Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Two

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Two

"Any response?"

Bai Sha asked Win Chen beside her.

Win Chen, as the chief among the mech pilots and leading in communications technology, tried various methods to enhance the signal transmitter’s performance. Although the distress signal was sent, there was no response.

Not just him, others in the team were also experiencing similar symptoms.

The focus was no longer on the few Federation students who had died, but on Cen Yuehuai, who had fallen into a coma. She was frowning, her jaw clenched, with frightening hints of blood red seeping from the corners of her eyes. She had actually woken up once before, and upon awakening, began to violently attack everyone around her, unresponsive to anyone calling her name. In the end, Ji Ya had no choice but to tightly restrain her, knocking her out before her spirit could escape.

It wasn’t just Cen Yuehuai; several more team members started showing similar symptoms in twos and threes. With Cen Yuehuai’s case as a precedent, everyone was prepared, but the number of injured needing treatment was still growing.

"What’s happening to them? Poisoned?" Xino asked Ji Ya, frowning. "Have you seen symptoms like these before?"

"No," Ji Ya said, looking at those who had fallen into comas, feeling something sinister. "We don’t even know if this thing is contagious."

"Cen Yuehuai wasn’t right when she woke up this morning. Do you remember?" Yu Yan said softly. "Even though her physical examination data was normal at the time... I’m more inclined to think that the pathogen had been hiding in her body for a long time and just wasn’t detected then."

Xino: "It’s not just her. When I woke up this morning, I also felt a bit off, but I thought it was just poor rest last night..." As he spoke, Xino suddenly felt a wave of weakness and a cool liquid trickling from his nose. Touching it, he found it was blood. He hastily wiped it off, chuckling bitterly. "Looks like I’m also affected, just like Cen Yuehuai. Only the progression is different."

He would eventually end up like Cen Yuehuai.

"What is this? Some kind of secret weapon of the Federation against the Empire?" Bai Sha said incredulously. "If they had something like this, why didn’t they use it earlier?"

Ji Ya gripped her weapon: "Has everyone been affected?"

Yu Yan: "Not sure. I felt nothing when I got up this morning, and still don’t feel anything unusual..."

Was it a toxin? Or some kind of virus?

Suddenly, behind them came the screams of students and a falcon’s screech. A massive, snow-white falcon had appeared amidst the crowd, looking extremely agitated and angry, flapping its wings and knocking over several nearby mechs. In the midst of the swirling sand, its bright red eyes seemed eerily out of place.

"It's Cen Yuehuai's spirit entity—"

"Quick, stop it!"

A runaway spirit entity is extremely dangerous, not only to others but also to Cen Yuehuai herself. If the white falcon were to fly away, Cen Yuehuai's brain would eventually deteriorate due to the loss of her spirit entity.

Two students wielding metal whips controlled their whips to entangle the wings of the white falcon, then wrapped the whips around their mech arms a couple of times and, with a tug-of-war gesture, pulled the half-aloft falcon down to the ground.

Bai Sha, observing the chaos, clicked her tongue, picked up Cen Yuehuai's bow and arrows from the ground, notched an arrow, and aimed at the screeching white falcon in the air, while stealthily releasing a stream of her own spiritual energy. As her spiritual energy enveloped the falcon, it suddenly trembled as if losing its strength. Bai Sha negotiated in a coaxing tone:

"Either I shoot through your wings and you won't fly anymore, or you calm down and go back. It's your choice."

Xino, somewhat surprised and about to say something, saw the white falcon instantly submit, tucking in its wings and dissipating on the spot.

Xino: "...That worked?"

Bai Sha sighed in relief: "I was just trying my luck. Seems like Cen Yuehuai is in a frenzied state but not completely without consciousness. It’s good that she can still communicate."

The incident put the entire team on high alert. Fortunately, no more spirit entities flew out afterward, indicating Cen Yuehuai’s case was somewhat unique. Being the first to show symptoms, her spirit entity might have been inherently unstable.

After discussing, the main team members decided to have those still conscious carry the comatose members and retrace their path back to the entrance of the site.

However, they hadn’t gone far when the sand ahead of them started to ripple, with a rustling sound spreading from the horizon toward their feet.

It was the mechanical snake they had encountered before. Its silver-white body occasionally revealed itself in the shifting sands.

Bai Sha, eyeing the lurking mechanical snakes, drew her solitary light, pointed to a few people, and said, "You guys come with me to lead the way, everyone else, follow."

"Cough cough..." Xino coughed lightly, touching his face to find it feverish. Since his symptoms started, he had been quietly tracking them, estimating how much time he had left before losing consciousness. He wanted to contribute as much as he could to the team's combat efforts. Suppressing the itch in his throat, he opened the team channel and said, "Your Highness, let me join the front line too."

Bai Sha: "Can you hold on?"

