Chapter 224: The Moment of Collapse and the Hand of the Undercurrent

The platform shook violently, energy transmission briefly interrupted, the light extinguished! Shadow Pupil, due to Zero's precise strike and Xiang Lingna's life-risking interference, instantly lost his balance and absolute control over the energy field! He let out a roar of mingled shock and fury, and for the first time a flicker of panic flashed through his pitch-black eyes as he instinctively tried to steady himself and regain control of the nearly completely corrupted seed and the energy around him.

And the last stubborn emerald glow of that "Dawn Seed," seizing this once-in-a-thousand-years instant, erupted with unprecedented power! Like a spring compressed to its absolute limit, it violently broke free of the violet-black energy's bonds, sprang from between Shadow Pupil's slightly loosened fingers, traced a faint green streak, and plunged downward into the raging energy abyss!

"No!!!" Shadow Pupil's eyes nearly split with rage; abandoning everything else, he lunged toward where the seed was falling, the unstable energy field around him churning violently and tearing the damaged platform beneath his feet even further apart!

At this moment of absolute chaos—

Glorna, who had been slumped at the edge of the observation platform with her power armor severely damaged, suddenly blazed with the fierce light of a desperate gamble in her eyes! "Now's my chance! I'll take you on with everything I've got!" From somewhere she squeezed out the last dregs of strength and violently activated the power armor's final—and most dangerous—overload mode: Core Furnace Overload!

Wooooooong——!!!

A blinding red light burst from the power core in her chest! The battered power armor let out a terrifying noise of imminent disintegration! Like a crimson mad dog, dragging her nearly shattered body, she slammed sideways into Shadow Pupil, who had lost his center of gravity lunging for the seed!

Boom!!!

The two collided heavily, tumbling toward the platform's edge! Glorna clung to Shadow Pupil with all her might; the overloaded power core radiated destructive heat and energy, searing the protective energy around Shadow Pupil and even setting his tattered elven robe ablaze!

"Get off me, you filthy beast!" Shadow Pupil raged, his pitch-black power hammering Glorna's power armor in relentless blows, shards flying in all directions!

"Down… together! Bastard!" Glorna laughed wildly, locked him in her arms, and the two of them plunged into the abyss below, choked with energy storms and spatial rifts!

"Glorna!!!" Xiang Lingna, who had just regained a sliver of consciousness, saw it all and let out a heart-rending wail.

But the next instant, her cry was drowned out by an even more terrifying sound!

The countdown hit zero!

【00:00:00】

The Shadow Engine let out its ultimate, world-tearing wail! The chaotic vortex at its core collapsed inward for a billionth of a second, and then—

RRRRRRRRRRRRUUUUUUM————————!!!!!!!!!!!

An indescribably terrifying explosion occurred! Not conventional flame and shockwave, but space itself being torn, twisted, annihilated! A massive, irregular black-purple energy orb erupted outward with the engine at its core, and everything in its path—matter and energy alike—was utterly broken down and devoured!

First in its path were that platform and the observation deck! The metal structures melted away like snowflakes in sunlight! At the last instant, Zero's console converted all its energy into a faint shield that covered the nearest Xiang Lingna and Sister Ai Li, and then itself shattered and vanished into the light!

Xiang Lingna felt only an irresistible, icy, deathly force sweep over her; Zero's shield crumbled like paper, and she lost all consciousness.

And in the final instant before that destructive energy utterly consumed everything, a faint, almost imperceptible emerald glow (the fallen seed) and two tangled black shadows plummeting together (Glorna and Shadow Pupil) were suddenly seized by the wildly chaotic spatial ripples from the blast and vanished in an instant, flung to who knows where!

The destructive orb swelled rapidly, on the verge of devouring the entire Shadow Engine cavity and even reaching the ley-line energy well above!

At this most critical juncture—

Above, at the core of the ley-line energy well, the massive cocoon of light enveloping Lin Mo seemed to sense the destructive spatial collapse and the shock of wildly chaotic energy below, and suddenly erupted with an unprecedented, gentle yet incomparably resilient milky-white radiance! A vast wave of energy, carrying the meaning of order and stability, spread downward like an awakened titan, and with great difficulty forcibly constructed above the destructive orb a thin membrane of milky-white energy imbued with the world's primal laws!

Hissss——!!!

The destructive energy slammed violently into the membrane, erupting in a blindingly brilliant flash! The membrane caved in sharply and rippled, as if it might shatter at any moment, yet stubbornly withstood this initial, most violent onslaught! It confined the vast majority of the destructive energy within the cavity below, preventing it from spreading fully, but at the cost of its own radiance instantly dimming, with even fine cracks appearing on its surface.

The spatial collapse was temporarily contained within the Shadow Engine area, but that place had already become an absolute death zone, filled with raging spatial turbulence and the aftershocks of destructive energy.

No one knew how long passed—perhaps an instant, perhaps an eternity.

Xiang Lingna slowly regained a sliver of consciousness from the endless darkness and cold. Intense pain came from all over her body, especially from the broken stump of her right arm, which throbbed with a searing agony. She struggled to open her eyes; before her was devastation and drifting energy dust. The observation platform was mostly gone, and she lay on a precarious metal slab at its edge, with the destructive abyss—still churning with black-purple energy—below. Sister Ai Li lay unconscious beside her, her breathing faint.

Zero was gone, leaving only a small charred fragment on the ground. Glorna and Shadow Pupil had vanished, and so had the seed.

The milky-white membrane cast down by the ley-line energy well still held on with great difficulty, but clearly could not last.

It's all over… after so many sacrifices… still a failure… Xiang Lingna's heart was filled with boundless sorrow and despair, tears mingling with blood as they slid down.

Yet, in the depths of that despair, a faint, familiar thread of anxious意念 fluctuation, as if piercing through layer upon layer of spatial obstruction, intermittently seeped into her nearly collapsing consciousness.

【Ling…na…hold…on…】【Energy…resonance…guide…me…】【Priestess…Liyana…woke…she's…trying…to…locate…you…】

Is that Brother Lin Mo?! A意念 from within the cocoon of light?! Faint as it was, it was like a single wisp of light kindled in endless darkness!

Priestess Liyana has awakened?!

Xiang Lingna jerked her head up, looking toward the dimmed energy membrane above, and a spark of hope reignited in her eyes.

But the next second, that spark of hope was shattered by cold reality!

A shrill whine of energy engines came from above! Through the thin energy membrane, several assault boats painted with the Doctor's insignia, ugly and vicious in design, could be seen circling at the entrance to the energy well—clearly taking advantage of the upheaval and energy chaos inside the Ark to force their way in! The grapples and scanning beams on their undersides flickered constantly, clearly searching for something.

The Doctor's forces had finally gotten in! And at the moment when they were at their weakest and most desperate!

Xiang Lingna's heart instantly sank to the bottom. Just as she'd glimpsed a sliver of hope, an even greater despair descended.

She looked at the unconscious Sister Ai Li, at her ruined right arm, at the churning destructive energy below and the enemies glaring down from above, and an unprecedented sense of powerlessness drowned her.

And just then, at the crystal fracture on her remaining shoulder and the small remaining portion of her upper arm, that one faint, lingering green glow suddenly gave an extremely slight… twitch.

As if, at the arrival of those assault boats above, it had produced some… extremely faint resonance?