StarCraft: Tyranid Empire

Cerberus Leviathan floats quietly above the clouds in Oblivion, casting a huge shadow. It is truly a mythical behemoth, much larger than any human ship. Its hard skin full of barbs makes it intimidating. The purple-black hard-shell armor is like an undulating organic mountain, breathing softly. It seems it can also bring hurricanes.

On Leviathan's giant body with piles of horns and mountains, all passages are open to the outside world. Most of them are folds, depressions and cracks in the skin, covered by hard skin with many sensory hairs and tentacles attached, like the exit of a dark and deep cave.

Others are even larger, with the edge of the entrance surrounded by muscles that are constantly tightening and relaxing, and can be opened and closed more freely. There are many flying zerg creatures and human spaceships coming in and out, and their functions may be more similar to The semi-open dock deck or huge viewing window on a human warship.

Each entrance leads to darker, narrower passages, cavities, and transport hoses similar to Nydus Worms, and beyond that are huge hollow chambers, gas-filled vesicles, and vesicles that are warmer and moister than the outside world. There are many more closed pits than there are rooms in the Augustgrad Palace.

Even if human scientists could figure out Leviathan's entire physiological structure, they would never be able to understand how such large and complex organs work together.

Some would think of the Leviathan as a Zerg bio-battleship of astonishing size. It has all the features a warship should have, its polymeric biocarapace is better than steel armor, biomass spewers, bile worm swarms, and swarms of explosives. There are enough mosquitoes to overwhelm an Imperial Navy squadron. It can jump across time and space at will, and neither humans nor protoss can do anything about it.

This is not the first time that Pryor has dealt with the Cerberus Swarm Master, but he has never been invited to the interior of Leviathan before. For many years ago, the empire did not have such a rare thing, and it was not until the past two years that it was Two feral individuals were caught at great cost.

And without advanced zerg creatures like Cerebrates, it would be impossible to control a Leviathan beast. Most of the protoss hate research related to zerg, and they are determined not to do such a thing. This thing Now only the empire has it.

"I've wanted to come in and take a look for a long time. This opportunity is rare." Pryor's adjutant, Senfa, was sitting in the window seat and looking at Leviathan outside the window with interest.

The Griffin fighter is currently flying under the belly of Cerberus Leviathan. Above its head is an organic compound sky composed of hard skin, chitin armor, and wasp-like growths. There are ravines in it. As the fighter plane moves, The roar continued to extend toward the far end of the field of vision.

In addition, this Leviathan is also welded with a large number of fine steel armor, searchlights and sensors, as well as mounting platforms for taking off drones and fighter planes, like a basket tied under a hot air balloon. These facilities are more like those from a battlecruiser.

The military technology of the Tyranids is more practical and far less gorgeous than that of the protoss, but Pryor believes that metallurgy and industrial style are precisely the valuable features of human beings.

The Griffin fighter plane is a small fighter plane. It can only seat a few people except the pilot. It is even more impressive in front of such a behemoth.

From the beginning, Pryor felt that the fighter plane was heading towards a large mountain range covered with spikes and metal blades, and now it was sailing among lofty mountains.

Every time they encounter such a monster, it means that the Imperial Navy will have a tough battle. As for those colonies with few airports, they would not even have a chance to resist.

"It's really rare that it doesn't come in as food." Pryor complained, but he was thinking about how much food would be needed if Leviathan really needs a huge diet to maintain such a large-scale life activity. rise.

"Giant birds don't go to great lengths to catch mosquitoes for food," Senfa said.

"But the mosquitoes will bite him all over his head," Pryor concluded.

The Griffin fighter jet began to climb upwards, and their eyes suddenly darkened, as if they were traveling in a dark and deep cave. Even the lights of the fighter jet could not dispel the darkness in front of them. There is no light source in Leviathan, but it is certainly not as bright as the brightly lit human battleships.

Prior couldn't guess which part it was, but he thought it might be the nostrils. No matter what, make sure this giant beast doesn't sneeze.

When Prior looked up, he suddenly saw many scarlet eyes.

That was the Cerberus Allosaurus hanging above. These weird and cunning creatures were mixed with the genes of the Tyrador gigabat and had the ability to use recycling positioning. Pryor thought that it would be easy to deal with such a monster. Using sonic weapons would naturally keep it confused.

They stare at every visitor with their disturbing eyes. Every pair of eyes and ears are the eyes and ears of the lord of the swarm. As long as it dedicates a little bit of its extremely strong energy, it can strictly control the situation. Watch everyone.

The Swarm Lord's will can be brought upon any Zerg at will, and the entire hive can become the embodiment of his wrath.

