Chapter 1683: One Year Later! Mechanical Clan Fortress!

The third-ring mission was not difficult for Xu Jingming.

What was difficult was the aftermath.

After all, destroying an alien fortress would certainly alert the alien races.

Thus, in the following period of time,

Xu Jingming acted with extreme caution: after destroying one planetary fortress, he immediately departed.

The next strike had to be spaced at least half a month or a month apart.

Moreover, the distance between any two planetary fortresses had to be at least fifty light-years.

Of course,

during this time, he was not doing nothing.

Haley had already taken root in the insect race's main base, supplying him with vast amounts of core intelligence.

Xu Jingming used this intelligence to select insect race outposts on the Seven Stars Continent for strikes.

In this way, he operated on two fronts simultaneously.

Either he was destroying planetary fortresses, or he was killing insect races on the Seven Stars Continent.

The former was done alone; the latter involved taking Lin Qianxue with him.

Time swiftly passed. One year later.

In a desolate stretch of cosmic space,

where once there had been an empty star region, only a few aging red dwarfs and countless drifting asteroids,

today, the space in this region underwent a bizarre distortion.

Hum—!!!

Space rippled like water.

A vast continent, thirty light-years across, slowly drifted out from the void's interlayer!

The continent was entirely dark gray, its surface crisscrossed with massive fissures and bottomless canyons.

Countless ruined buildings, broken mountain ranges, and dried-up riverbeds dotted its surface.

The entire continent radiated an ancient, desolate, ruined aura.

As if it had existed for hundreds of millions of years, witnessing the rise and fall of countless civilizations.

"This is..."

A demon race spacecraft happened to pass through this region.

Inside the ship's control room,

a demon race commander of Immortal Stage Three widened his eyes, staring fixedly at the scanner's display.

He froze for several seconds, then his face broke into incredulous ecstasy!

"The Primordial Ancient Battlefield!! It's the Primordial Ancient Battlefield!!!"

The demon race commander trembled with excitement, his voice shaking:

"The legendary Primordial Ancient Battlefield, said to appear only once every million years, has reappeared again!!!"

He spun around sharply and ordered his subordinate:

"Quick! Send the highest-level encrypted message to the clan immediately!

Coordinates: Sixth Combat Zone—Primordial Ancient Battlefield has appeared!!!"

"Yes, my lord!"

The subordinate, equally excited, rapidly operated the control panel.

After the message was sent, the demon race commander's eyes flickered with greed:

"Rumors say the Primordial Ancient Battlefield hides countless relics of ancient civilizations, lost secret arts, and possibly even ancient lineages!

If I can gain even a sliver of opportunity from it, my ten-thousand-year bottleneck at Immortal Stage Three might finally break!"

He took a deep breath, his eyes hardening with resolve:

"No waiting for reinforcements! First come, first served!"

"Full speed ahead! Target—Primordial Ancient Battlefield!!!"

The demon race spacecraft turned, engines fully engaged, becoming a streak of light racing toward the dark gray continent.

In the cold void of space, a massive mechanical planet hung silently.

The planet was entirely composed of silver-gray metal, its surface covered in countless geometric patterns—mechanical clan energy circuits and defense matrices.

Three orbital fortresses, each tens of thousands of kilometers tall, orbited the planet like three satellites.

Their cannons glowed with an eerie blue light, perpetually at maximum alert.

This was the Mechanical Clan's "Silver Core Fortress."

It housed twenty-seven Immortal-stage mechanical clan warriors and over eight million Cosmic-stage mechanical soldiers.

At this moment, inside the Silver Core Fortress, alarms blared suddenly!

"Warning! High-energy signature approaching!"

"Warning! Energy level... Immortal Peak!"

"Target speed... incalculable!"

Inside the control room, the mechanical clan commander's electronic eyes flashed wildly.

A cold voice, rare with shock, spoke:

"Immortal Peak? How is this possible? How could a warrior of this level suddenly appear in this star region?"

Yet before it could react—

Boom!!!

A golden-green lightning column, over a hundred kilometers in diameter, suddenly crashed down from the void!

It pierced straight through the outermost energy shield of the Silver Core Fortress!

"No—!!!"

The machine race general emitted his final electronic screech.

The lightning column, like a spear of the gods, pierced through the entire orbital fortress.

Then, without pause, it slammed into the second, then the third!

