Chapter 635: It!

Chapter 635: Him!

On the edge of the North Second Ring Road, a silver-gray powered armor stood silently in the middle of the dilapidated street, gripping a heavy rifle as tall as a man, shaped like a bladeless greatsword.

Time had left its marks of wind and frost on the armor's surface, the urban camouflage coating replaced by mottled patches of scarlet.

The same was true of the rifle in its hand; the tuning-fork-shaped magnetic rails were filled with fleshy red fungal lumps.

Memories lingering in the cells surfaced before its eyes from time to time; it vaguely recalled being a machine born for battle.

Only it had long forgotten why it fought, or when its last battle had ended...

Just then, a light breeze blew from the other end of the street, and almost at the same moment, the rumbling of wheels came charging from the silent corner.

As if sensing the murderous intent rushing toward it, it slowly raised its head, gray-green mist seeping from the gaps in its helmet, while a bloodthirsty scarlet glint reflected in its pitch-black visor.

"Kill them!" The voice drifting from the void echoed in its ears again, and it felt every cell in its body boil with excitement.

It was a command that could not be refused—

In truth, there was no reason to refuse either.

It existed solely to answer that call.

Its heavy arm slowly lifted, the greatsword in its hand creaking with friction like a machine that had not been oiled for years.

Yet the moment its arm rose, that bulky body seemed to come alive again, bursting forth with astonishing speed and power.

Like a cannonball shot from a barrel, it charged with thunderous force toward the leading truck, swinging the blunt, heavy greatsword.

"Clang—!"

The instant steel met steel, the truck's cab, welded with steel plates, caved inward and snapped in two, like ice cream scooped by a spoon.

The entire truck overturned and crashed by the roadside; the driver died on the spot, while the people in the cargo hold tumbled out, staggering to their feet.

It could faintly hear them shouting something.

Though it did not understand.

But—

The prey's last words never mattered; soon they would be ground into pulp beneath its feet.

Standing beside the wreckage, it tightened its grip on its weapon, its scarlet pupils quickly locking onto the next truck—

Next!

Just as the slime-corrupted powered armor swung its weapon and charged toward the next transport truck, the Death Corps, caught off guard, finally reacted.

Midnight Umbrella Without Knife: "Holy shit! That's a sixth!"

Laplace: "Sixth my ass, it's a Decayed Knight!"

Midnight Umbrella Without Knife: "Boss spawned! Grab your weapons, bros!"

Outlaw: "Ooh-rah! Tatakai!!"

Players crouching on the truck roofs immediately aimed their fixed machine guns at the creature, unleashing a fierce hail of bullets, but still could not stop its charge.

The 10mm machine-gun rounds, enough to shred concrete walls, struck the armor's curved surface, leaving at most a shallow scratch.

What was even more hair-raising was that this thing not only had absurdly tough armor but was also no less agile.

The greatsword in its hand easily deflected a few tracer rounds flying toward its face, then it sidestepped and lunged to the next truck.

Another truck erupted in flames.

Watching the evolution unit rampaging through the crowd like a one-man army, Edge Loafing frowned, while Debt Big Eye beside him cursed angrily.

"Damn it, I knew this mission wouldn't be so easy."

"There's something off about this thing," Construction Site Youth and Brick suddenly blurted out.

"Yeah." Edge Loafing nodded gravely, then turned to Big Eye. "Deploy the drone!"

"OK!"

As the words fell, Big Eye closed his eyes, pressing a fingertip against the side of his tactical helmet.

A quadcopter drone launched from the truck, flying straight toward the Decayed Knight.

As if sensing the approaching threat, the Decayed Knight slammed its greatsword into the ground, sending a dozen chunks of stone hurtling into the air.

Through direct neural link, Debt Big Eye skillfully maneuvered the drone through a series of improbable rolls, like a fluttering butterfly, weaving nimbly through the dense hail of concrete fragments.

"Die!!!"

The moment the drone reached its face, he activated the detonation function, and the three-kilogram warhead hanging beneath the drone exploded into a ball of flame.

Such terrifying force could even flip a Conqueror tank, yet this two-hundred-year-old relic merely staggered.

Seeing this unbelievable sight, Big Eye's eyes widened as he opened them.

"Holy shit! Is the 'Dragoon' armor this insane?!"

"This isn't a 'Dragoon,' nor does it look like a 'Champion'..." Edge Loafing's voice gradually carried a hint of excitement as he clenched his fist on the truck roof. "This might be an upgraded model not even in the official art book!"

