Inside the command room, Xiahou Zhong had laid everything on the table, whether he should say it or not. Looking at Lian Qiguang sitting in the chair with his head lowered, not even his breathing changing from beginning to end, Xiahou Zhong could no longer figure out Lian Qiguang’s attitude.
If Lian Qiguang had gotten angry and made a fuss, he could still have come up with some words to fool him. But Lian Qiguang remained completely silent, quiet from beginning to end, and Xiahou Zhong began to feel uneasy.
After a long while, Lian Qiguang slowly raised his head and expressionlessly looked at Xiahou Zhong, who was uneasily squeezing his cup across from him.
“Finished?”
“Ah.” Xiahou Zhong nodded dryly. “So, what do you think?”
“Prepare a spaceship for me.”
Ignoring Xiahou Zhong’s hesitant mumbling, Lian Qiguang stood up, picked up Qianming from the table, and carried it behind his back.
Xiahou Zhong was startled, then immediately understood what Lian Qiguang meant and stood up with him.
“How many soldiers do you need?”
“Not a single one. Just prepare a spaceship for me alone.”
“This…” Xiahou Zhong hesitated.
“I don’t need troublesome deadweight.”
Lian Qiguang swept a cold glance toward Xiahou Zhong, pulled up the hood of his top, and put it on, covering half of his face.
Seeing how unyielding and forceful Lian Qiguang was, leaving no room for refusal, Xiahou Zhong could only give up. He asked in a low voice,
“When are you planning to leave?”
Lian Qiguang fastened the final button. His cold, silent black eyes turned toward the window. After a moment of silence, he calmly uttered two words.
“Immediately!”
A lightning-type ability split a super-intelligent being into pieces of charred, foul-smelling flesh.
Xiahou Shaoxuan glanced at Chong Mu, who was behind him, covered in blood and barely clinging to life, and his brows furrowed slightly.
“Boss, fighting like this isn’t going to work!” Xuan Lang shouted as he held Chong Mu. “If this keeps up, we’ll eventually be trapped to death!”
“Boss…” Chong Mu stiffly pulled at the corner of his mouth and struggled to prop himself up into a sitting position. “The brothers all know what you’re capable of. Don’t let us drag you down. Hurry and leave.”
“Shut up!” Xiahou Shaoxuan shouted coldly.
His lightning-type ability swept toward the surroundings, once again blocking the super-intelligent beings’ ability attacks.
“Boss.” Xuan Lang smiled bitterly. “With your ability, escaping unharmed isn’t impossible. Although there are a lot of super-intelligent beings, none of them are your match. If you keep wasting your strength here, sooner or later you’ll be dragged down and killed by the brothers.”
Xiahou Shaoxuan coldly looked at the few people who remained, then turned to ask An Yi,
“How much longer?”
“Almost!” An Yi’s face was pale and covered in sweat as he rapidly pressed the densely packed buttons. The prolonged high concentration and continuous operation of his hands had already pushed him close to his limit. “Give me another ten minutes. I only need ten minutes!”
Xiahou Shaoxuan coldly watched the super-intelligent beings continuously rushing toward them from all around and tightened his grip on his blade.
“An Yi, how many special shells are left?”
“What are you planning to do?”
“There are only three spaceships left. Rather than bombing them aimlessly, it would be better to gather the super-intelligent beings together, then concentrate all the special shells and bombard them. We can use that to tear open a corner of the encirclement and break out.”
“Boss, these are all battle-hardened super-intelligent beings. They’re not mindless ordinary zombies. On the contrary, their intelligence is probably higher than ours.”
An Yi smiled bitterly helplessly.
Xiahou Shaoxuan fell silent for a moment before raising his head to look at the few people behind him who were about to lose their ability to fight.
“Their target is me. I’ll lure them away!”
“Boss!!”
“Boss…”
The moment Xiahou Shaoxuan said this, everyone became agitated. One after another, they stood up to stop him.
“An Yi.”
Xiahou Shaoxuan raised his hand, stopping the unfinished words of the others. His expression was solemn.
“Tell me. What are the odds?”
The communicator remained silent for a while.
After a long time, An Yi’s suppressed voice came through.
“Fifty percent…”
“That’s enough!”
After saying this, Xiahou Shaoxuan threw away the special gun that was already empty and took out the water that Lian Qiguang had prepared for him, drinking it down.
“Boss, you’re taking too much of a risk.”
Yuan Ling frowned deeply, his face filled with displeasure.
“This is an order.”
Xiahou Shaoxuan interrupted Yuan Ling’s attempt to persuade him and said coldly,
“Next, I’ll gather these super-intelligent beings together. The three spaceships will seize the opportunity to bombard them. At the moment the spaceships attack, you will immediately break through in the opposite direction.”
