Chapter 2: Being Targeted by a Weird Uncle!

The incubation nest destroyed by the Imperial fleet drifted in shattered pieces through the silent ring system.

Its bio-reactions had ceased.

All around floated various debris.

A servitor-piloted probe hovered in the void, its optical lens fixed on the nest’s remains, scanning continuously.

Rumor had it a certain biologis magos was deeply interested in Tyranid void hatcheries.

He had planned to come personally to collect bio-samples.

Unfortunately, battles within the system delayed him.

To protect the Cult Mechanicus’s valuable assets in orbit around Ordveil IV, he had to commit his own ark mechanicus to the fight.

Suddenly, the probe detected a small object approaching the nest.

It appeared to be a bio-ship, still in juvenile stage.

Unlike the purple-shelled bio-ships, this one was almost pure white—an albino of the hive fleet.

Servitors did not think.

Its prefrontal lobe had been excised.

Only flickering binary code remained in its turbid eyes.

It held no interest in the bio-ship juvenile and continued monitoring the nest wreckage.

Chen Xing had no idea her every move was already spotted by an Imperial probe.

But she was simply too hungry.

Intense starvation nearly drove her mad.

She had never craved food this desperately.

A large chunk of bio-tissue drifted toward her.

She immediately directed the tentacles on either side of her bow to seize it.

She wolfed it down, stuffing it into the massive maw beneath her prow.

As the frozen bio-mass was crunched by ringed teeth, the hunger in her belly eased a little.

Reason began to return.

“Starving me to death—hunger made me lose my mind.”

She wiped sweat that didn’t exist from her forehead.

“Damn it, I want KFC, I want McDonald’s—hey? Emperor grandpa, can I order subspace delivery?”

Rough chewing sounds echoed around her.

Chen Xing dared not think about what she was eating.

She was still too small.

She could only start with small bio-mass chunks.

Hiding in the shadows of the nest wreckage, she continually tore into the flesh of her kin, gradually strengthening herself.

And so, a month passed.

Chen Xing had now grown into a 120-meter small bio-ship.

She possessed more psionic tendrils and thicker chitin external armor.

Even her feeding tentacles had increased to six.

But her greatest change was the abdominal hatchery.

With the hatchery matured, she was finally ready to produce worker bees.

“System bro,” Chen Xing said expressionlessly, “it’s all on you.”

[Ding, detecting host about to become pregnant. One Pregnancy Eight Treasures System activating service! Ding, worker bee conception successful. System launching!]

Twenty hours later, Chen Xing watched eight worker bees squeeze out from the hatchery.

Severed umbilical cords and amniotic membranes drifted in space, soon freezing into ice.

She used the bio-material of one worker bee to produce eight.

But recalling the birthing process turned her face iron-blue.

Aaaaah, giving birth… I’m a man, damn it.

The newborn worker bees quickly devoured their own membranes and cords.

They looked exactly like space monsters—bodies covered in bone-white chitin shells, surfaces riddled with honeycomb depressions and angular protrusions, like living armor.

Four head tentacles and a pair of massive serrated pincers could seize and crush prey—perfect for cutting and hauling.

[Host, your kids look so ugly.]

“Get lost!”

Chen Xing stretched out a pale little foot and unexpectedly kicked the system flying.

She focused her mind to establish psionic links with the worker bees, placing them under her psionic node control.

As the links formed, adorable chibi lolis popped into existence one by one.

Chen Xing patted their heads.

They were all miniature versions of herself—way too kawaii!

No, no—these were her bio-terminals.

She couldn’t spoil them!

With that thought, she issued psionic commands to all worker bees.

Their murky eyes lit up.

They immediately split up to collect bio-mass fragments farther afield.

Over the past month, two Imperial warships had passed by.

One was a Firestorm-class frigate.

The other was the renowned Lunar-class cruiser.

The Firestorm was likely a system patrol vessel, constantly inspecting major planets.

The Lunar-class merely transited, soon vanishing into a Mandeville Point warp rift.

For safety, Chen Xing anchored her hull directly below the nest wreckage.

Distant sunlight was perfectly blocked by shadow.

Whatever she did, discovery was unlikely.

But as time passed, local bio-mass dwindled.

Between risking exposure and continuing to hunker down, she chose to hatch a batch of worker bees.

This batch did not disappoint.

Hours later, fully laden worker bees delivered spoils right to her maw—three times her usual haul.

Chen Xing’s hull gorged itself.

Hunger finally gave way to satiation.

The second batch hatched soon after, then the third.

Twenty-four worker bees now resided in the abdominal hangar.

Chen Xing fully embraced capitalist management.

She divided the worker bees into three shifts—20 hours work, 4 hours rest—forcing them to collect bio-mass day and night.

This was straight from her previous life’s boss playbook.

Soon, another month passed.

Chen Xing’s hull had grown to 300 meters.

