Hearing footsteps, Beacon turned. A deep scratch stretched from his forehead to his jawline on his signature metal mask, its edges marked with burns. His exposed electronic eye gleamed a calm blue light, but beneath the mask, his voice shone with undisguised fatigue and solemnity: "I'm back."
His gaze swept over the two men's bedraggled, bloodstained forms, pausing for a moment at the bone-deep wound on Lu Chen's shoulder and Wen Shifei's pale face. "The situation is worse than expected. The backlash of the 'Resonance Virus' and Lu Qiming's cannon have completely ripped through the fortress's defensive shell. Even more troublesome," he pointed a finger at the dark purple halo that was constantly wriggling on the sand table, "this thing is like a living wound, constantly emitting the contamination of the 'Ark'. Our people... are being eroded bit by bit. The evacuation route is being closely monitored by the chaebol's Hounds, and the decentralized relocation of the 'Firefly' plan... has come at a huge cost."
"Where is Qingyi?" Lu Chenshang asked the question he cared about most in a hoarse voice.
"In the deep medical shelter in Area C, safe for now. The 'Healer'...didn't make it out." Beacon's voice deepened, with a subtle fluctuation. "She used her own energy source to transfer Qingyi, and stayed behind to process the last batch of core data...along with the main control tower..."
Lu Chensheng clenched his fists violently, his knuckles crackling softly. The wound on his shoulder began to bleed again from the strain. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and forced down the surging anger and grief. "Can the source of the Ark signal... be determined?"
The "beacon" pointed to the ruins of the fortress's main control tower on the sand table. A miniature, slowly rotating model of a dark purple seven-pointed star hovered there. "It's right there. It's like a living beacon, constantly summoning and amplifying the Ark's signal. Any attempt to approach will be met with a strong mental shock and physical energy repulsion. We've attempted several small-scale directed energy neutralization attempts... but the effect was weak and it actually stimulated its activity."
Wen Shifei's body trembled imperceptibly, and her nails dug deeper into her palms. That seven-pointed star was a nightmare she had created with her own hands.
Beacon turned his gaze towards her, his electronic eye seemingly able to see through people's hearts. "Wen Shifei, I need to know what you found in the old hospital. Any clues, any information that might turn the tide! The fortress won't hold out for much longer."
Wen Shifei raised her head, her eyes mingling with immense grief and a near-paranoiac determination. Without hesitation, she carefully removed the sealed bag from her pocket. Inside was the blood-stained neurosurgery scalpel, engraved with the flying bird symbol.
"This is my brother Wen Yuan's knife." Her voice trembled slightly, yet was remarkably clear. She placed the sealed bag on the console and pointed to the delicate bird pattern on the end of the handle. "His personal emblem. Found it in the old hospital... in a bloodstained ward. There... were traces of his research, including fragments of documents related to Protocol Zero... against the Ark and the chaebols."
She paused, took a deep breath, as if to suppress the severe pain in her chest, and then continued with difficulty: "I also...saw it. It was the residual projection of consciousness...Wen Yuan...was transformed by them...into Subject Zero."
The command center instantly fell into a dead silence. Even the noise on the communication channel seemed to be blocked by an invisible force. Only Wen Shifei's voice, suppressed with immense pain, echoed, bloodily exposing the cruel truth.
Lu Chen's pupils suddenly constricted as he stared at the blood-stained knife, as if witnessing another battlefield, another story of family ties and struggles crushed by the chaebol. "Zero"... Lu Qingyi had almost become one of them! The flames of anger burned silently in his chest.
Beacon's metal mask held no expression, but the light in his electronic eye flickered sharply, revealing his inner turmoil. "Wen Yuan... 'Zero'..." he whispered, his cold metal fingers slowly brushing the edge of the console. "What...did he say last?"
"He said..." Wen Shifei's voice choked for a moment, then became unusually clear, each word seeming to be squeezed out from the depths of her soul, "'They took my body, but they could not take my will.'" She paused, her eyes fixed on the knife, as if trying to squeeze the last bit of information out of it, "and...'The key...beats in your blood...' and...before the illusion disappeared, his remaining consciousness said to me in the factory: 'Remember...the factory...the control room...the core...the key...'"
"Key..." Lu Cheneng chewed on the word, his eyes as sharp as a knife, looking at Wen Shifei, "In your blood? The core of the control room?" He instantly thought of Wen Shifei's unique mental guidance ability and affinity with the energy network.
The "beacon" reacted faster, and its cold electronic synthesized voice was a little hurried: "The core of the factory control room? The abandoned factory in the old city? The weak point of the "Ark" signal?" He suddenly called up another data projection, which was the energy field scan record of the old city conducted by the fortress in the early days. A red dot marked as "abnormal energy silence area" coincided with the location of the abandoned factory mentioned by Wen Shifei!
"Wen Yuan and Lu Qingyi...did they discover a natural shielding point or...interface weakness in the Ark?" Beacon's voice took on an unprecedented solemnity and...a faint hope. "That knife...is the key? 'Pulsating in your blood'...Wen Shifei, your abilities, your genes...may be the key to activating it!"
This conclusion exploded like thunder in the command center. Wen Shifei was stunned. She subconsciously clutched her chest, feeling her heartbeat. Her brother's "code"... was in her blood? She had always believed it was merely a spiritual inheritance, a trust of will... Could it be true?
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