In front of her stood a creature, an Ant to be more specific. With a formidable presence, its form was shrouded in an aura of fire and majesty. Its pitch-black exoskeleton shimmered with a mysterious sheen, while long, gangly legs extended from its body, each bristling with sharp barbs that glistened in its own fiery glow.

Scarlet fur, thick and luxurious, adorned the top of its head, thorax, and abdomen, a stark contrast to the darkness that enveloped it. Atop its majestic head sat a magnificent horn, gleaming with ethereal light, while a stinger poised menacingly at the end of its abdomen, ready to strike with deadly precision.

In addition to its imposing form, the creature possessed a pair of magnificent wings, each membrane stretched between long, slender bones reminiscent of obsidian. The wings shimmered under the faint glow of the moonlight, their scarlet hue mirroring the fiery intensity of the flames that surrounded the ant. As it moved, the wings unfurled with a graceful sweep, casting patterns of shadow and light across the ground below.

In a two-meter radius from the ant, a circle of fire was ablaze where a singular sphere of flames was joyfully floating around, and Silent River immediately noticed that this was exactly the sphere that had managed to immediately surround her with flames.

In but a second after her realization, the ant lunged at her once again, the sphere of flames dutifully following and throwing waves of flames at Silent River.

Faced with such a barrage of attacks in her currently injured state, she could no longer fight back and just kept retreating using her claws, and before long she was already completely burned that no feather was safe.

She weakly fell to the side, looking with horror at this incoming monster, but she soon heard something that shocked her to the core, "Sorry, Silent River..."

Lei Yan, looking at the person who played a big part in his survival thus far and where she was right now, he felt conflicted.

Without Silent River accepting to become his subordinate as well, he wouldn't have received the rewards from the mission, and without them, survival would have been nothing but a dream, especially what happened to him a while ago.

He knew that this was all because of Stone Face, and even more so the complexity of the circumstances where they met one another made the tapir both afraid and suspicious resulting in all of this.

However, he knew that she had to die, as much as he hated doing that. So, controlling his new technique, he ordered, "Kill."

Because Silent River was now in the range of his Scarlet Flame Domain, the firespirit was finally able to show its real might.

The sphere of fire immediately split into dozens of smaller parts that all jumped at Silent River at the same time, then with Lei Yan's gaze still meeting her terrified eyes, the small parts of fire began to burn through her body making their way inside.

Slowly, but surely, the parts entered deep enough that they connected, and the moment that happened Silent River's body exploded after the original form of the fire spirit converged once again.

The meat, intestines, and feathers of Silent River that stuck to its fiery form began slowly melting away before they all rose up in plumes of smoke.

For the very first time in his life as an insect, Lei Yan turned his back on the body and went back to where he sensed his subordinates were. He just didn't want anything that would remind him of Silent River ever again.
...

20 Minutes Prior.

When Lei Yan noticed that several humans and monsters were coming toward his direction in the tree, he immediately moved his body and flew to the east. Fortunately, no one followed because the two groups were targetting one another, and so a fleeing weak mosquito didn't raise many concerns.

It was then that he took advantage of how few monsters remained in the Purple Forest, and continued his journey toward the Red Minnedare Wetlands, his goal was to go see what happened to his subordinates after he lost all of the other mosquitoes.

Fortunately, along the way he had encountered several nocturnal mosquitoes and started hunting them to finish his mission.

The moment he swallowed the last piece of the last mosquito, a cool interface appeared in front of him.

It not only gave him descriptions of the insects provided, but it also showed him videos and images of them fighting.

- Fire God Velvet Ant

- The Giant Titan Beetle

- The Thunder Spirit Hornet

- The Void Ripper's Fly

Needless to say, all of the insects were beyond overpowered. In fact, he realized at that moment that when he chose the dragonfly in haste, it was a terrible mistake.

The Fire God Velvet Ant, which was the species he chose was an absolute ruler of fire. However, that wasn't the most shocking part about them, when they are born the laws of the world converge to give birth to a fire spirit that would accompany them on their journey.

There was a limiting factor and that is the fact that the spirit had to be anchored to a particular skill, and so he used his newly learned Fire Domain technique and thus allowed it to exist inside of it. His other technique although more powerful, clashed with the existence of the fire spirit so they were not compatible.

