Silence reigned.
The aftermath of the explosion left the once-great nest in utter ruin. Where intricate tunnels and curved walls once stood, there was now only obliteration — a cratered wasteland of molten crystal and fractured earth. The dome Denwen had created hadn't just exploded — it had detonated a layered essence core, turning every embedded crystal into a localized singularity that ruptured everything it touched.
Entire chambers collapsed, tunnels caved inward, and the surrounding terrain bore the scars of a weapon too advanced for its environment. Spires of crystal jutted from the ground like jagged tombstones. Light refracted in eerie, dancing patterns off scattered shards, casting ghostly reflections across the broken stone.
At the center of the devastation stood Denwen.
He rose slowly from a field of glowing dust and shattered remnants, his body cracked, singed, and bleeding from a dozen spots. His Resonance armor was no longer the seamless shield of elegance it once was — it flickered and hissed, cracked parts of his skin like broken shards falling off his shoulders like scorched snow.
Even with his 75% essence immunity, the explosion had not spared him. His arms were bruised to the bone, his ribs ached with every breath, and part of his right leg had gone numb from the backlash of mana recoil.
Still... he stood.
His hand shook slightly as he reached into his spatial ring, materializing on his fingers brushing against the familiar cold glass of a vial. He pulled it free, uncorked it with his teeth, and drank.
The restoration fluid burned down his throat like liquid fire, snapping nerves back into place. His skin shimmered faintly as the regenerative essence kicked in, slowly weaving tissue and sealing lacerations. He winced.
"It hurts like hell… but I'm still breathing," he muttered, wiping blood from his lips.
Around him, the five Rank 3 ants writhed in various states of agony.
They had survived — barely.
Their bodies, once immaculate fortresses of blackened chitin, were riddled with crystalline perforations. Their mana shields had cracked under the force, unable to fully repel the singularity shards. One of them had lost an entire limb — another's face was gouged open, one eye blind and weeping with violet blood.
They had scattered just before the explosion, retreating into separate paths with incredible speed — but even that hadn't been enough. The blast radius had extended far beyond a simple detonation. Wherever Denwen's crystal had been embedded, it amplified the force, creating chain reactions throughout the nest. The more essence he had used to create any crystal, the more devastating the destruction produced from that crystal, causing the greatest area of impact to be just above the dome he had previously created.
And the walls that made up the various chambers of the nest... was gone.
What remained was a war zone — an echoing shell of the hive's once-pristine structure, with flickering mana fires burning along the walls and floors laced with the corpses of lesser ants that hadn't escaped in time.
Each of the five Rank 3 ants twitched, their legs jittering as they tried to regain balance. Blood dripped onto the ruined ground. The air buzzed with fractured mana — unstable, chaotic.
Denwen narrowed his eyes, letting the restoration settle just enough to stand straight. His essence simmered in his veins, not yet fully recharged, but no longer at critical collapse.
"You're still alive…" he said to the broken shadows flickering around the edge of his vision.
He didn't smile.
He wasn't arrogant.
He had seen what they could do.
But now... they had seen what he could do.
He rose slowly, legs still shaking, his body coated in drying blood and fragments of half-melted crystal. The bitter taste of iron lingered on his tongue as his vision steadied against the flickering aftermath of the explosion.
Then—
PING.
A familiar chime echoed in his mind like a divine whisper breaking through the chaos.
[System Notification]
Event: Adversity passes and leaves behind blessings and necessary tools for growth
Result:
➤ Strength: 970 → +1200
➤ Agility: 870 → +1500
➤ Stamina: 970 → +1100
➤ Vitality: 1000 → +1050
➤ Essence: Undefined
For a moment, his breath hitched.
And then—he felt it.
Like a dam breaking inside him, power surged through his limbs — not the flicker of unstable essence, but the crushing weight of raw, stable might. Muscles tightened. His senses sharpened. The cracks in his body began to hum with power instead of pain.
He stood straighter. Taller. Stronger.
This… this wasn't survival.
This was transcendence.
