The Scarletlight Fruit ripened, and the harvest was completed smoothly.

Dragon Cypress and Ink Orchid headed north, racing straight to Xinghu Lake, loaded up a batch of hefty Dragon Cypress Divine-Given Seed exuviae, made a brief stop at Xianglan Mountain for adjustments, then set off straight for Ghost Fan Mountain.

...

In an ordinary Ghost Fan Tree orchard, Ghost Fan was leading Woodberry to weed under the trees.

After decades of tireless effort, more than half of the mountain hollow had been opened up as an orchard, where the main plants grown were Ghost Fan, White Willow, Maple Poplar, Keg Vine, as well as some kiwi, woodberry, peach trees, longan, and cypress.

"Ghost Fan! Woodberry!"

Ink Orchid arrived first, greeted them, and asked, "Woodberry, you're a 6-age-period intermediate warrior now?"

Woodberry: "Yes. I just completed the evolution a few days ago."

"Ink Orchid, you're really late this year." Woodberry climbed up a tree, standing atop to gaze out; the Dominating Throne was wobbling its way over.

"Wow!"

"Dragon Cypress Ant King hauled a lot of stuff over!"

Woodberry's compound eyes sparkled, hopefully asking: "Ink Orchid, is it something tasty? Is it ant honey?"

Ink Orchid: "There's the ant honey you like."

Ink Orchid: "But mainly Source Stones. And also… Dragon Cypress and I found something from the last Origin Force Era…"

Ink Orchid had learned Dragon Cypress' speech, tweaking and embellishing it a bit as she told Ghost Fan and Woodberry the story.

Just as Dragon Cypress piloted the Dominating Throne to arrive, Ink Orchid finished telling it.

"Dragon Cypress Ant King!"

Woodberry fluttered her wings, took off from a Ghost Fan tree, and spiraled down to land atop the stump ant nest, staring curiously at a spider silk bag. She tried reaching out with a claw to poke it; when Dragon Cypress and Ghost Fan made no move to stop her, she clambered onto the bag, opened a gap, and buried her head in to rummage around.

"Ghost Fan. Woodberry."

Dragon Cypress greeted them, asking, "The general situation, Ink Orchid's already told you by now?"

Ghost Fan: "Yes, she told us. Dragon Cypress, thank you."

Dragon Cypress waved his antennae lightly and said, "It's nothing. No need to thank me."

Ink Orchid: "I haven't mentioned the Divine-Given Sky-Blue Persimmon Seed yet."

"Oh—"

Dragon Cypress immediately turned, picked up a petite spider silk bag, leaped to the ground and handed it to Ghost Fan, saying, "Got hold of 50 Divine-Given Sky-Blue Persimmon Seeds. Don't think it's too few, Ghost Fan. With these, your evolution to Mountain Lord is basically a done deal."

Ink Orchid: "100 Source Stones per seed. You can owe for now and settle after this autumn's Ghost Fan Divine-Given Seed harvest. No interest."

Dragon Cypress: "Ghost Fan, you can start planning for your Mountain Lord Level evolution. I've delivered 4,000 Source Stones here. Out of those, keep 1,500 to use during the Ghost Fan Divine-Given Seed fruiting period. The other 2,500 Source Stones—apply them to the Life Seed Plants every five or six days, use them in batches."

"To ascend to Mountain Lord Level, it isn't just Insect Clan Warriors and Life Seed Divine-Given Seeds that risk failure. Even common Life Seed Plants have a certain chance of failing and dying, so don't be careless—and never skimp on Source Stones."

The Divine-Given Life Seed's awakening of consciousness means it has a soul, forming a deeper bond with the Insect Clan Warrior, evolving in tune—a rise for one is a rise for all, a loss for one means all suffer.

Common Life Seed Plants lack soul consciousness, and their growth and evolution aren't fully synchronized with the Insect Clan Warriors. It's only after the warriors successfully evolve that these plants, at a steady and gentle pace, gradually complete their Life Level leap.

For a Great Rank breakthrough, the failure risk for common Life Seed Plants is much lower—but not zero.

Losing a single common Life Seed Plant inflicts irreparable soul damage on the Insect Clan Warrior, blocking any further evolution and leading to unbearable consequences.

All of this is recorded in detail in the Inherited Memory.

Ghost Fan: "I understand!"

Dragon Cypress: "Ink Orchid and I will make two more trips, bringing over two more batches of hefty Dragon Cypress Divine-Given Seed exuviae. Ghost Fan, make sure every Life Seed Plant gets some."