The Giant Titan beetle was a species of beetle that could reach up to kilometers in length, that is a distance that would take most people a considerable time to traverse, and it was just its size.

Naturally, that size was more so their limit not something that he would have gotten instantly.

He also learned that most times the names given were very appropriate, The Spirit Thunder Hornet was a species of hornets that ruled over all elements of lightning to the point that their body had the potential to become so attuned and close to it that bodies could split into thousands of lightning bolts and converge once again.

The Void Ripper's Fly was a transparent species of fly that had the power of space, but more so they were awfully dangerous in anything related to sharpness. The cutting power of the space element could be said to be the strongest.

But Lei Yan understood that all of those things were potentials and so it would have taken a lot of time to get there, and in his particular situation, the ant was the best choice.

Thus, he chose it and began his transformation like last time, so it didn't a long time. When he sensed the existence of his subordinates he immediately followed it, and that was when he saw the retreating figure of Silent River, and he immediately understood her purpose so he followed after her.

because he didn't want to attract a lot of attention in case anyone saw him, he immediately transformed into his mosquito form and ordered all of the subordinates from a distance to follow. However, he immediately noticed the blue dragonfly's state and approached them.

"My king!" Echoed three voices in his head, and then he saw the two dragonfly siblings and Nevas approaching.

He had already noticed their existence and knew that they must've stayed just around these areas awaiting him, so he commanded them for their hard work and helped the small dragonfly recuperate by giving him a pill.

He then said to the others, "Carry him with you, we can't stay here for too long."

Lei Yan noticed how the other two were somewhat dejected because he didn't pay that much attention to them even though they had been waiting for this moment with dying breath for days, so he quickly comforted them, "The situation is dangerous right now, we can't lower down our guard. We'll talk plenty when then the time is right."

This indeed managed to soothe their spirit a little, and so they all used their Qi to carry the blue dragonfly and followed after Lei Yan as he made his way toward the cliff where he was staying previously.

Although he somewhat felt complicated over Silent River's issue, his heart still fluttered with excitement simply because he was finally free, and all of his subordinates were safe. Other than the dead ones of course, and the other mosquitos who were gathering intelligence.

But this was enough for him.

Lei Yan and company flew in silence for a long while, and soon they reached the cliff. Glancing at the familiar place, he felt as if months had passed, whereas it was only days, a testament to the myriad of problems both inward and outward that happened to him during this short period of time.

An inconspicuous transparent dragonfly appeared out of the cave, surprising the others. But when Lei Yan looked at him he smiled and praised, "Good job man!"

He could feel that the dragonfly was also excited when hearing that, and not solely because of his praise, but because of the ability given. Now that he could transform into a human his survivability in the world would increase by a lot. Even though it doesn't offer any improvements in terms of pure raw power, it has immense potential in other areas. Like the one he had used it in previously, among many.

The dragonfly dutifully joined the crowd as the others all began inspecting this newcomer.

'Should we stay here?' He pondered, his mosquito form hovering beside the cliff and looking at the cave. 'Maybe not, it's still a bit risky, but...' He knew that going even beyond would also prove to be dangerous.

Finally making up his mind, the group continued moving forward. He reasoned it was nighttime, and humans always liked to take shelter around those hours.

The group traversed through the forest doing their best to limit their presence to a minimum. Small creatures scurried around whenever they passed, their strength wasn't something to be trifled with now.

Using his spiritual senses, Lei Yan studied the condition of the blue dragonfly behind him. The two dragonfly brothers were carrying him above a small wave of wind. 'This guy is rather tenacious,' He thought, noticing his improvements.

Suddenly, Lei Yan heard something. He didn't sense it, just his ears picked up on it. It was the low growl of a monster, and it sounded like it was cutting up a tree with its teeth. Using his blood detection, he was able to sense a relatively strong monster to the northeast.

From the strength of the blood vitality, he knew that he would be able to overpower it, but there was another reason why he was contemplating going there.

'Alright let's see how that works,' He mused, and so he slowly veered to the right as the group dutifully followed behind him.

With every aerial step the group took, the sound became louder and louder. And when they finally reached their destination, they could hear a grating sound coming in front of them. Using his spiritual sense, Melvin knew that there was a monster that looked somewhat like a black armadillo with a horn.