Chapter 142-1: King of Ideas Catastrophe Legion (1) |
Primordial Altar.
Qi Sheng sat cross-legged on the altar. Following Guide, his consciousness descended to the Evil Eye Tower at the Abyss of Heaven Territory Node in the Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range.
The Black Tide under the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s control had suddenly been strengthened, and he naturally knew the reason.
He had watched the Azure Star Sea Region campaign from a macro perspective the whole time.
During it, he also noticed the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s consciousness descend and, through the Evil Eye’s projection, control and command the Black Tide in battle.
He had even paid attention to the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s behavior of secretly siphoning resources.
What puzzled him was that the Earthmind Evil Spirit had not been discovered by the Black Tide’s higher level management for doing this. More importantly, that the Earthmind Evil Spirit actually dared to do it.
This was extremely unreasonable.
Guide had given a detailed analysis of the Black Tide’s legion structure.
There were three core systems of the Black Tide.
Among them, Evil Spirits were commander-type warriors, possessed independent emotions, and were the core cornerstone of the Black Tide.
Evil Eyes were functional support units that, while highly intelligent, had their emotional function weakened. All decisions followed the Evil Spirit’s lead. They were responsible for interfacing with other Black Tide nodes, could consult an information database of vast stored knowledge at any time, and possessed a highly developed mental information network that could rapidly parse the battlefield environment, formulate tactical strategies, provide the Evil Spirit with real-time battlefield sensing, and offer operational and development suggestions.
They were think tank units unaffected by emotion.
The final Black Tide part consisted of Black Tide energy and Evil Entity units, the core strength in Black Tide warfare.
The Evil Entity units had a corresponding massive unit library. The exact number of units available was unknown for now, but Guide believed the Black Tide’s unit system might number in the several millions. High level units also had corresponding attribute systems suitable for different battlefields.
These three systems formed one Black Tide combat unit, and countless combat units formed the vast Black Tide Catastrophe.
In this system, it was necessary to ensure that Evil Spirit warriors possessed absolute loyalty.
They were the only units in the Black Tide system that had high intelligence as well as emotions and feelings.
As for the setting of emotions, Guide had also analyzed it.
Although the Black Tide could, like the Swarm, establish a cold and ruthless slaughter command operation, from the perspective of adapting to complex war environments, the reaction mechanisms of emotions and feelings would significantly assist in warfare. Suppose the Black Tide encountered a force it could not possibly contend with. If the Evil Spirit commander had a reaction similar to caution, it might avoid unnecessary losses of Black Tide energy.
Emotion at times was a kind of high sensitivity to danger signals and an instinct to adjust strategy.
Second, emotions such as a desire for growth, greed for resources, and yearning for victory could also help the Black Tide develop.
This differed markedly from the Swarm’s trait of launching frenzied slaughter regardless of the enemy’s strength.
But the emergence of emotion would also introduce uncontrollable factors in Evil Spirits.
Therefore in the Black Tide Legion’s structural design, the first thing to ensure was the Evil Spirit warriors’ absolute loyalty.
Only if the Evil Spirits did not go wrong would the Black Tide Legion be the super catastrophe that swept countless worlds.
Guide’s analysis held that three factors constrained Evil Spirits.
First was loyalty indoctrination during an Evil Spirit’s growth. Every Evil Spirit warrior took pride in the terrifying Black Tide’s conquest of more worlds.
Second, there should exist an absolute restriction akin to a mental seal to ensure there was no possibility of rebellion in an Evil Spirit’s heart.
Finally, there was supervision by the Evil Eye. Although the nearly emotionless Evil Eye assisted the Evil Spirit warrior’s growth, in essence it still centered on higher level units and could not possibly deceive higher units to help an Evil Spirit warrior.
But the situation with Earthmind and the Evil Eye was rather different.
The Earthmind Evil Spirit’s behavior clearly differed from other Evil Spirit warriors and was highly emotional.
The Evil Eye by its side was the same. While possessing high intelligence, it actually exhibited an emotional side.
This made Qi Sheng think of a piece of information once recorded by Guide.
The Earthmind Evil Spirit had told the Evil Eye that it was a warrior who had graduated from the Abyssal Assessment.
This might be one of the reasons the Earthmind Evil Spirit was different from the rest.
The eeriest part was the Evil Eye. It actually put the Earthmind Evil Spirit first, deceiving higher units to seek benefits for it.
The Evil Eye that was supposed to play a supervisory role stood together with the Earthmind Evil Spirit, completely breaking the Black Tide’s normal legion system.
It was certain that there was definitely a problem with the Earthmind Evil Spirit and the Evil Eye, but for now it was impossible to analyze exactly where the problem lay.