Everyone looked at Xiahou Shaoxuan unwillingly and remained silent.
“Did you hear me?!”
Seeing that no one answered, Xiahou Shaoxuan’s voice became sterner.
“Yes!!”
Lian Qiguang did not say goodbye to anyone. He boarded the spaceship Xiahou Zhong had prepared for him and left District One.
The spaceship left District One and stopped atop a ruined area in District Three.
Lian Qiguang had not told Xiahou Zhong that his target this time was not Xiahou Shaoxuan, but Wuma Yan.
Wuma Yan was the beginning of all of this.
Then all of this also had to end with him.
Abandoning the spaceship, Lian Qiguang held Qianming in his hand and walked through the war-burning ruins.
Xiahou Zhong had frozen the zombies around the outskirts of District One, and heavy snow covered the cities in every district.
Looking at the slow-moving ordinary zombies and the collapsed buildings around him, Lian Qiguang narrowed his eyes, as though the peace and tranquility from not long ago had merely been a dream.
A figure blocked Lian Qiguang’s path.
Lian Qiguang’s footsteps paused slightly, and he coldly looked at Qi Yin, who stood opposite him with his hands behind his back.
“You came.”
Qi Yin smiled, just as gentle as he had been when they first met three thousand years ago.
Qianming was unsheathed in Lian Qiguang’s hand, its point aimed at Qi Yin’s heart. His voice was cold and indifferent.
“Your divination is impressive, but when it comes to martial strength, you are absolutely no match for me.”
Qi Yin lowered his head and chuckled softly, sorrow flashing through his eyes.
“You shouldn’t have come. He’s been waiting for you for a very long time. Once you come, you won’t be able to go back. I always thought you were very smart.”
“I came here today because I only want to kill one person. Move aside.”
Looking at the murderous aura covering Lian Qiguang’s body, the smile on Qi Yin’s face did not change, but there was more bitterness in it.
Qi Yin slowly stretched out both hands. His water-type ability gradually gathered in his palms, growing larger and larger.
Lian Qiguang’s eyes darkened. His grip on Qianming tightened slightly, his tightly pressed lips revealing whether he was angry at Qi Yin’s resistance or at Qi Yin seeking his own death.
The water-type ability split into a hundred streams of water, slicing through the air and passing through the snowstorm before surging toward Lian Qiguang.
The streams of water were already right before his eyes.
Lian Qiguang stepped backward, reversed his grip on Qianming, and the wind and snow around him swept up, wrapping him within.
Just as the water streams were about to pierce through Lian Qiguang’s body, the originally flowing liquid visibly froze into ice pillars.
Lian Qiguang’s feet landed on the ground. He leaped into the air, Qianming in his hand reflecting an eye-searing cold light as he brought it down toward Qi Yin’s head.
Qi Yin turned sideways and retreated.
Lian Qiguang pressed forward step by step.
Lian Qiguang became ruthless. Not a single move or technique held the slightest mercy, every strike aimed directly at Qi Yin’s fatal points.
The ice pillars continuously shattered beneath Lian Qiguang’s blade. The raging wind howled, sweeping countless shards of ice through the air and leaving one crack after another across Qi Yin’s skin.
A blade came slashing straight toward him.
Qi Yin raised his water-type ability to block it. The two forces collided.
The water shield shattered.
Qi Yin let out a muffled groan and was thrown several meters away, crashing heavily onto the ground. A mouthful of black blood melted the snow beneath him.
Looking at Qi Yin lying on the ground, Lian Qiguang withdrew Qianming.
His hand turned over, and the ice shards drifting through the air slowly gathered. Beneath Lian Qiguang’s hand, they formed a vortex.
“Qi Yin, you’ve lived long enough. Go where you are supposed to go.”
The ice shards flew toward Qi Yin, sweeping him into their midst.
Qi Yin looked at his legs gradually being frozen. The smile at the corners of his lips grew wider and wider.
“After a thousand years apart, My Lord, you still haven’t changed.”
“You’ve changed.”
Lian Qiguang silently looked at the child he had personally brought back all those years ago. He only felt a heaviness in his chest.
“Do you still remember what you said when I brought you back back then? You said you hated those disgusting monsters. You said that one day, you would kill them all and welcome a new world. But look at what you’ve become now…”
“I only want to see My Lord. I don’t care what I become.”
The frost had already frozen up to his chest, and Qi Yin’s speech was becoming increasingly difficult.
Looking at the man before him, although his appearance had changed, those eyes were still just as beautiful as they had been in his memories.