Though it was an opponent they had never encountered before, neither he nor any other player showed a trace of fear.

Instead, their fighting spirit burned even fiercer—

This was an unprecedented challenge!

If they got the first kill, they would not only earn the honor of a server-wide announcement but also have their names permanently enshrined in the Hall of Fame!

"Infantry squad, covering fire!"

Watching the Decayed Knight stagger to steady itself, Edge Loafing shouted into the comm channel.

"Anti-tank team, move up! Concentrate fire with HEAT rounds!"

Though the earlier explosion had not directly destroyed the Decayed Knight, the shockwave had still dealt considerable damage.

Large patches of fungal mat peeled away from its body. To steady itself, it had to rely on its greatsword, while the surrounding players already opened fire with rifles, pouring a fierce rain of bullets at it.

"Ugh—"

Gray-green smoke leaked from the gaps beneath its helmet, like a silent roar. It angrily raised its greatsword, ready to charge at the players, but just then, several players carrying RPG launchers lined up in front of it.

"RPG!!"

With an excited shout, one HEAT round after another shot forth like arrows from a bow, trailing white smoke plumes as they slammed into the Decayed Knight.

The Decayed Knight swung its greatsword swiftly, deflecting two HEAT rounds aimed at its face, but could not stop more from striking its chest, knees, and shoulders.

"Boom—!"

Brilliant sparks scattered amid the roar of explosions, like molten iron splashing from a forge.

Struck by multiple HEAT rounds, the Decayed Knight staggered backward, let out a hoarse roar, lost its balance, and crashed heavily to the ground.

Even armor from the Age of Prosperity, without its shield activated, could not withstand such a concentrated barrage of HEAT rounds.

A thumb-sized hole had been punched through its chest plate, revealing the crimson flesh beneath. Its right leg was completely crippled, pierced clean through by the metal jet.

The Decayed Knight struggled to rise, but as it sat up halfway, two more rockets slammed into it.

Knowing the importance of finishing off the boss, the players did not stop attacking after bringing it down; instead, they immediately followed up with a thermobaric warhead!

The blast wave slammed into the chest armor, causing the road beneath it to shudder upward.

The scorching air rushed in through the breaches in the armor, instantly shredding the fungal mass inside into a pool of black sludge.

The heat flooding its chest carried its consciousness far away; in its dying moments, it seemed to hear the wails of every slime mold cell in its body.

Watching the crowd approaching, the crimson behind the pitch-black visor slowly faded in the firelight.

The nightmare that had imprisoned it for two centuries.

Finally ended...

The slime mold clinging to the armor was utterly destroyed. The power armor, fallen once more, finally went still, releasing the greatsword that had become as much a part of it as its own body, no longer struggling to rise, no longer making a sound.

A player stepped forward, inspected its corpse, and confirmed the thing was dead for good.

Gazing at the rectangular iron block corroded by slime mold lying nearby, the construction site youth with the RPG launcher muttered in surprise.

"This thing is actually a rifle?"

And a Gauss rifle at that!

Large patches of fungal mat peeled away from the weapon, revealing a tuning-fork-shaped barrel and a forward-folding grip, while a faint emblem could be seen on the streamlined stock.

[111th Orbital Drop Division]

Below the emblem, a blurred line of text was barely visible.

"He must have been a soldier in life... maybe a squad leader," Debt-Eyed speculated, looking at the battered armor wreckage, piecing together its story in an uncertain tone. "While on a mission in the center of Clearspring, he and his squad were consumed by the slime mold, then continued fighting as an evolved form for two centuries."

"So we just beat the 111th Orbital Drop Division from the backstory?" the construction site youth said, scratching his head.

"At least we gave one of them peace." Edge-Skimmer let out a soft sigh, looking at the armor lying face-up on the ground. "Drag it onto the truck."

The chances of repairing it were slim.

Besides, the Alliance now had its own self-developed power armor, "Dawnlight," so there was no need to force these old relics.

A museum was where it belonged.

"Sia is ahead! Keep moving!"

Reorganizing the stalled column, Edge-Skimmer shouted over the comm channel, urging everyone onward.

But just then, the road beneath them began to tremble faintly, as if an earthquake were striking.

Edge-Skimmer jerked his gaze forward, but his view was blocked by a thick fog, revealing nothing.

Debt-Eyed decisively launched another drone, sending it flying toward the direction Edge-Skimmer was looking.

Yet the drone had barely entered that dense gray mist when it lost signal, as if it had slammed into a wall.

"Damn..."

