Cold metal fragments fell like dirty snow, striking Pei Du's newly formed thorny body with a subtle crackling sound. He stood in the center of a devastated, abandoned chamber, beneath the twisted and deformed metal floor and the nearly invisible blue dust left by the final disintegration of the gravekeeper's shadow. The massive left arm, composed of countless tangled dark gold thorns, slowly lowered, burning embers flickering at the sharp ends like a recently extinguished furnace. Along the edges of the dark gold lines covering the torso, dark green life-glow and dark blue arcs of destruction flowed and faded like entangled venomous snakes, leaving behind an inhuman, heart-pounding pressure.
His molten-gold pupils, swirling with dense dark green runes and dark blue data streams, scanned the space that had just experienced the destructive storm with an icy glance. His gaze finally settled on Xu Shuangyao, gently yet firmly encased in an invisible thorn force field, suspended in mid-air.
She floated quietly in the center of a cage woven from dark-gold thorns, her eyes closed, her long lashes casting a fragile shadow in the dim light of the force field. The skin at her heart, once burned by zero energy and forcibly suppressed and combed by the thorn sparks, took on a strange, translucent texture. The conflicting veins of pale gold and dark green beneath it had not vanished. Instead, like a tamed river, under the constraints of a greater force, a new, complex pattern, like the intertwining symbiosis of thorns and vines, was formed, faintly emitting a faint, steady energy glow. The cold command forcefully implanted by the cradle seemed to be temporarily suppressed and driven away.
Safe for now.
As soon as these two words flashed through Pei Du's cold and complex mind, they were completely shattered by an unexpected, yet icy cold throbbing!
Buzz——!
A massive, precise, and absolutely logically repressive sweeping wave, like the cold eye of the cosmic law itself, instantly penetrated layers of rock and twisted metal structures, locking onto him! And Xu Shuangyao, protected by his thorny force field! This will was more concentrated and ruthless than before, carrying a pure, destructive killing intent that had accumulated to its peak after repeated provocations!
Cradle! It has never left! The silence before was just a deeper depression before the storm!
"Detected... an abnormal composite energy source... the contamination level of the 'Source Blood' mark... increased... the threat level... redefined as... annihilation level+..."
"Detected...'Scarlet Protocol' carrier...contamination spreading...clearance priority...raised to...Sequence Zero..."
"Target area…Abandoned Unit G-7-β…Execute…Final decontamination protocol…Logical warhead…Load…Launch countdown…5…"
A cold, emotionless, mechanically synthesized voice boomed deep within Pei Du's consciousness! Every byte struck like an ice pick! As the countdown began, a terrifying energy surge, powerful enough to warp and freeze the very fabric of space, descended from the unknowable depths above like a dormant Death Star awakening! It locked onto this abandoned chamber, locked onto every spatial coordinate they were within!
Logic Warhead! Cradle's highest level of physical erasure! Once detonated, this space and everything within it will be completely disintegrated into the universe's fundamental particles by the absolute laws of logic! Even spacetime itself will be reset!
No warning! No temptation! Cradle's will was ruthless to the extreme, and he directly used the ultimate weapon!
Five seconds! Only five seconds!
Pei Du's thorn-covered torso suddenly tensed! The dark green runes and dark blue data streams in his molten gold composite pupils instantly accelerated! His massive left arm, a thorn-like structure, rose in response, its knotted dark gold thorns growing and entwining frantically. The massive battering ram at the end instantly coalesced, igniting an unprecedented thorn spark! The liquid metal claws on his right arm popped out, a cold blue light slicing through the air!
Fight! Only fight to the death!
However, just as his power exploded, ready to face the destructive impact—
Buzz!
A completely different, faint but extremely clear throbbing feeling, like a spark thrown into an icy lake, suddenly came from the depths of the thorny force field that wrapped Xu Shuangyao!
It was Xu Shuangyao! It didn't come from her body, but... from the depths of her consciousness! A faint yet tenacious crimson thought, imbued with a strong will to resist and survive, seemed to have penetrated a thick curtain and gently touched the cold core of Pei Du's consciousness!
This thought is not a cry for help, but... guidance!
Along with this thought came an extremely faint, yet incredibly precise… stream of spatial coordinate information! The coordinates pointed not to the source of the cradle's destruction above, nor to the sealed metal walls surrounding it, but… beneath his feet! Deeper within this abandoned chamber, a location marked on the gravekeeper's data tombstone as "Deep Confinement Unit"!
There are also several broken key bytes in the coordinate information stream:
[…Emergency…Escape Protocol…]
[…low-level…data interface…]
[…Leading to…‘The Cradle’…Shadows…]
Gravekeeper! It was the completely annihilated data tombstone! In the final moments, it had imprinted this final escape route, locked by its authority, deep within Xu Shuangyao's consciousness like a will! And now, under the threat of Cradle's ultimate destruction and the protection of Pei Du's thorny force field, Xu Shuangyao's newly stabilized consciousness, imbued with the "Scarlet Agreement," like an activated key, briefly transmitted this path!
No time to think! No time to verify! The countdown to the logical warhead's destruction echoed coldly in Pei Du's consciousness like the footsteps of death:
“4…”
"Go!" Pei Du let out a tearing roar from his consciousness! He suddenly raised his thorn-covered right leg, and then, like a giant axe splitting a mountain, with violent thorn sparks and dark green earth energy, he stomped hard on the metal floor marking the coordinate point!
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