As Fang Senyan inquired, Mogensha quickly replied: "None remaining. There are currently only three Spike-Tongue strongholds. I suggest we take out the western one first; it lacks the cover of the other two Towers. Furthermore, we haven't spotted any Flameworms—they must all be concentrated at the Red-Vein base."

What followed could only be described as utter destruction. More importantly, Reef preliminarily felt the benefit of coordinating with Fang Senyan: the risk he undertook had significantly decreased. To be precise, the original 100% risk had shifted to a model where each of them bore 50%. This became strikingly apparent when assaulting the remaining two Spike-Tongue strongholds: As soon as Reef’s health dropped to 50%, he would immediately retreat with Mogensha outside the Spike-Tongue's attack range, naturally transferring the damage from those two strongholds to Fang Senyan. Then, when Fang Senyan's health was considerably depleted, Reef would use potions or similar aids to recover most of his vitality, allowing him to step up again. This greatly enhanced both their survivability and margin for error.

Upon breaching the central nest of this sub-base, Mogensha viciously charged into the main hall first, riddling the Worker Bees transporting crystals with several volleys, causing them to splatter green ichor upon death—due to the impending exhaustion of the mineral vein, their primary activity was no longer harvesting but transportation. They were then depositing the inventory of Pandora Crystals into the nest’s digestion pool to extract energy—energy that was then transferred, through means incomprehensible to humans, from the sub-base nest to the main body of the Red-Vein tribe, the Red-Vein Mother-Nest, without any loss.

Although the mineral vein here was already depleted under the overload of mining after Fang Senyan and his team cleared the enemy defenses, the inventory piled up in the nest gave them a feeling of immense bounty.

After a thorough inventory, Fang Senyan and the others had acquired nearly 2800 units of Rare Pandora Crystals and over 500 units of GA Rare Symbiotic Ore. What was tricky was that these crystals and ores were not digitized like Universal Credits; they took up physical space! They could be sold to the Nightmare Imprint for Universal Credits, but that would yield a maximum of only 10,000 Rare Points, a mere pittance when divided among the three. Just looking at the eager glint in Reef’s eyes showed how desperately he craved the materials; after all, he had already offered twenty thousand Universal Credits to ask the other two for help.

Fortunately, Fang Senyan’s promotion to Second Lieutenant had expanded the storage capacity of the Nightmare Space to a considerable volume. While it couldn't hold all the crystals and symbiotic ore, after clearing out as much as possible, it managed to fit the majority. Mogensha and Reef naturally split the remainder. Mogensha seemed fine, but Reef looked at Fang Senyan with great astonishment: "What is your current rank? Have you already been promoted to a commissioned officer rank in the Reserve? Your personal space is that vast?"

Fang Senyan shook his head: "No, I am a Second Lieutenant."

As soon as he said this, both Mogensha and Reef’s eyes widened: "You are a Second Lieutenant!??? Not a Reserve Second Lieutenant?"

"Yes," Fang Senyan replied, taken aback. "Is there something unusual about that?"

Reef turned away and looked intently at Mogensha: "Initially, I didn't believe your words. How could the pairing of Metal Mentor and Nu be so monstrously powerful only to be defeated by a single Mariner... But now, I’m starting to believe it."

Only then did Fang Senyan learn that only Contractors who used untraded Merit Points to advance their rank received the formal title. Otherwise, if traded Merit Points were used for rank advancement, it was like having a stain on one's life story; the designation "Reserve" would precede the rank, granting only the most basic capabilities.

Of course, there was a rumored way to remove those damned three characters, "Reserve," but the cost was steep: for every Merit Point gained through trading during a rank promotion, one had to pay double that amount in self-earned Merit Points to cleanse the stain. For instance, if Mogensha was currently a Reserve Private First Class and had traded 10 Merit Points during his promotion, he would need to pay double—20 earned Merit Points—to wash away that stain. If he were a Reserve Officer, the multiplier would be threefold, and so on. Furthermore, ranks achieved after such a cleansing process were never as advantageous as those gained through direct promotion.

Hearing this, Fang Senyan felt a wave of relief. If he hadn't explored the ruins of that Goblin Kingdom and acquired such a large number of Merit Points, how could he possibly have advanced to Second Lieutenant so quickly? Reef suddenly added: "Mariner, I wonder if you plan on forming a team after this world concludes? I heard that teams formed by Contractors with formal ranks seem to inherently possess team capabilities? And perhaps other advantages, generally far surpassing those of Reserve teams."