All three orbital fortresses were reduced to cosmic dust within three seconds!

"Attack!!"

"Activate the planetary defense matrix!!"

"All Immortal Climates! Engage the enemy!!"

Across the surface of the Silver Core planet, countless defense systems activated simultaneously.

Layer upon layer of deep blue energy shields unfolded.

Tens of thousands of planet-destroying cannons locked onto the sky; twenty-seven Immortal Climate auras surged upward!

Yet—

Before the figure descending from the heavens, all of it appeared pitifully feeble.

"The tenth."

Xu Jingming hovered above the Silver Core planet.

Gazing down at the mechanical race's fortress, his lips curled into a cold smile.

Lightning flickered around him; the lightning mark on his forehead blazed like a sun.

The Mark of Destruction glowed dark as an abyss, while the Mark of Life emitted a soft, emerald glow.

The power of three primordial laws merged perfectly within him.

Combined with his monstrous, nearly four-meter-tall demonic body, this created a terrifying pressure that shook the soul.

"Kill Domain, unfold."

Hum—

A dark crimson, nearly black, killing aura instantly engulfed the entire Silver Core planet!

After over a year of slaughter, having devoured countless alien lives, the killing aura had thickened into a tangible substance.

Illusions of mountains of corpses and seas of blood surfaced within the domain; countless vengeful spirits shrieked.

Causing every mechanical warrior's processor to briefly stall.

"What kind of domain is this?! My processing speed dropped by 73%!"

"Unanalyzable! Unanalyzable!"

"Attack! Concentrate all firepower!!"

The Immortal Climate machine beings roared in frenzy; tens of thousands of planet-destroying cannons fired at once!

Deep blue energy beams rained down toward the sky, each capable of piercing through an ordinary planet!

Yet—

Xu Jingming merely raised his right hand and curled his fingers inward.

"Sunlight Divine Thunder: Thunderstorm."

Boom—!!!

Centered on him, a terrifying thunderstorm erupted with a diameter exceeding two hundred thousand kilometers!

Golden-green lightning surged like ten thousand furious dragons, savagely tearing apart the defense systems on the Silver Core planet's surface.

Energy shields capable of withstanding a full-force strike from an Immortal Seventh Stage shattered like paper before the lightning.

Planet-destroying platforms melted in the storm; mechanical warriors were reduced to charred corpses.

The alloy bodies of Immortal Climate machine beings twisted and disintegrated under the lightning.

"No!!! This is impossible!!!"

"Flee! Escape quickly!!"

"Damn demon race! The machine race will not forgive you!"

Desperate screams echoed through the communication channels.

But Xu Jingming would give them no chance.

"Annihilate."

Boom—!!!

The thunderstorm suddenly contracted.

Condensing into a golden-green lightning sphere only a kilometer in diameter, yet compressed to an absolute extreme, it slammed into the Silver Core planet!

It was a lethal strike, compressing billions of Sunlight Divine Thunders!

Time seemed to freeze in that instant.

The next instant—

An indescribable explosion occurred.

The entire Silver Core planet began to shatter, starting from its core!

The metallic surface melted; mountains evaporated; oceans boiled.

Every structure, facility, and mechanical lifeform was reduced to nothingness in this single strike.

Blinding lightning filled the entire star region, staining the surrounding tens of thousands of kilometers of space golden-green.

'Ding. Eliminated one Cosmic Peak machine race entity. Qizhi +0.023.'

"Ding. Killed one Longevity Tier-2 Mechanical Tribe creature. Quarks +50."

"......"

A cascade of system notification sounds appeared in Xu Jingming's mind like a waterfall.

Only after a full three minutes did Lei Guang slowly dissipate.

Where the silver-core planet had once been, only countless drifting metal wreckage and still-jumping tiny electric arcs remained.

The entire Mechanical Tribe planetary fortress had been utterly destroyed!

Only the corpses of those Longevity-tier Mechanical Tribe drifted in the starry sky.

"Mechanical Tribe corpses — every one of them is a treasure, can't let any slip away."

Xu Jingming's divine sense stirred.

He drew all 27 Longevity-tier Mechanical Tribe corpses into his World Ring.

Whoosh—

Immediately his figure flashed, and his towering, Gao Da demonic body vanished from the spot in an instant.

When he reappeared, he was already inside the cabin of the Star Mark universe ship, thirty thousand kilometers away.