By the time Liu Shu arrived at the capital world of each of the insectoid empires, what welcomed her was a perfectly prepared arrival party. So, to make sure that she showed off enough so that they didn't think Xakira had become crazy, Liu Shu did what she knew best.
In all the worlds of the three Insectoid Empires, Liu Shu's roots manifested in the outer orbit of the empire. The sky, in just a few moments, transformed into a full cosmic spectacle.
Gargantuan roots that dwarfed everything descended into deserted areas, plunging into the world and sending tremors through the ground. The insectkin, who had not expected such a magnificent display, stared at the roots descending with their mouths agape.
Moreover, since this place was under Xakira's and the other kings', Liu Shu gave everyone a single blessing straight away instead of waiting for five years like everywhere else.
[Congratulations! You've received the blessing
After her displays, Liu Shu would hide her roots inside her
'It is so comfortable…'
Until now, each time Liu Shu conquered a new Solar System, she needed to send prepared government batches of people to take them under control. Thankfully, Flor and Ignatia had prepared before Liu Shu set off, hiring many people and giving them certain benefits for being the colonizers, so to speak.
It was quite successful because the government didn't just arrive with normal people. They also came with an assortment of varied ants, including enough Ant Princesses to rapidly populate the underground systems of the worlds. Truthfully, not many of the public knew, but each world had a growing colony of ants underground at all times.
Moreover, Stella was about to finish her
Remember that tree-type and other large flora-type living beings needed a lot of time to ascend. This was one of the biggest characteristics holding them back. Of course, the return on investment for all that time was always well worth it.
Either way, Liu Shu's large conquest streak finished when Liu Shu became 303 years old, exactly 74 years after the war, and almost 25 years after the war for those outside her domain.
No one outside had expected Liu Shu to use a mere quarter of a century to conquer a grand total of 52 Solar Systems, boosting her Empire's size to 62 Solar Systems. There were around 340 Worlds with different living, but habitable conditions, and over 400 Moons that could be similarly populated.
As for the numbers, counting the uninhabitable planets, they went well over 400. As for uninhabitable Moons, there were far too many to count. After all, some worlds had over 100 Moons alone. So, it was difficult to count them.
She was no longer a little speck of dust in the surrounding empire situation. Liu Shu now had resources, territory, and much more to help her develop. Once everything was assimilated into her midst.
Even then, Liu Shu had never really stopped creating and growing her Star Reaching and Moon Soul fleets. So, each World and Moon had an average of 2 to 3 Moon Soul Lignified Fortresses, and a small fleet of around 100 Star Reaching Starships stationed to protect the worlds.
These numbers did not include the few thousand dedicated to the army, not defense. Still, even though the numbers were high, most of them were still growing and were below Level 200.
'If I have another 20 to 30 years of progress, most of those will be able to reach Level 200.
Her own Level was also slowly but surely approaching Level 300. She had managed to reach Level 280 on the dot over the years, gaining another small boost to her overall stats.
'My leveling speed is slowing down tremendously. If it weren't because of the
Among all her berries, those were probably one of the most balance-breaking berries. Together with her time acceleration, it was as if her people were eating 3
'The way everything is clicking into place is really… delightful.'
Liu Shu now needed to stop her indiscriminate expansion and had to reinforce what she had. While it had only been 25 years outside, and the Nexus and Covenant had been fighting for 23 of those 25 years, it didn't mean she was off the hook.
There was a chance that some nearby powers would begin a massive resistance against her soon because of her expansion speed. Unlike other World Trees, who took their time to reach out to new territories and fought for a while to conquer them, Liu Shu was lightning fast.
The threat level of her conquest felt more like a human-scale invasion than a World Tree invasion. Sometimes, a World Tree would start its conquest and finish it when the fourth generation of those she initially attacked were born. Liu Shu didn't even let the first generation become adults before her roots were already hovering in your skies.
After quite a while, Liu Shu looked back at the Ceperet System's situation. She had left parts of her subconscious so that, if she was called in an emergency, she could look back quickly. Still, other than those and what her Avatar heard daily, Liu Shu didn't check the progress of her own empire.
"Let's see… Wow."
While the population had not changed much in number, that was because Liu Shu's terraformed worlds were finally fully functional. Therefore, the population had moved to all six worlds of the Solar System, leaving Solkara alone for now.
