I Am The Swarm-Chapter 809: Pursuit

Lumina was indeed strong—very strong—but compared to Luo Wen, it’s only remaining advantage seemed to be time.

Lumina was a powerhouse of this universe, perfectly suited to countering all mechanical civilizations. But Luo Wen possessed powers that transcended the confines of this cosmos. In terms of interference capability, he operated on a level fundamentally superior.

As time flowed, even if Lumina had a million-year head start, Luo Wen steadily closed the gap—and then surpassed it.

Luo Wen didn’t fully understand the worldview of an intelligent lifeform evolved from an AI. But if Lumina behaved like any other lifeform he knew, then under existential threat, it would lash out in desperation—just like how even a rabbit can bite when cornered.

Push it far enough, and it might even kick an eagle.

Yet in all of Lumina’s moves, Luo Wen hadn’t seen that kind of unhinged reaction. Though the Ji, under Lumina’s lead, were resisting—even to the point of self-immolation—it all felt… procedural. Predictable. Mechanical.

Had Lumina’s formerly algorithmic thought patterns become so entrenched that even after achieving sentience, it still couldn’t break free?

Or perhaps… Was Lumina hiding some trump card?

From Luo Wen’s perspective, he preferred to believe the latter. After all, it was in his nature to imagine the worst—and plan accordingly.

—

As more ultra-long-range interstellar Star Gates were completed and reinforcements from the Swarm’s extragalactic bases surged in, the Ji had no choice but to relocate again—and again—and again.

Once the Swarm had fully scouted the original border’s minefields, the Ji no longer had resources to rebuild those extravagant defenses. Their troops had no choice but to retreat.

This ripple effect forced the withdrawal of the Ji from several major fronts. They had to stay aligned with the broader defensive line—otherwise, any bulging positions would be exposed and easily encircled by converging Swarm forces.

But retreating from the frontlines that spanned several light-years wasn’t so easy. The situation was obvious, and future military actions easy to anticipate. The Swarm had long since detected the Ji’s intentions and formulated detailed pursuit strategies.

Still, the Ji’s frontline forces had no choice but to fall back. Remaining meant annihilation. Retreating, at least, preserved some strength.

The resulting pursuit battles were brutal.

The Ji tried to stall the Swarm with waves of superbombs, aiming to separate their pursuers. But this wasn’t the same Swarm that had once fought the Rikens. They wouldn’t be stopped by a few scorched bands of radiation left behind by detonated thermonuclear devices.

So long as they weren’t caught in the core blast radius, the shockwaves and fallout couldn’t halt their advance.

Explosions lit up the void. As the Ji warships retreated, they continued firing, pushing their propulsion and weapons systems to overload with energy reserves the Swarm could only envy.

But the Swarm pressed on, heedless of losses. Even when friendly units ahead were blasted apart, the Primordial bodies behind would storm over the wreckage without hesitation.

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Puffer Cannonfish followed close behind, raining fire on the Ji fleet.

Soon, the Swarm broke through to the Ji’s former defense lines. Many new-model unmanned fighter drones had been left behind—immobilized as part of the Crystalline Barrier Network. In the chaos, the Ji had neither the time nor opportunity to recover them. They could only be abandoned as a final shield.

The Swarm, of course, accepted the gift with open arms. Even scraps held value—and in this case, there were a lot of scraps. Multiplied across the battlefield, the haul was massive.

Though these “scraps” tried one last suicide charge, the size disparity was too great. The five-hundred-meter-long Primordial bodies crushed the sub-hundred-meter drones like bugs.

In the end, the Swarm broke through the crystalline defense net at minimal cost.

But every gain for the Swarm was a loss for the Ji. And with their resource pools running dry, every loss hurt. Replacing those advanced drones—each one requiring enough material to build several warships—was a painful expense. Even if Lumina didn’t have a carbon-based body with pain receptors, it could likely feel this one.

Or at least, so some imagined.

—

But this was just the appetizer.

The Swarm didn’t stop their chase. While some units paused to collect the spoils, the bulk of the force pushed forward.

The Ji warships were fast, powered by immense energy reserves that allowed them to shoot and run simultaneously. But there was one thing they couldn’t take with them so easily: Battle Stars.

These monstrous war platforms—immense and bristling with firepower—were the pride of the Ji. Their massive size gave them many advantages, but also one huge disadvantage: mobility.

That flaw became painfully obvious in the time-sensitive retreat.

Over the years, the Ji had accumulated nearly five hundred Battle Stars across several major fronts. From the very beginning, these brutal weapons had inflicted immense losses on the Swarm. To this day, the number of Swarm units obliterated by them was beyond counting. Their contributions were unquestionable.

The Swarm hated these things, they were like nails in the flesh, thorns in their eye. They had attempted special operations to destroy them, but the giant metal spheres didn’t have a single living crew member aboard. There was no way for the Swarm’s Intelligent Entities to infiltrate.

And Lumina had long since taken precautions against the Swarm’s micro-seeds—creating miniature flying machines that patrolled the Battle Stars nonstop, scanning every dark corner.

The few micro-seeds the Swarm managed to sneak aboard had never found a chance to germinate. To this day, they remain in their original state.

A Battle Star, though only slightly larger than a small planetary body, required far more resources to construct. Building one could consume nearly an entire star system’s worth of matter (excluding the star itself).

When the Ji still dominated the Confederation, that kind of resource wasn’t a problem. A few “protection fees” from the outer-ring races, and they could churn out ten or twenty at a time.

But that was then.

Now, with their backs to the wall, the Ji couldn’t afford to lose even one.

And yet, circumstances allowed them no other choice.

The Ji had hoped to evacuate their Battle Stars ahead of time—but the Swarm watched them like hawks. The moment a Battle Star’s firepower diminished even slightly, the Swarm surged forward in attack, denying any chance of withdrawal.