Chapter 306: Invasion

That was the final whisper softly murmured by the "Invader"—the breath of life at the moment of death was so faint it sounded like a breeze drifting from the edge of a hallucination; that wind sound quietly dissolved at the ear, leaving only a slightly unsettling ticking.

That was the sound of blood dripping onto the ground.

"What did he say?"

Another member of the Hidden Order nearby leaned in and asked in a low voice.

The black-robed figure standing beside Yu Sheng's corpse kept his head bowed, seemingly still confused by that unsettling auditory hallucination, until his companion asked a second time; only then did he lift his head as if waking from a dream, muttering in a somewhat dazed tone: "He said he was dying, but something else came back to life... I don't know, I didn't hear clearly."

His voice carried a hint of hesitation, as if even merely repeating that sentence would bring a slight mental unease.

But where exactly did this unease come from? What exactly was he worried about? The black-robed man himself could not explain.

He only heard the Hidden Order compatriot who had just been knocked flying by the Invader's club and suffered severe injuries groaning in pain; the large dose of cardiac stimulant and adrenaline automatically injected by the powered armor could not fully suppress this pain, and now the armor's life-support system was forcibly extending his life, but if delayed any further, he would not survive.

"Must be sent to the operating room immediately... his internal organs are like a lump of mud," someone went to check the injured man's condition, speaking rapidly, "The Primal Body cannot be saved; make a decision: Pure Steel or Blessed Flesh?"

The Hidden Order member lying on the ground breathed with difficulty, raising his hand slightly; a hoarse, pained voice came from inside the helmet: "Steel..."

The black-robed man checking the injuries nodded and instructed the others: "Good, notify the medical team, prepare for the brain-body transfer surgery—we need a Mechanical Ascetic's body."

Speaking thus, he lowered his head again, grasped the injured man's hand, and comforted him in a deep voice: "Relax, brother, you are about to possess a new body that is pure and powerful; the useless Primal Shell will be sent to the Biomass Processor to become the cornerstone of our progress—hold my hand and proceed to the starting point of the path of ascension, but before that, I must first sever part of your limbs—we cannot wait for the stretcher cart; we must get your brain to the operating room as soon as possible."

The harsh noise of "processing" the injured man's limbs echoed through the corridor.

Even with amputation below the neck, the helmet of the n-k-22 type powered armor could still guarantee the brain's survival for fifteen minutes.

However, even with much commotion behind him, the black-robed figure standing beside Yu Sheng's corpse still stood motionless in place, as if his spirit had been extracted by something, looking at the "Invader" on the ground with a blank, dazed gaze.

"What are you looking at? We must leave this place," someone called from the side, "Leave this pile of wreckage in the corridor; someone will come to recover it later."

The black-robed man reacted, hastily nodding in response: "Oh, oh, okay."

He turned around and walked toward his compatriots, but could not help turning his head back to glance at the pool of fresh blood on the ground, then, as if sensing something, looked up toward the corner of the wall.

A hidden camera in the corner of the wall was also quietly watching him.

The Brass Knight escorted several black-robed cultists away from this place at high speed; these Hidden Order members seemed to subconsciously sense some danger and departed in great haste.

Where Yu Sheng had fallen, scattered clothes, a small knife that had fallen from a pocket, and a blood-soaked club—all these things were slowly dissolving in the pool of blood, as if being swallowed into another dimension, gradually sinking into the bloodstain.

That mobile phone was also soaked in fresh blood; thin streaks of blood, as if alive, covered its screen and casing, and then the phone screen suddenly lit up.

The Border Communication interface popped out, followed by a private message window; the keys on the virtual keyboard flashed lightly, and a line of text was quickly composed and sent to Bai Liqing—

"Ah, back to the previous topic, do you want the cultists of the Holy Hidden Order?"

A moment later, the phone buzzed; Bai Liqing sent a reply, only a single short character: "Want."

Then, after a moment, perhaps feeling his reply was problematic, Bai Liqing sent another message: "Do you want to capture one alive and bring it back? Might as well I just send a batch of reinforcements to you; you are too dangerous alone in their nest."

The bloodstain on the phone screen slowly diffused; a message was quickly sent: "No need; if you send people over, it will alert the snake; if they discover the situation is out of control, they might directly blow up the entire spaceship."

"... Okay, then tell me, how should we coordinate?"

At the top of the "Pillar of Order," inside the control hall, an old man in white robes still sat majestically in his position, waiting for the results from the action team.

He waited for good news.