'That world is just too small, too hot, and too unstable. Solkara will do better as my stress ball!'
Solkara: QAQ.
'Anyway… I see that avian beastkin and other types of flying individuals have mostly moved to Tiravel, the Gas Giant. The environment there is quite perfect for such species.'
As for her
Looking at that world was incredibly amusing. Everything was flying all around. Trees, flowers, fish, humanoids, mountains, islands… 'As amusing as it is, it is also magnificent. It's a spectacle that makes you sigh with emotion.'
Actually, Skyflower was thinking of moving over as well. Speaking of the big sisters, they were slowly but surely completing their
If it weren't for Liu Shu holding, reinforcing, and fine-tuning Ceperet's rotation and overall structure, the many World Trees digging into the world would've caused a few problems on the surface.
Regardless, with Liu Shu as an anchor and the Ocean Essence Spirit Liu Shu once found and spread around, the seas, land, and skies were as peaceful as ever.
'They all are learning how to create their own
Life Trees, those gentle and utterly adorable little darlings, had perfectly merged into societies as the number one healers, where most hospitals were built. Their gentleness, soothing auras, incredible proficiency in healing arts, small size, and many other perks compared to World Trees made them prime candidates for the role of healers.
Elderly, mentally unstable people, those with disabilities, those with difficult illnesses—everyone gathered in those locations and, with very few exceptions, eventually healed and returned to society with hearts full of gratitude.
If Lignified Structures were the ones that nobody was able to bully because you would be lynched in the streets, Life Trees were those that, if someone dared to even say one bad thing about them… good luck!
They were quite literally the only species that people 100% classified as inherently good. If the Life Tree snapped at someone, eyes would always turn toward the person the Life Tree snapped at rather than the Life Trees.
Tree was among the oddities in terms of specialization of Life Trees, but everyone knew Tree was Liu Shu's mother, so she was treated as the mother of their revered divine entity. Speaking of Tree, Aurelise, the Life Tree that Liu Shu met all those years back and was planted by Tree's side, had developed tremendously since then.
Aurelise, the Life Tree that first moved into the Golden Sap City shortly after Tree transformed into a Life Tree herself, was the representative of the best hospital in Golden Sap City, and the Life Tree that took care of it.
Moreover, after almost three centuries of living near Liu Shu and other incredibly powerful entities, Aurelise developed into a healing master who, when it came to treating illnesses, could be placed among the top 10 without much discussion.
All her titles, passive skills, and talents developed not toward healing Phoer Essence, but toward healing these types of afflictions, making her skills work on
"Mom, are you free?"
Flor was playing with one of Liu Shu's young children. It was a
"Welcome back… Well, you never truly left." Flor paused, laughing softly. "Regardless, welcome back, Liu Shu."
"Mhm. Thank you! How is everything going? Did you prepare enough teams?"
Flor asked back. "I've followed your reports, so Ignatia and I have prepared around 1,000 teams we can deploy at any time. Once Stella comes out of her
As Liu Shu spread, the large army that had first moved out thinned and spread to every world to make sure they didn't go rogue. Of course, with Liu Shu existing as a deterrent, few had the intent or even the will to do so. Even then, there were those who were excessively brave or foolish and tried either way.
The soldiers were already accustomed, so they suppressed the first riots without lethal force. In Liu Shu's Golden Empire, everyone tried to give second chances. Even the law… But only second chances.
If you didn't learn after the first forgiveness, that was on the individual, not anyone else.
"There have been a few who went overboard… but everything is within expectations or below them. My presence is much more impactful than we first thought. Still, if we don't put them in order within 20 years, people are bound to forget. Thankfully, Stella will finish her
Flor hummed. "One year left? Got it. I'll tell everyone to start preparing. The 1,000 teams will be ready by then."
Liu Shu nodded and thought to herself. "We've swallowed a good deal of territory. It is time to digest it and make it completely ours."
Her next objective was not free territory but conquering a few strategic Solar Systems in Deadly Petal's direction. 'I hope I am not too late. It has been only 25 years outside, so Balaya should not have moved against Deadly Petal yet. The fallout from my influence and the recent fierce but short war against the Nexus should have distracted Danlier and the others from her.'