Chapter Forty-Nine: Hello! Tang Jie

When he saw the queen bee's head blasted away, her massive body plummeting from the sky, Joe finally breathed a sigh of relief...

"Her head is gone—surely she can't possibly come back to life now..."

"I've never seen anyone resurrected after having their head blown off..."

"Well, except for the boss, that freak!"

"Come to think of it... if the boss can come back even after his head's exploded, losing half a body probably isn't much of a problem either."

"But where on earth is that guy?"

Though Joe muttered to himself, his heart was pounding with excitement.

As long as Ye Hai was unharmed, wouldn't Javier still have the upper hand?

Within a single day, two incredibly powerful corpse hunters had joined the Corpse Catcher Organization, causing its strength to surge.

The alien channels that once hindered the organization's development were now backed by the Great Tree Planet.

Joe had a feeling that the Corpse Catcher Organization was about to take flight.

The boss and Ye Hai’s dream of setting foot among the stars now seemed... almost within reach.

From a distance, watching Liana and Javier, Joe grinned.

“That woman Zero must be going mad with rage—once the strongest corpse hunter after Ye Hai, she’s now only fourth in rank...”

“Well, no, Liana’s infection ability likely wouldn’t work on Zero...”

“Maybe Liana still isn’t a match for Zero...”

“As for Javier!”

“If he didn’t have the antimatter mech components, it seems... he might not be a match for that madwoman either!”

“Damn it... why is that lunatic Zero so strong!”

...

Titch’s eyes were locked on Javier in the image.

Javier’s sudden increase in power no longer shocked Titch as it once did.

After witnessing the changes the Veronica Virus brought to Liana, Titch had developed certain expectations regarding the miraculous viruses in the Corpse Catcher Organization.

But this was the first time Titch had seen the sustained combat of an antimatter mech.

The power on display shook him deeply.

As the imperial commander of the Great Tree Planet, he was more familiar than anyone with antimatter mechs.

Without the full suit, those two weapons Javier used were merely detachable components.

Separated from the mech’s energy supply, the two parts could function independently, but their maximum output was only 15%!

Judging by Javier’s use, the cannon maintained about 5% output, and the shield about 7% defensive power.

Even so, that was enough to clash head-on with a ninth-stage mutant.

If, one day, a super soldier could be trained to operate a mech at full power...

The destructive force such a warrior could unleash in war was beyond imagination.

The Great Tree Planet and the Four Great Stars both possessed prototypes.

Surely those factions had spent years researching the mechs as well.

...

But Titch knew that no matter how the Four Great Stars tried, in just twenty years, without technical schematics, making great progress was nearly impossible.

The Great Tree Planet’s scientists had determined that such mech technology had already surpassed intra-system civilizations and reached interstellar civilization levels.

Many critical problems at key points simply couldn’t be solved at the current level of science.

Titch couldn’t help but lament—this planet, which had brushed the edge of interstellar civilization, was wiped out in a single biochemical disaster.

Yet Javier’s ability to wield an antimatter mech at such low power made Titch consider another possibility.

If a super soldier could be trained to fully master a mech—even at just 50% power—one could change the course of a major battle with a single suit!

Because of this, Titch was more desperate than ever to acquire the technologies held by the Corpse Catchers.

No price was too high.

...

Javier sauntered over to the half-corpse of the crystal queen bee, lighting a cigarette with a casual air.

He was inwardly astonished by his current power.

Once, if someone had told him a few people could kill a ninth-stage mutant, Javier would have thought them insane.

Yet now, he’d done it himself.

Even if he’d had the help of the antimatter mech.

Javier crouched before the queen bee’s corpse, carefully examining his prize.

When his gaze swept over the human body embedded in the queen bee’s chest, a bizarre, indescribable feeling crept over him.

“What on earth is up with the human body inside this mutant?”

Hearing Javier’s question, Liana could only look confused.

She’d never researched mutants—how could she possibly answer?

She turned instead to look at the human torso within the queen bee’s remains.

And as Liana turned, focusing on that body, she was horrified to see its previously shut eyes snap open.

The lips curled into a chilling smile.

Javier shouted, “Get back!”

His energy shield plunged into the ground between them and the queen bee.

A surge of massive energy erupted from the queen bee’s corpse.

The shield was instantly shattered.

Both Javier and Liana were hurled away by the blast.

They were flung high into the air, half their bodies obliterated.

On Javier’s mangled body, flesh and blood writhed and squirmed, rapidly restoring him to his original form.

Liana, too, absorbed the virus from the creeping vines to repair her body.

Javier felt a chill in his heart—if he hadn’t sensed something was wrong and raised the shield in time,

that blast would have wiped them out completely, with no chance of recovery.

When they finally landed, both wore grim expressions.

“Damn it, does this queen bee have a third form?”

The explosion sent a towering plume of dust into the sky, obscuring their vision, making it impossible to see what lurked within.

Both were on high alert, taking up defensive stances.

Suddenly, a strange voice sounded behind them:

“Are you waiting for me?”

Both started in shock, immediately trying to retreat.

But in a blink, their bodies were enveloped by two spheres of light, immobilizing them completely.

As their captor rotated the orbs, they finally saw who it was.

A monster, its upper body human, its lower half that of a bee, stood behind them.

But even more frightening than the stealth and the obviously more powerful psychic field was the fact that this mutant spoke.

The creature glanced around, noticing the queen’s guards battling hordes of eighth-stage mutants and the corpses strewn everywhere.

It turned back to Javier and Liana and said,

“You’ve made a complete mess of this place…”

“You even woke me from my slumber!”

“You’d better hurry up and die!”

“If Erita is awakened, it would be a true disaster!”

“I went through so much trouble to put it to sleep and take the queen’s place, developing my own brood—only for you to nearly destroy everything. Fortunately, Erita is still undisturbed…”

With that, the queen mutant gently pressed its hands through the force field, gripping Javier’s and Liana’s heads, and whispered, “Goodbye.”

Just as the queen was about to crush their skulls, another voice called from behind.

“Hello, Researcher Tang Jie!”

“I’m very curious—what exactly happened between you and Erita over these twenty years?”

“And how did you awaken your psychic abilities?”

Startled by someone approaching undetected and calling him by name, Tang Jie quickly activated his psychic field, trying to immobilize the newcomer.

But as Tang Jie turned to look, a huge, eyeball-covered arm surged with wild power, tearing through the psychic field from within.

A massive hand seized Tang Jie’s head and drove it mercilessly into the ground…