The Great Worm Lich

After Annette and Alice dug out a shallow pit in the volcanic ground, they placed the iron plates into the pit and compacted them.

Zhang Lisheng, who was sitting cross-legged by the side, continuously dug out wasp pupa from the hive he bought and placed it in his mouth. Chewing on each pupa he dug out, he could feel that his energy was gradually recovering with each passing minute. Breathing a sigh of relief in secret, he watched the two of them placing the meat on the iron plates before asking curiously, “Can the meat be cooked by just digging a hole and placing iron plates on it?”

“Of course! After you’ve dug out the uppermost insulating layer of volcanic ash, the bottom is very hot.” As Alice replied to Zhang Lisheng’s question, the meat on the iron plates sizzled faintly.

An alluring meaty smell began to fill the air, prompting Zhang Lisheng to sniff. “This smell is amazing.” His finger inadvertently broke a hole on the cracks on the hive. With just a bit more force, he actually dug out a large hole in the hive.

The young man was stunned for a moment before taking out his finger from the hive carelessly. To his surprise, a thick worm, that was as long as an adult human’s outstretched palm with a thickness of three fingers, fell out of the hole from the hive without warning.

The worm had a bean-sized wasp’s head that was not in proportion with its body. The fat body that was full of wrinkles had four wings that already shriveled a long time ago

After it fell, it weakly squirmed as it was the verge of death before staying still right away.

Zhang Lisheng was stunned for a moment. Silently, he picked up the worm and found out that it was a queen bee.

The so-called queen bee was transformed from the first worker bee that was hatched in the queen comb. After its birth, it was fed by all of the worker bees in the nest. Other than spawning, it had no other purpose in life.

The method the natives used to pick the hive was to first seal the entire hive with wet mud. By the time the mud dried up, the worker and soldier bees would naturally get suffocated to death. Before they died, it was obvious that the queen bee who was six to seven times larger than an ordinary bee and consumed more oxygen would die first.

The young man pinched the soft body of the worm and a light flashed across his eyes. Lowering his head, he muttered, “The queen of the wasp hive. I can’t believe that the vendor was actually telling the truth. There is indeed a living queen bee in this hive. A queen bee who is even more tenacious than the Island Dragon that I first obtained…”

Then, he strenuously lifted his backpack up and placed it between his knees to block his chest. As he placed the queen bee carefully into the bag, he pretended to flip his backpack as he cast the “assimilate” spell with his thoughts.

Unknowingly, several minutes went by. Now that the meat was cooked, Alice ate a few pieces and felt that her stomach was no longer as hungry when compared to before. Accidentally, she saw Zhang Lisheng burying his head into his backpack as if he was looking for something so she blurted out, “What are you looking for? We only carried a pack of meat each…”

When she mentioned the word “each”, she suddenly thought of her friends who had died so she did not continue her sentence any longer.

Zhang Lisheng cursed Alice in his heart for being so nosy as he jogged his mind to give a decent answer. “I remember that l have a bottle of nuts my mum prepared in the back of my backpack but I can’t find it…”

Annette, who was silently stuffing the cooked meat into his mouth, heard the young man’s words and chimed in loudly, “Can’t find your nuts? I’ll help you look for them later.”

“Be my guest since I can’t find it anyway. If you’re interested, you can try and look for it…” Finally finished casting the last “transform” spell, Zhang Lisheng raised his head that was pale yet had a faintly excited expression as he placed his backpack on the ground.

Before one became a Rank-6 Wizard, other than the quality of the spell obtained during a breakthrough, the powerfulness of a wizard was basically decided by the quality of the wizard gus he refined.

Now that he had obtained a powerful new ace, the young man, who consciously felt that he had changed the situation completely around to some extent, raised his head to look at the vast universe before secretly starting to increase his wizard power using the negative emotions produced by the archer when he was swallowed by the Island Dragon before his death. He was thinking of how confident he was on making a breakthrough to Rank-6 Wizard and undergo a transformation if he could kill all of the spies here.

As he was caught in a daze while thinking about it, the starry sky in front suddenly changed into an unkempt woman’s face with a bitter smile. “What are you thinking about? Our situation is already so terrible and you can still smile? Looks like a successful person who can earn 100 million dollars a year is completely different from ordinary people like us.”

The young man was dumbfounded. Suddenly snapping back to reality, he knew that his joy came in quick succession, to think that he was absent-minded just now. Patting his face, he sat up. “Miss Ashley, aren’t you also smiling right now?”

“This is a wry smile. I first thought that if I grasped the chance now that I’ve come across such a rich person like you, I wouldn’t be far away from success but who knew that in the end, it would turn out to be like this…”

“Don’t worry. The fact that those madmen have not killed us yet is enough to prove that we’re still very useful in their eyes. We’ll be alright!”