“My Lord, you will never know. The one who has always been watching you from behind isn’t only Wuma Yan. There’s also me…”
The frost froze over his eyes.
Qi Yin was completely frozen in ice.
His final expression remained forever upon that warm smile that had once moved Lian Qiguang.
Lian Qiguang closed his eyes and walked heavily past Qi Yin.
With a crisp crack, fine fractures spread across the ice sculpture.
A moment later, together with Qi Yin, it transformed into frost covering the ground, swept into the boundless snowstorm, and scattered throughout the world.
“Wuma Yan!! Didn’t you want to see me?! I’m here! Come out!!”
“Found them!”
Xiahou Zhong hurriedly kicked open the door to the command room and looked toward the floating screen, moving past the group of military officers.
The person on the floating screen was from a video An Yi had sent.
The noisy sounds, shaking footage, and horrifying corpses and blood told everyone just how difficult and brutal this war was.
An Yi’s voice was hurried as he briefly and urgently reported their situation, their coordinates, and the battle plan currently being carried out.
The video was less than three minutes long, yet it caused everyone’s hearts to sink.
“Marshal!”
A military officer stepped forward, breaking the silence.
“They need a support force.”
Xiahou Zhong remained silent for a long time before turning and leaving.
“Everyone, report to the conference room immediately!”
“Yes!!”
Another wound deep enough to expose bone split open across Xiahou Shaoxuan’s chest.
He covered the blood-soaked wound and coldly looked at the super-intelligent beings slowly closing in around him.
“You have enough strength, but you’re not a smart man.”
One of the super-intelligent beings looked coldly at Xiahou Shaoxuan, with both mockery and regret on its face.
“You should have escaped.”
Someone stepped forward and sighed.
“If it were only you alone, you would have been more than capable of shaking us off. And we would have done our best to cooperate with you.”
“My soldiers are here.”
“The difference between humans and monsters is that we have hearts, while you merely possess the skin and flesh of human beings.”
“In this world, if you want to survive, you have to stop at nothing.”
“We have no intention of killing you. You are very important to My Lord, but we also cannot disobey the command of our leader.”
Someone walked up before Xiahou Shaoxuan, flames slowly gathering in his hand.
“If one day My Lord takes his anger out on us, I will repay you with this life.”
“That sounds a little too arrogant.”
Xiahou Shaoxuan raised his head, the corners of his lips curling into a cold arc.
The group of super-intelligent beings froze slightly.
An ominous premonition suddenly arose in their hearts.
“You don’t have to wait until I die.”
“When that day comes and my wife gets angry because of your deaths, I’ll comfort him properly.”
The moment Xiahou Shaoxuan finished speaking, a square piece of metal rose from beneath his feet, rapidly carrying him out of the encirclement.
“Not good! We’ve fallen into a trap!”
One of the super-intelligent beings shouted and turned around, attempting to flee.
Xiahou Shaoxuan crossed both hands.
Hundreds and thousands of metal shields rose from the ground, forming wall after wall like a secret realm, trapping the super-intelligent beings within.
After all, Xiahou Shaoxuan’s strength was greater than theirs.
Even though they had the advantage in numbers, they still could not escape this golden prison in an instant.
Xiahou Shaoxuan broke free of the encirclement. The metal beneath his feet continuously changed shape, supporting ladders one after another against the surrounding buildings.
“Now!!”
Xiahou Shaoxuan roared.
The three spaceships converged.
Shells rained down like a dense downpour toward the encirclement.
The earth trembled. The surrounding buildings collapsed one after another.
For several miles around, everything became a wasteland of ruins.
Wuma Yan looked at the heavy snow flying outside the window. His red lips slowly curled upward.
“He’s here.”
Lian Qiguang coming personally to find him made Wuma Yan extremely excited.
Suppressing his trembling body, Wuma Yan could not conceal the smile on his face as he turned around and was about to leave.
A hand tightly grabbed Wuma Yan’s arm.
Wuma Yan turned his head and met Qiu Lima’s sorrowful eyes, his heart trembling slightly.
Qiu Lima looked at Wuma Yan with trembling eyes. His hoarse voice was filled with despair.
“You will die.”
Wuma Yan curled his lips into a smile, pulled his arm free, and in an excellent mood patted Qiu Lima on the head.
“Wait for me to come back.”
Watching the door slam shut, Qiu Lima could no longer conceal the anger and despair in his heart. He screamed at the top of his lungs,
“You will die!! He will kill you!! He came looking for you precisely to kill you! Why can’t you understand?! He will never fall in love with you! And he will never come back with you!!”