There was another flash of light, and Pryor's eyes became bright again.

This is completely another land, extremely open, and any space is larger than the empire's Beamon-class transport carrier. But it's clearly not like it's inside Leviathan, or not entirely.

Pryor originally thought that the interior of Leviathan should be similar to a hatchery, at least it should be like this. The accumulated tissues are spread out like a thick carpet, and high walls made of flesh and blood divide each huge and hollow chamber. Separating and connecting these spaces is a twisted network of microcavities and narrow corridors. Everything was slimy and damp, and only slugs and zerg could live happily in that environment.

The people from Cerberus Engineering embedded an alloy deck inside Leviathan, with a dense metal building above it. At the edge of these metal facilities is the sea of ​​flesh and blood that is still crawling, and it can be clearly felt that the walls are alive.

This is a typical imperial military camp, with hangars and machine shops, all military and service facilities, and several fusion cores for power. Bright lights cast the neat steel facilities into shadow.

On the divided parking platform, dense metal racks are filled with supply boxes of food, medicine and ammunition. There are shadows of people among them, and engineering vehicles come and go.

They don't even have to build ventilation here, as Leviathan's breathing system takes over that function. As long as the ruler of the swarm wants to, it can even evolve a throne covered with spikes in Leviathan.

The Cerberus Project claims that this is a perfect combination of biological and mechanical technology, but almost all of their transformations serve humans, and the Zerg have no need for such things. Of course they also have factories, but those factories are made of flesh and blood.

At this time, Pryor seemed to be able to hear the thumping heartbeat of the giant beast, and it took him a while to remember that he was inside a living creature. This is just one chamber within Leviathan, and its rich belly lurks thousands of zerg, comparable to a secondary hive.

But Pryor always felt that there was an ammonia smell like urine here, as if he was inside the intestines of a giant. Living in such a giant was not a pleasant experience.

However, it must be much more comfortable here than in the native Leviathan. Each large nest of Leviathan has some differences.

Pryor once heard a medic who had narrowly escaped death describe the horrors inside the Griffin Leviathan. Kalos, the plague lord, had turned it into a breeding ground for disease, and many of its places looked more like... Scenes that would appear in nightmares, bloated, deformed pieces of flesh, and off-white cocoons wrapping corpses.

Every corner is filled with the screams and cries of victims. Human beings are buried in flesh and blood, with only the head and upper body exposed. Deformed snake-like creatures are rampant among them, which can easily remind people of the nightmares they least want to recall. .

Human beings are decomposed and reorganized there until they become ghastly monsters, no different from zombies.

Carlos the Cerebrate is particularly fond of human telepaths, because they can be infected by the swarm and have a chance of preserving their sanity. It will select the most intelligent among humans and physically connect them to Leviathan's nerve center. As one body.

Carlos is convinced that he is completing the original plan of the first generation of masters, the Great Hungerer, when he discovered humans, which was to devour human genes and use them for his own use.

"Six marine divisions. There are also Minotaur battlecruisers, Cromwell-class science ships (Kurzweil-class) and Dusk Wing Banshees in the chest." Senfa said to Pryor: "This is still Just for us.”

"Great." Pryor could only deal with his old subordinate.

The high command in Augustgrad will never be so kind. When something like this happens, it usually only means one thing. The hardest battle and the hardest bone to chew are about to come, and Pule You specialize in fighting tough battles and chewing hard bones.

The Griffin fighter plane continued to shuttle through Leviathan. In front of it was a huge pit filled with fog. Senfa told Prior that this was called the Evolution Pit.

Pryor saw a rather strange sight. Swarms of springtails were lining up to jump into the evolution pit. These springtails had just emerged from their eggs and were still carrying the mucus in their egg cocoons. .

When these springtails crawled out again, Pryor could clearly see that these monsters were becoming stronger, and their carapace and claws were becoming stronger and sharper. The yellow-orange light in the eyes of some springtails shone brighter and brighter. He was not sure whether these guys had become smarter.

When the springtails crawled out, they walked into the semi-mechanical splitting pool, the evolution chamber and the roaring automatic machine factory, and then changed their appearance and replaced them with mechanical eyes and gleaming blades.

A mature Cerberus zerg must be able to put on its own nano-armor and replace its titanium alloy blades.

These zerg actually don't need humans to worry about, and no one dislikes the hard-working Cerberus worker bees.

They finally landed in the nerve center, which was surprisingly large. It was far from a "small room" like the ordinary Leviathan. It did not have the expected large-scale neural tissue, but more like an empty brain. The really important parts were all occupied. Hidden in a mountain-like wall of flesh.