Fang Senyan smiled: "I hadn't thought about it, but now that you mention it, it certainly piques my curiosity."

The three then proceeded to demolish the now completely undefended base. To say it was completely undefended would be an overstatement; the nests were still instinctively hatching Hydralisks and Zergling-like creatures, but this level of sporadic reinforcement was useless against them. After systematically eliminating the anti-air Spore Cannons around the base, the Black-Spine tribe's Spore Wyverns, alerted by the commotion, began to arrive, along with five Overlords carrying several squads of Black-Spine Zerglings to assist. Within half an hour, the base was utterly annihilated. Defeating one sub-base was certainly a remarkable achievement, earning Fang Senyan, Mogensha, and Reef nearly twenty thousand Reputation Points each.

Information extracted from one of the Overlords revealed that the Black-Spine Brain-Bug, Mojizhi, for some unknown reason, had unexpectedly gone on the offensive, using its aerial superiority to launch multi-pronged, comprehensive suppression attacks against the Red-Vein tribe! It was even attempting forced aerial drops using Spore Wyverns mixed with Overlord transports, fully engaging the Red-Vein tribe in a war of attrition. Temporarily, the Red-Vein tribe's territory was erupting in skirmishes. Although their main forces held a significant numerical advantage in Hydralisks and Zerglings, their mobility was severely lacking. A full-scale offensive now would leave their rear exposed; losing their core base and continuous reinforcements would almost certainly lead to defeat.

"We need to hurry," Fang Senyan muttered, gazing at the distant sky.

The main base of the Red-Vein tribe was now only a few hundred kilometers away. Occasionally, deep green beams of light could be seen tearing through the horizon like streaks of sunset, immediately followed by the projection of three or four massive, emerald-green spheres shooting into the sky. These spheres rotated at extreme speeds, creating a vortex-like, colorless distortion in the air ahead of them, leaving behind faint trails of scattered green light particles in their wake. Each sphere was at least a hundred meters in diameter. Even viewed from a distance, they exuded an overwhelmingly powerful, all-destroying force! Simply watching them from afar transmitted a feeling of boiling light and raw power rushing towards them, compelling one to instinctively hold their breath.

Reef sighed as he looked toward the source of the spheres: "That must be the Giant Spore-Fungus Anti-Air Turret we were tasked to destroy! Damn it, it didn't seem so terrifying when we were on the shuttle, but now I realize this thing might not be easily dealt with."

Fang Senyan's expression grew grim: "If I'm not mistaken, the reason the Black-Spine Brain-Bug, Mojizhi, dared to attack so suddenly is that it has acquired extremely powerful reinforcements! That’s why it can attack wholeheartedly without reservation, which means one thing: if we want to destroy the Giant Spore-Fungus Anti-Air Turret, we must move faster than the Black-Spine tribe. Otherwise, we won't have another chance!"

"Powerful reinforcements?" Mogensha exclaimed, "H, HIT! Who else would help these bugs?"

Fang Senyan stated calmly: "If the Black-Spine Brain-Bug, Mojizhi, could cooperate with Lieutenant Colonel Dundee of the Earth-Side forces and us, why couldn't it cooperate with other human factions?"

The idea Fang Senyan put forward exploded like a detonated time bomb, stunning Mogensha and Reef into a daze, yet they couldn't find a counterargument. Fang Senyan continued, his gaze profound: "The high-energy, rich mineral vein occupied by the Black-Spine tribe is extremely vast, which is why it became a public enemy in the first place. Therefore, what this faction lacks most now is time, not resources. From its behavior, we can also see that it shows little reverence for the Zerg Queen, displaying instead a clear ambition to establish itself independently."

"And it's imaginable that the established human colonial powers on this planet would not want the homeworld interfering and cutting into more profit. Thus, a mutual agreement would be the natural outcome. The Black-Spine tribe likely paid a substantial amount of Pandora Ore and GA Rare Ore to purchase weapons. In the face of such massive profit, there is no reason for human financial consortiums to refuse such an offer, especially since the weapons they sell will be used in an internal conflict among the Zerg! This lends a veneer of righteousness to their actions, making them even more unrestrained!"

Reef frowned skeptically: "But that's just your speculation, Fang! There's no proof!!"

Fang Senyan smiled slightly: "Proof... is simple enough... only..." ... There will be an extra update tonight at 12 o'clock, see you then! Ciao. Also, everyone's theories regarding Reef's talent are incredibly insightful! They have greatly broadened my scope for thought! H