The "chosen laborer" whom Sarkadi had once pinned down and thrashed at the starport was named Kai.
When the black Core Species went darting through the streets and alleys to snatch this unlucky worker, the latter nearly performed another full-body prostrate slide. His compound eyes, which had finally stopped swelling, betrayed a frantic swirl of emotions: *How can this be? Help me, help me, help me!*
With a perfectly friendly air, Sarkadi draped his tail over the other’s shoulder and neck, pulling the nearly fainting worker female close.
"Long time no see," he said, giving the other a cordial pat.
The middle-tier Zerg let out a wet *gloop* on the spot.
"How long have you been on Ja?" the high-ranking Core Species asked. He used the benevolent tone of a leader conducting an inspection, as if asking, *Have you eaten? What did you have for dinner?*
"One Great Cosmic Cycle!" The middle-tier Zerg was so terrified his accessory teeth clattered against his mandibles. As if the answer were scalding his mouth, he rapidly demonstrated his quality as a creature who answered every question posed.
That was roughly equivalent to one Old Earth year. A Small Cosmic Cycle was similar to an Old Earth week, while a Great Cosmic Cycle was close to a year.
"Then you must be very familiar with Ja."
Sarkadi was quite satisfied with his eye for talent. It must have been the miraculous universe itself that delivered this chosen laborer to his side. No sooner had they landed on the energy planet than a free guide practically threw himself into the net.
"Whatever you ask... ask, ask..."
Terrified, the other automatically switched to the honorifics a lower-tier species used for a high-ranking one, emitting hissing sounds that translated to something like, *Greetings, Leader. You’ve worked hard, Leader.*
"Tell me about the Angon Great Sacrificial Grounds."
Sarkadi had seen plenty of these reporting scenes where subordinates' legs turned to jelly at the sight of him. He walked unbothered along the streets of Ja, passing through one dense cluster of nests after another.
Kai followed immediately, staying half a step behind. His two hind legs moved at a frantic pace, yet miraculously, he remained perpetually just slightly behind the high-ranking Zerg.
"The Core Species built Angon when they first discovered Ja."
The middle-tier Zerg’s command of the Common Tongue wasn't particularly good; he relied more frequently on emotional language. For a moment, Sarkadi even felt that Gera’s usual phrasing was positively elegant by comparison.
The worker’s tail pressed against the back of his knees, and his wings rubbed together softly. "The Direct Lines always believe in it. To them, Angon is a symbol to show they’re different from other mongrels."
The worker female muttered under his breath.
"Acting like a King Zerg is actually going to be born or something."
"Do you know Kata?" the Core Species asked, adding a helpful reminder: "The middle-tier administrator of Angon, that female in his senescence."
In their few meetings, Kata had shown an excessive amount of concern for Gera. Sarkadi couldn't help but become concerned about that concern, forming a recursive loop of suspicion. Although the elderly female meant no harm—and often even used a critical tone to offer warnings—Sarkadi never used outward emotions as his sole basis for judgment.
"He seems very concerned about the male at my side."
"Oh, Kata." Kai rubbed his forelimbs together, speaking in a habitual, hissing drawl. "That old bug has plenty of stories. He doesn't mean your partner any harm. After his tribe was wiped out, he became a wanderer, a loser carrying his own larva. I don't get why he didn't just abandon the larva; it would've been much easier."
"His only surviving larva was also a male. Couldn't fight, could only consume resources."
There was no male beside the elderly administrator living in the Angon nests. Whenever Sarkadi saw him, the old bug was always alone.
"What happened to his larva?" he asked.
"They ran into some roaming raiders. It was a Core Species leading a pack of middle-tiers. They were thrilled to find those two unlucky strays, and so, Kata’s little male died."
Kai shook his head indifferently. Most Zerg were accustomed to such things. The weak were consumables, burdens that wasted resources.
