Cultivating in the Wizard World-Chapter 325 - 291: The Nest and the New Expedition
The series of test results for the "Patroller" left Jeming very satisfied.
This "living missile" that pursues speed and one-time destruction perfectly fills the gap in his air assault and rapid strike capabilities.
Next, according to the planned schedule, he turned his attention to another area urgently needing completion—the cannon fodder unit for sea warfare.
However, compared to the relatively smooth development of aerial combat units, the design and implementation process for sea warfare cannon fodder proved exceptionally challenging.
In the end, it even took Jeming a full fifty years to produce the final version.
At this moment, crawling in the specially designed giant ecological cultivation tank in the laboratory, there lay a massive entity that almost occupied the entire room space, slowly wriggling.
Its entire body exhibits a deep black color, with a texture resembling viscous crude oil.
Overall, it looks like some kind of giant slime, without a fixed shape, merely rising and flowing unconsciously there.
Jeming, holding a high-precision biological detector in one hand while activating the All-Purpose Eye with the other, double-checked this behemoth for the final index scan.
The data stream jumping on the screen was stable and strong, with each parameter detected by the All-Purpose Eye reaching or even exceeding his expected design values.
He slowly put down the instrument, closed the witchcraft, and let out a long breath, revealing a complex expression of relief and accomplishment on his face.
"Finally... it’s completed."
In fact, the initial concept of developing a sea warfare cannon fodder wasn’t particularly difficult.
But the problem was that, after completing the Patroller by the book, Jeming’s research heart, which pursued perfection and extremity, kept "itching" throughout the process.
Various novel ideas and function stacks emerged one after another, leading to repeated changes in the design goals.
What was born, in the end, had already transcended the scope of "cannon fodder" and evolved into this creature before him, which could be called a monster.
Strictly speaking, this thing no longer could be called a singular cannon fodder unit.
But rather a comprehensive ocean combat platform integrating survival, defense, attack, and production!
Its basic form is this seemingly clumsy black slime-like body.
Its combat style is flexible and bizarre, capable of separating part of its body to simulate various aquatic creatures for attacks or harassment.
When facing powerful enemies, it can quickly aggregate its dispersed body, causing its size to expand dramatically.
Turning into a mountain-like giant, launching powerful physical crush or energy impact.
Besides purely physical attacks, this thing’s offensive and defensive means are relatively straightforward, relying mainly on its internal Energy Core to launch energy cannons of various attributes and support a robust Energy Shield.
But the truly terrifying aspect of this creation, which Jeming continuously modified, lies in two points.
Firstly, its incredibly exaggerated efficiency of resource conversion and energy absorption.
The material scarcity of the Aerial Plane led to organisms within it evolving extreme survival abilities in a barren environment.
Jeming merged several highly representative biological decomposition abilities, allowing this "slime" to hugely digest all organic materials it comes into contact with.
Whether it’s algae, fish, or even enemy unit corpses... it can efficiently convert them within its body into nutrient-rich biogel, used for self-maintenance, growth, or as an "ammunition" reserve.
At the same time, it inherited the energy absorption system of the Black Giant, able to continuously draw thermal energy from the surrounding environment, converting it into its own energy.
That profound blackness is an external manifestation of its efficient absorption of all spectrum energy.
The second and most prideful design of Jeming is the built-in biological incubation platform.
Inspired by the Magma Giant’s Incubation Pool, this creature’s interior was modified into a mini high-efficiency incubation chamber.
It can inject its collected energy and biogel into the incubation chamber, serving as a rapid frontline hatching nest for the "Patroller"!
This means that on the ocean battlefield, the "Hive" itself is a mobile "living missile" production base.
It can continuously produce Patrollers for air support or underwater attacks.
Though the Patroller’s speed significantly decreases underwater, its combat power remains formidable.
More brilliantly, this incubation platform can even temporarily act as an "emergency station," providing urgent energy to retrieve the Black Giant Core after self-detonation, accelerating its body reconstruction!
Jeming’s mind actually holds more wild ideas, such as integrating reconnaissance units or adding space jump capabilities.
Unfortunately, limited by the internal space volume and his own knowledge limitations, he could only stop regrettably at the current "semi-finished product."
"The code name of this thing... let’s call it the ’Hive’!" Jeming casually decided on its name.
He instructed the laboratory’s automated humanoids to begin supplying a large amount of basic biomatter and pure energy to this newborn "Hive" for its initial growth and stabilization.