“We may be useful now but how about later? Now that we’re in their hands, we may die at any time! Damn it! I’m not a bad woman! I just wanted to succeed and use my beauty to obtain a good life for myself. Isn’t it the same with all those female artists and supermodels?! Why? Just why am I so unlucky?!” As Ashley began to talk, her emotions began to get somewhat out of control.

“Oh, sh*t! W-What the hell is this?! A vibrator?” Suddenly, Annette, who finished eating the barbecued meat and began to ransack Zhang Lisheng’s backpack for nuts without informing Zhang Lisheng, pulled out his hand from the backpack with all his might, before stamping his feet and shouting.

“Of course not.” Zhang Lisheng stood up and walked up to Annette. Crouching down, he took out an ugly wasp doll with a twisted body that was a foot long before shaking it. “This is my lucky token. Bee… Kyuuko. I always carry it with me. You must have been stabbed by its tail. This is a model made from imitation materials. It’s best to be careful when you hold it.”

“Fucking realistic model! Stab me huh? You actually stabbed me? I’ll let you have a taste…” The unbearable pain made Annette explode in the end. He snatched the wasp model from the young man’s hand before throwing it on the ground and stamping on it. After stamping on it to vent his emotions, he slumped on the ground as he was exhausted with despair before starting to burst into tears.

On the other campfire in the distance, looking at the three of the four preys who started to get a mental breakdown gradually as time went by, Altman suddenly stood up and walked towards this campfire under the guard of the two soldiers together with Kamil.

When the old man came to stand beside the campfire, his comical hairstyle appeared to be dark and lit indefinitely under the illumination of the flickering flame. “Kamil, tell your friends that they’re safe as long as they do as we say. Mr. Zhang Lisheng, we’re running out of time so I’d like to have a sincere and honest talk with you.”

“Sage Altman, I’d advise them properly.” Upon hearing Altman’s instruction, Kamil looked at Zhang Lisheng with a strange look before nodding his head and crouching down beside Annette.

Zhang Lisheng swallowed his saliva and asked nervously, “Sage A-Altman, what do you want to talk to me about?”

Altman smiled and suddenly reached out a hand to pat his shoulder. Like having a daily conversation, he said, “Come on, kid. Let us walk around while we talk. I think you must have learned about our origins from your friend right?”

“Yes, Sage Altman. It’s a bizarre story indeed.” Zhang Lisheng slowly walked beside the old man.

“It’s not a story but the reality. The reason we came to your world is not to kill nor to declare war. instead, we just want to protect ourselves and stop our homeland from being invaded and eventually perish…”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Sage Altman.”

“Kid, not only should you feel sorry, but you should also stand on the side of justice and help us as well.”

“H-Help you? O-Of course, as long as it’s within my ability. O-Of course…”

“Don’t say such insincere words. I understand very well just how much influence a person who earns 100 million annually can exert on this world.” Altman opened his hands that was holding a book and Zhang Lisheng was surprised to see a tablet stacked on the book.

“S-Sage Altman. W-Where did you get this thing?”

“A few friends of yours were carrying these with them. Kamil taught me how to use it and I must admit that the degree of openness of your world on knowledge and information are indeed amazing. Perhaps this is also the reason why you can force us to such a desperate situation despite possessing such a terribly frail body.”

“Oh! Then this means that this tablet is connected to the Internet too. I can’t believe that such a place would actually have a wireless network coverage too. If that’s the case, you can just post on the Internet and reveal the existence of your world and condemn the US army’s invasion against your world…”

“Nobody would believe in such a post! Doing so will only attract the attention of the US government. They will definitely send an army equipped with the most advanced weapons and annihilate all of us including all of you as well.” Altman pointed at all of the spies from the supernatural realm before pointing at Zhang Lisheng, Alice and the other three as he whispered.

“Oh, sh*t! This is indeed the biggest possibility…” Zhang Lisheng was dumbstruck for a moment before a realization dawned upon him.

“For this reason, we’re on the same boat now. Helping us is equal to helping yourself. As gratitude, we won’t let you help for free.”

“Won’t let me help for free?” A wry smile that resigned himself to destiny appeared on Zhang Lisheng’s face. “I’ll already be very grateful if you can spare me my life.”

“Oh, kid! You look down on us too much! Don’t think that we don’t have what you need. Our world is indeed not as advanced as yours in general but you can also see that when it comes to individual power, we’re far stronger than you. Just take Casdia as an example, he has a strength that exceeds the limit of the human body. Julinas, on the other hand, has a mysterious profound sorcery power. And I, have a long life span that allows me to live for 157 years already. We can give all of these to you…”

“A-Are you kidding? Sage Altman?” Zhang Lisheng, who was accompanying the old man as they slowly walked around the fire, froze in place. Coming to a halt right away, he asked dryly.