"Then Kata came to Ja alone and has lived here for a long time. Maybe because his sub-adult male died so miserably, his brain went a bit soft. If he really liked eggs that much, he could have just sired a whole new batch."
"But he didn't want to do that at all. Instead, he rapidly entered his senescence."
Kai let out a low murmur, accompanied by the sound of rubbing wings. "I really don't understand him."
Sarkadi’s golden-brown eyes looked toward the gloomy mountains at the far end of the Angon Great Sacrificial Grounds. His expression remained unruffled. Those mountains were heavy and silent, merging with the sky and earth as if they had remained unchanged since the planet's birth.
But such a posture held no deterrent power for Sarkadi.
He had seen mountains collapse and planets tear asunder. He had seen those seemingly immovable giants disintegrate in an instant, with scalding, boiling magma surging from the planet's wounds like lifeblood. It would flow unceasingly, incinerating all the heavy darkness in its path, forcing even the falling light of stars to give way.
For some reason, Kai felt a sense of dread toward those golden eyes. The chosen laborer couldn't help but shrink back, trying his best to put on a human-like, fawning expression.
"Of course, Kata’s cub couldn't compare to your partner. Your partner is a high-tier—"
His mouth was suddenly clamped shut by the tall Core Species. Sarkadi wore an expression that said, *You said that very well, now never speak again.* The other’s behavior—dancing frantically in a minefield—made him let out a soft sigh.
"Do you all have some kind of misunderstanding regarding the word 'partner'?" he asked.
The middle-tier worker female clearly misunderstood his meaning. His tucked tail wagged slightly, and the moment Sarkadi released him, he spoke again. His sincerity was so profound that for a moment, the Core Species felt as if he were looking at one of those sycophantic courtiers who lived to flatter.
"If you don't like that white male, I can go to the black market and find other types for you. Whatever color you like, I can—ee-ee-wu-pu-pu—"
Sarkadi hammered him into the dirt with a single swipe of his tail.
"Get up. Stop playing dead."
The black scaled tail flicked leisurely. The Core Species remained expressionless. "I don't need males. I need you to go to the black market and contact a few weapons suppliers for me."
After a thought, he added a warning: "Stay away from Gera, or I'll twist your head off."
Kai shook a handful of dirt out of his spiracles and mandibles. His antennae flailed, and his hissing was urgent.
"No problem! Your partner is named Gera? Ah, what a beautiful name, truly worthy of you—pu-pu-pu—"
Sarkadi pressed him back into the ground once more. For once, his gaze held an indefinable, complex sense of shock.
He really was a sycophant. The kind that was exceptionally flexible.
***
He met Kata again in the nest district outside Angon.
Pushing the white male forward, Sarkadi smiled. "Hi."
The senescent administrator looked like he didn't want to say "hi" or anything else to them. He glared at the two uninvited guests who had barged into his nest, letting out a threatening hiss. "If I remember correctly, last time I told you to get the hell out of my nest."
"I have business with you." Sarkadi didn't care what the other thought; he was well-versed in the philosophy of shearing a single sheep until it was bald. "You're the administrator of the Great Sacrificial Grounds, so you must be familiar with Ja's internal information nests and message classification systems. My little friend needs a guide. You teach Gera."
Kata looked like he was about to burst his spiracles, questioning angrily, "Why should I help you?"
"Because I need a tutor?" Sarkadi thought about it and answered seriously.
Sincerity is the ultimate killing move; it looked like it was about to strike the administrator dead.
Before the other could puff up like a bullfrog in rage, Sarkadi kindly led Gera to a seat. The male sat on the chair with a standard, obedient posture, like a well-behaved kitten.
The training tasks the Core Species had assigned over the past few days had nearly cost Gera half his life. The male, who had never encountered such demonic treatment since birth, gritted his teeth and persevered. However, at night, when he curled up in his nest in a motionless semi-sleep state, he could feel the other massaging his wings, back, and limbs with a very gentle strength, slowly kneading away the stiffness.
