The biting wind whipped up iron-gray snow foam, lashing Lin Mo's face, exposed outside his torn protective suit, like countless tiny ice knives. Every breath carried the heavy smell of rust and the burning sensation of radioactive dust, the icy air filling his lungs with a tearing pain. He half-knelt on a patch of charred ruins, reduced to a skeleton of twisted steel. His heavy tactical armor had long since cracked and warped in previous battles. The wound on his back, burned by the purple lightning, felt like an old scar, repeatedly torn open in the cold. Every movement sent a sharp pain piercing his bones.
He struggled to raise a monocular energy detector, covered in frost and oil. Through the cracked eyepiece, his only remaining electronic eye (the other, scratched by blast debris, blurs his vision) mechanically scanned the vast graveyard of urban ruins below. All he could see was charred, twisted metal, toppled chunks of concrete, frozen blood, and the scattered, lifeless remains of mechanical beasts and humans. Deathly silence was the only melody in this scorched earth.
"Area B7... Scan completed..." The detector emitted a dry electronic tone, which was fed back to the extremely weak communication channel built into Lin Mo's helmet. "Available supplies: None. Energy reaction: Below the threshold. Threat: Environmental radiation value, fatal. Recommendation: Evacuate immediately."
Evacuate? Lin Mo's mouth curled into a bitter arc, pulling at the frozen blood scabs on his face. Evacuate to where? Return to the "Ark" that was also struggling on the brink of death? Is there food there? Is there medicine? Is there any hope of repairing the "Pillar of Creation"?
Three days had passed since the brutal and nearly annihilating Battle of Blackstone Castle.
The cost is devastating.
Lei Gang, Zhao Qiming... the pillars of the base fell one after another under the enemy's reckless charge and the frenzied tearing of the polluters, leaving no trace. Over two-thirds of the soldiers were left forever on the cold surface or in the shattered passageways within the base. The "Pillar of Creation" hub, once the nerve center of the base, now lay like a disemboweled giant. The server arrays, riddled with holes and eroded by Shen Qingli's final uncontrolled energy and the "zero" pollution, rose in wisps of smoke, and most areas were covered in thick frost. The few remaining screens flickered with incomprehensible garbled text and glaring red failure signs. Repair? With the resources and technicians completely depleted, this was almost a fantasy.
The most lethal threat was food and medicine. The "deep well" underground farms deep within the base, relying on geothermal heat and artificial lighting for survival, had suffered severe damage from the previous tremors and energy shocks. Crops froze to death across the board, and the temperature control system was completely paralyzed. The remaining emergency synthetic nutrient paste was barely enough to sustain the minimum needs of less than two hundred people (the only remaining living people in the base) for a week. Medicines had long since run out, and the seriously injured, suffering from hypothermia, infection, and despair, were silently dying one by one.
"Ark", the giant ship carrying the last hope of the ruined world, is now more like a slowly sinking cold iron coffin covered with cracks.
But the enemy...did not disappear.
The detector's faint signal picked up unusual movement on the distant horizon. Several faint but distinctly hostile energy signals were converging and moving in the direction previously occupied by Anvil City and Quicksands. Like hyenas scenting blood, after a brief moment of shock and loss, they licked their wounds, their greedy gaze once again fixed on the seemingly defenseless "wreck." Their sole goal was to plunder the remaining resources and completely eliminate the thorn in their side, the Ark.
A new attack was only a matter of time, and this time, the Ark might not even be able to mount a decent resistance.
"Commander... cough cough..." A weak voice came from the communicator. It was Chen Bo, an old engineer who was temporarily in charge of the base's internal affairs. His voice trembled in the cold wind, "Area D... the insulation layer of the freezer... has completely failed... the last batch... of emergency nutrient paste... has frozen into ice cubes... we... we..." The rest of the words were drowned out by violent coughing and desperate sobs.
Lin Mo dug his fingers into the frozen earth, his knuckles turning white from the strain. Icy despair, like the chill wind in the ruins, seeped through every pore, attempting to freeze even the last vestiges of his will. He closed his one remaining eye, only to see Su Mu's bloodshot eyes, struggling to hold their breath, and the wounded in the medical area, groaning in pain, their eyes still gleaming with hope.
He can't fall! He is the final commander! He is the final anchor for everyone in this iron coffin!
He snapped his eyes open, a near-savage gleam emanating from his electronic eye, like a wounded lone wolf. He stopped looking at the detector and, dragging his legs, heavy as lead, he inched deeper into the ruins, toward a maintenance tunnel half-hidden by a massive alloy wreck. There, before the disaster, had been a warehouse for a small automated parts processing plant. Perhaps... perhaps he could find something forgotten, something useful? Even a box of expired sealing lubricant, some cryogenically resistant cables, or... a small, forgotten can of industrial-grade nutrient?
Hope is as slim as a candle in the wind, but he must go! For that little bit of "residue" that may exist!
The main control hall of the "Pillar of Creation", once the heart of technology, is now a frozen hell.
A biting chill poured in through the cracks in the shattered dome, creating a howling wind in the vast space. His breath turned to frost. The few remaining emergency lights emitted a pale, feeble glow, barely illuminating the devastation. Melted through by turbulent energy currents, corroded by purple-black pollution, and frozen by the cryogenics, the server arrays stood silently like a bizarre forest of ice sculptures. The air was filled with a strange odor: a mixture of ozone, burning metal, and a faint hint of blood.
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