Behind the Allied Forces' fortress, everyone had their eyes closed.
This was the order issued in advance by No. 055.
"Close your eyes, lower your heads, do not look directly."
But that fiery red light ignored the obstruction of flesh and blood, burning straight through everyone's eyelids, searing a massive, lingering afterimage into their tightly shut vision.
The dead silence lasted for ten seconds before being shattered by No. 055's cold electronic voice.
"Light radiation has decayed to safe levels. Visual observation is permitted."
Hao Chi was the first to open his eyes.
His first reaction was that he was hallucinating.
Because as far as he could see, there was nothing.
The canyon was still there.
The rock walls were still there.
The sky was still there, too.
But that Valley of Death, which had once been filled with the Insect Tide,
was empty.
Completely and utterly empty.
That nauseatingly dark green smudge had been erased from the canvas called "reality" by an invisible giant hand.
The ground was scorched black.
The rocks had melted under the super-high temperature and then instantly cooled, forming a smooth, reflective, glass-like surface that mirrored the last glow of dusk on the horizon.
The air was thick with the pungent smell of ozone.
But there was not a single trace of blood.
Because there was no blood here.
No corpses.
No severed limbs.
No shattered carapaces.
One kilometer in depth, the entire width of the canyon.
The tens of thousands of Mantisfolk that had once covered the land like a tide had not left a single speck of dust behind.
They had been completely "deleted" from this world.
An absolute silence descended over the battlefield.
This deathly stillness allowed Hao Chi to clearly hear the drum-like pounding of his own heart, the gulp of the Pandaren Guard beside him swallowing, and the sharp clatter of a distant soldier's weapon slipping from their hand and striking the glassy ground.
Clang.
Lin Xiyue's shield slid to the ground.
She didn't pick it up, her hands hanging limply at her sides. Her entire being seemed drained of its soul, leaving only a pair of wide, unfocused eyes.
Su Wan's lips moved soundlessly.
Her brain was trying to force the scene before her into her own cognitive framework.
In the end, her logic processor burned out.
She gave up on thinking.
Xia Lian's hand, holding her phone, finally began to tremble uncontrollably.
She had just recorded the whole thing, without missing a single frame.
"The Captain was right..."
Her voice was choked with tears, yet mixed with ultimate excitement.
"This... can really be bragged about for a lifetime."
Meanwhile, in the mecha's tactical interface, Lin Qingyue was experiencing a carnival of data.
[Ding! Killed Mantisfolk (Ordinary), Exp +15]
[Ding! Killed Mantisfolk (Elite), Exp +120]
[Ding! Killed Mantisfolk (Ordinary), Exp +15]
-
The flood of notifications was so fast that the information bar couldn't keep up, switching directly to a scrolling summary mode.
But what truly delighted her was another notification.
[Ding! Your act of slaying bugs has gained Firefly's recognition! Your "Firefly Trial Card" available time +1s]
[+1s]
[+1s]
[+1s+1s+1s+1s+1s+1s...]
The number of available time was skyrocketing at a frantic speed.
That last strike, roughly estimated, had cleared over 240,000 targets.
240,000 seconds.
That was over 66 hours.
The total available time on the Firefly Trial Card shot up from less than a day to over three days.
The more you kill, the longer you can use it?
The renewal model for this trial card was actually "sustain the war through war"?
Lin Qingyue almost snorted like a pig in the cockpit.
"Hehehe... I'm making a killing!"
Four seconds after the white light faded.
No. 055's electronic voice exploded across the entire communication channel.
"Signal confirmed!"
It was no longer a cold command.
That voice now carried a certain scorching emotion that shouldn't have belonged to a machine.
Fanaticism!
"All units, charge! Seize Bottleneck Defense Sector No. 1!"
This was an autonomous military AI, and for the first time since the war began two days ago, it was issuing an offensive order!
An even more mind-boggling scene unfolded for all the officers.
No. 055 did not remain in the rear.
Its metal feet crushed the rocks beneath it as the dark silver robot leaped down from the fortress's high platform. With a sharp "shing," it drew the High-Frequency Combat Blade from its back, the blade's vibrating hum piercing the deathly silence.
This cold machine, which always remained in the rear to calculate the optimal solution, was now leading the charge.
Its blue optical lens glowed with a blinding light.
"All units! Charge with me!"
These words, which should never have appeared in a robot's logic module, became the final fuse that ignited the entire army's morale.
"Roar! Follow the Commander!"
The Oxfolk veteran with half a broken horn was the first to roar, his battleaxe raised high above his head as his iron hooves shattered the vitrified ground, leading the charge.
The tide of soldiers instantly exploded.
The Pandaren Heavy Infantry Phalanx advanced with a chaotic but uniformly fast pace, their iron shields forming a moving wall of steel.
The Simian Light Infantry fanned out from both flanks, leaving countless afterimages among the scorched rocks.
The Oxfolk Assault Team abandoned their formation, charging at full speed in a primitive wedge, their hooves thundering like drums.
Jinyu Mages chanted in the rear, casting buffing auras over the entire army.
The Allied Forces of twelve thousand soldiers switched from passive defense to a frenzied all-out charge in just three seconds.
Sixty seconds.
They had to cover this one kilometer in sixty seconds.
The scorched earth was as smooth as a mirror, making it even faster to run on than flat ground.
Of course, it was also more slippery.
A young Simian soldier accelerated too hard, his foot slipped, and he was caught by the scruff of his neck by a comrade beside him before he could fall.
"Steady! Don't fucking embarrass us now!"
"Who designed this terrain?!"
No. 055 sprinted at the very front with a mechanical precision unique to its kind, its High-Frequency Combat Blade casually slashing through a stray enemy that had slipped through the cracks in the rocks.
Its optical lens was locked dead on the canyon bottleneck ahead, which was drawing ever closer.
Forty seconds, the vanguard had covered six hundred meters.
Fifty-two seconds, the Oxfolk Assault Team reached the bottleneck entrance and cleared the wreckage.
Fifty-eight seconds, the Pandaren Heavy Infantry Phalanx fell into position, their iron shields slamming down as the first line of defense formed!
Sixty-one seconds.
No. 055 drove its combat blade into the ground, its optical lens scanning the troops who had already fallen into position.
"Bottleneck Defense Sector No. 1, occupation confirmed."
Its electronic voice echoed across the entire army.
"Time taken: sixty-one seconds. One second over the expected time."
"Reason analysis: Three Simian soldiers slipped on the vitrified ground, causing a total delay of 0.7 seconds."
In the communication channel, someone swore loudly:
"How is this shitty ground our fault?! Tell that pink-haired one to burn it more evenly next time!"
This complaint sparked a brief and frenzied burst of laughter.
Not because it was funny.
But because they were still alive.
They had been besieged for two days, and so many of their brothers had died.
And now, they were actually on the counterattack.
And they could actually still laugh.