Wizard: I Can Refine Everything

Chapter 127: Chapter 27: The Underworld (Part 2)

Slimu was a planting insect from the Aisen Worm Nest.

From the moment he was born, he had always lived in this dark, damp cave system.

He grew up eating moss, sang among giant mushrooms, ran through tunnels, and swam in underground pools—living an incredibly free life.

Occasionally, he would fantasize about the world outside the nest, but according to the Priest Insects, beyond the nest was an endless expanse of yellow sand, yet there also lay a dazzling starry sky.

Slimu had always wanted to see what the real starry sky looked like.

Perhaps it was even more beautiful than the Star Mushrooms that dotted the glowing moss.

...

More than a month ago, a Priest Insect he knew had left the Underground Insect Nest.

The Priest Insect said, the Mother Worm God had decreed an oracle, instructing all insects of the Insect Country to go to the surface to confront the extraterrestrial enemies.

Slimu had seen the abilities of the Priest Insects—flames, thunder, and brilliant starlight that could easily kill the most terrifying Demon Spiders underground.

Before such mighty powers, Slimu believed it would definitely be a one-sided war.

In the near future, he would hear the Priest Insect tell of the enemies he saw on the surface, boast of his great deeds, and the dazzling starry sky.

But a month ago, Slimu suddenly felt a wave of sadness.

That sadness nearly overwhelmed his cognitive organs, rendering him immobile for several days, unable to even budge toward his favorite mushrooms.

Slimu didn’t know what the sadness meant, but after it faded, he resumed his daily work.

Every insect of the Black Crystal Worm Clan had their responsibilities, and as a planting insect, Slimu’s task was to cultivate. Billions of insects consumed vast amounts of food daily, most of which were fungi cultivated by the planting insects.

Slimu never felt his role was lowly; the notion of lowliness didn’t exist in the entire Black Crystal Worm Clan.

They all came from the same Mother Worm; whatever they did was merely a distribution by the Mother Worm.

Today, Slimu was cultivating fungi in the cave as usual.

The black soil of the Earth Cave contained moisture and minute fungi, which Slimu killed by spitting his slightly acidic saliva into the soil.

Then, he took out some white fungal spores from his carapace and threw them into the cleaned soil.

This was his favorite type of fungus, called the Warrior Fungus, generally reserved for Warrior Worms, but as a planting insect, he occasionally got to taste it too.

The taste of the fungus was quite good; each time he ate it, he felt much stronger.

One spore, two spores, three spores…

Soon, he had planted the entire cave,

but just when he was about to move to the next cave to continue his work, a faint sound traveled through his limbs into his auditory organs.

Something was approaching; the footsteps were very heavy, utterly different from those of Black Crystal Worms.

Moreover, the owner of these footsteps was rapidly nearing the cave he was in.

“Could it be the surface enemies have burrowed down here?”

A flicker of panic crossed Slimu’s mind.

As a planting insect, his body wasn’t designed for combat; in times of danger, they always hid behind Priest Insects and Warrior Worms.

“Hide!”

Slimu made a swift decision.

He quickly ran to the edge of the cave, furiously dug a hole with his forelimbs, burying most of his body, leaving only parts on the surface, which he covered with handfuls of mossy mud.

Blending with his natural camouflage, Slimu was nearly one with the environment.

Bang!

Three strange creatures entered the cave.

These creatures were short, wearing silk garments only Priest Insects would wear, and to Slimu’s astonishment, these creatures had no carapace; their tender flesh was exposed directly to the outside.

“Aren’t they afraid of being attacked?” Slimu thought.

Soon, Slimu got a good look at the faces of the three creatures.

What terrifying faces they had.

Their heads were large, but their eyes were pitifully small—what could such tiny eyes see? In the Insect Nest, creatures either had no eyes or very large ones. Moreover, they had no antennae on their heads, only something resembling fluffy stuff—were those degenerated tentacles? What could such tiny tentacles do? It seemed rather foolish to use such tiny tentacles to hear sounds.

After watching for a while, Slimu thought these creatures were truly ugly, even the ugliest insect in the nest looked a hundred times better.

Their voices traveled through the ground to his limbs, and then into Slimu’s auditory organs.

It seemed they were discussing something.

Then, the group of creatures began digging up the fungal spores he had just planted, and one even tasted it by throwing it into what seemed like a mouth.

Good heavens, these creatures seemed to eat anything.

Slimu quietly watched from a corner. Although he had a very low opinion of these few creatures, their strength made him dare not make a single move.

These creatures emanated an aura only seen in battles involving Priest Insects.

Slimu watched as one of the creatures dug up the fungus he had just planted; each time one was dug up, his heart ached.

What a great variety of fungus, if it continues to grow, there will definitely be a bumper harvest.

But before Slay could grieve any longer, Richard arrived in front of him, having dug out all the fungus, and pulled it out of the ground in one go.

