After seeing how powerful the mechanical ants were, Money Body determined that the forger was a rank 7 forger and a weak one at that. This was because the power that the ant drones were able to create was greater than what the Cave Heaven of a rank 6 cultivator can provide. But the power of the Cave Heaven wasn’t impressive for a rank 7 cultivator like Nether Flame.
Meanwhile, Loki was sighing in relief. After sighing, he said to himself, ’Fortunately, I was not in a rush and only summoned the small drones. If they can get all riled up because of the small ones, I wonder what they would think if I had brought out even more powerful drones.’
Thanks to their conversation, he has been able to confirm that Hammock truly has an advantage in making rank 6 drones. The cause for this that he finds most plausible is the Hive Mind Metac and how it helps the ant drones use Hammock’s power without breaking.
Their conversation has also helped him to determine that he can’t show off Hammock’s advantage mainly because he is not a forger. This is a factor that he usually overlooks because he doesn’t suffer from law fragment suppression.
There is also the fact that even if he were a forger, Hammock’s ability to create rank 6 ant drones with a 100% success rate would still be eye-catching and might draw unwanted attention from those who would like to also have a 100% success rate in making rank 6 ant drones.
All of these meant that he wouldn’t be able to use the medium and large drones for now. Since he had made changes to them and had never been able to use them, he had been looking forward to using them.
He thought to himself, ’It would seem that I can only think about them for now. Anything more would be too dangerous.’
Then he proceeded to think about the changes that he made in the medium and large ant drones. The first thing he thought about was their size.
The race of the ant that Hammock belongs to is the Colossal Ant race. This is why the small ant drones are giants compared to Ant Hill ants.
So while the small ant drones are as big as people, the medium ones are as big as houses. These medium drones are further divided into two classes, which are the shield class and spear class.
The shield class of drones was bulky brutes with a shield for a head. When a bunch of them are lined up, they will form a wall of metal. He maintained this feature in them and didn’t change them.
What he changed about the shield class medium drones was the flame throwers that were attached to their mouths. He replaced them with arc guns that create and fire electric arcs at enemies.
The arc guns would fire metallic projectiles connected by a conductor to the shield drones. Once the metallic projectile touches the target, a bolt of lightning will pass through the attached conductor into their bodies.
He had initially wanted to create fire that could burn underwater. He thought about using magnesium rods for fire, but the result was not pleasant.
The fire that was created couldn’t be controlled and channeled into a single direction like the fire of a flame thrower. The fire burned indiscriminately, and it burned nearby shield drones. So he opted to use something that was easier to control by the shield drones.
Another advantage of the arc guns was that the electricity that they produced would be very effective against aquatic creatures. This was why he attached the electricity generators to the spears of the spear drones, too.
The spear drones are supposed to be lighter and faster than the medium drones, so he added a water jet engine to them. After turning their spear limbs into arc guns, anything they stab will be electrocuted.
As for the large class of drones, which are many stories tall, he removed the trebuchet and giant ballistae that he had initially built them with. He also removed the most formidable cannons.
He had replaced all of these guns because they were kinetic weapons and would be less effective in the water. Instead, he had installed many high-energy laser guns and ultrasonic sound blasters.
The ultrasonic sound blasters have a short range, but they have the advantage of bypassing most defenses and wiping out large swaths of targets with one round of fire. As for the lasers, they are strong enough to drill a large well through the ground to the core of the world.
These are the things he planned to use in Oceania. Now he can only think fondly about them.
While he was thinking, he noticed that Money Body didn’t do anything to help with the defense of the outpost core. Money Body appeared to be busy looking around.
Loki knew what Money Body was looking out for, so he shrugged and said to himself, ’It is not as if he needs to kill mortal creatures for him to make significant contributions in this mission. He already has the largest contribution for permanently reducing the strength of the crystal shield and helping us bypass it without dying. We will have to do a lot to beat that.’
Then he glanced at Ant Hill and smirked as he thought to himself, ’As for the person who has the largest contribution deficit, it will have to be her. After all, it was her cockimamy idea to send the crystal ant that let the world know that we were invading.’
’Now she has a lot to make up for. I bet she is very anxious about that.’
Everyone was thinking about different things, but they all began to focus on protecting the outpost as time went by. This was because, as time went by, the attacks intensified.
The situation had taken a turn for the worse when the island became submerged. But this was just the start of their struggles.