October 15th, seven days after the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays had ended, at 6 pm, Zhang Yanhang was in the outer zone of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu.
Lying in bed and fast asleep, Zhang Yanhang suddenly opened his eyes in confusion and stared straight at the direction of the ceiling, "Another unfamiliar ceiling..."
Having just woken up, Zhang Yanhang lay in bed for a while to gather his thoughts, then he lifted his hand to check the time on his watch, "I actually slept for nine hours this time? That’s so long..."
Zhang Yanhang felt that it must have been due to the fifteen continuous hours of work he had put in before going to sleep that resulted in his nine-hour slumber this time.
Lazing in the warmth of his bedding, Zhang Yanhang somewhat couldn’t bring himself to move. He was now pondering what he needed to do next. As before, he had two choices: one was to go monster hunting right away; the other was to open treasure boxes.
At present, Zhang Yanhang had only three areas left to clear in his Second Tier Clearing plan. Once he finished the Second Tier Stage of his plan, he could go to the slot machine to draw prizes. He had been coveting the slot machine in the Crimson Iron Ant Nest for quite a long time.
"But although I’m about to finish the Second Tier Stage of the Ant Nest clearing plan, right now I’m more inclined to open some treasure boxes. After all, I hunted down three to four thousand Crimson Iron Ants before sleeping, and they dropped quite a few treasure boxes. Opening treasure boxes won’t take much time anyway, so I might as well finish opening them before continuing to hunt monsters.
Moreover, if I open the treasure boxes now, I can use the proceeds from these boxes to upgrade some skills, particularly the Death Wave Skill and the Limitless Universe Skill. Upgrading these two skills would further improve my hunting efficiency—that’s the idea of ’sharpening the axe won’t delay the cutting of firewood.’"
However, although on the surface Zhang Yanhang’s reason for choosing to open treasure boxes was to improve his hunting efficiency, the real reason pressing him to open the boxes was quite simple—he was just feeling too lazy to move after waking up from sleep. So, he thought, why not take this time to leisurely open some treasure boxes?
This time, Zhang Yanhang had killed roughly more than three thousand Crimson Iron Worker Ants and about five hundred Crimson Iron Flying Ants, along with a dozen of Crimson Iron Soldier Ants.
Regarding the Crimson Iron Soldier Ants, Zhang Yanhang had encountered a few during the initial phase of his First Tier clearing plan. Thereafter, during the Second Tier Stage, he hadn’t seen them at all.
Thus, even though Zhang Yanhang had cleared more than a third of the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest, he had only managed to kill a dozen or so Crimson Iron Soldier Ants in total.
But this was quite normal since the Attribute list for the Crimson Iron Soldier Ants stated that they were responsible for guarding the inner regions of the Ant Nest, while Zhang Yanhang had been clearing the outer zone of the Crimson Iron Ant Nest all along. If there had been any interaction between the two, it would have been peculiar.
Even now, Zhang Yanhang still couldn’t understand why a group of Crimson Iron Soldier Ants had suddenly appeared in the outer zone of the Crimson Iron Ant Nest. It had to be said that the movement patterns of this group of Soldier Ants were quite baffling.
"I’ve been in the Crimson Iron Ant Nest for twenty-four hours now, and it seems like the Crimson Iron Ant Queen has had no reaction whatsoever," Zhang Yanhang scanned the surrounding environment with ’Seeking Fortune and Avoiding Evil’, only to find that the area he had cleared before sleeping had not been repopulated with Crimson Iron Ants.
"If she wanted to surround and attack me, shouldn’t the Crimson Iron Ant Queen be sending out a large number of Crimson Iron Ants to track me by now?" Zhang Yanhang felt his whereabouts should be quite obvious since wherever he went, the Crimson Iron Ants from that place would vanish, and finding him should not be difficult.
Even up to this point, Zhang Yanhang was still nostalgically reminiscing about the ambush set up by the Crimson Iron Ant Queen when he had first entered the Ant Nest because a higher monster density resulted in a higher hunting efficiency for him.
Under normal circumstances, it took him six hours to hunt over two thousand monsters, whereas during the Crimson Iron Ant’s ambush, it had taken Zhang Yanhang only half an hour to kill over two thousand Crimson Iron Ants—a difference of twelvefold. It could be said to be quite outrageous.
While Zhang Yanhang was contemplating why the Crimson Iron Ant Queen had yet not initiated an attack, a thought about an objective factor he had caused suddenly crossed his mind. It might have been this factor that prevented the Crimson Iron Ant Queen from launching an attack.
"The first time I entered the Crimson Iron Ant Nest, I killed five hundred Crimson Iron Ants. The second time I entered the Ant Nest, right at the beginning of the C-shaped passage, I was attacked by the Crimson Iron Ants. With no choice, I killed over two thousand of them.
Adding to that, the three to four thousand Crimson Iron Ants I just killed for the First Tier and Second Tier Stages of the Ant Nest clearing plan, all together, I’ve killed roughly six thousand Crimson Iron Ants, while the total number of Crimson Iron Ants in the nest is just barely over ten thousand.
That is to say, I’ve actually already killed three-fifths of the entire Crimson Iron Ant population in the nest, and with only the remaining two-fifths, the Crimson Iron Ant Queen, even if she wanted to launch an attack, would be in a position of ’having the will but not the strength’..."
Upon realizing this, Zhang Yanhang couldn’t help feeling a bit sad. This was all the melancholy that came with improving his strength too quickly. He had always been looking forward to being ambushed, only to find that in just over a dozen hours, he had wiped out three-fifths of the entire Ant Nest population of Crimson Iron Ants.
"Since things have developed to this point, the chances of an ambush are probably slim, so I might as well diligently carry out the Ant Nest clearing plan. After all, as long as I steadily progress step by step, it will likely take no more than one more day to completely clear out the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest."
The total area of the small Crimson Iron Ant Nest Dalagu was forty square kilometers, and Zhang Yanhang had already cleared fifteen square kilometers. Now, only twenty-five square kilometers remained. Even if he continued at the pace of clearing one square kilometer every forty minutes, he would need about sixteen hours to finish.
However, as the density of Crimson Iron Ants was sure to decrease later on, Zhang Yanhang’s clearing efficiency was expected to increase further. Logically, the final time needed to complete the clearing should be reduced to some extent.
Therefore, according to this situation, Zhang Yanhang estimated that if everything went smoothly, he might be able to completely clear the entire Crimson Iron Ant Nest by around one or two o’clock the following afternoon.