Xyrin Empire
Chapter 546: Ah, you dead girl

Chapter 546: Chapter 546: Ah, you dead girl

When I was very young, the sky was still blue, the water was still clear, and when boys and girls spent time together it was innocent. Two girls chatting or drawing together weren’t automatically considered a yuri couple, and two boys romping around in the mud together weren’t labeled as gay buddies. In that wonderful era, we little kids wandered through a world full of loli without a clue, oblivious to our own ignorance. Too busy watching cartoons with female leads whose giant eyes took up a third of their face, we failed to notice the potential around us. Those were the days of pastoral simplicity and luxurious times in our lives. Looking back, it fills me with a melancholic sorrow... Wow, I’ve really gone off on a tangent.

Actually, I’m just reminiscing about those Saturdays and Sundays spent at home playing video games. The aforementioned sentiments were basically a bonus.

Ah, the video game console... I have to say, the Red and White Machine was already outdated during my elementary school days, but in a home barely held together by an under-fifteen girl’s determination, it’s a miracle I still had weekend time to play video games. Back then, I couldn’t appreciate what Big Sister had to go through to keep us afloat with the meager inheritance left by our (foster) parents. Now, however, I have a bittersweet understanding when I think back on those times.

And among those memories that have become an indelible part of me is the classic side-scrolling shooter game family—see, no matter how far off topic I go, I can always loop back.

Against the simplistic black backdrop of space in those games, you were a blocky 15×15-pixel craft, surrounded by oddly shaped alien monsters—spheres, cubes, triangles—all floating by. You needed to relentlessly pound the AB buttons, blasting those weird geometric shapes trying to indecently float past you, and imagine yourself heroically amidst splendorous space fireworks—the limited capabilities of the machine meant that we kids had to use our imaginations to fill in the pixelated gaps. Of course, the lack of H-games back then was also due to censorship so extreme that not even imagination could fill in the blanks...

I realized why Big Sister was so worried about me getting into trouble with no one to watch over me. She knew me too well, aware that given free rein, I could spiral off-topic in fifteen minutes flat to the point where I couldn’t even remember what I was originally pondering.

What I’m trying to say is that the scenes before me now involuntarily bring to mind those Red and White Machine games from my childhood.

The monotonous blackness of cosmic space—where even the most dazzling stars are merely a few pixels in your view—the crisscrossing flashes of gunfire... They’re the light from our own fleet illuminating this dead space. And, of course, there are the strangely shaped space enemies, countless black spheres.

Engaging with thoughtless Abyss Energy Bodies is tedious—it might be more powerful than most high-level civilization fleets, but these black spheres only know how to charge mindlessly forward. The exchange of fire between us is as uninteresting as a side-scrolling shooter from the Red and White Machine games. That’s why I can’t help but draw parallels with something else entirely: a next-gen, fully 3D sensory shooting game.

However, this ’game’ is anything but enjoyable, especially when up against a growing Abyss Gate with only a few hundred militia ships that hardly compare to a regular army.

I really don’t know how I manage to go off on such tangents in dire situations like this.

"Warning, adjust by 0.35 ahead, fire block breached, prepare for impact resistance."

The flagship’s main computer sounded another alarm, followed by a jolt felt by everyone.

On the holographic display, another massive energy flash appeared—a black sphere with a radius of at least two kilometers exploded in front of our defensive line. It was so close, just before its destruction, that I could even see the eerie layered patterns on its surface from the projection. When Trappers infected by the Abyss morph into these bombs, their internal crystal structures are magnified in a bizarre way, forming these strange patterns that reveal some secrets of the nature of Abyss Power. It’s just a shame Taville wasn’t here—she would’ve been thrilled to catch a "Big Black Ball" alive.

"The Sinapus Battlecruiser’s main shield has taken severe damage! The Great Harmony Cannon is inoperative, main armor and sections one to three of the isolation chamber are contaminated and jettisoned, retreating from battle!"

"The Delta-class Battlecruiser’s Ghost Energy mounting bay has sustained a fatal hit, we’ve lost our shields and have a light contamination! Contamination is contained, ship withdrawing from battle!"

