Eaten Ch.89

Chapter 89: “Wu Heng, you’re going to have a baby”

“Whose kid are you? Where are your parents?”

Du Weichen crouched down and wrapped his arms around Li Qing’s thigh again. He lowered his voice as much as possible. “He… he doesn’t seem human.”

“No sh*t, Sherlock,” Li Qing said.

“An ant?” Wu Heng tilted his head, staring straight at the boy.

“What’s it to you,” the boy snapped fiercely.

Wu Heng gave a calm, indifferent look and turned to Xie Chongyi.

A dagger had appeared in Xie Chongyi’s hand.

The little boy looked barely ten years old, round-headed and round-faced. Aside from the pair of wings on his back, he appeared to be a human child with zero offensive ability. A child showing up at a school was normal—he was supposed to belong to the vulnerable group that society protects. But appearing here, in a monster-infested forest, looking bright-eyed and energetic with clean, neat clothes… the image was too jarring. A damp chill slid silently through everyone’s heart.

“This is my home. You barged in uninvited and slaughtered my people.”

The boy glanced at the endless field of yellow stinging-ant corpses and let out a cold laugh.

“I’m going to make all of you die with them.”

The bald man stepped forward, face twisted. “You want to avenge monsters? Are you human or an ant?”

“You expanded your territory recklessly, forcing the mutant bamboo out of its native habitat and destroying bases along the way,” Wu Dian said expressionlessly. “Because of the series of disasters caused by your invasive behavior, we have the right to implement scientific management measures on your kind. If necessary, after preserving your species’ genetic material, we will completely eradicate you.”

“It’s just survival of the fittest.”

The boy made a goofy face at them.

Wu Dian remained unmoved. He pulled out a Polaroid camera and snapped a photo of the boy.

His golden eyes emerged coldly from beneath the camera.

“This will be your last picture.”

He put the camera away. Then, gripping his blade, he charged at the boy—the moment his body blurred into a phantom, he suddenly reappeared above the boy’s head.

As the blade came down, the wings on the boy’s back lifted over his head. With a loud clang, the echo rippled through the entire bamboo forest, the bamboo stalks trembling violently.

“If this is all the ability you’ve got, then ants taking over the world is only a matter of time.”

The boy’s wings trembled as they lifted upward, and three pairs of yellow-brown long limbs sprouted from his back. The uppermost pair shot straight toward Wu Dian’s abdomen.

A cold gleam flashed. Wu Dian drew his blade and dodged, then without the slightest pause swept it sideways.

Puchi.

A yellow stinging ant suddenly appeared out of thin air in midair—what Wu Dian pierced was the ant, not the boy. The ant was still alive. It let out a low sound, its scarlet eyes filled with fury and killing intent as it lunged at Wu Dian.

At the same time—

Two soft antennae extended from the top of the boy’s head. His body began to stretch; his short black hair turned into long chestnut hair. On his face—besides the pair of human eyes—two additional pairs of slightly smaller red compound eyes emerged.

He, or perhaps she, lifted a hand and hurled the yellow stinging ant she was holding, smashing it into pieces. She curled her lips into a smile.

“You two… the good-looking ones… stay. Become my ant queens.”

Wu Dian sheathed his blade onto his back, watching her without a hint of emotion.

Her gaze drifted and landed on the confused-looking youth standing behind the group.

“You. You ate my child.”

Wu Heng thought she was completely unreasonable. He grabbed X in one hand.

“He ate more than one.”

X twisted his head twice. “So what?”

Wu Dian tilted his head slightly and asked, “What exactly are you?”

“Does it matter?” she replied. “You’ve already seen it. I’m an ant.”

She lifted her chin. In the distance, the rustling sound of an approaching insect tide echoed. Overhead, the bamboo crowns, interlinked with one another, began to tremble in advance.

“As far as I know, ants don’t have the ability to change sex, and males don’t have reproductive functions,” Wu Dian said, voicing two points of doubt.

The long limbs on the girl’s back rotated and hooked onto a bamboo stalk, lifting her up above their heads. Looking down on the people below, she said:

“Is it not common for a queen ant to suppress and regulate the hormones of other females so they dutifully serve as her foot soldiers, all to maintain her own status?”

