At that moment, Fang Senyan risked being brutally trampled several times and suddenly began circling the Burrower Worm in a clockwise direction. Clearly, this action was extremely strenuous and agonizing for the Burrower Worm. After being forced to spin many times, it roared in anger a few times before suddenly reversing direction counter-clockwise, attempting to catch Fang Senyan off guard.

But Fang Senyan had long been prepared for this move. After all, a human's size was at least several, even ten times smaller than a Burrower Worm, so he immediately darted in the counter-clockwise direction as well. The Burrower Worm could only helplessly continue to rotate passively. After persisting for thirty or forty seconds with heavy thuds, it suddenly collapsed silently, six legs pointing skyward, twitching violently, like an unlucky child suffering an electric shock. A large amount of foul-smelling, pungent white foam spewed from its mouthparts.

Faced with this bizarre sight, Fang Senyan laughed heartily and immediately turned to flee; this situation was entirely within his expectations.

It turned out that back on Planet P, the Zerg had already discovered that the Burrower Worms' brains had a congenital flaw: the spinal gray matter associated with their vestibular systems was severely underdeveloped. Thus, this back-and-forth circling placed an immense, invisible burden on its poor brain, the direct consequence being insufficient cerebral blood supply, causing it to instantly faint—displaying the grim symptoms of human epileptic seizures.

Of course, the method Fang Senyan employed could not be used as standard tactics, because encounters where a Burrower Worm fought a human one-on-one were exceedingly rare. Typically, these creatures were used either as main assault forces like the Mammoth Zerg, mixed with Hydralisks and Zerglings, or they attacked enemy strongholds in swarms to cause artificial earthquakes.

A one-on-one engagement like this one was a complete anomaly. Normally, if Fang Senyan had started running in circles, he would have been severely beaten by nearby Zerglings, Hydralisks, or even other Burrower Worms first.

Fang Senyan fled five or six hundred meters before looking back. He noticed that his expectation of the remaining enemies pursuing him in rage did not materialize. The one still foaming at the mouth continued to foam, and the Zerg units that had been observing ignored Fang Senyan's actions and were already roaring as they charged toward the Protoss positions.

The reason was quite simple: the Zerg's earthquake offensive had suffered another massive setback!

As technology advanced along the tech tree, another powerful Protoss bioform had been engineered and quickly deployed into the war—a creature that perfectly countered the Burrower Worm!

Yes. This creature, both in name and appearance, shared commonalities with the Burrower Worm. Its name was the Golden Beetle!

Unlike the brute strength and agility of the Burrower Worm, the Golden Beetle moved very slowly, its attack speed sluggish, and it didn't even possess legs, moving by wriggling along the ground, appearing bulky and clumsy. However, it ranked among the Protoss's high-tier units based solely on its single unique ability.

The Golden Beetle was one of the few creatures capable of directly chewing and consuming Crystals. After consuming fifteen units of Crystal, if it chose to, it could convert the material into a bizarre, quasi-living projectile, storing it within its enormous, swollen abdomen.

When this quasi-living entity was vomited out by the Golden Beetle, it could execute complex and unpredictable maneuvers like the most agile missile, attacking targets designated by the Beetle. More importantly, this projectile possessed extremely high attack power and dealt area damage!

Theoretically, one shell from a Golden Beetle could eliminate a squad of Zealots without question.

Therefore, under the relentless pursuit of these quasi-living projectiles that shadowed their targets, even though Burrower Worms could swiftly dive into underground tunnels, their massive bulk always left behind deep, wide subterranean passages. The projectiles would follow relentlessly; an explosion would often severely wound the Burrower Worm, and the area-of-effect characteristic would frequently trigger cave-ins. As the Golden Beetles entered the fray, dust clouds and earth pillars erupted intermittently from the Protoss lines, scattering high into the air, mixing with the flesh and shrill roars of the Burrower Worms.

However, for the Zerg commanders, the initial charge had already destroyed at least close to one-third of the Protoss's defensive infrastructure, and this Burrower Worm assault had once again demolished another third of the Protoss defenses!

His strategic objective was achieved. On the distant horizon, the dark, surging tide of Zerg forces rushed forward again, and leading the frontline were dense swarms of Overlords, thick as storm clouds!!

Having personally commanded Zerg battles, Fang Senyan was familiar with various Zerg tactics. Upon seeing this scene, his pupils suddenly contracted, and he muttered in disbelief, "Deploying completely defenseless Overlords on the front line... and it doesn't look like they intend to use mass drops either. Are they trying to conceal the killing intent behind them?"

