Sage of Humanity

Inside this carapace shard, there's actually a misty space.

The space isn't large, but within it countless strange patterns spread out, densely covering the entire space. They look like Formation lines, yet not quite.

In three corners sit three figures, all from the Insect Race!

Lu Ye only glanced briefly and knew these three insects were already dead.

They didn't seem to have any injuries, but their life force was indeed completely gone.

Lu Ye frowned slightly, somewhat unclear what exactly was going on. With a stir of his Mental Consciousness, he wrapped those three corpses and pulled them out of the carapace space.

He reached out and checked; these three corpses weren't completely cold yet, which meant they had only died not long ago.

Looking at it this way, these three insects likely died at the same time as that Insect Race cultivator he had just killed.

Drawing the Boulder Mountain Saber, he split open the bodies of the three insects. Very soon he extracted five Dao Bones from each, fifteen in total.

This undoubtedly showed that these three insects likewise had the strength of the 9th Dao.

The carapace shard was definitely a Dao artifact, and a very high-quality one at that. So why were Insect Race members inside? And why did they die together with that Insect Race cultivator he killed?

Some vague ideas surfaced in Lu Ye's mind.

If he wanted to verify them, he had to test it out.

Lu Ye raised his hand and condensed a Talent Tree Avatar, then tossed the carapace shard over.

The avatar caught it and, without the slightest hesitation, directly pressed the shard against its chest.

At the instant of contact, the carapace shard seemed to come alive. Thin tendrils suddenly extended from it, stabbing into the avatar's chest.

A sharp pain surged up, as if his heart were being gouged out, yet the avatar remained unmoved, only carefully sensing any possible changes in the shard.

Unexpectedly, not only did the shard show no change at all, it didn't bring any improvement to the avatar's strength.

Lu Ye blinked and faintly felt that the boost this Dao artifact provided to strength was directly tied to the cultivators housed within it.

Otherwise there'd be no reason for that Insect Race cultivator to store three 9th Dao clansmen inside the carapace.

If that's the case…

The avatar raised a hand and pulled the shard away from its chest. Blood instantly drenched the whole chest.

The main body took it, then pressed it against his own chest.

Based on the previous attempt, he could already confirm that the carapace itself posed no harm. Lu Ye naturally wasn't worried this would trigger anything bad.

Once the shard was affixed, Lu Ye moved his Mental Consciousness, wrapped the avatar, and stored it into the carapace space, placing it in one of the corners where the three insects had previously sat.

In the next moment, Lu Ye's brows lifted slightly.

Because now there was clearly a subtly different feeling. He immediately circulated his Dao force, and went straight to his own limit.

Previously, this truly was his limit, but right now he clearly felt that at the shard on his chest, another strand of power had been added, allowing him to wield more Dao force.

Yet this additional power… wasn't much, seemingly only the strength of a single Dao.

That didn't make sense.

That Insect Race 9th Dao cultivator, under the blessing of the Dao artifact, could exert nearly the power of the 20th Dao—an astonishing increase.

How did it become almost negligible on his side?

Thinking it over, Lu Ye felt there were only two possible reasons for this.

One was insufficient numbers. From what had happened before, the carapace shard needed to house three people to fully bring out the Dao artifact's might. On his side he only had one avatar and was short two people.

The other possible reason…

Was that the amount of Dao force he could already wield was too large, so the boost this Dao artifact could provide was limited.

In other words, he himself was too strong; this Dao artifact was useful for others, but not much use to him.

If it's the former, then there's a solution—just gather three people.

But if it's the latter…

A Dao artifact that could increase nearly ten Dao of power would still be of immense help to Lu Ye at his current stage. Though he'd just arrived in Banlan and didn't know much about Dao artifacts, he could still infer that an artifact of this quality probably wouldn't have many peers across the entire stellar space.

If he couldn't use it, that would be a real waste.

He still had to find a way to verify it.

Going out to capture a few cultivators from the Insect and Blood Races was clearly unrealistic; this required them to actively cooperate, and cultivators of the Insect and Blood Races definitely wouldn't cooperate with him.

For the moment, he had no good method.

He released the avatar from the carapace space and carefully checked. The shard embedded in his chest caused no discomfort, so Lu Ye simply left it alone.

Looking back now, that incident where he killed the Blood Race cultivator with the claw Dao artifact was definitely exposed; there must have been Insect Race spies nearby.

Because of this, the Insect Matriarch set her sights on him, leading to everything that followed. Otherwise, how could a completely obscure Enter the Path cultivator like him make the Insect Matriarch go to such lengths?

And with him killing that Insect Race cultivator and claiming the carapace Dao artifact, the Insect Matriarch would surely take him even more seriously.

Lu Ye let out a sigh.

He'd actually already been very cautious. In this stretch of time when he was killing members of the Insect Race, he never exposed too much of his strength, afraid that the brief images the insects saw before death would be sent back to the Insect Matriarch and arouse her suspicion.

But some things ultimately couldn't be avoided.

With things stirred up like this, he had to alter his appearance again, even hide away the Boulder Mountain Saber, so as not to let the Insect Matriarch notice anything off.