"This is the Quantum Special Battlecruiser. Abyss Energy has breached our Ghost Energy Shields; we have Soldiers who are contaminated... Ghost Agents are containing the energy spread... A two-dimensional Shadow has appeared in Reactor Three, abandon ship, abandon ship!"

"The carrier ’Voice of the Void’ reports to the Great Mentor, we are deeply sorry that we have lost combat effectiveness, all major power reactors have stopped operating, and the defense system has collapsed. We are now receiving escape pods from ’Quantum’ and ’Zhiyuan Star’ and evacuating the front lines..."

"Rumble—"

A deep, barely discernible sound transmitted, and the entire bridge shook once more.

For something to make the colossal several-hundred-kilometer steel body of the ’Imperial Admiral’ tremble, this time, it must be another head-on collision—The dense ghost energy fire was no longer capable of stopping these endless assaults.

"Cool the main cannon assembly again quickly, don’t rush to activate the space shock; they can still hold out for a while," I pressed on the crystal panel of the command table, the complex data that emerged on it... Well, I basically couldn’t make heads nor tails of it, but after all this time, I had some understanding of these things, "How is the ’Light of El Holy Mother Ship’ faring?"

"We used micro black holes and space annihilation systems to forcibly absorb two major impacts for the flagship, barely avoiding loss of control due to abyss contamination," came the report from the flagship’s ancient mainframe through the information link, "It’s estimated that combat capability cannot be restored within six hours. The only thing they can activate now is the high-energy purification light beam, but this attack is very limited against the spreading abyss energy."

The ship’s mainframe provided precise and objective analysis, a shame it just gave me a toothache after the other.

And what’s even more of a toothache—

"Your Majesty, we are still unable to restore the connection with the ’Shadow Fortress’! The Abyss Gate is mixed with another type of energy radiation, and until it is decomposed, we cannot get the coordinates to the Different Plane!"

Anyway, I’ve been nursing a toothache for over half an hour now.

Leading a few hundred civilian rescue ships (I admit calling them that would cause Zeratul and Reynolds to be deeply disheartened, but compared to the Imperial Regular Army, to be called a civilian is actually rather praiseworthy) and duking it out with an Abyss Gate, one that, for some unknown reason, was unprecedentedly powerful; I was feeling very conflicted: before saying anything, I hadn’t said that I was going to get married back home after this battle, so why was I this unlucky? Could it be because I watched the holograms of Sandora and Qianqian too often in secret?

"Report to Your Majesty! The Mutated Abyss Condensed Bodies have been completely annihilated, but the true body of the Abyss Gate has still not been exposed! The combat effectiveness of the United Fleet is now less than 40%!" The Deputy Officer in the command hall brought me some disheartening news, but my response was always the same: "Continue to deploy Trappers until the true body of the Abyss Gate is exposed!"

Do you know what the most frustrating battle in the world is? Let me tell you, it’s exactly this kind.

We must continuously deploy Trappers because if we can’t promptly bind the energy emanating from the Abyss Gate into the Main Material Plane, it will go completely out of control. These two-dimensional Shadows without any physical properties have a rate of spread that increases exponentially with their distance from the Abyss Gate, but the result of deploying Trappers is that the abyss energy will first infect the Trappers, turning them into powerful contaminated bombs to attack us—although at that point, the latter turns into a Main Material form that can be attacked. But no matter how you look at it, this whole process is filled with a strong masochistic tendency.

This Abyss Gate seems really unusual...

When the thousands of Trappers that had just been deployed were still several thousand kilometers away from the "Liquid Drop" (formerly Earth) nearly completely covered in black patterns, they were successfully turned and became master balls... cough cough, black spheres that then charged fiercely towards ’Imperial Admiral’ and its lackeys. During this process, the cosmic droplet containing the Abyss Gate continued its slow blackening as if completely unaffected by the energy being siphoned away, increasing my confusion.

Although theoretically, an Abyss Gate is just the gateway to that twisted, mad "world," its other end being the entirety of the Abyss, in reality, every Abyss Gate has a "capacity limit," and they can only unleash a limited amount of energy. When a certain amount of energy is extracted, these horrifying evil headquarters expose themselves in the Main Material Plane, becoming a boss for raid teams to push around. The reasons why an Abyss Gate cannot fully connect with the Abyss vary according to Xyrin Scientists, but everyone concedes that each one will be exhausted. However, the one in front of us... its capacity is just too exaggerated, right?