The communicator in front of the seat lit up; a Hidden Order member wearing powered armor and covered by a black long robe appeared on the screen: "Sage! We have eliminated that Invader, in a corridor on the outer perimeter of the Core Zone."

The Sage's tightly tensed facial muscles finally relaxed a bit: "Well done—the recovery personnel will go handle the aftermath. What are the losses?"

"One combatant is severely injured, amputated below the neck; we are carrying his head to the operating room; he fought bravely and applied to enter the Steel Evolution Branch at the moment of death."

"Hmm, those who fight bravely deserve this reward," the white-robed old man exhaled lightly, and his whole body relaxed, "After handling it, return to the Upper Zone to report."

"Yes!"

The communicator disconnected, and the atmosphere in the control hall also relaxed considerably with the arrival of the good news.

"Thought he was much more impressive."

A Hidden Order member muttered nearby.

"Just a very strange fellow, but there are many strange things in this world," another person agreed, "Not as troublesome as those Shadows we dug up in the Adar Great Pit."

"Uh..."

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing, the screens of a few monitors flickered just now; probably the Core System reset a few channels during self-repair; I checked, everything is normal."

"Don't scare people..." an operator standing guard before the console muttered, stretched in his chair, and looked up at the camera on the top of the hall.

The camera was also quietly watching him, just as in days past.

But for some reason, he suddenly felt a trace of... disgust and displeasure toward that camera staring at him.

This unpleasant feeling was very inexplicable; he couldn't help shivering, yet did not know how to explain it to others, so he quickly shifted his gaze, not looking at the ceiling.

Slight weak static noise came through the monitoring earpiece, as if someone had said something in the communication channel, but it was too blurry to hear clearly.

The operator frowned; at first he suspected the earpiece had poor contact, but quickly ruled out this possibility, because in that weak static noise someone was indeed speaking.

He frowned, adjusted the monitoring channel more seriously, wanting to find the source of that noise.

And the Sage's voice suddenly came again from not far away, interrupting the quiet conversation in the hall—

"Have the personnel responsible for handling the aftermath sent any reply yet?"

"No," a communicator answered immediately, then immediately made an "Eh" sound, his tone quickly becoming tense, "Something is wrong!"

"What happened?"

"The recovery team's signal disappeared—just a moment ago!"

The atmosphere in the hall, which had just relaxed, suddenly tensed again; the Sage's face immediately turned gloomy, and he rose from his chair: "Signal disappeared? Figure out what the situation is; is it a communication failure or..."

"Both the communication signal and the vital detection signals on the personnel have disappeared—Sage, they are gone!"

"What about the surveillance?"

"They were just filmed passing through Corridor D-2 and walking into the connecting gate, but no one came out at the next gate in the corridor!"

"Which is the nearest drone hangar? Send drones there immediately."

The hall suddenly grew chaotic, a cacophony of tense and urgent commands and reports filling the air; the Sage's voice carried a faint undercurrent of anger, while the nearby operators' voices were thick with nervousness and embarrassment.

Yet the operator stationed before the console continued to diligently adjust his monitoring headphones, constantly switching between the various standby channels as if entranced, desperate to understand what the source of the noise within the system was saying.

After an indeterminate amount of time, he suddenly heard a voice—extremely, extremely clear, as if someone were speaking right against his ear:

"Do you hear clearly now?"

The operator tore off his headphones as if struck by lightning, his eyes widening in terror as he suddenly looked up toward the Sage: "Someone is speaking in the monitoring channel! Something has breached our equipment—"

"What?!" The Sage was greatly startled, then immediately activated his communicator, connecting with the task force still on their way back to the upper sector, "The situation has changed; proceed immediately to the server compartment, and there is an intruder hiding on the ship!"

However, only a hollow burst of white static came through the communicator.

Soon, someone checked the communication system and surveillance, reporting with tense unease: "The task force's signal has also vanished—near corridor D-1; the cameras captured no footage of any attackers or combat."

The Sage stood motionless, his face as still as water, lost in unsettling contemplation.

Something is hiding within this tower.

It is attacking the people in this tower one by one; although we do not know what means it employs, it clearly moves with extreme speed and strikes with extreme ruthlessness, capable of eliminating combat personnel in powered armor before they can even react.

Moreover, there may be more than one intruder—because the two consecutive teams that encountered trouble were not in the same area, and just now there was a report of voices in the monitoring channel; the intruders are clearly breaching the system while creating attacks everywhere.

"... Dispatch a second squad, follow them via surveillance the entire time, maintain contact, seal all passages from D-1 to D-2, and search inch by inch."

"Yes!"

(End of this chapter)