One could not take away Xela's contributions in this fight from her. Darius and Gunner both heaped praises upon the Elven Princess, making her cheeks rosy with pride.
Still, the grind continued on. Now that there had been such a large skirmish, the results of the battle were quickly disseminated to the source.
Once the Insects had learned that their mighty swarms failed to even take a single bite out of the enemy, the Insect Queens of those hives could no longer sit still.
Some who were close to Darius' location quickly packed up and began fleeing deeper down, seeking protection. Even though the Insect race moved using its instincts, it still knew how to fear a stronger opponent.
Still, this was not enough for Darius. He needed the bugs to become absolutely desperate and crazy, so that more of them would migrate downward instead of sending troops upwards to resist their attack.
As such, they chased after the fleeing bugs and continued killing them ruthlessly. Even though there was little to be gained by killing them, Darius and his two Branded Servants hunted them down as if they were carrying gold on their backs.
This kind of determination and frenzy terrified the bugs even further, and those who at the backline began to pack up and rush below.
From the example of the earlier ones, running when the enemy was close was not enough to guarantee safety.
One had to move early in order to reach shelter.
It was around a few days later that the group moved down far enough to reach the entrance of the Journeyman band.
Interestingly, most of the fleeing Amateur bugs had stopped around here, believing that the Journeymen hives had more than enough power to deal with these intruders.
By the time they came over, they would be walking into certain death!
Not only that, by staying here to watch the spectacle they might be able to forage some scraps of their flesh, planning to savor it as a form of revenge for forcing them to abandon their homes.
Still, once these intruders were dealt with, they would be able to peacefully go home and return to their hives. However, what the bugs didn't know was that every inch of ground they gave was practically lost forever.
Miranda and Solena went all out to claim as well as develop upon the various nodes and tunnels in the underground to expand their network. Darius had emptied out 90% of Guard Androids and Critterbots from his Bags of Holding, so the workforce was more than enough.
In fact, the majority had gone above ground and began renovating the dilapidated Polito city slowly, bringing it back into working shape.
Miranda already had access to all the knowledge in the entire database, not to mention the inheritance the Politos themselves had left behind.
Unbeknownst to Darius and co, Miranda had grand plans for her father's empire. The AI began by renovating the city and expanding outward, trying to claim more land above ground.
However, the situation with the barren earth would require more methods that were not available to her currently, so Miranda kept the development to the city and set up a framework there.
Apart from the house Darius had transmuted back into perfection, all others had been torn down and turned into automated buildings that were either refineries, factories, dispensaries, and more.
After all, Miranda had long since discovered a special metal in the walls of the underground inhabited by the Insects.
What else could it be if not the very same Holy Silver, Holy Iron, and Holy Gold that existed only on Pokterr?
These specials metals were a mystery to them before, but after gaining the Polito knowledgebase as well as the complete knowledge hidden inside God Krona's restricted section, Miranda knew of a thousand and one ways to process such a thing without needing human interference.
And so, that was exactly what she did.
The factories began working seriously, spitting out new Critterbots and Guard Android with new specs that were amazing.
Miranda didn't stop there though, she also crafted weapons from modern Earth, tanks, helicopters, drones, jets, and the like. Unlike their Earthly counterparts, these did not need fuel or electricity, but were powered using Source Energy!
What could be a better energy source than this one that could run forever? It only depended on the conduit which controlled how the Source Energy would flow through a thing as well as how long it would last.
The contraptions were AI-controlled, so there was no need for human operation. These contraptions began to spread out from the city above ground and below, spreading more signal connectors in order to expand Miranda's range.
Miranda was proving how scary an efficient AI could be and why many had feared that they could make the human race obsolete.
His virtual daughter was aware that Darius did not have time to settle and conquer this continent by himself, as it required time and a lot of resources.
However, doing something like this was incredibly simple for the current her given the uniqueness of Pokterr as well as the sheer information she had at her disposal, not to mention 'hands' in form of the robots.
Soon, the face of the continent began to change. What used to be barren and flaky became metallic and chromium, making one feel like they had stepped into a land of steel and technology.
Over the course of the next few months, this phenomenon would spread until it became dominant, creating an entire land full of robots that were weaponized and willing to do the bidding of one man.
As for Darius himself, he was currently going deeper into the Journeyman section of the underground, his speed here had not been impeded in any way, and he watched casually as hundreds of defiant bugs died to him by the hour.
He had already cleared more than 80% of the entire lot on his side, with Gunner and Xela having roughly around the same level of progress on their fronts as well.
Darius listened to the intercepted messages from the communicating hives, and it seemed like they had become desperate enough to go down below to warn the Adepts about what was going on.
Having killed off all Amateur hives as well as the majority of the Journeymen ones was a feat unprecedented since the very first mission to cull them all that the Insect race had barely survived.