The group had discovered it immediately upon entering, using their spiritual power.

“What is this type of insect called again? A planting insect?”

“Let me see…this is a planting insect.”

Richard looked at the planting insect in his hands, over a meter long and constantly struggling, feeling somewhat surprised.

He had tasted some of the fungus earlier and discovered a life-active material inside that, if consumed regularly, could promote physical development and accelerate evolution.

Now that he had found the insect that could cultivate them, he might be able to grow this fungus himself in the future.

“How is the Slave Seal used again…”

Richard held the Slave Seal distributed by the command headquarters, which was engraved with the Soul School’s slave mark spell on the inside. This spell, developed by the Stockholm Great Wizard, was designed for creatures below Level 1 Creatures. Once marked with the slave mark, the enslaved creature would naturally obey the Wizard’s commands.

Therefore, whatever Great Wizard went on a plane expedition, this Magic Equipment would be distributed in large quantities to capture low-level alien slaves.

Richard infused Magic Power into the Seal and then stamped it onto the body of the planting insect. The next moment, Slay’s thinking organs felt dizzy, and the creatures in front of him no longer seemed repulsive to him.

“What have they done to me?” Slay thought in fear.

Richard loosened his grip, took out a Warrior Fungus spore, and communicated with Slay using spiritual power.

“Alien, tell me how many more of these seeds you have.”

“Alien?” Slay could clearly feel the discrimination in the term. It wanted to question, to curse, but the words turned into answers to the question.

“I still have one bag of Warrior Fungus seeds.”

“Where are they kept?”

“In…in…”

Slay instinctively resisted giving the answer because it would lead these creatures to their settlement, but the more it resisted, the more painful its body felt.

This pain did not come from the body but from the soul.

Due to the effect of the slave mark, Slay was essentially split into two personalities: Alien Slave Slay and Black Crystal Worm Clan Slay.

They struggled for control of the body in Slay’s thinking organs, like two wild beasts tearing at each other.

Finally… Alien Slave Slay won, or rather, the Alien Slave won.

Black Crystal Worm Clan Slay had already turned into a remnant of the spirit— even if the slave mark were removed, it could not return.

“They are in our settlement.”

Richard nodded in satisfaction, pleased with the effect of the slave mark. Seeing the pain Slay was in, he had been ready to deal with this insect.

“Good, lead us there.”

“Yes… Master.”

…

The environment of the Underground Insect Nest became progressively warmer and more humid as they descended, resembling a volcanic hot spring.

While heading towards the Black Crystal Worm Clan’s settlement, Richard passed several caves cultivated by the Black Crystal Worm Clan and encountered many planting insects.

All these planting insects became Richard’s slaves.

Due to the vast number of planting insects, their value in the Black Tower Great Wizard’s market was merely a Magic Stone each—neither Ali nor Lawrence cared much for such a small amount of Magic Stones.

In these caves, Richard encountered many peculiar creatures and collected many biological specimens.

As a Wizard, being curious about the world is an essential quality.

Among these, a fungus called Sacrificial Fungus, cultivated by the planting insects, surprised the three Wizards greatly.

As the exclusive food for Sacrificial Insects, this fungus had the effects of stimulating spiritual power growth and healing soul injuries—although these effects were very weak, they were still enough to surprise the Wizards, especially Richard.

Ulysses’ soul injuries required a large amount of Soul Crystals for recovery, and since Soul Crystals were quite expensive, using this fungus to heal Ulysses’ injuries undoubtedly saved Richard a considerable amount of Magic Stones.

Following the tunnel, the three Wizards soon reached the Black Crystal Worm settlement that Slay had mentioned.

This settlement was located in a large cave. The floor of the cave was covered with huge blue glowing fungi, under which there was a layer of glowing moss resembling velvet. The Black Crystal Worm Clan moved among the giant fungi, their limbs brushing against the moss creating subtle frictions, and occasionally, they emitted deep, rumbling calls.

The entire cave looked misty and eerie.

Lawrence waved his Magic Wand, and a pitch-black bat emerged from his shadow.

This was a shadow creature contracted from the Shadow Plane by Lawrence, whose ability to hide in shadows was well-suited for ambushes.

The Shadow Bat turned into a shadow and entered the settlement, returning to Lawrence’s shadow shortly after.

“No Warrior Worms, no Sacrificial Insects,” Lawrence relayed the message brought by the bat.

“None? Looks like we’re in luck,” Richard said, somewhat surprised.

With the Black Crystal Worm Clan’s retreat, quite a few insects had entered the Insect Nest and fought guerrilla warfare against the Wizards, but the nest was so vast that definitely there were areas untouched by these defeated troops. @@novelbin@@

Encountering these places was no different from picking up money on the ground.

“But the Shadow Bat also brought back a strange message…” Lawrence hesitated, “It said there are a few odd things among this group of insects.”