"I can," Xino replied.

Nearly all the conscious main team members charged into the swarm of snakes.

Against such mechanical creatures, the ideal attack method was to use armor-piercing weapons and then target the exposed areas with electromagnetic bullets. Their supply of armor-piercing rounds was limited, and the charging time for railguns was continuous, so they had to cooperate with each other, seizing the right moment to kill the mechanical snakes in one strike.

Considering their coordination, Bai Sha simply grouped the main team members according to their previous five-on-five tournament formations, clearing mechanical snakes in front and on both flanks. The rest of the team followed closely.

Giant snakes surged, kicking up towering clouds of sand. The sand under their feet sometimes sank, sometimes overflowed, making their progress uneven, as if wading through rapid deep waters.

A student carrying a comatose teammate struggled to walk. Suddenly, he slipped, and then a strong force knocked him away—it was Xino who pushed him, taking his place to be caught in the jaws of a mechanical snake.

The mechanical snake rose into the sky, flinging Xino high, opening its tooth-filled mouth, about to bite down on his mech.

"…!" The student, unable to call for help in time, saw a flash of bright light in the sky—it was Xino's chain knife glowing. He flipped in mid-air, activating the thrusters to accelerate his descent, while whipping the chain knife to entangle the mechanical snake's lower jaw.

The mechanical snake missed its bite and shook its head violently, trying to fling off Xino clinging to its jaw. Xino retracted the chain knife and used the momentum to pull away to a safe distance from the snake.

"Don't just stand there, run," he shouted.

The student, as if waking from a trance, picked up the unconscious teammate and scrambled to follow the main group.

Xino breathed a sigh of relief, turned to face the rampaging swarm of snakes behind him, and was about to step forward to continue fighting when suddenly a sharp pain surged through his mind—

The world before his eyes was suddenly tinged with a faint red hue.

His sanity shattered in an instant, like snow under the blazing sun. A searing heat surged against the flow of his blood, compelling him to instinctively want to tear apart everything in his sight.

Suddenly, a familiar, crisp, and youthful cry rang out—bringing him an instant sensation of being cleansed by a spring.

The agony seemed to dissipate substantially, and the blood-red haze before his eyes gradually faded.

Xino was momentarily dazed; he looked up to see a magnificent sweep of silver-blue tail feathers fluttering by like clouds and realized belatedly that Bai Sha had activated "Resonance."

Realizing they were intimately connected to others, even fear and pain could be fragmented to bearable levels.

Xino's heart pounded, breathing greedily like a fish out of water.

He now had the strength to keep moving forward.

After an indeterminate amount of time, the original entrance had vanished, replaced by ruins standing in the desert.

The sky gradually darkened. The night was pitch-black, without stars or moon. The artificial day and night of the site made them even more cautious, fearing what might emerge to attack them next.

But now, even the exit had disappeared, their last hope of leaving this place nearly shattered.

Many in the team were either unconscious or starting to show symptoms. If they delayed any longer, most of them might lose the ability to move.

Even Bai Sha was struggling to walk.

Maintaining the Resonance state was immensely draining. She used her will to sustain the vast network of spiritual energy. The consciousness of the team members was like heavy droplets on a delicate spiderweb, most losing their sanity while Bai Sha strained to keep their minds from falling.

Waves of fatigue hit her. Bai Sha didn't stop the Resonance, only ordering a temporary rest near the ruins.

Yu Yan hurried over—his condition was among the best in the team: "Your Highness, we've scouted the area. The entrance seems to be hidden underground, but we can't open it."

"Keep looking," Bai Sha's voice was hoarse. "They’ve set up a frame-up plot, haven’t they? If we don't get out, their whole charade is for nothing."

Yu Yan nodded.

They had been out of contact with the competition organizers for several hours, and the Empire side must have already reacted. A confrontation was inevitable. Surely someone would come to rescue them. Of course, that assumed they could last until then.

Bai Sha sat in the cockpit, about to send a few more messages to try, when suddenly, a line of faint white text appeared on her screen:

[Do you want to save them?]

Bai Sha’s eyes narrowed slightly, her eyebrows raised: "…Who are you?"

[Their anomaly is due to a virus, 'Nelgar'. Remember? The expedition ship from eighteen years ago, with only Cephas surviving.]

…Bai Sha knew what it was referring to.

The accident eighteen years ago, where all the crew members on the expedition ship died, including Han Cong's parents. Cephas Ronin lost his spirit entity after the accident and abdicated soon after. The patriarch of the Greiz family also vanished in this incident.

[At that time, Cephas Ronin paid a heavy price to prevent the virus from leaking. But after so many years, it has finally resurfaced...]

[Even if you manage to escape, those already infected can only face mental collapse.]

[Do you want to save them? Do you want to stop all this?]

[Come find me in the City of No Limits.]