that he couldn't even bite the tenderest leaf buds, so he could barely survive by sucking the microorganisms in the sewage of a mud pit.

Eventually he found some grasshopper eggs of the same kind, which grew by eating his body and could eat plants to sustain life.

But even so, it was difficult to change his congenitally deficient body. After several narrow escapes, he became an adult grasshopper and was only half the size of an ordinary adult green-tailed grasshopper.

But before he died, he found a mate, a female grasshopper who was also deficient, and before the dream ended, something was still in his mouth.

……

In this way, one dream after another, System experienced many, many dreams like a revolving lantern, and experienced many strange grasshoppers' lives.

He even once turned into a grasshopper egg buried in the ice and snow. After 10,000+ days and nights, the ice and snow melted before hatching from the egg.

It has also experienced many times when grasshoppers took off in groups and became a member of thousands of locust swarms.

System gradually understood that these dreams were nothing but the various experiences of his grasshopper ancestors, and each of his grasshopper ancestors was extremely lucky to survive, and he was the sum of countless luck out of existence.

System knew that the blood of the grasshopper could not convey so many and such detailed dreams.

These dreams should be simulated by his intelligent grasshopper based on his blood, and cannot be said to be fake, but ordinary grasshoppers would not have such dreams.

The ancestors of the grasshoppers in the dream seemed to want to convey something to him.

System felt carefully...

At this moment, countless voices suddenly appeared in System's mind——

"Live on.", "Live...on.", "Live on!", "...live on.", "Live on."...

At the end of each dream, the words spoken by the grasshopper became clear, and each word contained expectations and blessings. These dense voices made System's spirit seem to buzz, making System's body The spirit was incomparably shocked.

System suddenly woke up from his drowsy state.

"……Thank you."

System didn't know how long he had been asleep during the pupation process, even the [Tools Menu] didn't show the time.

But if he doesn't wake up again, maybe he won't be able to wake up again, completely turning into a dead chrysalis.

In the final analysis, although he has the talent of [Pupation], and has performed a brief pupation before, his bloodline still does not fully match the talent of [Pupation], and this third pupation is also very dangerous.

If it wasn't for the series of dreams given to him by the grasshopper's blood, he might not have had the chance to wake up at all.

According to the rhythm in the blood, System controlled the liquid in the pupa to rotate gently.

As if taking a deep breath, System's body suddenly became refreshed from a stuffy state, and his body became extremely relaxed.

Not long after, the unique rhythm from the blood finally appeared.

— Choose.

(End of this chapter)