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Qi Yang's voice at this moment was far gentler than S1 remembered.
In the cold wind, his voice seemed even more ethereal as if it might drift away with the breeze and be lost forever.
Naivety and innocence flashed across S1's strikingly handsome yet eerie face for just a moment before vanishing completely. His nearly pitch-black, lightless pupils stared intently at Qi Yang for a long time before he suddenly spoke, "How about I let you kill me first, okay?"
This statement completely caught Qi Yang off guard.
His left hand trembled slightly in a place where S1 couldn't see, and he countered, "Why?"
S1's dark pupils shimmered with flecks of white, like cat's eye stones, as he replied matter-of-factly, "Your right hand is useless, Yang. Compared to me, you're already as good as dead."
His voice abruptly stopped, as if the simplicity and innocence of his explanation disgusted even himself. The darkness in his eyes surged violently with the overwhelming flecks of white, and his beautiful yet unsettling face twisted into a grim expression. He roared, "I want to kill you, Yang."
As soon as the words left his mouth, S1 raised his right hand before stopping it half a meter in front of Qi Yang.
In response, Qi Yang swiftly raised the high-torque strong electric nuclear magnetic cannon in his left hand with its dark muzzle menacingly aimed at S1.
S1 paused for a moment, then curled his lips in disdain, "Yang, what are you doing with this little toy? It's not even fit to scratch those two idiots down there. This isn't fun, Yang."
Qi Yang ignored S1's contempt as the smile on his face vanished completely. "S1, do you know what I regret most in my life?"
S1 lowered his gaze and remained silent.
Qi Yang, however, slowly curved his lips into a smile before speaking in a wistful tone, "Back then, I thought you were too weak and had Lieutenant Chen use the Lightning Cannon to knock you out. Tell me, if I had used this gun—capable of severely injuring an S-Class Mutant—to shoot at you when you were just a C-Class... no, even a D-Class Mutant, what would have happened?"
As soon as he finished speaking, Qi Yang pressed the trigger.
A blinding white light erupted from the cannon's muzzle, and at the same time, S1's patience finally ran out.
The last traces of innocence in his eyes were completely overwhelmed by an endless, fierce darkness.
In his hand, a highly compressed air cannon formed, and he launched it at Qi Yang's already frail and slender body.
Perhaps intentionally avoiding a fatal blow, the air cannon just tore a bloody hole through Qi Yang's left shoulder.
The violent impact sent the silver-white cannon in his left hand tumbling down the 60-meter-high embankment, leaving only the white light still gathering at the muzzle as a faint hint of a failed attack.
S1 tilted his head slowly with his black bangs falling to obscure half of his eyes. He blinked and finally answered Qi Yang's question, "You asked what would have happened... but Yang, you didn't do it back then. And now, using this toy is just too late."
The massive blood loss had left Qi Yang's face even paler, and the force of the Air Cannon sent him staggering back a step. But S1 had no intention of letting him retreat.
His long, slender left arm swiftly gripped Qi Yang's fragile neck before pulling him close.
When the distance between them was less than half a meter, S1's fingers gradually tightened as he asked, "Yang, you're going to die."
Even thought the wound on his left shoulder was healing at an astonishing rate, the gradual depletion of air in his lungs left Qi Yang feeling a profound weakness with his vision darkening in waves.
His body was lifted off the high embankment by S1's action and left dangling in mid-air.
A single release of S1's grip would mean a fatal fall.
In fact, S1 did just that.
His left hand suddenly loosened, but before he could react, Qi Yang abruptly wrapped his arms tightly around S1's body.
Those thin, pale arms clung fiercely to S1's waist and squeezed so tightly that it became difficult for S1 to move as his brow furrowing in irritation.
As Qi Yang moved, his wide sleeve slipped down to reveal the horrifying scars on his right arm.
S1's gaze flickered to these wounds hidden beneath the fabric, and a fleeting, almost imperceptible glint of something unidentifiable passed through his dark eyes before they returned to their usual calm.
"You…"
On the chaotic, dimly lit beach, the sounds of clashing swords filled the air.
At first, some had tried to observe what the humanoid Mutated Beast was doing, but as the endless waves of the Mutant Beast Army surged forward, they had no energy left for anything but fighting.
Qi Yang's arms clung tightly to the Mutated Beast's lean waist with his grip firm but not as tight as the seamless press of their lips.
The warmth of their breath mingled before escalating into a bloodthirsty, flesh-tearing bite.
Blood trickled down the corner of Qi Yang's mouth.
A flicker of confusion passed through S1's eyes and a fleeting transparency that was quickly suppressed by darkness.
He pushed the handsome, pale man away with his thin lips stained with blood, enhancing a demonic beauty.
The ambiguous atmosphere vanished without a trace as S1 gazed at Qi Yang with an inscrutable expression for a long moment.
"I won't save you." S1's low, hoarse voice broke the silence. His fingers pried at the arms of the handsome man clinging to him as he asked, "Why did you think I would want to save you, Yang?"
What he received was Qi Yang's meaningful smile, filled with a resolve to die. "Then, S1, why do you think I held onto you just to save myself… or to distract you and block your view?"