Debt-Eyed's shoulder jolted violently. He shook his head, clearing the snow-white static from his vision.

When his sight returned to normal and he looked toward where the drone had vanished, he froze entirely.

There, a fist as huge as a billboard was clenched, connected to an arm as thick as a train car and a body as towering as an iron pagoda.

"...Titan."

Edge-Skimmer's face shifted slightly, forcing the word out between his lips.

A Titan, of all things!

And not just that—

Silvery-gray figures emerged from the mist, marching forward with steady steps, their eyes glowing with crimson murderous intent, their heavy armor no less formidable than the one the players had just taken down.

Edge-Skimmer made a rough count: at least twenty power armor units clustered around the Titan!

They held all sorts of weapons, still maintaining the formation from their deep-city exploration two centuries ago.

The slime mold had consumed them and turned them into guardians of this ruin.

Feeling the overwhelming pressure bearing down on them, the nearly three thousand players packed into the street all swallowed hard in unison.

The construction site youth's Adam's apple bobbed. He glanced at the matchstick-like RPG in his hand and muttered under his breath.

"...We're completely screwed now."

The one they'd fought so hard to kill was just an elite minion beside the boss.

The real boss had only just appeared!

Though his scalp crawled, Edge-Skimmer gritted his teeth and grabbed his weapon.

They had already fooled Sia, making those restless forces charge into their prepared ambush, tying up almost all of the Tide's strength.

Now was the moment when the newborn mother's own defenses were most vulnerable—if they could seize the chance to kill it, they would win this war—

At least solve this year's crisis!

"Prepare for battle!"

No matter what, they could not fall here!

...

"Holy crap... is that a Titan?"

Sitting in the Lingyun fighter, weaving between skyscrapers, Falling Feather caught a glimpse of the mist-shrouded ground and couldn't help but exclaim.

A steel giant, six stories tall, stood on the street, crimson fungal patches crawling like moss over its boxy armor, a low roar echoing across the city.

The Death Corps brothers seemed to have run into it.

Though he wanted to help them, he had something more important to do now.

"Hang in there, brothers..."

The Goblin Corps' planes were on their way; air support would soon be overhead.

Gritting his teeth, Falling Feather pushed the throttle, accelerating toward the city center.

As the distance shrank, he felt his heart pound faster and faster.

Then, a soft murmur reached his ears.

"Mmm." (I see Him.)

The spores drifting in the air had merged completely with this wasteland; He was like a god of this land, every stirring breeze His breath.

This was a life form Little Feather had never seen before.

From that overwhelming power, it felt a faint fear.

The partner it lived with was no match for Him...

They were still too weak.

Even all of them together probably couldn't compare to a single filament on His body.

"Don't be afraid. Tell me, where is this Him?" Sensing Little Feather's anxiety, Falling Feather focused on piloting while patiently comforting it.

Little Feather calmed down a little.

"I can take you to Him... but I'm not confident we can defeat Him."

Falling Feather: "Don't worry, I won't let you face It alone. I'll be with you!"

Xiao Yu's voice was tinged with pessimism.

"You'll die... I might not, since only my fruiting body remains on you, but he'll devour you—along with the part of me left inside."

Die?

Falling Feather grinned.

"Relax. I won't die."

No joke.

He was an ace pilot of death!

To think he'd perish after being killed once was to underestimate him far too much!

Xiao Yu's voice still wavered with hesitation.

"Really?"

Gripping the control stick, Falling Feather spoke earnestly.

"I promise you... even if my heart stops beating, I'll appear before you three days later."

The whimpering sound fell silent for a moment, then drifted out again, light as air.

"Forever?"

Without a second thought, Falling Feather answered without hesitation.

"Of course!"

Though he couldn't see Xiao Yu deep underground, he could feel the joy leaping in that whimper.

Pale red tendrils seeped from the backs of his hands, slowly extending toward the control stick clenched in his grip, like invisible hands covering his own.

In just a few breaths, those pale red tendrils had merged with the aircraft's central controls and began spreading through the cockpit.

At this sudden change, Falling Feather showed not a trace of alarm.

He trusted Xiao Yu not to cause trouble at such a critical moment.

And just as he expected.

The instant those pale red tendrils fully fused with the mechanical components inside the cockpit, an unprecedented sensation coursed through his entire body.

He felt his consciousness sink downward.

In that fleeting moment of daze, he suddenly realized his awareness had merged with the entire aircraft!

The forward-swept wings stretched out like his own arms; he could clearly sense the airflow brushing past the wingtips, as if it slipped through his very fingers.