Pryor found the master of the Cerberus swarm in a small palace built by humans, the empire's alpha-numbered cerebrate, the earliest cerebrate.

At this time, Alpha, the brainworm, was lying on a high-end sofa that he got from nowhere, watching a movie and eating potato chips. Behind the sofa, there were a few pairs of buzzing mechanical arms that were tickling and beating the brainworm. Tofu cubes.

In any case, Cerberus technology was indeed created for war. Arcturus Mengsk even wanted neural connection technology to control humans, but this brainworm used it all on how to lie down more comfortably. on something.

It is undoubtedly a real slacker, preferring to copy the work of its predecessors even during the evolution of its own species.

To be more precise, it was copied from the work of Abathur, the evolution master of the insect swarm. This strange life created by the first generation master can be called a living DNA library of the insect swarm, and even led the evolution of the insect swarm.

The insect swarm is evolving every moment, and new and better genetic sequences will be spread throughout the galaxy through spores, accepted by all other groups, and then used and updated according to their own needs.

When a terrifying variant appears on a planet, it also means that this species will soon appear on other brood worlds.

And the Cerberus swarm is among them.

What makes the evolution master Abathur angry is that its shameless rebellious kin have obviously plagiarized their own achievements and do not understand what respecting copyright means. However, the brainworm α is screaming, "Who told you to secretly open my room, you little bitch?" The door stirs my heart.

"Have fun." Pryor and this brainworm are old acquaintances. It's rare to see him teasing others like this. It's obvious that they have a pretty good relationship.

The other person's personality is extremely difficult to figure out, and can be described as moody and willful. But compared to some of his colleagues in the Imperial Army, this brainworm may be more worthy of being treated as a human being.

This brainworm is very popular among humans. It has mastered all the vicious curse words since mankind, and is preparing to publish his personal book "The Art of Confrontation on the Imperial Ethernet" recently.

"What's there to be happy about? Just work for the Dog Emperor." Brainworm smiled playfully.

"Is this really a brainworm?" Senfa asked his general in a low voice.

"It's strange." Pryor said: "We see a lot of people who can walk, but it's very rare to see brainworms in wheelchairs."

Senfa's face twitched, but luckily he didn't laugh.

"It's rare but strange." Brainworm commented.

Pryor looked behind the brain worm. On the wall were written the words "I am the only one who respects the light of the swarm in the sky and on the earth". Next to it were the portrait of the first master and Queen Kerrigan, but the only one who didn't see the portrait of Emperor Augustus was .

"I think you are disloyal." Pryor struck the other person.

Brainworms can read minds and naturally know what he means.

"The emperor is in the heart." This brainworm can lick.

If you really think about it, even after death, it may not be impossible to catch a brainworm, but it is absolutely impossible for them to succumb to anyone other than their master. The Overlord is not a simple individual, its will symbolizes the entire insect swarm.

Cerebrate Alpha is an exception. It boasts that it has the hardest bones in Char, and would rather starve to death than go to Korhal to beg for food. However, it is the first conspicuous person to bow down to humans.

If it were only forced by Augustus's lustful power, this brainworm would not have given up its allegiance to the empire. What it truly surrendered to was the Queen of the Tyranids, a powerful human who had a fateful fate with the zerg.

But this is not a shame, because it was originally the brainworm of the Queen of Blades, and everything was just fate.

"Be careful when you do bad things and you get caught by him again." While knocking on the Mountain Zhenhu, Pryor sat down across from the brainworm and took out a handful of potato chips from the other person's bowl.

"scare!"

He wasn't angry at all before, but now this brainworm is anxious, like a cat with explosive fur.

"scare!

Pryor took out another handful and gave it to his adjutant, ignoring it at all: "I told you before, this brainworm monster is fun, there is no need to be afraid."

"Serve tea, serve good tea." He ordered his worker bees and swallowed the bowl and potato chips together.

"What happened again?" Pryor stopped teasing it and started talking about business.

"The infected man Dugar has returned with the Alexander. In a world where his corruption is even greater, he must be stopped." The brainworm said this.

Those who didn't know it thought he was a marshal of the Tyran Empire who was loyal to his emperor and served his country.

"He comes back at least four times a year, and every time he doesn't get beaten to a bloody head." Pryor was puzzled.

"This time he also brought an army of hybrids, including a half-machine, half-biological Moebius hybrid. That kind of monster seems to be a great threat to humans." Brainworm said.

The ghost of the UED still floats over the Koprulu sector, and Alexei Stokov always feels that he should be corrupted instead of his old friend. (End of chapter)