Compared to his own safety, these disguises were still very necessary. He was indeed far stronger than ordinary Enter the Path cultivators, but compared to Dao Fusion, he was still lacking.

This time the Insect Matriarch's mobilized army had failed in its encirclement, and even a carapace shard Dao artifact had been lost. Lu Ye was certain that if his whereabouts were exposed again, the Insect Race would definitely deploy a Dao Fusion cultivator.

He had to move carefully!

Recently, the entire war zone had become incredibly lively. Because the Insect and Blood Races had first mobilized their great armies, the human race and Giant Race side had also begun working closely together. Clashes and slaughter were far more frequent than before.

In such circumstances, with Lu Ye changing his appearance and acting cautiously, he still managed to reap some gains.

He no longer dared to expose too much of his strength, usually only acting with the power of the 12th Dao. That level of strength could also be considered elite, but at least it wasn't that eye‑catching.

Many times, Lu Ye clearly had the ability to completely annihilate an enemy squad, yet had no choice but to give up.

The speed of his advancement in strength suddenly dropped; it took a full two months to increase by only two Daos.

But compared to what he'd gained in the Star Abyss, it was still much better.

Blue Water Battle Planet, Governor's Residence.

"Still haven't found him?" Zi Ying asked.

The scout cultivator's face was full of shame. "No trace discovered."

For these two months, he'd been under orders to search for the whereabouts of that human race cultivator who had broken out of the encirclement by his own strength, but unfortunately he'd made no progress. Ever since that day, it was as if that man had completely vanished.

"My lord, could he already be dead?" he asked.

Zi Ying shook her head. "If he were truly dead, the Insect and Blood Races wouldn't be pressing us step by step like this. They're also searching for that person, but they've never found him."

"Then there's only one possibility left—he's hiding somewhere to heal his wounds," the scout cultivator speculated. With that level of encirclement two months ago, even if he forced his way out, he must have been seriously injured.

Once injured, of course he would need to heal.

Zi Ying remained silent. To this day she was still very curious about what exactly that human had done to provoke such a huge reaction from the enemy troops.

All these years, no Enter the Path cultivator had ever had that kind of ability.

Blood Cloud Battle Planet was the battle planet of the Insect and Blood Races.

The core of the battle planet was already riddled with scars, crisscrossed by countless passages leading in all directions, with figures of the Insect and Blood Races frequently moving through them.

The entire battle planet had clearly been transformed into an insect hive.

At this moment, a figure was traveling inside one of the passages. Wherever he passed, the cultivators of the Insect and Blood Races all bowed respectfully.

For no other reason than this: this was Fei Lian, the Blood Race Dao Fusion cultivator sitting in command over Blood Cloud Battle Planet. His status was equivalent to Zi Ying's on the Blue Water side.

He passed smoothly all the way, heading to the very core of the insect hive.

In the boundless miasma, a huge, bloated figure lay sprawling there like a mountain of flesh, with many insect bodies busily moving around that mound of meat.

The space was permeated with some indescribably foul stench.

Even though he'd been here countless times, Fei Lian's brows still creased slightly as he held his breath.

"Insect Matriarch," Fei Lian said softly.

"I know why you're here." A voice echoed out. It sounded seductively charming to the bone. Just from the voice alone, anyone would picture an irresistible, peerless beauty in their mind.

But the one speaking was that bloated, hideous mountain of flesh.

The Insect Matriarch of the insect hive, like Fei Lian, possessed Dao Fusion cultivation, and her cultivation faintly surpassed Fei Lian's by a small margin.

But because of the Matriarch's special nature, she could never leave the insect hive. All her life she could only be trapped here; her life was intimately bound to the hive itself.

"It's been two months, and we still have no trace of that human. Moreover… the giant ant must not be lost. You understand, it's not just a top‑tier Dao artifact—it concerns the exploration of the ruins, and even the future path of our two races!"

The Insect Matriarch fell silent for a moment before responding, "The previous deployment was my mistake. No one could have imagined that human would be so powerful, that even the most elite warriors of my Insect Race were no match for him."

"There's no point talking about that now," Fei Lian said calmly, his expression betraying no joy or anger. "The urgent matter is to seize the giant ant back."

"With the giant ant in human hands, it must already have been sent back to their home planet."

"No." Fei Lian shook his head. "Recently I've observed that the human side's reconnaissance camp has been extremely active, obviously searching for something. So the giant ant is very likely not yet returned to their home planet—that human is still hiding somewhere in the war zone."

The Insect Matriarch thought it through carefully and realized it was indeed so. It wasn't that she lacked intelligence, but there was simply too much she had to monitor, scattering her focus. You had to know that every insect spawned within this hive could serve as her eyes and ears; the information she probed each day was beyond counting.

"What do you plan to do?" the Matriarch asked.

"Force him to show himself!"

"Specifically?"

"Mobilize all our armies—and attack their planet!" A trace of viciousness surfaced on Fei Lian's face.

The Insect Matriarch pondered briefly before replying, "It's a good plan. But your strength is roughly on par with Zi Ying's. Even if that man is forced out, how can you guarantee you'll defeat Zi Ying and take back the giant ant?"

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