Chapter 8: Hunting and Evolution
In the blood-colored sky, the originally majestic rain had begun to weaken, and the temperature in the air became more and more scorching, causing the water vapor that enveloped the entire mountain to gradually thin out.
The River Styx is slowly receding, revealing more eggs.
It's the month of birth, the time for the worms of the abyss. During this period of time, the abyssal worms of the endless abyss were able to devour each other freely and evolve without worrying about other demons.
The situation in this level is somewhat special, the River Styx spreads almost the entire level, and in this case, ordinary demons cannot survive. Styx water is a deadly substance for demons, because the most important property of Styx water is to purify the soul. Lower-level demons always rely on devouring and assimilating other souls to move up the ranks, which is also the main factor why lower-level demons are always capricious and irritable. Once the effects of the Styx water appear on demons, the result is a loss of strength and memory loss. Therefore, most of the Endless Abyss planes are always restrained by powerful demon lords who make the Styx flow within a certain range.
Like the plane where Zod is located, the Styx is so unbridled that it has swept through almost all areas of vision. It is quite rare, either this level has not yet given birth to a demon lord, or this level is too small and the environment is harsh, or both.
Either way, it's good news for Zode. This means that he won't encounter powerful demons anytime soon and will have plenty of time to improve himself.
Standing on top of a jutting rock, Zode carefully surveyed his surroundings.
As the River Styx receded, more and more mountains and earth were exposed to the water, and tens of thousands of abyssal eggs remained on them. The Abyssal Worms had evolved to be in sufficient numbers to form a terrifying tide of worms that rushed down the mountain. It's a feast. They are tireless, crazy and greedy. Evolution, evolution, and re-evolution are the only goals of their lives.
Zod noticed that a number of large Abyssal Worms had been born in the swarm, chasing the swarm, frantically devouring other weaker people around them. Just when Zod was obsessed with those mysterious otherworldly knowledge, the evolution of these worms had almost caught up with Zuod's.
What a terrifying evolutionary speed! Zuo De was a little frightened. Although the memory of Laosis gave Zod an infinite future, it was an endless abyss. Anyone who underestimates the existence here has a price. Even a demon as powerful as Laosis has not been resurrected for a hundred years, so you can know what kind of terrifying place this is.
Zuo De cheered up, stared at the growing number of insects under his feet, and told himself secretly.
The hunt is on!
It was a vast mountain that stretched for thousands of miles, and one after the other towering peaks emerged from the mad waters. These are pure stone mountains, nothing grows except stones, and there is no mess that has just surfaced. Instead, it left behind an innumerable ball of eggs. These eggs are scattered all over the mountains and can be found everywhere.
A strange insect that looked like a centipede but had a huge jaw quietly broke out of its cocoon. As soon as it was born, it pounced on the eggs around it, and its sharp jaws tore open the skin of the eggs, dragging out the unhatched larvae inside, and frantically biting and devouring them. Soon, the strange bug swelled at a speed visible to the naked eye. Then break open another egg and continue to devour.
When more insects hatched from the eggs, this strange insect had grown into a behemoth, it was more than ten times larger than other adults, the hideous upper jaw was like a pair of giant horns, under the thick insect beetle, dozens of pairs of body segments were covered with barbs, which looked extremely terrifying.
Like a mad train, this giant monster worm rampaged through the swarm, rolling all the bugs that came into contact with its body into its mouth, and its body was like a bottomless pit, devouring all the food it could get endlessly.
At this moment, there was a "buzzing" vibration sound in the air, and a black shadow jumped down on the head of the strange insect, and then with a click, the head of the strange insect cracked two huge wounds that were deep and bone-seeing, and the dark green insect blood sprayed everywhere like a waterfall.
The Black Shadow is also a strange bug, looking like some kind of praying mantis, its size is less than one-fifth the size of a giant monster, and the elytra are rapidly retracting on the streamlined shuttle body, protecting its flexible abdomen. Six powerful hind feet clasped the head of the big bug, and it had a pair of exaggerated crusts, which were like windmills to deal a devastating blow to the big bug's head.
The huge worm let out a terrible roar, and it suddenly stood up, more than thirty pairs of legs twisted into a ball, forming a dense fence, wrapping its head tightly with the terrible attacker, looking like a black ball full of spikes.
Time seemed to stand still, and then, with a violent wriggling of the black ball, there was a "click", and a large hole was opened in the sturdy insect beetle, and the mantis-shaped insect jumped out of it.
The black ball coiled by the long worm immediately seemed to be drained of its soul, and it suddenly dispersed, scattering into stiff limbs. Suddenly, the panicked insect swarm around them suddenly rushed over and pounced on the flesh of the dead giant insect and tore it.
"Careless, I didn't expect that the soul core of this rare worm was not in the head, but hidden in the body, and it was almost cut into two pieces by these sickle-like foot segments...... "The mantis-type insect is Zuode."
After meticulously studying all that Laosis knew about the Abyssal Worm, Zode decided on an evolutionary direction. That is to rely on plundering the soul core of the worm to obtain more innate abilities.
The Abyssal Worm is not a natural creature, but a manifestation of the soul fragments of all living beings in billions of planes, tainted by the will of the Abyss. In fact, the physical bodies of all living beings in the outer planes, except for the main physical plane, are appendages attached to the soul. To put it simply, it is the will that determines matter.
The soul is everything!, the demons always say. So the worms fight and devour, and the root of everything that evolves is to plunder the soul energy of other worms. The egg fluid inside the Abyssal Worm's eggs is the purest soul energy, which can provide the nascent larvae with a basic evolutionary step and will not pollute their souls. However, once they grow into adults, killing and devouring other worms, their souls will be infested by other souls. The more it devours, the more mixed the soul becomes. If all the soul impurities are not evolved out of the soul core within a certain period of time, the Abyss Worm will "bang" and self-destruct.
The soul core is also the main consciousness of the worms, and it is the key to whether they can transform into demons. Of course, even the demon's soul core is a rough core formed by fusing too many messy soul fragments. Therefore, exhaustion, irritability, cruelty and evil, changeable personality, and capriciousness are the norm for the middle and lower demons.
It is quite rare for someone like Zode to be born with a pure and complete soul. Because of this, he couldn't take the initiative to devour other worms, otherwise, it would cause the terrible consequences of contaminating his soul.
At this stage, there are not many abyssal worms that can form soul cores, and almost all of them are rare varieties with a level of 5 or above. This meant that Zod had to challenge these creatures of the same level of evolution or even higher than him, and take their soul cores to strengthen themselves.
Zuo De carefully observed the black crystal-like crystal caught in the claw, this was the soul core. On the main physical side, the soul cannot be seen or touched, but here is the abyss, and the soul is the heart of the body, which can be embodied.
Of course, the soul core is not for eating, in fact, the soul core of the worm stage has too many impurities, and direct devouring will also cause the contamination of the soul. Zode needs to carry out a special way to eliminate the excessive impurities attached to the core.