The ratman heavy-infestation zone — Shen Cong had been through it before and broken out before the encirclement could close. Great Vajra was beyond anything ratmen could damage.

A smaller vehicle wouldn’t have that luxury. Being surrounded by ratmen meant no way out.

He decided the military jeep trailing behind wasn’t safe enough as-is. He ran the winch cable out and tethered the jeep to Great Vajra’s rear. If ratmen pinned the jeep completely, the cable would let Great Vajra drag it clear by force. If he’d committed to protection, he was going to do it properly. That was his way.

Both vehicles reached the Chuma Expressway. Right on schedule, ratmen began emerging from the ruins on both sides of the road — lining the shoulders, watching.

Then the larger ones came. After a brief exchange of what sounded like coordination calls among themselves, they rushed both vehicles in a mass. These big ratmen showed no concern for their own survival and fought with genuine ferocity. Their numbers kept climbing. One by one they hauled themselves onto Great Vajra and the military jeep alike.

The Flying Wing Knives on Great Vajra and the core-weapon blades on the jeep cleared large numbers as both vehicles pushed forward. It wasn’t enough to stop the surge.

“Hold your speed. We push through.” Shen Cong’s voice through the walkie-talkie was steady, carrying only a trace of detachment.

Zhao Zilong answered immediately. “Understood.”

More ratmen this time than last. Significantly more.

Within ten minutes, Great Vajra was a creature covered in moving bodies. The military jeep was similarly engulfed. Vehicle speed was beginning to bleed off under the accumulated weight.

Shen Cong checked the power reading — 85% — then checked their position on the map. He pressed a control without hesitation.

CRACK.

The High-Voltage Perimeter Grid discharged. A hundred-odd large ratmen, hair standing up, convulsed and fell in a rain.

Great Vajra’s speed recovered. The cable went taut. The jeep — still wrapped in a moving cluster of ratmen — was dragged forward along the expressway.

The ratmen were inexhaustible. This wave was substantially larger than what he’d encountered before.

Three discharge cycles before they cleared the Chuma Expressway and broke into the Ningluo Expressway beyond the infestation zone. Thirty percent of the stored charge expended.

He kept pulling the jeep for another ten minutes before stopping.

Half-Activated Armor on, Tyrant Broadsword in hand, he dropped out of the vehicle and worked through the ratmen still clinging to the jeep — one strike per large ratman, with occasional Pepper Water from a spray bottle for the clusters. Methodical and efficient.

Five minutes. Half the ratmen on the jeep were down. The rest scattered. Zhao Zilong’s group emerged and helped finish the job.

Old Wei surveyed the field — ratman bodies in every direction, Shen Cong’s armor streaked red — and stuck out a thumb with genuine admiration. “Colonel Chen. Outstanding. I, Old Wei, have the utmost respect for people who are just that good.”

Shen Cong glanced at him once, looked at the flame-red clouds at the horizon, and said: “Don’t stand around. Cut out all the jin-cores and bring them to me. Tonight we camp in the Laian County ruins. Tomorrow we find the branch road to the Changshen Expressway and continue north to Huai’an.”

He started working through the ratman bodies himself, separating the clawed forelimbs — the Activity core portion.

Five people working together was fast. Every core was harvested and loaded into Great Vajra. Then both vehicles moved into the ruins of Laian County.

No signs of human activity. Barren zone, as expected. Desolate throughout.

He drove Great Vajra through the ruins with the dozer blade clearing a path, working toward the county’s edge — making tomorrow’s departure route usable. Outside the town itself, the roads were less buried and would allow normal travel. When he returned to the ruins, Zhao Zilong’s group had already dug a basic defensive perimeter trench and had ratman meat roasting over a fire.

“Colonel Chen, come eat with us.” Old Wei called over with his characteristic warmth.

“You eat. I’ll manage.” He parked Great Vajra twenty meters from their trench, deployed the extended ground armor for camp configuration, and maintained his distance.

Twenty meters away — a jeep, a fire, four people. One world.

Great Vajra. Another world.

He cooked his own meal and ate. Then the evening’s standard work began.

Three new Activity fruit to assess. The pomegranates and hawthorn berries were normal-spectrum Activity — good, standard enhancement. The potatoes were something more: “more vital” Activity, the plantable variety. He cut several into sections and pressed them into growing medium in a container.

He ran the rest of the new fruit past Blackhead first — standard protocol, let it eat a sample, confirm no toxic reaction and no surface damage before he consumed any himself.

The enhancement was real but modest. At nineteen-bull strength, his physical composition was approaching its organic ceiling. The marginal gains from Activity fruit were narrowing noticeably.

After eating, he went to the ant burrow.

He’d felt it earlier — the Antgod’s first offspring was about to emerge from its pupa.

Ten minutes. With Blackhead in attendance, a black ant emerged from the casing — larger than Blackhead, body segments more developed. The mandibles were Activity core material, same as Blackhead’s, but not as pronounced overall. A worker ant, then.

The new worker’s Talent: 0.55H. Half-Star classification. Substantially above Blackhead’s 0.41H. The Vajra Ant colony was evolving upward across generations.

“Blackhead. You’ve been surpassed.” He nudged the enthusiastically bouncing Blackhead with his foot.

Blackhead was one size class below the new arrival — if Blackhead’s body was “1,” the new ant was “2,” and the Antgod’s continually expanding frame was approaching “4” and climbing.

Being surpassed didn’t register as any kind of problem for Blackhead. Its emotional signal was simple and unambiguous: delight that the colony had a new member.

The new ant directed gentle, submissive signals toward Blackhead, the Antgod, and Shen Cong in turn.

He named it Black One. The system going forward: Black Two, Black Three, Black Four, Black Five, in order of emergence.

Because of the Antgod’s hierarchical position in the perceptual link structure, Shen Cong had no direct link established with Black One — only a faint ambient awareness. He could issue simple commands: attack, defend the nest, eat, retreat. Anything more complex didn’t transmit cleanly. Not the fluid, instinctive communication he had with Blackhead.

Adequate, though. And it opened a direction he found genuinely satisfying.

A Vajra Ant army — eventually.

He also didn’t particularly want dozens of ants broadcasting emotional states at him simultaneously. One Mechanical Vine murmuring “comfortable” and “uncomfortable” at odd moments was already more than enough.

“Blackhead — Black One is yours to lead. You two are now the Vajra Ant Squad. Time to start training for actual combat.”

Feed the army for a thousand days; use them in a moment. What had started as a research project had become something closer to a tactical unit in development.

The ant burrow aboard Great Vajra as home base, rolling across the wasteland — not quite an army ant colony, but the structure was there.

He reached out and rested a hand on Black One’s glossy head, then looked at the oversized egg still on the rack — the differentiated one, the specialist. Black One is nearly a meter long now. That one could be two meters. Riding it would be something.

Outside, the temperature had dropped close to freezing. Clean moonlight was swallowed by moving clouds, and the world went completely dark.

(End of Chapter 237)