After leaving the swarm’s territory, Shen Yi first landed on a tree, intending to gather his team.

His bumblebee subordinates instinctively formed a protective circle around him.

It was his first time leading so many bees, and Shen Yi felt a touch of nervousness. He cleared his throat and began with a morale-boosting speech: “Although we’ve left the swarm, I believe we can build our own hive from scratch.”

“We need to think long-term. You’re different from those worker bees who only know how to toil—you are all unique, with unlimited potential…”

Someone new to leadership isn’t skilled at making grand, empty promises. His gestures were awkward and unconvincing.

Shen Yi mused to himself, does everyone automatically master the art of ‘drawing big cakes’ once they become a leader? Even he wasn’t immune.

But since his subordinates didn’t respond to his pep talk, and talking to himself felt pointless, he decided to abandon the hollow rhetoric and get practical.

“First, I’ll give you names.”

He’d heard that pets develop intelligence and responsiveness over time. With a soul connection in place, Shen Yi believed he could nurture his subordinates the same way. If he didn’t have companions who could talk to him, he’d train them himself.

“Line up by size, largest to smallest.”

The subordinates probably couldn’t discern their own sizes. They looked at each other, buzzed around in confusion, forming a messy line. Shen Yi had to arrange them one by one himself.

In truth, the worker bees didn’t vary much in size and looked almost identical, but Shen Yi could easily distinguish each one. The most noticeable size difference was the downgraded worker bee that had once been a young queen bee—it was the smallest among the eleven subordinates.

Though it was the smallest, it was small but mighty.

As soon as Shen Yi finished speaking, it enthusiastically raised its head and thorax, positioning itself first in line.

Shen Yi pushed it back. It waved its antennae at him, seemingly confused for a moment, then moved to the second spot. Pushed back again, it went to the third…

It was clearly being mischievous, yet its actions were earnest and precise. Once it settled into a spot, it tilted its head and extended its antennae toward Shen Yi, as if asking, “Is this okay?” It was quite obedient.

By the time it reached the seventh position, Shen Yi was tired and couldn’t be bothered to push it back anymore, so he let it be.

“Alright, alright, you’ll be Little Seven. Stay right here.” This stubborn little one was the first to receive a name.

Without Little Seven’s antics, Shen Yi quickly arranged the line. “Remember your positions. From now on, when I say ‘line up,’ this is how you’ll stand. Understood?”

“…” Silence was the bumblebee subordinates’ eternal response.

“If you understand, wiggle your right antenna.”

This time, the subordinates uniformly wiggled their antennae. Shen Yi was satisfied. They were teachable, and the future looked promising.

“I’m the boss,” he said, lifting a foreleg to point at himself, then at the first bumblebee in line. “You’re Number Two.”

“You’re Number Three, Number Four, Number Five, Number Six…”

When he reached the tiny Little Seven, Shen Yi paused. “You’re Little Seven.”

“Number Eight, Number Nine, Number Ten, Number Eleven, Number Twelve.”

It took considerable effort to make the subordinates remember their own and each other’s names, but Shen Yi was unusually patient.

He felt that having a name was the first step to making their mark on this world.

He wanted his little bumblebees to make their mark in this world too.

And so, on an utterly ordinary afternoon, under the dense leaves of a giant banyan tree, Shen Yi held a small meeting with his subordinates.

Eleven bumblebees in this world now had names.

It’s said that all things can develop sentience when infused with enough emotion. Shen Yi believed it too.

“Watch out!”

The plump bumblebees’ gathering had attracted the attention of a hunter hidden among the leaves. While teaching his subordinates, Shen Yi felt an inexplicable unease. He instinctively looked around and spotted a giant praying mantis slowly emerging from behind the tree.

Compared to the bumblebees, it could indeed be called a giant monster.

Its triangular head turned flexibly, its large compound eyes bulged with a cold, metallic gleam, and its sharp, scythe-like forelegs were lined with barbs to firmly grasp prey. From a bumblebee’s perspective, it was menacing and terrifying.

And this menacing monster had already raised its scythe-like forelimbs into a hunting stance.

Bumblebees were prey for praying mantises.

Shen Yi ordered Number Two and Number Three to stay in place and attract the mantis’s attention while the others followed him to attack from behind.

“Bite its neck.”

Avoiding a head-on confrontation, they launched a sneak attack from behind. Eight or nine bumblebees swarmed in, dodging the sharp, agile sickles, and injected their venom into the mantis’s abdomen. It reminded Shen Yi of playing games—attacking whatever target presented itself.