S1's body stiffened abruptly, and he stopped trying to pry Qi Yang's arms away.
He tilted his head slightly to look down, and finally saw what the man had been shielding with his body.
On the blood-soaked ground, a young man in a white lab coat stood while holding the cannon that had been thrown down earlier with its barrel glowing with a blinding white light aimed directly at him.
The light grew brighter and brighter, so intense that it began to boil the cold blood that had always flowed through S1's veins.
It was a long-forgotten taste of fear.
"S1, let's go together." Qi Yang sighed softly with his voice sounding distant.
"No!!!"
S1 immediately thought of escaping, but before he could react, the cold white light gathered at the gun's muzzle erupted completely and formed a towering white beam that mercilessly engulfed Qi Yang and S1's bodies.
"Boom—"
The earth-shaking noise drew the attention of everyone on the beach.
At that moment, it seemed as though the heavens and earth had turned into an endless darkness, with only the towering white beam illuminating the world and casting a light on Jing Xia's bewildered face that was now stained with blood and grime.
The white beam eventually vanished into the vast expanse of the sea.
As the energy gradually dissipated, the oppressive force that had weighed down all life on Earth also faded away, leaving only a massive breach in the dam's center.
A testament to the terrifying attack that had just occurred.
Zhang Bendan collapsed onto the soft sand.
The high-torque strong electric nuclear magnetic cannon in his hands was completely destroyed with its muzzle scorched black and still emitting faint wisps of white smoke.
Something that should never have been used as a vessel had been forced into that role to lower the enemy's guard, and it's only fate was destruction.
Now, Zhang Bendan felt as though he had lost his soul.
He sat dazed on the beach while staring up at the empty air and his cracked lips moving slightly.
All the Mutated Beasts and Evolved Beings had stopped moving.
They were all shaken by the terrifying and bizarre energy wave from moments ago that their bodies were trembling uncontrollably. Even now, the overwhelming sense of being mercilessly crushed had left them unable to recover.
"Major..."
A hoarse voice escaped Zhang Bendan's throat.
The sea wind howled as it swept across the ocean, but the beach remained eerily silent, with even the faintest breaths and gasps clearly audible.
After a moment, a heart-wrenching cry of anguish pierced the heavens—
"Major Qi!!!"
The dead were gone, but many others still waited for a chance to start anew.
A leaderless group spells disaster for any dynasty. And for the majority of Mutated Beasts, who lacked intelligence, the loss of a king with absolute power and capable of crushing all opposition, was nothing short of catastrophic chaos.
The Mutated Conger Eel and Mutated Orca, leading the S-class Mutated Beasts with basic intelligence, barely managed to suppress the frenzied Mutated Beasts on the battlefield at S City Base. However, the Mutated Beasts in other regions were completely beyond their control, and some even began to riot.
N City Base, the closest large human settlement to S City Base, understood the principle of "when the lips are gone, the teeth will be cold". Thus, from the outset, they dispatched about two-thirds of their elite forces to support S City Base.
This near-suicidal move resulted in them suffering even heavier losses than the more powerful enemy forces at S City Base when the full-scale war erupted.
However, just as the number of Evolved Beings in the entire N City Base had dwindled to less than five hundred, and when they were on the brink of despair and ready to fight to the death, the shockwave from the explosion that had shaken the entire nation reached their ears.
The earth trembled, and the aftershocks spread from the S City Base as the epicenter before rippling across the globe.
Before all the Evolved Beings could comprehend what had happened, the sudden rampage of the Mutated Beasts threw all their thoughts into chaos.
The dozen or so intelligent S-Class Mutants roared in fury.
The A-Class Mutants fared slightly better, but the B-Class and lower Mutants went completely berserk.
Those uninjured only thought of fleeing to safety, while the wounded were even more unwilling to stay another minute.
This was an instinct inherent to all living creatures.
Even with only a few hundred Evolved Beings left, they could still kill nearly a thousand Mutated Beasts.
Not a single Mutated Beast was willing to test this slim possibility. The giant blade that had been hanging over their heads was gone; they were finally free again!
This newfound freedom might temporarily leave them too exhausted to confront humans, as more chaos awaited them in the near future.
Perhaps another Mutated Beast with overwhelming power would emerge in the future, but that was not the case now.
The familiar, terrifying scent in the air was gone, and the overwhelming force that had once oppressed everything on Earth had vanished.
Even in the United States that were halfway across the globe, all the attacking Mutated Beasts suddenly halted their actions. .
They didn’t need to witness it firsthand or confirm it; they simply knew that the death threat that had loomed over them like a physiological reaction had inexplicably disappeared.
All the B-Class and lower Mutants began to cheer.
But some of the A-Class Mutants and all the S-Class and above Mutants fell into a silent, deathly stillness.
They all knew: the fascist-like oppressive force was what the Mutated Beasts needed in this apocalyptic world.
Humans possessed intelligence. Even without absolute strength, they understood unity, cooperation, creation, and innovation. With these, they would always remain the dominant species and pressing down on the Mutated Beasts.
What the Mutated Beasts needed was an irreversible assault, a swift and effective strike that would leave humans unable to recover.
This was something the lower-class Mutants would never understand.