Truly worthy of a massive entity that requires a whole planet to accommodate, I reckon this thing could annihilate a couple of worlds just for fun, sweeping through the village east side’s Slime King with level-85 Epic Equipment must feel somewhat like this, so we absolutely cannot let this Abyss Gate erupt out, not to mention, humans who’ve just escaped to the Mars Sanctuary wouldn’t stand a chance in front of this gate, as they would be even less than a slime.

"Halo, Striker, Gemini, Dawn, and Crusader battlecruisers’ shields have all collapsed! Primary and secondary weapons completely destroyed, withdrawing from battle!"

"The Dawn battlecruiser, the shields of the Shadow Ark carrier have been hit by Abyss Energy, the warship’s main body has collapsed, all surviving crewmembers abandon ship and escape!"

One piece of bad news after another—the Imperial Soldiers were upholding the excellent combat traditions of the Xyrin People: stubborn to the point of never knowing fear. As long as the leader didn’t break down in tears, they could fiercely fight to the end of the world with blood boiling in their veins and would always share all combat information on the public channel. Hearing these dire updates bluntly broadcast by the commanders over the communication network, all I could do was painfully maintain a calm demeanor.

The words once spoken by Sandora remained clear: "Ah Jun, I’m scared too, but here, we are the ones who can’t afford to be afraid because we stand before everyone..." Of course, due to that pitiful Mortal-Level memory of mine, I had to mentally add the words "in essence, that’s it."

Dammit, the so-called demeanor of a leader, dammit, the infuriating calmness! If I’d known I’d be leading a Civilian Corps to take on an Abyss Base Camp, I would’ve brought two million Regular Army troops no matter what! This thing, once it blows up, can overturn even the Star Domain Divine Race armies!

I definitely shouldn’t have been arrogant enough to venture out with only a Flagship and a bunch of Militia; I’ve decided, from now on, even if I’m just going to Academy City to chat with Misaka and the others, I have to bring a whole squad of Imperial Soldiers with me. I always feel like there are eyes 36,000 kilometers above my head watching me, with the sole purpose of bestowing trouble upon me so I can never live in peace...

"The entire New Eden Federation Army will retreat to the second defense line, and deploy the last batch of Avengers into battle. Assault ships still able to move, get ready in the launch tunnel for support. Turn on the Flagship’s shields to full, charge the main cannon, and make a direct strike at the Abyss Gate—"

No matter whether that thing has reached the Main Material Plane or not, I’m firing at it now!

"Your Majesty, the risk level of this plan has exceeded 73.25 percent, are you sure you want to proceed?" asked the warship’s mainframe, which possessed high intelligence but devoted entirely to rational thought, warning me against my order. My response was quite straightforward: "You find me a plan with a risk level below seventy percent! If this battle keeps going like this, by the time they roll the credits, we’ll be framed in black!"

Although there were no major casualties yet, if the battle continued this way, the Civilian Corps would certainly be wiped out! Even the Flagship being overrun was just a matter of time—unless I abandoned all the Servant Armies and the Humans at the Mars Sanctuary, and led the Flagship to slip away from the Abyss Gate.

Would that be possible?

The order was confirmed, and there were no objections left in the Empire’s command network. The Federation Army, which had basically lost its combat capability and was nearly turned into a refuge for wounded allies, began to collectively retreat under the protection of the Holy Mother Ship, which had barely managed to restore its shields, withdrawing tens of thousands of kilometers. Three Faith-class Colony Ships, whose combat power was barely enough to protect themselves, opened their shields wide and stood between the Federation Army and the Imperial Admiral, acting as a barrier.

Suddenly lacking a primary target, those corrupted black spheres immediately concentrated all their attacks on us. Numerous defense gun turrets spread across the entire Imperial Admiral sprang into action, turning the great Space Cross into a spikey hedgehog radiating light in every direction. Those Master Balls... ahem, black giant spheres, exploded like popped balloons, but with their sheer numbers and defenses comparable to warship armor, they gradually closed in on our close-defense danger zone.

