Wasteland Development Diary

Nightclaw began to describe the distribution of the local monsters.

This area, with the oasis belt as its core, has the Claw Boars in the north, the ever-expanding Mushroom Forest in the south, the Dead Sea with its various possible monsters in the east, and the Death Dunes where the Antlion dwells in the west.

Unlike the Claw Boars that travel in packs, the Antlions are solitary creatures. They are enormous and create sinkholes and quicksand in the dunes to hunt passing creatures.

They sleep in the sand year-round, dividing their hunting grounds among themselves.

During the day, Antlions sometimes emerge from the sand to bask in the sun and dead light to absorb power. They rest under the sand at night, waking to hunt any creatures that approach the dunes.

"We Claw Boars are also hunted by them."

Nightclaw couldn't help but complain, "Compared to the Antlions, we are much more disciplined. Claw Boars only attack intruders to defend their territory. Our main goal is to find space to survive, and we don't have any particular hatred for humans. In fact, we often coexist with humans in the same area."

"Because the presence of humans proves that there are no super monsters nearby. After all, we are at the bottom of the Light-Nascence groups... not much better than ordinary humans."

"But Antlions are completely different. They modify the soil, turning any land into a desert to facilitate their hunting. They create bait and enjoy hunting humans, going so far as to kill their own kind when they go crazy. They are dangerous monsters, and their strength can reach Level D when they mature."

Zhou Yi got on his vehicle and led the team to the dunes in the west.

It was an endless desert.

Under the sunlight, it appeared particularly empty and desolate.

Zhou Yi looked around and suddenly noticed a person slowly crawling out of the sand not far away. The person shook off the sand, looked around, and then staggered toward the depths of the desert.

"Master, that is the Antlion's bait."

Nightclaw said beside him, "Someone will always fall for it."

Zhou Yi looked at the remote control in his hand.

Zooming in, the sand walker was nothing more than a human-shaped object with only bones left.

Its skull and chest cavity contained thorny vines, and it was wrapped in clothes. The human-shaped bait was controlled by the spiky vines, making it difficult to identify without close observation.

The Antlion's body was covered with long, spiky tentacles, which served as its limbs. Like a puppeteer, it manipulated the bait to lure other creatures closer.

From a high-altitude perspective during the day, many such baits could be seen in the desert, including wandering human-shaped baits, Claw Boars with hollowed-out bodies, wheel vehicles disguised as being stuck in the sand, and boxes that appeared to contain items.

Getting close to these baits meant entering the Antlion's trap.

Zhou Yi looked at the human-shaped bait closest to him.

Let's start with you and test its strength.

"Switch to ranged weapons."

At his command, the Warrior Crabs pulled out kitchen knives from the weapon straps on their abdomens, including traditional cleavers, rectangular knives, pointed fruit knives, serrated knives, and so on.

"Target, human-shaped bait."

"Pay attention to the range and use free parabolic attacks."

Upon receiving the order, the twelve armored warriors immediately spread out and aimed their pincers at the target.

Swish! Swish! Swish!

Various knives gleamed in the sunlight.

Under the Warrior Crabs' wild brute force, the kitchen knives rotated and flew, slashing at the human bone bait thirty meters away. After just one volley, it was chopped into a pile of broken bones.

The severed spiky tentacles writhed madly in pain, finally pulling the main body out from under the dune. First, a pair of spiky, pincer-like jaws emerged, followed by more spiky tentacles rising from the sand, rushing towards them like snakes.

The Warrior Crabs split into two teams, moving swiftly to the left and right, continuing to throw all twelve knives they carried, and then retreated to a safe area without looking back.

This revealed the Antlion's weakness. It was skilled in positional warfare, but when its traps were discovered and forced into mobile combat, its rigid and powerful body, spiky tentacles, and the suction on the sand were difficult to use.

After angrily chasing for a distance, it finally chose to give up, and the tentacles returned to the desert again.

But soon, the Antlion began to twist and churn madly, causing the entire dune to roll and boil with yellow sand, reducing visibility in the vicinity.

