Chapter 112 Overt Scheme
Before dawn on May 1st, Qi An had just been relieved of his night watch and was dozing off for a while next to the most heavily guarded command tent when he suddenly woke up.
"The fallen insects have moved!" Qi An exclaimed as he got up.
Chen Yuezhou, who was just about to rest next door, woke up immediately upon hearing this and asked, "Is there a large-scale movement?"
"Yes, they're moving underground; a large number of them have already been moved!" Qi An said.
The two of them, both sporting large dark circles under their eyes, looked at each other for a moment before fully waking up.
The ground-penetrating radar and seismic wave detectors subsequently issued warnings, confirming that there was indeed significant activity underground.
Chen Yuezhou immediately contacted the mountain detachment.
I didn't receive a reply for quite a while.
A fully charged reconnaissance plane and a spy plane were immediately dispatched, and two team members with high speed enhancement values also rushed into the mountains to investigate the situation.
But five minutes later, Starlink communication was restored, and a message came from the other end:
Some insects have infiltrated the mountains in small groups, but some of them are wisdom insects.
They contaminated two members and seriously injured one of the patrol team members on the perimeter.
That squad of 30 insects has now been wiped out.
The thousands of queen insects in the original coal mining area were moving downwards at an extremely fast speed. In just over ten minutes, Qi An could sense that the front of that group had already exceeded the range of the queen nest by 1 kilometer.
However, the last team was still stuck at the edge of the mother nest.
They descend the escape tunnel extremely quickly, but their speed towards the exit is not fast.
Have the mother insects exhausted themselves and can't run anymore? That was the first thought in Qi An's mind.
But then the mountain team sent a second message:
[More squads of Fallen Insects have been discovered, and they are gathering; the estimated number is no less than 500!]
Qi An's heart sank, and he suddenly understood the intention of the group of fallen insects underground!
We're waiting for their reaction!
There are too many Fallen Insects gathered in the mountain battlefield. If they send most of their forces there, the Fallen Insects underground may have to turn back and break out from here.
If they don't move, the mountain squad will definitely be wiped out, and the cave entrance will be reopened by the 500 Fallen Insect Squad, allowing the underground Fallen Insects to escape from there!
Are there any more mimicry insects nearby? Qi An couldn't help but look around.
Even though she felt that her perception had improved since coming up from the mine, she still couldn't sense those gifted mimicry insects beyond a 1-kilometer radius around her.
This seems like a calculated scheme?
Qi An looked at Chen Yuezhou, whose sword-like eyebrows were tightly furrowed.
I wonder if this strategy came from that White Priest underground.
Although that insect was cunning and missed several opportunities to turn the tide, it was quite adept at laying the groundwork and setting up strategies.
While Qi An was pondering, Chen Yuezhou had already communicated with all parties several times.
The quality of Starlink and radio communications fluctuated wildly just minutes before, but has now stabilized again.
Under the worried gazes of several team leaders in the command tent, Chen Yuezhou gave the order to the mountain detachment:
[Retreat. If possible, find a safe hiding place and observe the situation in the mountains.]
Upon hearing this, Qi An breathed a sigh of relief, but several team leaders blurted out:
"retreat?"
Doesn't this make room for those corrupted insects in the mountains?
The underground worms ran wildly in that direction!
However, Chen Yuezhou's orders were absolute and he never retracted them.
"Gu Liansheng, Feng Xu, protect Doctor Qi as he leaves the nest to track the location of the underground insects. Be careful to stay hidden and safe! Do not get too close to that mountain!" Chen Yuezhou said.
Although Gu Liansheng and Feng Xu had their doubts, they accepted the order and left the tent with Qi An.
Since they weren't driving, when the topic of who would carry Qi An came up, the two exchanged a glance, as if sparks were about to fly!
However, Qi An chose Feng Xu because Feng Xu's previous injury was relatively minor and he recovered well. Moreover, after many days of fighting in the wild, everyone was covered in stench, but Feng Xu was still relatively clean, and his chin was the smoothest.
Feng Xu smiled and carried Qi An on his back, while Gu Liansheng snorted.
The three set off five minutes later, and Qi An's senses quickly picked up again—the underground worm army was indeed rushing toward the cave entrance in the mountains!
At the same time, she also vaguely sensed another large group of fallen insects, of unknown number, hiding on the west side of the mother nest, at a distance beyond her original perception range!
