The high-energy rays radiating from near-earth orbit dried up the clouds, fortress torpedoes roared as they crashed onto the plains, billowing smoke enveloped the mountains and valleys, and a body as tall and majestic as a demigod hero from ancient myths fell from the sky, disintegrating into pieces in the concentrated fire.
The cultists gathered around the high-level priest imdiately lost their morale, scattering in chaos.
The Brass Knights charged towards the position, the force field greatswords in their hands glimring with a dim glow, while two tall figures maneuvered around the battlefield, harvesting the cultists who miraculously broke through the siege like specters.
Xu Jiali opened the helt visor of his power armor, his eyelids twitching slightly, watching the scene unfolding before him as the marine soldiers behind him still tensely gripped their rifles, bodies hidden behind force field shields.
The voice of a Spiritual Servant ca from behind him: "Boss, this is indeed a bit eerie ow."
"If it weren't for the orders from above, no one would have believed it would turn out like this," Xu Jiali muttered, "In the middle of the fight, suddenly the hero units on the other side all turned into allies."
"Even better than allies ow," Lingdang's eyes widened, her cat eyes glimring brightly amidst the smoke, "They took out those cultists way more ruthlessly than we did, diced them up like squirrel fish ow."
Xu Jiali: "…Can you stop bringing up squirrel fish?"
Just as he finished speaking, he caught sight of a shadow suddenly flashing beside him, turning his head to see an Artificial Saintess in a nun's veil staring straight at him.
Even though he knew they were now allies, Xu Jiali instinctively tensed his muscles, hand hovering over his weapon.
But the Artificial Saintess before him rely tilted her head slightly, scanning his weapon with chanical eyes before pointing to a direction and casually reporting a set of coordinates.
"Underground Sanctuary," she said, her voice carrying a certain inorganic chanical tremor, "I know the entrance."
Xu Jiali blinked, turning to look at the cat-headed girl beside him.
"Never fought such a wealthy battle in my life," he muttered, gesturing to the soldiers behind him.
Lingdang's eyes glead: "A wealthy battle ow."
On the ship bridge of Mass Effect, a multitude of war reports from the planet's surface were converging onto the commander seat.
"We have destroyed or controlled 80% of the surface launch platforms and crippled all anti-aircraft guns in the northern hemisphere," Red said while looking at the reports, casually speaking to Baili Qing beside her, "The orbital elevator has also been controlled by ground forces."
She paused a bit here, adding, "Yu Sheng has successfully taken over the 'Soul Servers' of the Artificial Saintesses and Brass Knights, removing the cognitive veils and mind shackles from these units. Currently, these forces are inciting rebellion all over the planet, with nurous cultist headquarters hidden deep underground decapitated."
"…I should have known Yu Sheng would stir up a lot of trouble when he transferred the entire Star Gate above the Holy Realm," Baili Qing rubbed his forehead, "But even so, what he's done still exceeds expectations quite a bit."
"Regardless, things are progressing in a positive direction, except for…"
Red continued talking while turning her "gaze" toward the distant, massive view port.
The Holy Realm Planet hovered high in space, its thick atmosphere stained with smoke, with fires covering the planetary surface, gradually tinted with a layer of dark red.
"The gate hidden in the earth's core…"
…
Yu Sheng's consciousness withdrew from the Soul Wilderness, returning once more to the real dinsion, as Erin sat in Hu Li's big tail, poking her head out from the side and staring intently at him.
"Luna is rallying the awakened Artificial Saintesses and Knight Order to attack the global Holy Temple," Yu Sheng said, "But not all Artificial Saintesses and Knights are on this planet—quite a portion is spread across other colonized planets of the Hidden Monastery. We just contacted this part, asking them to find a way to sabotage the Hidden Monastery's communication system while ensuring their own safety."
The little puppet stared wide-eyed at the giant crystal beside her, already tinged with threads of blood color: "Is it actually working?!"
Then she furrowed her brows, her expression becoming slightly subtle.
"Anyway, did it really get resolved just like that? Such an important control center with such a huge vulnerability... just left here for you to exploit? Shouldn't sothing of this sort be guarded by heavy troops?"
Yu Sheng couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the little one's words: "Who told you this place isn't heavily guarded?"
Erin: "…?"
In her montary daze, she saw a white figure, hauntingly like a female ghost, leisurely float out from the nearby crystal wall, then leisurely floated into the Soul Wilderness, with half a head poking out from Luna's shoulder.
"The heaviest soldier is right here, isn't it?" Yu Sheng gestured towards the drifting spiritual creature, "They even arranged for a Living Saint to personally guard the last gate here, to be honest, I think the defensive force is quite strong."
Erin: "…"
The little puppet thought for a mont and realized Yu Sheng was right.