“You’re not the queen ant.”

Wu Dian frowned. That would explain how she could switch freely between male and female forms.

“When did I ever say I was?”

The girl folded her arms. “But all queen ants are my queen ants. They continuously produce offspring for me. I support their work, and I love them dearly.”

“Why won’t you all support my leadership? I haven’t done anything to harm anyone. I love animals. I stay away from humans. I seem to have no flaws—I’m practically perfect!”

“But now you’re hurting me,” she added, a shadow of disappointment falling beneath her eyes. “As expected, humans only ever care about whether their own interests are threatened. Why can’t I build many nests? Why can’t the bamboo forest cover the mountains? Why must ants follow the rules of your human society?”

Sitting on the ground, Du Weichen suddenly had an epiphany. “She’s right!”

Li Qing kicked him aside. “Are you an ant?”

Wu Heng listened calmly. He looked at Wu Dian’s back—Wu Dian seemed to be thinking. Then he turned to Xie Chongyi. Xie Chongyi looked utterly indifferent. Once he settled on a certain logic, no amount of talking from the other side could change it. So he was probably just waiting for the fight to start.

Wu Heng slowly climbed to his feet. Leisurely, he brushed the grass off his pants and fingers, then walked toward the opposite side. X hopped onto his shoulder.

“You just said it yourself: survival of the fittest. So why bother with all this talking?”

Wu Heng stepped beside Wu Dian and looked into the girl’s eyes. “As you said, if the expansion of the ant species is to earn the respect of human society, then in turn, you must also respect human society’s rules.”

“Don’t act like an ant delinquent,” Wu Heng muttered at the end.

“Fine,” the girl said, spreading her hands. With a rustling sound, she climbed higher. Her voice rang clear and bright: “Then let’s skip the nonsense.”

As her words fell, a hair-raising buzzing erupted overhead.

“They all have wings!”

Du Weichen pointed at the sky, eyes wide with shock.

“Ah—!”

A flash of gold shot from behind. A yellow stinging ant lunged at the bald man from the rear. Before anyone could react, the ant’s stinger at the end of its abdomen drove straight into the bald man’s lower body.

Xie Chongyi struck the ant down, but it was already one step ahead—its life extinguished the moment after the attack, its hound-like body still twitching lightly.

The bald man clutched his crotch and screamed in agony, the sound blood-curdling.

Du Weichen scrambled to his side, frantically slapping his back. “Hey! Bro! You okay?!”

The bald man had already fallen into despair. Pale yellow light flickered faintly under the skin of his face. Du Weichen stared at the bloody mess between his legs, wincing in sympathetic pain, but still forced himself to console him.

“It’s… it’s nothing big! As long as the green hills remain, there’ll always be firewood—no d*ck? Whatever, life goes on—what the—HEY—!”

The bald man kicked Du Weichen several meters away.

He landed at Wu Heng’s feet, but they didn’t know each other and had never exchanged a word.

“You have such a small face…” Du Weichen mumbled dazedly, lifting his hand to gesture. “About this small… so cute.”

Wu Heng glanced at him for one second, then blurred forward to the bald man. He crouched and grabbed the man’s chin.

The texture of his skin didn’t feel human anymore—it was cold and rigid. Yet the bald man was clearly still alive, breathing heavily and forcefully.

His eyes had already turned cloudy. A muffled, gurgling sound rose from his throat. Suddenly—his back split open with a violent crack, blood spraying everywhere. Several pairs of newly formed insect legs burst out. Yellow hard shell replaced his human skin, and compound eyes and antennae emerged simultaneously. He flung Wu Heng’s hand away, dropped to all fours, and crawled on the ground, his abdomen swelling rapidly.

In mere seconds, his human form vanished.

He had become a massive creature—and a female. His semi-transparent abdomen already showed clusters of black eggs inside. Once mature, they would surely pour out in heaps.

“My god…”

Zheng Xi involuntarily stepped forward. “How could this be…”

Above them, the ant swarm blotted out the sky. The girl stood in the center of it all, pointing lightly downward.