After completing all these tasks, Jeming sat back in his familiar work chair, leaning back, and for a long-missed moment, let his mind drift and empty.
He was acutely aware that at this stage, the qualitative upgrades he could achieve in his direct combat power and the composition of his corps had basically reached the limit under the current level of resources and knowledge.
The Black Giant Legion, the Patroller Air Force, and the "Nest" Navy, the triad of land, sea, and air cannon fodder systems had already initially taken shape.
Magical Treasures, Talisman Witchcraft, and various witchcrafts had also been updated.
What remained was nothing more than relying on time to accumulate quantities and conducting some optimization and refinement of details.
This meant that for at least the next fifty years, although he still had a vast amount to learn, experiment, and research, his overall combat power level would not have another transformative leap.
So he was momentarily bewildered, subconsciously calculating various tactical combinations, corps ratios, and fine-tuning his own combat style in his mind.
After some time, a deep sense of fatigue overwhelmed him.
Jeming did not resist, allowing himself to sink into a sleep that required no meditation or thought, a sleep of pure rest.
Sometimes, rest is also a part of cultivation.
When the next day arrived, and Elorcia Plane’s dim "sun" rose as usual, Jeming had already recovered his usual calm and focus, and returned to his regular research life.
In the next fifty years, Jeming began systematically stepping down from various positions at Nolun No.147 Academy.
He communicated with Dean Avery Knight, explaining that he would soon face a compulsory expedition and needed to prepare and transition in advance.
The Dean understood this.
Soon, a wizard from the Logistics Element of Alchemy, who had just rotated down from other Plane Battlefields, was arranged to take over Jeming’s work.
The handover process was exceptionally simple—after all, the Alchemy School still had no new apprentices.
The main work involved routine checks and maintenance on life-saving equipment and monitoring systems during the graduation trials held every five years, and occasionally refining some low-tier witchcraft artifacts or potions for other students in the academy.
These tasks were easily manageable for another experienced Alchemy Wizard.
Thus, while maintaining his own cultivation and research, Jeming smoothly completed the handover of responsibilities, and spent the last fifty years before the forced expedition in calmness.
When the time limit finally arrived, Jeming once again came to that familiar yet strange place—the gathering boundary point of the Wizard Civilization Expeditionary Army, through the cross-plane teleportation array.
This time, his luck seemed to be good.
Having just completed the registration, he happened to catch a large-scale expeditionary army gathering.
After registering, he flew straight to the designated assembly square.
However, when he saw the scene in the square, even with Jeming’s composure, he couldn’t help but gasp.
As far as the eye could see, the entire enormous square was densely filled with the figures of wizards!
Various colors of wizard robes, bizarre magic accessories, contracted magical pets of different sizes, and warframes suspended in the air... together they formed a vast ocean of people and energy glows that stretched beyond sight.
Jeming roughly scanned with his spiritual power and was shocked — the number of wizards gathered here had probably exceeded a million!
This number was simply staggering!
Under normal circumstances, a medium-scale plane expedition would mobilize around a hundred thousand wizards.
Even for the tough bones that require siege in a powerful plane, the scale rarely exceeded two to three hundred thousand.
Yet now, with this scene of a million wizards gathered... Jeming’s heart couldn’t help but sink.
This was by no means an ordinary expedition; the Nolun Workshop must have significant ambitions this time, and what they were about to face was likely an unimaginably difficult battle situation.
He silently found a relatively less crowded corner on the edge to land, quietly perked his ears, and tried to gather some intelligence from the conversations of the surrounding wizards.
"... Isn’t this too grand? I’ve been through five expeditions and never seen so many people!"
"I can only say the target plane must be very special, but until now, no information has come out."
"However, for such a challenging enemy, both military merits and resources should be quite substantial."
"... Before that, it’s better to consider if we can survive first."
However, the surrounding wizards also seemed to know little about the details.
But the heavy yet slightly frenzied atmosphere in the air clearly conveyed a common understanding: for an expedition that mobilizes such a massive wizard force, what lies ahead is sure to be an unprecedented hard battle!
To increase the chances of survival in the upcoming brutal war, many temporary small group recruitment points had spontaneously formed on the square.
Many wizards loudly announced their expertise in certain witchcraft areas and the aspects they were not skilled in, seeking companions who could complement them, preparing to sign temporary combat agreements and form squads to jointly tackle the unknown dangers.