But then she was a bit puzzled: "However, just speaking of it, wasn't this ghost guarding the Star Gate at the border before? How did it suddenly co to guard the 'Furnace' here?"
"I don't know," Yu Sheng shrugged. "I tried to ask, but she couldn't explain it, and gestured a lot that I didn't understand either—according to Luna, she should have already reached the end of her service life as an Artificial Saintess, and was later recast as a Living Saint, now left with limited mory and humanity. Maybe she can gradually recover so in the future, but at least for now, not even she knows her own situation."
The little puppet "oh"ed long and loudly after hearing it, indicating she probably didn't understand.
And just then, a sudden interference noise appeared in the air, interrupting everyone's actions.
The sound seed like sharp electromagnetic interference, the originally wind chi-like pleasant spiritual resonance in the Crystal Hall instantly lost balance, and imdiately, all the crystal walls in the hall and that giant crystal cluster surface began to ripple with unstable waves, all the lights started flickering.
"Savior!" Hu Li's tail fluffed up instantly, "Th-there's sothing coming!"
The little puppet yelped and darted out from Hu Li's tail, nimbly leaping onto Yu Sheng's shoulder: "Oh my, it's tickling!"
Yu Sheng steadied the wobbling little puppet on his shoulder with one hand, then unhesitatingly waved his hand, first rolling the giant crystal at the center of the hall into Fairy Tale Valley—
Actually, he didn't know if this thing needed to be kept, after all, this was just a dium used to maintain the mind control of the Artificial Saintess and the Knight Order, and now that the whole mind control system had been lifted by him, this crystal naturally no longer had a binding effect on the Artificial Saintess and the Brass Knights.
But he still instinctively took it back ho, without even thinking—it's just that there's a bit of instinctive reaction involved here.
And as soon as the crystal was taken away by Yu Sheng, the interference noise in the air turned into a huge roar.
It seed that the vast energy converging here suddenly lost focus, the crystalline barriers around the hall were suddenly filled with cracks of various sizes, and the entire underground space began to shake violently, explosion sounds continuously coming from the distant deep corridors of the underground facility, roaring like a landslide.
The do began to crack, pillars slowly collapsed, towering crystalline barriers shattered into pieces with snapping sounds, and a vast cave system that had been hidden within the rock layers and protective shells was exposed, amidst the massive collapse, Yu Sheng saw that it was actually a more expansive underground cavern outside.
The little puppet clutched Yu Sheng's hair tightly: "It's collapsing, it's collapsing, the place is collapsing!"
The next second, a massive silver-white figure expanded nearby, the giant Nine-Tailed Demon Fox charged towards Yu Sheng without hesitation, layers of tails and thick Protective Spirit Qi enveloped above him.
Luna also rushed over quickly, kicking away a huge rock that had fallen from above, then huddled under the Great Demon Fox alongside Yu Sheng.
But amidst the cascading rocks and crystal clusters, Yu Sheng noticed the radiant figure with wings on its back didn't react at all; she still stood dazed under the Crystal Hall's do, slightly tilting her head to observe a rapidly expanding rift between the crystal and rock.
Although her expression was unclear, her posture exuded a curious look.
Yu Sheng realized—right, she's a Spiritual Body, perhaps not afraid of this.
Just as this thought popped into his mind, he saw a huge crystal filled with spiritual energy light crashing from the sky, striking the Artificial Angel's head.
The crystal's entity fell into a suddenly opened ground fissure, the spiritual energy light burst into a fierce flash above the "Angel's" head, echoing like a gong throughout the cavern.
"Boom—"
That "Artificial Angel" instantly emitted a sharp sound, clutching her head as she darted into a pile of Hu Li's tails.
Yu Sheng: "..."
He looked at the Artificial Angel peeking half her body from between Hu Li's tails, locking eyes with him wide-eyed, his eyebrow twitching: "You didn't make this sound when you were up at the Star Gate firing Light Cannon shots at my head."
But there was no response from her.
After an unknown amount of ti, the terrifying, ongoing collapse gradually cald, and the explosion sounds from the distant caverns and corridors ceased.
Yu Sheng peeked out from beside the Great Demon Fox's claw to see that the previously enclosed Crystal Cave had expanded into an expansive and majestic underground cavern, various sizes of glowing crystal clusters and fallen architectural debris piled up on slopes and underground rivers, and nurous frightening chasms extended far away, the darkness below seeming to lead to this planet's hollow heart.
And further away on the rocky ceiling, one could see so varying sizes of glowing rifts, as if the massive collapse had also torn the upper rock structures, sunlight stread through the cracks, illuminating this underground world.
"Oh my gosh..." the little puppet poked her head out from Yu Sheng's shoulder, her little face full of shock, "What is this, what happened, how did this happen?"
Yu Sheng raised his hand, pointing towards a shimr coalescing among the crystal cavern.
"Though I don't know how it happened, it's clear that he did it."
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