Tens of thousands of gorgeous figures in red Light Armor surged out of the launch tunnels during a moment when the defense gun turrets were overwhelmed. These were the last batch of Avengers the Imperial Admiral carried aboard. These deadly and crazed "girls" immediately entered the highest state of overload upon entering the battlefield, unleashing an assault strength that didn’t fall short of a massive fleet by burning out their own bodies. A large number of carrier-based Assault Ships followed into space, bolstering this momentary overwhelming suppression, and the black spheres, which had always been at an advantage, were suddenly pushed back!

"Main cannon, charge!"

Dazzling white light burst from the two shorter arms and the bottom of the longer axis of the cross-shaped hull of the "Imperial Admiral," indicating that its most powerful main guns—all three of them—were housed in these positions. They were modified versions of the vastly amplified Galaxy Main Guns; and, since it was a command ship not well-suited for direct combat, there were no stronger weapons left in their arsenal.

As these were upgraded models, the three giant Galaxy Main Cannons only took two seconds to charge up, before releasing three radiant torrents of light that converged on a single point like focused beams.

The celestial body, now flattened and covered with black patterns due to its molten state, was torn open by this assault, causing nearly a third of its matter to be blown away, turning into cooling chunks of rock scattering across space.

I reckon even the planets in the world of Dragon Ball aren’t as tragic as Earth-kun right now. Hang in there, cradle of humanity.

Explosions in space are silent, so all I could see was a bright flare erupt on the massive projection. The super Ghost Energy Beams, hardly diminished by the annihilated black globes, struck the coordinates of the Abyss Gate with over ninety percent of their power. The mantle of molten celestial matter, numbering in the quadrillions of tons encompassing its surface, was violently blasted into debris. After being mostly vaporized, an eerie void within was exposed.

Is that thing the Abyss Gate?

Wait, something’s not right. Those two-dimensional shadows that protect the Abyss Gate are still being generated; the Abyss Gate hasn’t entered the Main Material Plane yet! That’s just the strange barrier that the agents had discovered within the Earth’s mantle, which has now been thoroughly Abyssalized!

"Damn it, Dingdang! This thing is really a son of a—"

I was finally about to curse the family tree of this gloomy object, if it had one.

But—this time I must admit, I love how this conjunction appeared—it’s almost a timeless truth that a turning point always arrives when you’re about to give up. Like that time Zhuge Liang stifled his energy and waited for Zhou Yu to foam at the mouth with epilepsy for half an hour before announcing his sworn brotherhood with the Wind Immortal Rain Master. The world just has these maddening yet exhilarating twists: "Wood! Wood! Calling Wood! Answer if alive!"

The sudden Spiritual Connection in my mind finally let me breathe a sigh of relief: This damn kid, you finally showed up! I’ve been delaying all this time just waiting for you!

"Detecting a large-scale gravitational collapse effect, high-energy entity approaching—identified as the Imperial Royal Guard, communications transferring."

"Hey there, Wood!"

Lin Xue’s face, always full of mischief and now looking especially cute, appeared on the communication device, completely unaware that he was being watched by millions of his soldiers. Grinning broadly at me, he said, "Still alive, huh?"

"Disappointed you’re not, am I?" I was quite pleased with his timely assistance, but knowing how he was, I couldn’t help but respond with my usual sarcasm.

"Hmph, not even grateful," Miss Lin Xue switched into her tsundere mode, "Before setting off, this Miss already said she would watch over you. Even though I didn’t foresee this troublesome thing appearing, didn’t I still provide timely support... Hey, I’m not worried about you, okay!"

...Girl, my apologies, but please don’t use such a classic line to raise Sandora and Qianqian’s anger levels.

The battered "Imperial Admiral" could finally catch its breath, along with the Civilian Corps behind it. The massive Imperial Fleet was gradually emerging from the dark expanse of space, and the formerly intimidating Abyss Gate was now reduced to the status of a spectacle for onlookers.

(To be continued. If you wish to know what happens next, please visit www.qidian.com. There are more Chapters available. Support the author. Support genuine reading!)