The Owl Dragon Star System, the First Hive-Race Research Institute.
This was an asteroid that had been hollowed out.
Zhao Chen's command ship berthed slowly beside the asteroid, and then a shuttle drove away from the starship and entered within this asteroid.
The shuttle finished berthing within the hangar.
Hive Princess followed timidly behind Zhao Chen, her small hand even tugging at the hem of his coat.
At this moment she had come to a kind of trust in Zhao Chen.
Perhaps it was besides because, in this stretch of time, it was only Zhao Chen who had stayed constantly at her side.
Hive Princess looked at the strange surroundings about her.
"Commander." Several people in white coats had long been waiting.
Hive Princess looked at them with a feeling of dread, and shrank the further behind Zhao Chen.
"Is everything ready?" Zhao Chen asked.
The head of the institute stepped forward and said, "All that you charged us with is ready."
As she spoke, her gaze went with interest to Hive Princess behind Zhao Chen.
"Then take us over," Zhao Chen said.
"Yes." The head of the institute led the way in front.
Zhao Chen and Hive Princess followed behind.
Zhao Chen said as he walked, "Little Bug, this is the institute where we hold captive those interstellar hive-race swarms that attacked and invaded our universe. We imprison some wounded Hive Motherships, or hive-race units, here for our study. To study the value of these interstellar hive-race creatures. For instance, what things upon their bodies we may put to use. Or what type of weapon upon the field can do the greatest possible hurt to a Hive Mothership."
Zhao Chen hid nothing, but told Hive Princess the business of this hive-race research institute.
Hive Princess followed Zhao Chen silently; she did not speak, but she was plainly grown somewhat timid.
All of a sudden, Zhao Chen halted.
Hive Princess, not being careful, bumped into his back.
"What you will see hereafter may perhaps be more than you can accept. You may still choose to leave now." Zhao Chen turned his head and looked at Hive Princess.
Hive Princess showed a look of hesitation.
She bit her lip lightly and looked at Zhao Chen. "Do you… think that I am the same as… them?"
Zhao Chen smiled slightly, and stroked Hive Princess's head. "You are naturally not the same as them. The hive-race, in my eyes, are only an interstellar race living within this universe. The same as our Human Race, the Angel Race, the Demon Race, the Machine Race. Were it not for all that came with these interstellar hive-race swarms when they appeared before, the thirst for blood, the cruelty, the invading of other planets without any reason at all, bringing the world's end upon those planets. In truth, I have no very great feeling about the hive-race. And you have done us no hurt, nor invaded our world and our home. So you are not our enemy. But those interstellar hive-race creatures shut up here. They are war criminals; they are our enemies."
Hive Princess nodded heavily. "I understand. Little Bug is a good little bug. The ones you have shut up here are bad little bugs. Mama said. Whoever it may be, one who invades another's home must pay the price. These bad little bugs invaded your home; however you deal with them, it is your right."
Zhao Chen stroked Hive Princess's head, then took her hand of his own accord and walked on ahead.
Upon both sides of the gallery ahead, there were no longer walls, but transparent glass.
They were sealed testing grounds, one after another.
Zhao Chen came before the first pane of glass.
He saw, opposite the glass window, a Hive Mothership stuck full of tubes; that should be a T2 Hive Mothership, a third of its body already gone.
It was only by those tubes stuck into it that it could stay alive.
Seeing this sight, though her heart was prepared beforehand, Hive Princess yet covered her mouth; one could see she was somewhat distressed.
"Hive Princess, you said before. That you of the high-order hive-race can exercise control over the low-order hive-race. Try now whether you can control them. Will this layer of glass affect you?" Zhao Chen said, looking at Hive Princess.
Hive Princess shook her head. "The glass does not affect it; in the ordinary case. Even a whole star system apart, we can sense the existence of low-order hive-race. And where there is need, we will even build a swarm network, and transmit directly by consciousness."
Saying it, she looked toward the T2 Hive Mothership opposite the glass window.
She closed her eyes.
All of a sudden, the T2 Hive Mothership trapped opposite seemed to suffer some stimulus, and began to struggle madly, so that the chains binding it gave out a creaking and grinding, as though they would burst apart at any moment.
Hive Princess shrank behind Zhao Chen at this; and in her eyes, as she looked at that T2 Hive Mothership opposite, there was no longer that complicated, distressed look of before, but a kind of wariness.
"What is it?" Zhao Chen asked.
"That is a bad little bug. It does not obey. It even means to attack Little Bug! Little Bug does not like it," Hive Princess answered.
"Which is to say, you cannot control it?" Zhao Chen asked.
Hive Princess nodded, and said, "Little Bug tried to join with its mind, but it resists very much…… and its mind is nothing at all like the mind of a normal interstellar hive-race. At the first touch, Little Bug felt slaughter, and a breath of madness. They… they… have already become madmen."
"Is there no way to set them right again?" Zhao Chen asked.
Hive Princess shook her head. "There is no way; they are already broken."
Zhao Chen knit his brows; this was the worst result he had looked for.
If Hive Princess could contend with Order for control of these interstellar hive-race swarms, then perhaps upon the frontal field he might control those interstellar hive-race swarms outright and turn them to his own use.
Only it was a pity that this plan, by the look of it, had now miscarried.
"Let us walk on further behind and see." Zhao Chen took Hive Princess and walked on.
One after another they walked through scores of rooms.
From hive-race combat units in bands and companies, small ones such as T1 flying-bugs, T2 Thorny Serpents, T3 Self-Detonating Beetles and T3 Corrupted Wyverns and the rest,
to the ruined carcass of a T4 Hive Mothership,
all of them were here.
This might be called the institute within the known universe that had put the most into hive-race study, and had the most fruits of that study.
The head of the institute at his side spoke to the Commander without cease as well, of what her institute had gained in this stretch of time.
Certain weaknesses discovered upon a Hive Mothership's body, or some use to which a certain part of a Hive Mothership might be put, and so forth.
Walking on through, Zhao Chen observed that as Hive Princess looked upon these imprisoned hive-race creatures, her eyes grew colder and colder,
as though she were not looking upon her own kindred at all.
"Little Bug, what… do you feel toward them now?" Zhao Chen asked.
Hive Princess said flatly, "They are no longer our hive-race; they are all bad little bugs!"
By the look of it, this trial was to end here.
"What is ahead?" Zhao Chen noticed at this point that there was a great door at the end of the gallery ahead.