It was probably this team that was responsible for observing the movements of the mother nest.
They also chose to temporarily station themselves on the desolate western side where there were no supporting defenders.
If reinforcements are sent from the main base of the mother hive to the mountains, this wave of insects will immediately rush towards the mother hive, kill the ground guards, and help the underground mother insects escape!
This report was transmitted to the command tent in real time. Everyone looked at each other, but their mood became even more solemn!
It was still early morning, and the day's killings had not yet begun. Everyone was focused on the images of the mountains transmitted back by the reconnaissance plane.
The morning mist was thick, but visibility was clear. The mountain detachment had already withdrawn, abandoning their guard of the cave entrance.
The cave entrance and the entire valley were then filled with fallen insects.
The fallen insects dug and sealed the entrance to the hole, and set up defenses.
Qi An focused intently on his senses, and his voice rang out in the command tent in real time:
"The initial part of the underground insect swarm is still about 8 kilometers from the cave entrance..."
6 kilometers, 5 kilometers, we're almost in the mountains!
This actually took about half an hour, during which the mother insects didn't move that fast.
Therefore, during this period, the blockage at the cave entrance has been cleared, and the insects in the valley are quite skilled in combat, having already deployed defenses at the entrance to the mountain pass and along the southern ridgeline.
Several team leaders couldn't help but look at Chen Yuezhou, but after launching a combat drone, Chen Yuezhou continued to stare at the screen.
"The fallen insects have entered the mountains, and my senses will soon be lost," Qi An said a few minutes later.
She sensed that the entire underground team was moving faster. After several days of despair and darkness, they finally saw hope and unleashed a surge of survival potential.
However, just as everyone's hearts felt as if they were being crushed by a boulder, the beautiful, fish-scale-like sunrise on the horizon was suddenly cleaved open by a white ray of light!
The white light was so fast that, if it weren't for the trail it left behind that disturbed the clouds, anyone staring at the sky would have thought it was an illusion.
Many of the fallen insects thought it was a hallucination and were stunned for a moment, their eyes on their tentacles turning blankly upwards.
Then something crashed down with a loud bang!
All the fallen insects were startled and hurriedly looked towards the place where the sound came from.
It's on the hillside where the secret exit cave is located!
However, the crash was quite powerful, and only a small hole appeared that was barely noticeable unless you looked closely.
The tiny opening emitted a continuous tremor that sent shivers emanating outwards... and so on...
Then, as if punched by an unseen giant, a mountain suddenly shook violently!
The entire mountain range shook violently. Yu Shuang and the others, who had not yet completely evacuated the southern slope, felt the tremor. Qi An and the other two, who had not yet approached the mountainous area, also felt the tremor.
The group of lurking insects in the west that were about to abandon their mother nest and join the insects in the mountains all felt the tremor!
That tiny bunker-buster missile completed its final detonation inside the mountain, above the tunnel.
The tunnel formed by the fissure in the mountain contracted violently like a collapsed trachea, and then suddenly expanded!
Countless boulders were ejected outwards by the shockwave. The fallen insects, who had just finished clearing the cave entrance and were about to go into the cave to meet the mother insect, were swept away by that wave, that smoke, and that rubble, their flesh and blood falling into mud!
The hilltop collapsed downwards, burying the tunnel that carried the light of hope completely, so completely that it could never be dug up again!
The vanguard of the underground worm army had already entered the mountains; at this point, they were nothing more than a pile of flesh and blood.
The middle section was also heavily damaged by the transmitted shockwave. Only a few hundred insects in the rear section escaped the calamity. After trembling for a while, they screamed and ran away!
Endless darkness, darkness in front and behind, it seemed there was no way to escape!
Chen Yuezhou turned his gaze from the now-black screen of the reconnaissance aircraft and addressed the stunned team leaders:
"This time, the command was determined and approved a lot of heavy weapons." He repeated the words he had used to comfort everyone.
But this is more than just a consolation.
In a small battlefield with less than 1,000 insects, it's impossible to deploy an extra tactical missile. However, the command center already has a prepared bunker-buster missile for the mother hive.
This was because the contamination in the mother nest was too severe, and even after the war, it would still be too dangerous to send people down into the well.
So this small bunker-buster missile was reserved for the final moment to completely wipe out the mother nest.
However, they had already gone down into the well before and had inflicted almost annihilation damage on the underground Fallen Insect Guardians in several battles.
This missile could be used to blast mountains!
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