After years of flying, he had never experienced anything like this.

He felt as though he had become a bird soaring among the skyscrapers, every impossible maneuver as effortless as breathing.

It was as if he wasn't piloting the Lingyun—

He *was* the Lingyun.

"Holy shit..."

Savoring this incredible, wondrous sensation, Falling Feather's heart swelled with delight.

He felt his understanding of flight had ascended an entire level, reaching the legendary state of "man-machine unity"!

Sensing his joy, Xiao Yu let out a delighted cry as well.

"Shit!"

For once, Falling Feather didn't mind Xiao Yu's foul mouth; his heart was now completely filled with elation.

"Haha, amazing, Xiao Yu!"

"I-wu!" (*We're getting closer to It—It's already spotted us!*)

"Roger!"

Watching the skyscrapers whiz past outside the cockpit, Falling Feather unlocked the cannon's safety, his eyes locked onto a patch of gray haze beyond the canopy, a fierce, battle-hungry grin curling at his lips.

"I'm ready!"

...

At the same moment the Lingyun fighter reached the battlefield, the twenty-man squad of the Burning Legion had already crossed the edge of the Second Ring Road via glider, arriving at the heart of Clearspring City.

This region, at the base of the spore cloud, was perpetually shrouded in a gray mist as thick as solid matter. Even veteran players like Old Bai and Fang Chang, who had been in the server since the early days, had never seen what lay here.

It wasn't so much a nuclear crater as a sunken lakebed.

The rules of concrete structures resisting nuclear blasts seemed utterly invalid here. Before absolute yield and heat, the concrete at the epicenter, along with the steel reinforcing it, had been ground to powder, erased from the world entirely.

The buildings at the crater's center seemed to have vanished into thin air, leaving not even wreckage behind.

Around the crater, chaos reigned—tall buildings either snapped in half or were uprooted entirely, underground parking lots and foundations torn from the earth!

The comm channel fell silent.

Witnessing this, almost every player was too stunned to speak.

Gripping the glider's handles tightly, Fang Chang's expression shifted from shock to gravity.

Unbelievably, even a strategic weapon of such power couldn't completely wipe that hive-mother from the planet's surface...

And eerily, after crossing the inner ring road of the city center, they could no longer see any trace of the fruiting bodies.

Where had those little ones gone?

Just then, Falling Feather's intermittent voice crackled through the comm.

"...Xiao Yu has locked onto the hive-mother's position. The nearest entrance is about six hundred meters due west of you. I've marked it on the map."

Old Bai, floating in the sky, frowned slightly.

"That thing's underground?"

The comm channel continued with a firm reply.

"Should be. Most of the spores in this area are spewing from a well. Its body must be buried beneath the earth. I'll provide as much air support as I can, but I can only handle the surface part."

Old Bai: "Copy that. Stay safe!"

Falling Feather grinned. "Don't worry—I won't come down until the very end!"

Signal conditions here were terrible, the comm cutting in and out.

Not wasting time on chatter, Old Bai confirmed the landing coordinates via VM and immediately led the group gliding down.

As their feet touched the ground, they raised their weapons and formed a defensive formation.

But to everyone's surprise, no tide of evolved creatures surged forth to engulf them. Instead, the silence was so profound it made them hesitate—had they come to the wrong place?

All around, the ruins of buildings stretched out, along with skyscraper foundations jutting abruptly from the earth.

Piles of concrete rubble rose like man-made hills, half-buried in fine sand.

Standing on the ground and looking around was far more breathtaking than gazing down from the sky.

Yet what puzzled everyone was that, before landing, they had carefully looked around but saw no trace of the slime mold.

Not even a single speck of fungal plaque!

“Where is that well?” Jie Yan asked in a low, tense whisper.

Old Bai glanced around.

“Luo Yu said it’s around here… Let’s look for it.”

At least no evolved forms were closing in—that was a good thing.

But just then, Ye Shi, who had been frowning all along, suddenly spoke.

“Do you hear something?”

Hearing his jinx, everyone was momentarily stunned, but before they could react, an earth-shaking tremor came from beneath their feet.

Fine sand and soil began to sink, along with nearby concrete debris.

Seeing the ground sinking, Fang Chang’s face suddenly changed.

“Holy shit—”

He finally realized why there were no fruiting bodies here.

The Mother Nest wasn’t hiding somewhere here; It had never concealed itself—It was right beneath their feet, already merged with this land—

They were standing on Its head!