Even when his scaled tail lashed out a few times due to a slight sense of grievance, the female only let out a faint, blurred chuckle, reaching out to pinch that section of the docked tail as if tickling him.
This made Gera feel like he was dying one moment and floating with happiness the next. He didn't know that this was already the result of the other "going easy" on him.
Back when Sarkadi was still training recruits, he usually upheld the principle of "if they aren't dead, train them harder." Every day, he would make a group of muscular men wail and cry. Listening to those vigorous, ghostly howls, he never felt any need for mercy.
More often than not, Sarkadi had also been surrounded by female colleagues. Women who grew up in war were like she-wolves; they were only more vicious when tearing open a prey's throat. That was an extremely powerful and beautiful form of life, full of the power of conquest.
During the era of the White Emperor, humanity faced alien contamination that was equally lethal.
The two highest female commanders under the White Emperor, Irene Holman and Tana Mapuz, had joined forces to overturn the Mapuz Academy of Sciences. They intercepted the alien tides outside the habitable star sectors, forging humanity's victory into that terrifying history with fire and blood, and initiating nearly two hundred years of Federal Republican autonomy.
Gender differences became insignificant in the face of absolute strength and power.
But the male Zerg were a completely new species.
This group lacked innate strength. From a physiological standpoint, it was difficult for them to reach the same heights as the females no matter what. Gera was particularly unlucky, having drawn the worst possible lot—a genetic defect—from a pile of bad options.
Moreover, the little male looked far too obedient. He never complained of exhaustion. Every time he was about to reach his physical limit, he would push himself desperately, his wide eyes looking over moistly, looking as if he were about to drop "little pearls" at any second.
And so, after having died once, the heartless instructor experienced for the first time the rare sensation of his half-black heart aching slightly. This was a path he had never envisioned.
Currently, the tall Core Species sat boldly in the middle-tier Zerg’s nest, looking every bit the rogue who wouldn't leave until his goal was met.
"Gera needs a teacher. I don't trust other females. You are the most suitable choice."
Kata huffed and puffed for a while. Finally, he forcibly suppressed his anger, his gaze lingering on Gera for a moment.
"You want the male to learn these things? Why?" he asked sharply. "Do you want to put him in danger?"
"I want the male to be able to survive on this chaotic planet," Sarkadi said. He smiled and patted Gera’s head, his golden-brown eyes calm and rippleless. "Have you been to the mountains at the end of the plains? Those dark mountain masses at the horizon that block the light—every one of them is covered in the nests of massive high-tier species."
"Those mountains look very high."
Kata was bewildered by this irrelevant topic, but the other’s first sentence had caught his attention.
"If that's your idea," he smacked his mandibles, making a gruff show of being reluctant, "Fine. I can try to teach your little partner, but how much he learns will depend on himself."
As if feeling he had lost face by compromising too quickly, the administrator switched back to a roaring tone: "The payment will be deducted from your energy stones!"
Viciously tapping the tabletop with his antennae, the elderly worker female resumed a seated, haughty posture.
"If you're short by even one stone, I'll throw this little male out!"
***
| Chinese | English | Notes/Explanation |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| 恺 | Kai | Name of the middle-tier Zerg worker. |
| 大宇宙循环 | Great Cosmic Cycle | A Zerg unit of time, roughly one year. |
| 小宇宙循环 | Small Cosmic Cycle | A Zerg unit of time, roughly one week. |
| 直系 | Direct Lines | High-ranking Zerg lineages/descendants. |
| 亚成年 | Sub-adult | A stage of development before full maturity. |
| 艾琳·霍尔曼 | Irene Holman | A historical female commander from Sarkadi's past. |
| 塔娜·马普兹 | Tana Mapuz | A historical female commander/scientist from Sarkadi's past. |
| 马普兹科学院 | Mapuz Academy of Sciences | A scientific institution from Sarkadi's past. |
| 掉小珍珠 | Dropping little pearls | Internet slang for crying (often used for cute/weak characters). |
