Heavenly Dao Engine
Chapter 432 - 432 0307 Locust Thief Bee

Chapter 432: Chapter 0307: Locust Thief Bee Chapter 432: Chapter 0307: Locust Thief Bee Chapter 0307 Locust Thief Bees

After uncovering this vein of spiritual stones, Qi Tian used the Heavenly Dao Engine to conduct a detailed Spirit Qi detection throughout the vein. In the end, it was discovered that this vein of spiritual stones was rather average. When converted into middle-grade spirit stones, there were not even three thousand pieces. Qi Tian worked his mining shovel and began to excavate at the fastest speed. He roughly extracted all of the spirit stones in less than half a day and stored them in the storage room of the Heavenly Dao Engine. Then, he broke through the earth’s surface and continued on his journey.

Qi Tian was truly surprised that he could find a small vein of spiritual stones shortly after entering this secret realm. This gave him a pretty intuitive understanding of the reserves of spirit stones in the realm. He suddenly understood why it was so dangerous here, and yet, the major forces in Wanjie City were still considering hiring a large number of laborers. Even if it meant sharing some of the profits, they wanted to continue exploiting this place. The benefits here were too generous. Even if they gave up a portion, they could still gain a lot.

In the blink of an eye, half a month had passed since Qi Tian entered the secret realm. He had found two more small veins of spiritual stones. Without any hesitation, he completely excavated these two small veins. Considering the amount of spirit stones he converted into middle-grade spirit stones, the total had already exceeded 10,000 pieces.

The two things Qi Tian was most worried about were encountering local cultivators or beasts in the secret realm, and bumping into other cultivators from Wanjie City. However, in the past half of a month, neither of these had occurred. Qi Tian’s process of exploring and extracting the spirit stone veins had been exceptionally smooth, without any twists and turns.

This made Qi Tian feel very unreal.Before he came, the dangers in the secret realm had been repeatedly emphasized by the Wanjie Commerce and the direct exploration teams they dispatched often met with complete annihilation. He saw no reason why everything would be smooth sailing when it was his turn.

Qi Tian secretly heightened his vigilance. On the surface, he continued to search for more veins of spiritual stones at a steady pace. During this period, he had left the vast grassland spanning thousands of miles. After crossing a mountain range, he arrived at a large plain. Here, just like when he was on the grassland, Qi Tian didn’t encounter any natives, which made him feel that things were somewhat unusual and extraordinary.

With the help of the Heavenly Dao Engine, Qi Tian found another small vein of spiritual stones. He dug another tunnel towards the vein, but this time he did not excavate the entire vein. Instead, he retreated from it without blocking the tunnel, essentially providing the local creatures of the secret realm with a ready-made spiritual stone vein for free. He wanted to see what exactly had happened in this secret realm and why there were such abnormal circumstances. Until he figured out the reason, Qi Tian felt uneasy.

After exiting the tunnel, Qi Tian hid himself. Not far from the site, he set up an Array to conceal his presence. Then, he hid within the Array and observed the movements around the spiritual stone vein from a distance.

At first, Qi Tian didn’t see anything and could only wait patiently. As time passed moment by moment and darkness fell, Qi Tian’s heart started throbbing as if something terrifying was about to happen.

Soon, Qi Tian heard a buzzing sound. The noise was very chaotic and loud. Qi Tian’s heart stirred, and he quickly glanced towards the source of the sound. What he saw made his heart leap into his throat.

Under the cover of darkness, a black cloud was rapidly converging in Qi Tian’s direction. Listening to the buzz coming from it, Qi Tian had no choice but to take a closer look. When he squinted his eyes, he realized that the cloud wasn’t a cloud at all but consisted of small insects, similar to bees. These insects were large with each one as big as an adult’s thumb. Their bodies were golden, and their mouthparts were like two steel knives. Their tail needles were thick and long like bamboo skewers, emitting a cold glint that looked far from ordinary.

Qi Tian didn’t know that these were Locust Thief Bees, one of the most dangerous pests in this secret realm. These gregarious insects would consume anything that contained Spirit Qi. Similar to locusts, wherever they passed, it would be like a disaster had struck. Everything containing spirit Qi, whether it was inanimate objects or living beings, would be completely annihilated.

The area Qi Tian was visiting became virtually uninhabited because of these Locust Thief Bees. The native inhabitants were either forced to relocate or became the food for these bees.

The Locust Thief Bees were preparing to leave this area because there wasn’t much left for them to eat. Yet, at this very moment, Qi Tian dug out a spiritual stone vein that had been buried deep underground and exposed it.

Due to their habitual arrogance, the Locust Thief Bees had never imagined that someone would dare to target them, let alone set a trap here. Sensing the aroma of the spiritual stone vein, all but a tiny portion of the bees swarmed towards the passageway dug by Qi Tian.

The Locust Thief Bees scrambled to attach their bodies to the spiritual stone vein. They, too, could practice cultivation directly absorbing spiritual stones, and because of their unique physical structure, their rate of absorption was even faster than cultivators. However, also due to their physical structure, while they absorb a lot they utilize very little. The majority of the absorbed Spirit Qi was wasted.