For interstellar travel, she sprouted twelve additional pairs of propulsion psionic tendrils.

These tentacle-like structures generated psionic fields with each sway, creating forward or reverse thrust via field disturbance—truly marvelous.

Just as Chen Xing planned to keep developing quietly, a Mandeville Point suddenly tore open a warp rift.

A black-and-red ark mechanicus emerged.

As the Geller field dropped, void shields rose, swiftly forming a solid energy barrier.

Biologis Magos Oberius sat upon the command throne of the ark mechanicus Seeker.

Over centuries, his body had been almost entirely replaced by machinery—less than 5% original flesh remained.

Rumor claimed only a logic chip remained in his skull, long since supplanted by rogue artificial intelligence.

“Kukuku, who would’ve thought that albino bio-ship was still here? Praise the Omnissiah! I, Oberius, shall soon unveil the Tyranid secrets—kukuku!”

The magos’s right-eye camera lens flickered red and blue.

His turbid left eye gleamed with eerie fervor.

Various tubes and cables connected to his back trembled with his body.

A servo-skull flew over, injecting a vial of green alchemical agent into a port on his spine.

As the drug took effect, his manic excitement rapidly calmed.

“In the name of the Omnissiah, prepare to capture that bio-ship.”

Meanwhile, Chen Xing also spotted the ark mechanicus.

It charged aggressively straight from the Mandeville Point toward the nest wreckage.

What else could she not understand?

It was coming for her!

[Host, that warship is closing in—run!]

“I know, that must be a Mechanicus ark. How did they lock onto me?”

Chen Xing felt wronged.

“Wait—don’t tell me it’s commanded by some bio-magos obsessed with Tyranid research? Why am I so unlucky!”

She had guessed correctly.

The ark mechanicus Seeker was a 12-kilometer behemoth.

Though not the largest among ark mechanicus, it carried complete bio-research facilities—bio-labs, chem-vats, gene-pods—plus heavy armament and Skitarii legions for deep-space exploration safety.

Chen Xing was merely a 300-meter bio-ship juvenile.

Compared to this fully armed ark, she was an ant beside an elephant.

“Only option is to flee.”

Chen Xing sighed.

Her “newbie protection period” was over.

It took five minutes to recover the worker bees.

She released the abdominal limbs anchoring her hull.

The tentacle propulsion system at her stern began oscillating, psionic glow flickering.

Soon, sufficient thrust built.

Chen Xing manipulated the psionic anti-gravity field for attitude control, deftly weaving between massive ice chunks and rocks, using them as cover to escape the nest wreckage swiftly.

But her trail was quickly picked up by a servitor probe.

After logic array clarity correction, footage projected onto the Seeker’s command bridge.

Biologis Magos Oberius trembled with excitement.

His chest vox emitted kukuku laughter.

“Deploy bombers. Seize it.”

A nearby tech-priest immediately relayed the order.

Minutes later, a twenty-bomber formation launched from the ark’s midship hangar, speeding toward the target.

Chen Xing soon detected the bombers.

They caught up precisely and dove into the ring without hesitation, attacking her.

For a 300-meter bio-ship, their plasma torpedoes were lethal.

Chen Xing could only rely on psionic gravity fields to maneuver nimbly between ice and rock, dancing with the relentless bomber squadron.

But then, a torpedo struck an ice chunk ahead to her left.

Expanding plasma flared brighter than the sun, instantly blinding her.

By instinct, Chen Xing spun her hull to evade.

Intense pain followed—her chitin shell dented and pitted by colliding ice.

“System bro, think of something!” She panicked. “I might be done for!”

[Wah wah wah, I’m just a female-frequency system—I can’t conjure warriors!]

“Then use your One Pregnancy Eight Treasures somehow!”

[Wait—you can produce spore mines.]

“Huh?”

Chen Xing nearly forgot she had that ability.

She had been exploiting worker bees for months and overlooked this basic unit.

The second slot in the hatchery list was spore mines.

She immediately issued production orders.

With her current hatchery scale, she could produce 12 per cycle.

Then the system applied “One Pregnancy Eight Treasures”—96 spore mines rapidly gestated.

“System bro, besides One Pregnancy Eight Treasures, any other functions?”

[Uh… painless delivery?]

“Don’t need that. Anything else?”

[Shorten gestation period?]

“That’s good—use it now!”

The system activated “shorten gestation.”

The spore mines’ progress bar rocketed to full.

A cloud of spore mines ejected into space.

They activated tail bio-jets, drifting around Chen Xing’s hull, instantly forming a protective net.

At that moment, three bombers approached from upper right.

Pilots locked onto the white Tyranid bio-ship but jumped at the surrounding spore mines.

“Abort drop, abort drop! All units evade!”

But spore mines were faster.

Before Chen Xing even commanded, 12 mines accelerated toward the bombers, detonating in a barrage.