Loki thought to himself, saying, ’They are much older than I am, so they should have more rank 6 servants than I do. And why do they even bother with rank 5 servants? Those are usually too weak to be useful for anything.’
’Either they are too busy to invest in making rank 6 servants, or rank 6 servants are too expensive to make, or Hammock has a special advantage in making rank 6 servants and can do so easily and cheaper than them.’
’If it is the latter and Hammock has an advantage, what could the source of the advantage be? Could it be because I converted Hammock’s body into a factory for making drones, or because Hammock is using a symbol of authority that has the support of the heart of a world to produce the rank 6 ants, or could it be because the Hive Mind Metac makes it easier for the ant drones to borrow Hammock’s power?’
He had a lot of questions that he didn’t have answers to. Since he didn’t mind lowering himself to get information, he sent a message to the two of them asking for answers.
He said, "It seems to me that making rank 6 creatures isn’t easy. Why is that?"
Usually, Ant Hill would ignore his questions. But this time, she didn’t.
She took this as an opportunity to talk down to him, so she said to him with disdain, "You ignorant boy. Of course, creating creatures that can borrow the power of a Cave Heaven is difficult. You wouldn’t know about it since you don’t make anything."
She said a lot, but none of it was useful information to Loki. At least, Loki didn’t think she said anything to answer his question.
After she said what she wanted to say, she ignored him. This made Loki shake his head inwardly and think, ’It is more like she spoke to insult me, not to answer my question.’
Fortunately, Nether Flame was more reasonable than she was. This rank 7 death cultivator said, "I don’t make anything either, but I’ve heard that making special creatures is expensive and has a high chance of failure."
"Someone once said that making creatures that can borrow the power of a Cave Heaven is like making pills. It requires technical skill, and most of the time, the refinement can fail."
"The person also said that the stronger the Cave Heaven, the more difficult it will be to create the special creature. This is because the power of the Cave Heaven can easily break the creature borrowing it. The rate of success can fall from 30% to 10% if a Cave Heaven becomes slightly bigger."
Loki immediately said, "Thank you for the answer. It is a blessing to have someone like you who is ready to teach."
But Nether Flame snorted before saying, "How did you get the rank 6 metal ants anyway? And you kept them in your Cave Heaven? Was the suppression of law fragments really worth it?
Nether Flame had also sent this message to Ant Hill and Money Body, so they were aware of the questions that Nether Flame asked Loki. Money Body was especially interested in hearing the answers to the questions, so he was paying attention and wanted to hear what Loki would say.
But before Loki could answer, Ant Hill sniggered and said, "Of course, carrying them around and experiencing the suppression of his law fragments have to be worth it for him. After all, they are stronger than he is. Since they are his greatest source of strength, what use are the law fragments in his Cave Heaven?"
This is an insult worse than what she said earlier. To say that rank 6 creatures and tools were stronger than a divine being is an insult since these special creatures can only borrow the power of a Cave Heaven, while a divine being has the power of their Cave Heaven and Divine Metacs.
So she was saying that even if he were to activate his Divine Metacs and consume his lifespan to increase his power, the ant drones would still be able to defeat him with just the power of the Cave Heaven that they are borrowing.
If this were the truth, she would be right to say that the ant drones are his greatest source of strength and the law fragments in his Cave Heaven don’t matter.
What she said wasn’t the truth, but Loki didn’t intend to enlighten them. He only smiled and said, "Ant Hill is truly insightful. It seems she is wiser than she looks. Who would have thought that a bug was so smart?"
Then he said to Nether Flame, "I got the ant drones from a friend. That friend lent them to me. I didn’t buy them."
Nether Flame nodded in understanding and said, "No wonder you didn’t know how expensive they were. It seems this friend of yours is powerful if they can lend you something like this."
As for Ant Hill, she didn’t say anything more. But she did snicker in disdain.
The fact that he had insulted her appearance as an ant and claimed that she looked like she was stupid made her understand that she had hit the nail on the head with her claims about how weak Loki was.
Since she had already struck gold, she didn’t need to continue digging. So she kept quiet while relishing her superiority over Loki. It truly felt good to her that she wasn’t the weakest and that there was always someone in the group that she could vent on.
The conversation ended at that point. The four of them began thinking about various things based on the information they just acquired.
The thing that Money Body was thinking about was trying to guess the power of the forger who built the ant drones. In order to determine the power of the forger, he focused on the ant drones to see how powerful they were.