Ghost Fan: "Thank you—"

Dragon Cypress paused, then continued in a consultative tone: "Ghost Fan, how about next spring, you let your Life Seed Plants take a rest from flowering and fruiting to store up force for evolution, then in early winter, have them go dormant for evolution. How's that?"

"Ah—" Ghost Fan hemmed and hawed, "Dragon Cypress, isn't that too quick… I'm severely short on Origin Force Food… I still need to stockpile a batch of Source Stones for Ghost Fan Divine-Given Seed…"

Dragon Cypress replied heroically, "No problem. I'll lend you twenty thousand, no interest. Think about repayment after you've successfully evolved to Mountain Lord Level."

Ink Orchid added at the perfect moment: "Ten thousand Source Stones worth of high-quality Origin Force Food, and ten thousand Source Stones in cash."

Ghost Fan: "Alright—"

Ghost Fan pondered, then asked: "Dragon Cypress Ant King, are you now a 4-age-period high-level Ant King? Did you and Ink Orchid go from 3-age-period to 4-age-period evolution after only one year? I remember you said you weren't in a rush to evolve before—why the sudden hurry?"

Woodberry also picked up on this keenly, echoing: "Yeah. Did something bad happen? Ghost Fan and I can help!"

Ink Orchid: "..."

Ink Orchid: "Dragon Cypress and I are planning something big!"

Dragon Cypress: "We found a super-large Land of Origin Force, and there's a…"

Dragon Cypress quickly told the whole story about the Purple Tung Insect Nation and the Termite Kingdom.

Ghost Fan felt she had received too many benefits from Dragon Cypress and Ink Orchid to refuse them.

In terms of Mountain Lord Level combat strength, Ghost Fan and Mountain Persimmon are supposedly the strongest on Cloud Trace Continent.

Just need Mountain Persimmon, too—will tell him in the autumn trade season.

...

Dragon Cypress and Ink Orchid made repeated direct trips between Ghost Fan Mountain and Xinghu Lake, delivering sixteen large bags of hefty Dragon Cypress Divine-Given Seed exuviae.

Then made a run to White Rice Mountain, delivering eight bags to White Rice and Black Rice.

And then to Scarletlight Mountain…

In this busy shuttling about, summer was in full swing.

On a pleasantly cool evening breeze—

By the Black Lotus Lake shore, beneath the White Willow Life Seed Tree.

White smoke curled up into the air.

Black Cory, imitating Xianglan Mountain, made a big stone pot out of rock and gathered the ant colony around the pot, bustling with activity.

The Blue Soldiers took turns stepping forward to use their 'Boiling' ability.

The Worker Ants cut up the prey, poked holes, skewered them with hooked wooden sticks, set them into the pot to boil, and brought them to White Willow.

White Willow was thoroughly enjoying the food when she suddenly stopped moving.

…Dragon Cypress Ant King is coming again~

White Willow fluttered her wings, shot straight up, and flew toward the oncoming Dominating Throne.

"Dragon Cypress! Ink Orchid!"

"Are you two here to pick up Black Cory for some work?"

This time, White Willow didn't bother showing off her flying skills, but flew parallel to the throne instead.

Dragon Cypress: "..."

Ink Orchid: "..."

Ink Orchid asked, "White Willow, did you and Black Cory find the Stealth Beetle Tribe's treasury?"

White Willow: "We found it."

Dragon Cypress: "!!!"

Ink Orchid: "!!!"

Before they could ask,

White Willow continued, sounding disappointed, "Empty. The ancestors left me nothing."

"Empty?"

"What about the Divine-Given Seed exuviae?"

Dragon Cypress and Ink Orchid asked at the same time.

White Willow: "None—"

Ink Orchid tilted her head to look at Dragon Cypress, "How could this be?"

Dragon Cypress: "Black Cory's cooking again? When did you find the ruin? Searched thoroughly? Where is it?"

"Found it more than twenty days ago, but inside there's only Stealth Beetle Warriors and some remains of our Beautiful Winged Dragonfly Tribe ancestors…"

White Willow hovered in midair, raising a front foot and pointing to the far river: "It's over there, on the highest peak of the eastern riverbank. The entrance is on the southwestern mountainside."

"I'll go check it out!" Ink Orchid buzzed her wings and shot off.

Dragon Cypress: "Take Black Cory, go together!"

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