Team Ye Yin was severely outnumbered. This fight would not be cake walk, even though so far there had not been any visible casualty in his team. Ironically, there had not been any visible progress in their travel as well.
The bristleworms were apparently unaffected by their own emission, their sensibility and mobility were still the same capable, unlike the mechs which had been completely slowed down due to the waves of these entities. A mech without speed would lose a large portion of its offensive capacity.
Yes, speed is what made a mech the fast and furious, the core of its existence!
Well, probably only Ye Yin's mech remained the same fast and furious as before, as luckily he had his Spikedrops guarding him with their efficient penetration which cleared out all bristleworms within the vicinity, making Ye Yin the sweeping pilot among his team.
The other mechs of Ye family were not as strong however, as they were swarmed by the bristleworms and that prevented them from accelerating freely as their will. Certainly, a mech's weaponry could harm these fleshy worms easily, but only to the extent before size became a matter. Once they faced a larger entity of the pests, the attack would no longer be fatal, only would anger the entity, causing uncontrollable havoc instead.
Ye Yin could not help but to feel powerless at the sight of the endless worm waves ahead. It was as if he was stuck in a bog of depression when he thought of their plan of making a clear-out in less than a day for the fleet.
His hope was sinking but not his hands on the control panel.
The fight must go on.
Ye Yin's mech had a stronger engine than other mechs and was armed with those unpredictable Spikedrops, that was why he was far ahead of his team especially when he programmed the Spikedrops to directly destroy the insides of bristleworm upon contact.
Soon he realized he had lost his teammates.
But there was something else that caught his attention, as he saw a tiny conglomeration of about 50 bristleworms on the projection. It was peculiar because the empty fleet before had penetrated the giant conglomeration, yet there was still this lump before him, that was unseen before in the last few hours.
The conglomeration sluggishly crawled to the front, with the neighboring pale bristleworms letting the way out, as its size increased when the greener ones joined it gradually.
This is not right...
Ye Yin's heart quivered.
Was that a new cycle?
Did the gigantic conglomeration they spent 50 ships to defeat start its formation this way?
Assuming Ye Yin was not making a wild guess, then this small lump would very likely be the seed, the beginning of it. A sense of crisis rose in Ye Yin's mind as he imagined the happening if the lump continued the process.
A new giant might be forming very soon!
They no longer had the leisure to modify empty ships to perform another drill attack! The conglomeration must not happen again!
In 3 days their shelter, the mechs would be disintegrated, they would die!
Ye Yin discarded the plan of heading back to his team. Instead, he had something in mind, regarding this growing lump of madness.
Ye Yin carefully followed the wriggling lump, his mind rapidly formed a basic plan on an attack. All he needed would be a good timin-
Something happened!
The lump seemed to have been stimulated by something as it began wriggling vigorously. In the space without air, Ye Yin could hardly hear a thing but somehow he imagined the monster was shrieking...
How?
The visual on his projection turned fuzzier over time. Ye Yin realized that the closer he approached the monster, the stronger the interference his detection system received. He could barely make out the shape of the worms around now.
As expected, this blob monster was not a simple task.
Thought Ye Yin, as his will to destroy it became firmer.
...(Meanwhile)...
Ye Chong was not doing great as well.
In short terms, he was finding chores for himself. The green mist was ineffective on his Han Jia, which gave him the freedom to do anything in the sea of green worms, as long as he behaved.
But the scene before him, and his thoughts, there seemed to be a direct connection between each other.
Strange... be it bristleworm or Crustalades, why are they so sensitive over metallic objects? Especially when bristleworms favored objects that contain high amount of energy activity. These worms were truly the natural enemy of humanity! Be it metal or the energy, those are the natural necessity of humanity today. A complete contradiction, both these worms and humanity could never co-exist!
But that has not much to do with me... I should be thinking a way to escape here. If it was not because I could not accommodate both Old Jalopy and Fei Si in Han Jia, I would have just headed back to the fleet and pick up both of them, then leave this place with Rui Bing. It would not be hard when these worms could not see Han Jia at all.
Oh well...
Thought Ye Chong as he shifted his focus back to reality.
Back on Trash Planet, Ye Chong had several occasions with different mutated lifeforms and of course in Archipelago he had tasted beast stampede, the century event before, so he was practically an experienced monster hunter himself.
From his observation this far, he noticed the hierarchy among the worms, so technically there should be a leader, or a mother queen somewhere. From the premise, if Ye Chong could find out the leader, maybe things would change.
Hmmm...
?
That was when he discerned a silhouette flashing by through his eyes' corners.
Silhouette? He searched the camera immediately.
No way Ye Chong was seeing things. The sea of worms was green, and a black silhouette had just passed by, Ye Chong was not color blind to have mistaken a random piece of meteorite.
It did not take long before Ye Chong discovered that silhouette. The darkish shape was traveling forward, much faster than the bristleworms. Without hesitation, Han Jia prompted its engine and chased after that silhouette disappearing in the deeper sea.
The distance was decreasing and Ye Chong began discerning the details of the silhouette.
It was ... Wait, what!
A large bristleworm... a large greenish black bristleworm!
The leader? Is this the leader?
Such thought popped up in Ye Chong's mind, his heart raced, according to his observation, the greener the worm, the darker the green was, the higher in rank, probably. And now this worm was much more greener and darker than all other minions he had ever seen, so it must be!
Ye Chong carefully piloted Han Jia. He must retain his stealth, he must not alert the leader worm.
While he was speculating if he was too lucky, the next scene had proven his theory.
The bristleworms around were opening a way for this sludgy-colored bristleworm.
Then, Ye Chong saw one random dark green bristleworm crawled out of the wave and followed the leader which seemed to be purposely slowing down, allowing contact with the follower. Soon, they made contact, and they had merged!
As Ye Chong hovered his way, he spotted more and more worms joined the leader, as if a magnetic force pulling them.
In no time the greenish black worm had been enveloped by the minions.
A conglomeration!
The fact was starkly clear! It was the miniature conglomeration of the gigantic mess Ye family's fleet had cleared before.
That would mean... the worm must be the queen!
Ye Chong decided to make a move, right away! Or he would only miss the golden opportunity to assassinate the queen.
Han Jia accelerated and emerged right behind the moving chunk.
The tentacles of Han Jia turned alive and sprung up.
On Ye Chong's projection, he could perceive a tiny gap in between the lump of dark green bristleworms.
Without hesitation, Ye Chong's skeleton tentacle made a stab!
He got it!
Yes! It wor-
Before Ye Chong managed to celebrate, a strong force sent Han Jia far, faraway.
Ye Chong did not panic as he tried to regain control of Han Jia.
The worms on the queen began squirming frantically. The living sea of worms turned dead out of sudden.
...
... ...
The bristleworms around Han Jia started moving rapidly, all towards Han Jia they hopped and pounced!
Oh no...