As he spoke, the Zerg advance appeared to be a frantic pushing forward using an impenetrable wall of Overlords. But only upon closing the distance could one discern that they were mixed with a strange, membrane-covered creature that floated in the air, propelled like a bellows—yes, it was the utterly defenseless Zerg unit, the Queen!

Evidently, the Protoss commander also realized something was amiss and immediately ordered the frontline Golden Beetles and Dark Templar to retreat! Unfortunately, neither of these unit types excelled in speed; even fleeing would be difficult!

Large numbers of Overlords exploded into gore under the assault of Photon Cannons, but this managed to buy the Queens precious casting time. Their membranes spread, and a stream of high-speed black shadows shot out from their mouths, instantly covering hundreds of meters before accurately striking the fleeing Golden Beetles and Dark Templar!!

The units hit by the black shadows immediately rotted and collapsed, dying. Two six-legged behemoths leaped from the wreckage of their corpses, ferociously pouncing on nearby enemies—this was the Zerg Queen's special ability: Spawn Broodling! It inflicted a cruel instant-kill effect on the enemy!

At this point, less than a third of the Protoss defensive structures remained!! And the Golden Beetles and Dark Templar, which were the most effective counters to the Zerg, had been largely wiped out by the Spawn Broodling ability. The main Zerg army poured out, complemented by the remaining dozen or so Burrower Worms, forming a three-dimensional offensive spanning air, ground, and subterranean levels.

Clearly, unless something unexpected occurred, the fall of the Protoss base seemed inevitable.

Just then, in the Protoss Hangar, a light flared, and an aircraft Fang Senyan had seen before, the Arbiter, resembling a clumsy swallow, appeared! This vehicle, representing the zenith of Protoss technology, had finally arrived on the battlefield.

However, the newly arrived Arbiter only possessed the ability for group cloaking; neither instant teleportation nor battlefield stasis technology had been researched. Furthermore, even if researched, the recently materialized unit lacked the energy to deploy them. More critically, the Zerg’s cheap and countless Overlords naturally possessed anti-cloaking capabilities—they were the Arbiter's natural nemesis!

What use was this single Arbiter?

It flew directly toward the fully constructed, non-conventional strategic structure of the Protoss!

This structure was now complete: it took the shape of a massive claw emerging from beneath the earth. It possessed the Protoss's characteristic clean lines and futuristic style, yet the dark crimson color, along with the fangs and sharp claws adorning its surface like decoration, carried a degree of Zerg ferocity!!

This giant claw suddenly gripped the incoming Arbiter. Then, the Arbiter emitted specks of light within the palm of the claw, beginning to dissolve into points of luminescence that coated the surface of the giant claw with a glazed smoothness and sheen, as if the structure had been imbued with a soul and brought to life.

Immediately afterward, this massive claw performed the peculiar movements of "clench" and "release." With this motion, one of the twelve Pylons built around the giant claw suddenly exploded, revealing a blood-red portal!!

Protoss warriors began emerging from this portal!

There were not many of these Protoss warriors, and they represented different unit types—exactly twelve men, a squad. But Fang Senyan immediately noticed that these twelve Protoss warriors looked distinctly different from the standard units.

For example, the one leading the group was a Zealot.

As a basic unit, the Zealot served as cannon fodder, a frontline shield to absorb damage.

But this Zealot's appearance was different. He looked fierce and unruly. Normal Zealots appeared nimble; this one was built like a muscle man, wearing a scarlet cape strapped to his back, and in his hands, he held not a Psi Blade, but a terrifying two-handed warhammer!

He charged into the fray instantaneously, and the first Zerg unit he struck was a Mammoth Zerg, representing the Zerg's strongest conventional ground combat unit.

With a single swing of his hammer, he slammed the Mammoth into the ground, leaving it struggling in the dust!!! It could only be described as majestic and domineering.

The second in line was a Dark Templar, commonly known as the Shade. While other Dark Templar wielded a single Psi Blade, this one held two, dual-wielding them! Furthermore, he could continuously hurl the Psi Blades from alternating hands, watching them spin back, slicing through a clump of Zerglings with every pass!

The third was a Dragoon. This Dragoon appeared to have a limp, walking with a noticeable stagger, moving slowly as if ready to fall at any moment. At that moment, a swarm of Mutalisks were rushing toward a nearby Photon Cannon, and this Dragoon raised its cannon to fire upon the Mutalisks. (To be continued...)