The bumblebee assigned to bite the neck executed Shen Yi’s command perfectly. The mantis had no pain sensation and couldn’t feel the pain, its attention fully captured by the bumblebees in front. The biting process went smoothly, and the powerful mandibles soon completely severed the mantis’s neck.

In a daze, Shen Yi thought he saw a faint glow emerging from the mantis’s body and flowing into his own. He shook his head, assuming it was an illusion, along with the warm current inside him that felt like a post-exertion warmth.

The headless mantis’s body continued to twitch sporadically as the bumblebees stood on its corpse, savoring their first victory.

Tiny creatures, once they gain intelligence and strategy, can indeed overturn the food chain order.

Unfortunately, bumblebees couldn’t eat meat.

After leaving the swarm, finding food became their top priority. They urgently needed to locate a territory rich in flowers.

There were many flowers in the forest, but they were still too close to the hive. Bumblebees’ detection systems could easily detect signals left by their own kind on flowers, and nearby blooms already showed signs of previous foraging. Shen Yi and his group had to explore further.

Mid-flight, Shen Yi felt a strange pull, as if something ahead was calling to him.

This premonition was unexplainable and without origin. After a moment’s hesitation, curiosity overcame reason, and he led his subordinates to follow his instincts.

About ten minutes later, the group passed through dense giant trees and vines, and a small clearing in the valley suddenly appeared ahead.

There were no bright mushrooms or flowers. The entire cliff wall was covered in lush green, blanketed with moss, ferns, and vines, without a speck of any other color.

Just a few meters away on either side of the valley, trees grew vigorously, stretching fiercely to compete for sunlight, unwilling to concede.

All plant competition and expansion came to an abrupt halt at this small valley.

As if something within made them hesitate and keep their distance.

Shen Yi hovered hesitantly at the edge of the valley, the intuition growing stronger.

It felt like a voice in his head urging him forward, telling him something valuable lay ahead.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. After much hesitation, he decided to venture in and check it out.

“Wait here for now.”

After instructing his subordinates, Shen Yi followed his intuition and flew directly onto the cliff wall on one side of the valley. Although it was a steep rock face, the soil accumulated in the crevices was jet-black, visibly fertile. At the base, damp crevices were covered in mosses and ferns clinging to the cliff, along with all sorts of unfamiliar grasses, all thriving vigorously.

He soon spotted a unique plant amidst the expanse of green. In this lush, densely vegetated valley, it blended in, easily overlooked.

But once his eyes fell upon it, he couldn’t look away.

It was likely the valley’s only flowering plant.

Its leaves were slender, somewhat like those of an orchid.

The stem stood straight, extending from a cluster of thin, elongated leaves, adorned with a spray of green buds. Two long, delicate, pale green sepals stretched from the receptacle, swaying gently in the wind like a wind chime adorned with butterflies.

Shen Yi was awestruck—it was his first time seeing a green flower, and it felt extraordinarily special.

The plant’s form was graceful, its colors understated and elegant. Dewdrops beaded on the buds, translucent and delicate, almost like jade carvings. It resembled the spiritual flowers and herbs described in novels, so beautiful it felt unreal.

Though he had never paid much attention to orchids, he imagined that among orchid collectors, this would fetch an astronomical price.

He approached, drawn by instinct toward one particular small flower that captivated him more than the others. Parting the closed petals, he squeezed his head inside.

The flower’s interior was narrow, but the moment he entered, Shen Yi felt as though he had stepped into a new space. His vision suddenly expanded—a small space, about the size of an adult’s palm, but to Shen Yi’s current size, it was remarkably spacious.

—Was he seeing things?

Shen Yi wiggled his antennae, pulled his head out, and looked again. It was indeed just a tiny flower bud. He crawled back inside, and once more, the surprisingly spacious little chamber unfolded before him.

—So this is a fantasy world?

Shen Yi’s first thought was: Could he cultivate here?

Perhaps one day, through cultivation, he could regain his human form.

This idea filled Shen Yi with exhilaration. His wings trembled unconsciously behind him as he pushed forward, fully entering the flower.

Meanwhile, far on the other side of the forest, the unlucky creature singled out by fate at that very moment was hiding beneath a leaf, waiting for an opportunity to bloom. At the critical juncture, it suddenly sensed an unusual disturbance in its Destiny Flower.

Countless spirit beasts lurked nearby, waiting for their chance. The possibility of swiftly obtaining the flower dew was nearly nonexistent.

Staring at the nearly blooming Thousandfold Butterfly, its expression hardened, a cold, sinister light flickering in its eyes. Ultimately, it retreated to its territory, filled with unwillingness and rage.

Though the Thousandfold Butterfly was rare, if anything happened to its Destiny Flower, it too would cease to exist.

What on earth could have approached and even opened its Destiny Flower?