His stats had pushed him well beyond the scope of early Rank 3 — no longer prey, no longer on the run. For the first time since stepping foot in this accursed nest… Denwen could fight.
He glanced up.
The five Rank 3 ants were stirring amidst the devastation. Their bodies dripped with thick, purplish ichor, and their chitin was cracked and bleeding in places that hadn't bled in centuries. Yet they stood — wary, silent, and now… cautious.
They looked upon him not as vermin.
Not as an intruder.
But as a threat.
But before any of them could move, the walls began to groan with a deep, ancient moan.
GrrrrrRRRRRNNNNNKKK—
A low rumble echoed through the ruin, stones trembling beneath their feet. Cracks spiderwebbed across the chamber walls as debris rained from above. Then—
KRSSSSHHHH!
The far wall split open, a sharp line of fracturing stone slicing into the air.
All five ants turned sharply — and for the first time, Denwen saw something alien in their posture:
Panic.
They shut up with a screech, bolting toward the collapsing wall with terrifying speed. Their auras, once focused entirely on Denwen, now surged outward to reinforce the structure, pressing back against the crumbling rock in a desperate attempt to stop what was coming.
Denwen took a hesitant step forward, eyes narrowing, crystal axe forming in his hand as his skin shimmered like diamond under firelight.
"…What are they trying so hard to protect?"
The damage had already been done.
The nest's structural integrity — already shattered by his Level 3 Prism Shard Volley — was too far gone. As the last barrier of stone fell away, it revealed a hidden inner sanctum.
A chamber the ants would've died to keep sealed.
Denwen froze.
The space was massive, stretching wider and higher than the outer nest chambers. The air inside was unnaturally warm, rich with life, and eerily still.
Eggs.
Thousands of them — countless pods arranged with unnerving precision. Hanging from the ceilings like glowing lanterns. Buried into the walls like jewels. Clustered across the floor like sacred offerings. Each one pulsed with faint mana, soft and innocent.
But it was the center of the chamber that stole his breath.
There, on a majestic raised platform of bone and crystal, rested a creature of grotesque grandeur — the Queen.
A monstrous ant, far larger than the others. Her abdomen was swollen, veined with glowing light, her upper body curled with jointed limbs and a hardened, ridged carapace. Her eyes—six of them—locked immediately onto Denwen.
And then… she saw everything.
The ruin outside.
The broken walls.
The corpses.
The bloodied, battered forms of her Rank 3 children, still limping, still bleeding.
The eggs trembling at the brink of danger.
And she screamed.
SSSKRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE—!!!
The sound pierced the air like a divine curse. It wasn't a screech. It was grief, rage, and primordial fury condensed into a single, soul-shattering cry.
Denwen was unprepared.
The force of the scream hit him like a hammer to the skull. His eyes widened, knees buckled.
CRACK!
Blood exploded from his ears as his eardrums burst, his body lurching forward involuntarily. A searing migraine ripped through his skull. He crashed to the ground, his vision tilting sideways, body seizing as essence scrambled from his control.
He tried to rise.
Couldn't.
Tried to shield himself.
Too late.
The Queen's aura swept through the chamber like a tsunami of purple light. It bent the air, cracked stone, and made the very ground tremble beneath its fury.
This was not an ordinary Rank 3.
This was Peak Rank 3.
And she was enraged.
Every fiber of her being shrieked with maternal wrath. Her body crackled with energy, her aura pouring into the ground, infusing every egg with protective mana. The Rank 3 guards stumbled back toward her, forming a line between her and Denwen, their injuries forgotten in the tidal wave of her presence.
Denwen coughed violently, his hearing gone — only a high-pitched ringing remained.
His hands clawed at the ground, pulling himself upright inch by inch, crystals struggling to reform around his wounds. His armor flickered like a dying flame.
He looked up — vision blurred, blood dripping down his chin.
The Queen glared back at him.
Not with disdain.
Not with fear.
But with a promise:
You will die here.
And Denwen — shaking, half-deaf, barely standing — clenched his weapon and smiled through the blood.
Let her come.