Chapter 396 - 393: Dust Land

Chapter 396: Chapter 393: Dust Land

"I’ve taught many bugs before. Most of them could never learn, and even the ones who did took a very long time. None of them were like you, learning it on the first try. You have a real talent for petrification..."

The Kind-hearted Worm praised him generously, encouraging Mo Ling all along the way:

"Once we get to a place with denser dust, you’ll surely be able to unleash your full potential. Failing at petrification is common, so don’t let one little setback make you abandon the path you’re meant to be on."

"You’re right," Mo Ling replied distractedly.

And so, the two bugs crawled farther and farther into the dust-choked canyon.

...

"We’re almost there," the Kind-hearted Worm said to Mo Ling, gazing into the distance.

Mo Ling looked around. The Petrifying Dust here was indeed much denser than before.

The layer of dust on the ground was incredibly thick, and stepping on it kicked up dense clouds. The canyon walls on both sides were constantly crumbling, sending heaps of dust crashing down from above.

The Kind-hearted Worm led Mo Ling around mountains of accumulated dust to the canyon’s exit.

Passing through the exit, a vast plain appeared before their eyes.

Endless Petrifying Dust carpeted the land. The gray in the seawater was even more intense than the blue, the particles clinging together to form a colossal, sky-blotting net.

As the currents flowed, this great gray net filtered out even more of the passing Petrifying Dust, raising the concentration in this part of the sea to an unprecedented level.

"I discovered this place when I fell from the top of the canyon. Pretty great, huh?" the Kind-hearted Worm said with pride, pointing at the net that resembled a colossal beast.

"Impressive."

Mo Ling replied, stunned.

The massive net blotted out all light, making this part of the sea even dimmer. If he couldn’t still move freely, Mo Ling would have thought he was already buried alive in dust-filled earth.

The seawater surged, and the edges of the great net quivered. The fibrous structures, formed by clumps of dust, twisted back and forth, looking exactly like the tentacles of some monster.

The gaps in the net opened and closed like the breathing of the monster, and its heavy exhalations sent countless particles of dust billowing downward.

After being here only a short while, Mo Ling’s round carapace was already coated in a thick layer of Petrifying Dust.

’This really is a good place.’

’If I want to master the power of petrification, this is without a doubt the best place to attune myself to the dust.’

However, it seemed that—contrary to what the Kind-hearted Worm had said—they weren’t the first bugs to have ever been here.

In the gloom not far off, many pairs of eyes had appeared without them noticing.

The Kind-hearted Worm noticed the eyes as well and tensed up instantly.

It tried to lead Mo Ling away, but their path was blocked there, too.

"Leave."

A cold warning came from the gloom.

The eyes had them surrounded, blocking every direction except for the path back to the canyon. They clearly didn’t want the two bugs to enter the plain.

With nowhere to go, the Kind-hearted Worm stood its ground and demanded of the eyes, "By what right? There’s more Petrifying Dust here than you could ever use! Why won’t you let others have some?"

"Leave." The owners of the eyes apparently had no intention of explaining.

Not only that, but they began to converge on the two bugs, apparently intending to force Mo Ling and the Kind-hearted Worm out of the plain.

As they drew closer, Mo Ling got a clear look at them:

They were pill bugs, identical to them, but their bodies were encased in thick stone shells, leaving only two hollow-looking eyes visible.

Their short, jointed legs struggled out from cracks in the stone, crawling slowly across the ground. Their movements were incredibly difficult due to the cumbersome stone shells, but they still painstakingly closed in on them.

The Kind-hearted Worm didn’t back down in the face of its approaching kin.

"You weren’t here when I first discovered this place, and I never thought to keep it all to myself! You can’t just hoard it like this! The dust doesn’t belong to any one bug!"

It stood firmly in front of Mo Ling, facing down its kin.

But its kin seemed uninterested in reason, completely ignoring the Kind-hearted Worm’s words.

"Leave. This place is ours," they repeated.

"This place doesn’t belong to any one bug!" the Kind-hearted Worm retorted stubbornly.

However, things weren’t as simple as it thought.

As they drew nearer, the other bugs began to whip up countless vortexes of dust.

The surrounding water churned, and turbulent currents from all directions began to pull at Mo Ling and the Kind-hearted Worm.

The turbulence made it extremely difficult for Mo Ling to move. Every time he tried, the currents would drag him back to the center, pinning him in place.

As the turbulence enveloped them, Mo Ling suddenly felt that the movements of the other bugs were slowing down.

’This seems to be another form of attack using Petrifying Dust.’

"They’re stripping the petrification off of us..." the Kind-hearted Worm said despairingly, trapped in the center of the whirlpool.

"What does that mean?" Mo Ling could feel the currents tearing at his body, but there was no pain. He couldn’t understand what the other bugs were trying to do.

The Kind-hearted Worm glanced at Mo Ling, its voice filled with self-reproach. "I shouldn’t have brought you here. You don’t know anything, and now you’re caught in this senseless disaster..."

It raised a leg and stirred it through the turbulent water.

"I told you before that we can manipulate the Petrifying Dust, sending it where we want it to go."

"By concentrating it on our prey, we petrify them, slowing them down. Eventually, we slow them to our own speed, or even slower, which makes them easy to catch."

"But what if you do the opposite?"

"What if we wanted to make them faster and faster..."

"You’d strip the dust off them," Mo Ling answered, finishing the thought.

"Exactly. If a current can gather dust, it can also strip it away. The method is the same. Right now, they’re creating turbulence to strip the dust from our bodies and make us faster and faster."

’Faster and faster?’

Mo Ling was confused. ’Wouldn’t making your enemy faster put you at a disadvantage?’

’Is an attack like that really effective?’

Amid the churning currents, the other bugs’ movements grew slower and slower, until they finally stopped completely, not moving at all.

As if... they had turned to stone.

Staring at those round stone shells, Mo Ling was struck by a sense of familiarity.

"Rigidstones?"

"What’s a Rigidstone?" the Kind-hearted Worm asked, confused.

"Nothing..."

A thought churned in Mo Ling’s mind. ’Could it be... these pill bugs *are* the Rigidstones?’

"What’s the point of them making us faster?" Mo Ling pressed.

"They’re waiting for us to die," the Kind-hearted Worm said in despair. "A bug’s lifespan is finite. If you accelerate it by ten times, its lifespan is shortened by ten times. Accelerate it by ten thousand times, and its lifespan shortens by ten thousand times..."

"From their perspective, we’ll turn into corpses in an instant, then turn to dust in the next, scattering into this dim seawater..."