Earthmind and the Evil Eye now behaved like two two-faced turncoats.
For the rapid growth of their own node, they schemed in secret and devoured most of a fellow newly born Evil Spirit warrior’s resources.
They even proactively provoked the Swarm and staged a defensive battle as cover to hoodwink everyone.
Such behavior was truly outrageous and did not accord with the highly stringent Black Tide legion setting in Guide’s eyes, leaving Qi Sheng and Guide thoroughly stunned.
Their impression was that these two Black Tide-system units seemed to have broken some kind of constraint and developed uncontrollable emotions and ideas.
[Boss, it is not only the Earthmind Evil Spirit and the Evil Eye that are off. North of the Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range, the Swarm in the Phantom Swamp region is also very off.]
At that moment Guide spoke, interrupting Qi Sheng’s thoughts.
Qi Sheng turned his head to look at Guide floating at his side.
“What have you found now?”
[From observation over these days of monitoring, during the process in which the Earthmind Evil Spirit obtained strengthened resources from the Azure Star Sea Region, the Swarm in Phantom Swamp also received an injection of cross-space energy and its strength rapidly grew in sync with the Black Tide.]
Guide’s words made Qi Sheng furrow his brow.
“Injection of cross-space energy?”
[That is right. I now have a bold guess. This suddenly descended Swarm was clearly not an accidental arrival in the Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range region but came with a purpose. That target is most likely the Earthmind Evil Spirit.]
Guide’s explanation sent Qi Sheng into deep thought.
Before long, an idea surfaced in his mind.
“Guide, do you think it is possible that the Swarm’s Supreme Hive Mind is searching for a way to counter the terrifying Black Tide, so it created a special Low level Hive Mind and had it descend near a Black Tide unit at the starting stage to accompany its growth?”
“During this period, by continually fighting the Black Tide in its starting stage, it would gradually adapt to the characteristics of the Black Tide’s various combat units, until it adapted to all of the Black Tide’s combat units, thereby creating a combat unit that perfectly counters the Black Tide legion system.”
Hearing Qi Sheng’s analysis, Guide immediately nodded.
[That is exactly what I think. The suddenly descended Swarm hive mind is very likely a tactic arranged by the Swarm’s Supreme Hive Mind. Its frenzied push at the opening upon descent forced the Earthmind Evil Spirit to the limit in order to understand in detail the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s comprehensive strength, then after grasping the data it began synchronized growth.]
[This was already evident before. After the Skyfire race campaign ended, the biggest winner was the Earthmind Evil Spirit, yet the Swarm inexplicably kept pace with the Black Tide’s growth rate. It is even more so this time. After the Earthmind Evil Spirit obtained Black Tide energy from the Azure Star Sea Region, the Swarm again caught up in growth progress. Clearly there is a hand behind the scenes controlling the Swarm hive mind’s growth rate, granting resources matched to the Earthmind Evil Spirit’s strength each time it falls behind, so that it always remains at the same combat level.]
Guide’s analysis was exactly what Qi Sheng was thinking at this moment.
At least the Earthmind Evil Spirit still had a process of striving. Every time it obtained resources they were recorded, with a logic that could be traced.
But the Swarm’s strengthening surged suddenly each time, and Guide sensed spatial fluctuations every time. It was clearly some power delivering growth resources.
The two top bullies of the starter village were each more bizarre than the other.
Qi Sheng did not delve into this problem. The Black Tide and the Swarm did indeed affect the players’ progress in opening up the world, but if a breakthrough could not be made he could change direction and open a node that could be expanded.
Just like the Colorful Mist Coast region, which was a new spatial node he had opened.
As for the Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range, it now looked more like a leveling ground.
Although the Black Tide and the Swarm were universally recognized by players as dirt poor monsters, their advantage was extremely high monster density, which was especially suitable for guilds and large groups to grind levels and grow.
This was an advantage the Colorful Mist Coast could not match.
Monsters in the Colorful Mist Coast region were relatively scattered, and there was still a ‘search’ step required before hunting could begin.
But hunting in the Emperor’s Mound Mountain Range region was very simple. If you lacked sacrificial power or evolution points, form a team and head out to kill. It was high-intensity combat from start to finish until death.
The main selling points were cheap and plentiful, letting players earn returns through volume.
But in this process, all three sides always despised each other, each feeling the other two were truly disgusting.
Without thinking further about this issue, Qi Sheng decided to quickly launch a new round of the player recruitment plan.
For this round of recruitment, he planned to issue seventy thousand player slots to the outside and also recruit another batch of alien players.
But before that, he needed to upgrade the existing item shop.