Chapter 478: Chapter 478: Ant King

As he continued down the road, the number of demonic worker ants increased. These level 25 common monsters had great strength and high defense, but no other advantages. Unless surrounded by hundreds or thousands of them, they posed no threat to Song Jian.

Throughout the afternoon, Song Jian hunted down these demonic worker ants. After killing several of them, Song Jian discovered that they didn’t just drop materials, but also other items, albeit at a low drop rate.

In the afternoon, Song Jian managed to kill more than a hundred demonic worker ants. Besides collecting over seventy blue-quality ant shell materials, he also obtained a silver-quality throwing knife, several dishes that could replenish Vitality Points during a battle, and two pieces of level 25 green-quality plate armor.

The quantity might not be vast, but the quality was quite good, at least compensating for the effort he put.

Although the demonic worker ants did not pose much of a threat to Song Jian, if their number exceeded five, he would have to pay a price to kill them all.

As dusk fell and the surroundings became hazy, Song Jian hadn’t noticed that the trees on both sides of the road have started rustling. The noise was akin to the sound of a spring silkworm munching on mulberry leaves, just ten times louder.

After Song Jian killed another demonic worker ant and picked up the dropped materials, he checked his task counter. He had already killed more than a hundred and seventy demonic worker ants. To complete a task of killing five hundred, he’d need another three to four days.

Initially, Song Jian was worried about monster scarcity making it hard to complete the task, but he realized here that the demonic worker ants were overwhelmingly numerous, in thousands and tens of thousands. It would be impossible for Song Jian alone to eradicate the entire horde.

“No wonder the old Beastman offered this mission to so many players. What a shame, they didn’t leave the Protection Black Mist. Otherwise, we might have formed an alliance…” Song Jian thought.

However, if those players had truly left the black mist, Song Jian would probably be the first to attack them; if he even received the slightest damage within the black mist, the Concealment Ring would lose its effectiveness, and his fate would be no better than the other players.

Swish Swish Swish~

Song Jian suddenly felt a chill run down his spine as if a massive threat was charging at him. Turning his head, dozens of demonic worker ants popped out from the trees around him. Behind these worker ants, there were larger ants, as big as calves and with wings on their back.

“Demonic soldier ants? Shit, have I already arrived at their nest?” Song Jian was shocked. The crowd of demonic worker ants alone was too much for him, let alone the soldier ants.

In a split second, Song Jian turned into a shadow and dashed towards the back.

Sword Shadow Step!

It could increase his movement speed by 35%, and had a 50% chance of evading ranged damage for 8 seconds!

When the group of demonic worker ants saw that Song Jian was trying to escape, they sped up. Those demonic soldier ants flapped their wings and quickly flew towards him.

The speed of the demonic soldier ants was too fast, like bombers swooping down from the air towards Song Jian.

Song Jian immediately pulled out two high-explosive grenades from his inventory and threw them behind, which exploded mid-air. Two demonic soldier ants that were less than three meters away from Song Jian were capsized in the air. Two damage points of over two hundred appeared above their heads.

On the ground, a carpet of densely-packed demonic worker ants was rushing towards Song Jian. In the air, dozens of soldier ants were shrieking eerily, trailing closely behind Song Jian, spurting out pools of corrosive liquid that carried a strong acidic smell.

This specific attack called “Acidic Splurge” was a special ranged attack of the soldier ants, extremely powerful and corrosive. Even though it was slow, several tens of soldier ants attacking together gave Song Jian a feeling of being overwhelmed. He was hit twice in the back.

Suddenly, intense pain surged from his back. Song Jian could feel that his defense equipment had completely failed, and the muscles on his back were nearly corroded away.

Two damage points of over three hundred floated above Song Jian’s head, accompanied by the lasting effect of “Acidic Corrosion”, which would decrease his Vitality Points by 10 every second for 30 seconds.

Song Jian stomped on the ground, his speed increased by a large margin instantly, leaving behind a white Ice Path.

This was a life-saving skill from Song Jian’s gold-quality boots called Frost Sprint, which could increase speed by 100% for 10 seconds.

When he used this move, almost all of the demonic ants got left behind. The ant’s “Acidic Corrosion” attacks that had been spat out towards him landed on the road instead, corroding it and forming holes.

To kill the enemy, one must first injure oneself. Song Jian took out a high-level healing potion and gulped it down, replenishing his lost Vitality Points.

However, he couldn’t instantly mend his damaged equipment. The durability of Ghostly Leather Armor dropped from 100 points to 63 points, nearly halved. If he took a few more hits from the demonic soldier ants, his silver-quality armor would be completely ruined.

Although the Ghostly Leather Armor was only a level 15 silver-quality armor, its properties and special effects were quite powerful. Song Jian was unwilling to replace it.

If it got destroyed due to this mission, Song Jian would definitely have tremendous heartache.

As Song Jian was sitting under a big tree to recover his vitality, he suddenly heard a terrifying roar of a beast coming from afar.

Song Jian immediately stood up and rapidly climbed up the tall tree behind him to get a good look.

In the middle of the wide road, a huge ant, over three meters tall and five meters long, demolished everything in its path just like a heavy armored tank. It casually tossed the abandoned vehicles parked by the road. It’s jaws, over a meter long and glistening like metal, effortlessly snapped small cars in two.

This giant ant was completely different from the worker ants and soldier ants previously encountered. Not considering its immensely larger body, just the thick layer of armor covering its body was enough to make anyone lose confidence in fighting against it.

“Is that… the Ant King?” Song Jian was completely taken aback. He had no idea that there could be an Ant King here. Could it be that he had killed so many demonic worker ants that he drew the attention of the Ant King?

“Aren’t you supposed to be at the deepest part of the ant nest, waiting for warriors to challenge you? Why are you here?” Song Jian muttered, furrowing his brows, and spread his senses to estimate the number of ants following.

“Eh, there’s only one Ant King?” Song Jian’s eyes lit up. This was a perfect opportunity to kill it. Even though this Ant King was at level 30 and had the combat power of the first level, it would be much easier to kill it here than to venture into the nest.

…