Nightclaw was stunned: "What's it doing?"

"Is it going crazy from the frustration of a failed hunt? This state looks wrong..."

Zhou Yi took a can of cola from his backpack.

Two Warrior Crabs immediately opened two umbrellas to block the flying sand.

Zhou Yi pulled open the can and took a sip.

"We'll know soon enough."

The Antlion's movements became slower and slower, and after a few minutes, it stopped moving completely.

The dust gradually settled.

The Warrior Crabs confirmed the death of this dune killer, dug its body out of the sand, and placed it on the ground.

Zhou Yi finally saw the full appearance of this creature.

The Antlion was about six meters long, with a wide, shield-like, yellow-brown layered shell, four legs that were also covered in hard shells with three-pronged barbs at the tips, a small head with wide, pincer-shaped jaws, and spiky tentacles on both sides of its body. They were more like flexible limbs and natural weapons, with bits and pieces of white bones hanging on them.

At this time, it was completely stiff.

The Warrior Crabs performed another round of finishing blows to its neck, chest, and abdomen to confirm its complete death before starting to collect the knives they had thrown earlier.

"How did it suddenly die?" Nightclaw's small eyes were full of confusion.

Zhou Yi did not explain, thinking, of course, it's because it ate my poisoned knives.

He placed his hand on the Antlion's shell, and the monster's corpse emitted a faint light, gradually condensing into a white light sphere, which he gently grasped.

This was the [Light Seed].

Integrating it into his own body allowed him to use this highly concentrated energy to directly increase his strength.

Among life, defense, and energy, Zhou Yi chose to replenish energy.

[Energy +40]

The body's energy was restored to 1732 points.

Since his life value and defense had reached a relatively high level, Zhou Yi began to focus on converting the harvested Light Seeds into energy.

He had explored the point allocation mechanism for a long time.

Increasing life value was the most immediate. 1 Light Seed could increase 10 points of life value, but the lost portion after being attacked would not recover on its own. It could only be replenished by acquiring Light Seeds or waiting for the natural absorption of the Dead Sea's power—which was very slow.

In terms of defense, 1 Light Seed could bring a 0.01 increase in defense value. If damage exceeding the defense could not be inflicted, Zhou Yi's body could not be harmed. At least the Warrior Crabs could no longer break through Zhou Yi's defense.

But there were also special ways to cause damage that ignored defense, such as poison.

The kitchen knives equipped by the Warrior Crabs were coated with a poison from a small monster in the Dead Sea called the "Jumping Snake." It would hop like a spring on the ground at the bottom of the Dead Sea. When it felt fear and terror, it would spray venom, and large monsters would suffer heavy damage if too much venom entered their bodies.

Zhou Yi managed to collect a lot of Jumping Snake venom and combined it with kitchen knives to form a long-range killing weapon, and the actual combat effect had been good.

The last element of the body was energy, which was also the key to maintaining the body's operation.

As the commander and doctor of the Warrior Crab Legion, Zhou Yi confirmed through a large number of actual battles that, whether in combat or survival, the Light-Nascence's energy itself would naturally be consumed to maintain their powerful physiological functions. Especially for Light-Nascence with special abilities, like the Red隼, they could not use their skills without sufficient energy.

Therefore, a certain amount of energy reserves must be maintained at all times in order to treat and replenish the Warrior Crabs and keep them combat-ready.

If life value represented the body's current survival state, the energy bar was the fuel and electricity that kept the Light-Nascence running at high speed, and it was the logistical lifeline for maintaining competitiveness.

Even powerful high-level monsters would become food for the Bone Fish after their energy was exhausted.

……

The Warrior Crabs began to clean up the spoils of war, especially dismantling the Antlion's carapace, which was a material with good impact resistance. They dismantled it and carried it away.

After a small test of strength, Zhou Yi also gained a practical understanding of the environment near his new home.

The local monster groups in the east, south, west, and north could be withstood with his own strength, and basic safety was guaranteed.

He looked at the sky and saw that it was almost time, so he rode to the Dead Sea beach to wait for the boy A Jin.