“My dear queens,” she said, “remember my name. I am Lan Qingqiu.”

“Q–Queens? Who? Who’s the queen? Us? No way!”

Du Weichen’s face turned deathly pale. His sensory ability only made everything worse—he heard the wingbeats of the ant swarm even more clearly, he heard Lan Qingqiu’s soft laughter. His fear magnified endlessly.

A streak of green flashed across their vision—

The fully transformed ant queen that the bald man had become was decapitated.

The queen’s bodily fluids splattered onto Wu Dian and Zheng Xi’s faces. Wu Dian shut his eyes briefly, then opened them again—sharp, focused—looking straight at Wu Heng.

Lan Qingqiu didn’t care about losing one queen. Her swarm was filled entirely with male yellow stinging ants in their breeding phase.

The swarm beat their wings and dove. Their dark-red compound eyes fell like crimson meteors; the insect tide crashed down like a golden wave.

Li Qing yanked out a black shadow, kneaded it into shape, and threw it onto Du Weichen. The shadow wrapped him instantly.

Right after she did those two motions, her body was suddenly pressed to the ground. A branding-iron-hot stinger was already aimed at her.

“A’Qing!!!” Du Weichen screamed, voice breaking.

Li Qing bit her gums until they bled. She curled her leg and kicked the stinger away. The black shadow pierced through the ant’s body and expanded instantly like an octopus, beginning a massacre.

Wu Heng sat on a stone, vines shielding him on all sides.

The yellow stinging ants in their breeding phase were far more aggressive than before—and radiated a chilling, ravenous hunger. Their compound eyes were locked on the humans’ lower bodies.

Bai He was knocked down, yellow ants crawling all over him. The vines slithered over and snapped them off one by one with crisp, crackling strikes.

This time, X refused to fight. He buried his head between Wu Heng’s knees and trembled uncontrollably.

Wu Heng lifted X’s head. His red eyes swept straight over its entire body.

“If a yellow stinging ant managed to plant eggs in you,” he asked, “what kind of little thing would you end up giving birth to?”

X let out a low whimper — “A’Heng” — and it was definitely not shyness.

Based on past experience, there was a 90% chance its owner would throw it out just to satisfy curiosity.

Wu Heng lost interest. He parted the vines in front of him. Above, Wu Dian was locked in combat with Lan Qingqiu. Lan Qingqiu’s speed was unnaturally fast — he could barely track her figure. Wu Dian’s clones were no real threat to her; they only managed to make swaths of yellow stinging ants fall. She wielded an axe twice her size — offense through the axe, defense through her wings. Wu Dian nearly stabbed her several times, but each time she slipped away with ease. With yellow stinging ants constantly swarming him, Wu Heng didn’t think highly of this energy-draining war of attrition.

Several yellow stinging ants landed on the stone beneath him, wings buzzing, drool dripping as they flew upward. Wu Heng twisted his wrist and the vines coiled along his arm, weaving into a spear. He stood and stabbed downward repeatedly like skewering fish.

X wrapped its wings tightly around the boy’s neck, desperately trying not to fall off.

Xie Chongyi’s peripheral vision never left him.

He observed closely — Wu Heng was just playing.

But even if he was only playing, it didn’t change the fact that Wu Heng was one of the strongest forces on the ground.

At that moment, a vine as thick as a wrist slid under Xie Chongyi’s crotch, brushing his ankle on the way past.

For some reason, Xie Chongyi stepped down on it.

Wu Heng frowned, looking over with crimson eyes.

Xie Chongyi ignored him. He crouched down, released the vine, then immediately grabbed it again. Feeling the uneven bumps along its surface, he chuckled — and in the next second, he appeared right in front of Wu Heng.

The vine was still in his hand.

Wu Heng’s expression was puzzled to the point of innocence — he had only touched it, he hadn’t eaten it.

Xie Chongyi tossed the writhing vine into the boy’s arms.

“Wu Heng, you’re going to have a baby.”

…?

Wu Heng lowered his head. Holding the vine in both hands, he lifted it up to examine it carefully.

It was a vibrant green vine, lush with staggered leaves and full of vitality — but on its surface were countless lumps and bumps of all sizes.

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