Chapter 80: Dual-Line Crisis

Those words he last said… Lin Zhen said you… are you really what he created?

Lin Xue's voice pierced the constant rumbling from above, sharp as a piece of ice.

Rubble and dust kept falling, striking the metal husk of the clone Wang Jun that had already lost all signs of life, kicking up fine dust. Those dark green mosses, like worms smelling blood, silently crawled over his body, covering his dim mechanical eyes.

The whole cavern was shaking, as if it would bury them completely at any moment.

Zhang Jun turned around sharply, not because of the stones falling from above, but because of Lin Xue's words—those words were like a needle, making him jolt all over.

"How the hell would I know!"

He roared back, his voice hoarse to an extreme, filled with the irritability of being driven to a dead end.

"Is now the time to be obsessing over this?"

Damn it.

That damn mental link, intermittent, yet once again became damnably clear.

There were no concrete words, just a cold suspicion, like a tide washing over from Lin Xue's side, carrying her own unconscious fear, scouring Zhang Jun's nearly exploding mind.

Fuck!

He wasn't cursing Lin Xue; he was cursing this shitty situation, cursing the damn news Wang Jun brought, cursing the uncontrollable, unknown-origin power within his own body.

Curse all this fucked-up nonsense!

"Get out first!" Lin Xue also realized—now wasn't the time for mutual suspicion.

Another chunk of the cavern ceiling collapsed, a huge boulder scraping past where they had just stood before crashing down, sending fragments flying.

Zhang Jun gritted his teeth, trying to focus his mind, to mobilize that purple energy, and blast open a path.

But that thing simply wouldn't obey!

Violent purple flames erupted from his palm without warning, but not toward the exit he had in mind; instead, they went out of control and slammed into the nearby rock wall.

Boom—!

The rock exploded, more cracks spread like spiderwebs, and the cavern's shaking grew more intense.

"Watch out!" Lin Xue cried out, instinctively trying to stabilize the surroundings with Ice Soul Power, but her fingertips only produced a thin, pitiful layer of white frost that quickly vanished.

The shock from Wang Jun's words, plus her earlier expenditure, had drained her strength to near empty.

The falling rocks from above grew denser; the vague exit direction they had seen earlier was now completely blocked by a new round of collapse.

Not a glimmer of light could be seen.

A feeling of suffocation pressed in from all directions, silently and soundlessly.

"No way out!" Zhang Jun snapped his head back, staring at Lin Xue, his fierce expression as if he wanted to devour her.

"We can only try once more!"

Lin Xue instantly understood his meaning—energy coupling, resonance.

She hesitated.

Wang Jun's words still buzzed in her ears. Lin Yan's deceit, the truth of the regulator, the power within Zhang Jun that was so similar to chaotic energy…

All of this made her instinctively want to resist, to resist mixing her power with Zhang Jun's again.

"Hurry up! What are you dawdling for?" Zhang Jun saw her hesitation, his voice growing harsher.

He grabbed her wrist in one swift motion, his strength astonishing.

Cold skin met scorching skin.

This time, there was none of the previous strong repulsion—perhaps because both had reached their limits, perhaps for some other reason. Two equally unstable forces, driven by the most primal will to survive, once again clumsily attempted to draw near and merge.

The process remained sluggish, like two mismatched parts being forced together, emitting a faint, teeth-grating screech.

But in the end, a flow of energy mingling violent purple radiance and icy silver light, twisting and struggling, barely formed between them, pointing toward a section of rock wall ahead that looked relatively weak.

That was their only chance.

"Now!"

The two almost simultaneously roared in their hearts.

The mixed energy suddenly erupted.

Boom——!

The rock wall seemed to be struck hard by an invisible heavy hammer, emitting a groan of overburden, then bursting open to reveal an irregular gap.

At the moment of the energy burst, several fragmented images, faster than lightning, flashed into Zhang Jun's mind.

A dim laboratory, everywhere precision instruments flickering with faint light. A much younger Zhang Tian Gang, wearing a white work uniform, stood before a huge glass container, whispering something. Inside the container, murky liquid soaked a blurry humanoid silhouette.

On Zhang Tian Gang's face mingled fervent expectation and anguish hard to conceal. And in the laboratory's shadows stood another figure, whose outline resembled Lin Zhen in a frightening way, bearing a faint, almost imperceptible smile that sent chills down the spine.

The image flashed and was gone.

Zhang Jun's head buzzed; before he could even begin to ponder what that fleeting glimpse meant, his body was already being yanked hard by Lin Xue, stumbling into the newly blasted passage.

The passage was narrow and steep, littered with rubble and rocks ready to topple.

The two practically rolled and crawled, desperately climbing upward.

They had no time to worry about skin sliced by sharp stones, nor about lungs burning with pain.

That brief but intense energy fusion just now reactivated the damn mental link between them.

This time, it was clearer.

It wasn't concrete words, but an uncontrollable surge of deep apprehension from Lin Xue's side, like a branding iron searing his consciousness—if he truly was made by Lin Zhen, then his power… could it also be part of the plan? To activate the beacon? Or… something worse?

Zhang Jun abruptly stopped his steps, right there in this narrow escape passage that could collapse again at any moment.

He suddenly turned his head, fiercely "looking" at the equally disheveled Lin Xue behind him.

"You the hell doubting me?"

His voice low and distorted, as if squeezed from between his teeth.

"I…"

Lin Xue was intimidated by his appearance at this moment, and instinctively stepped back half a step. She opened her mouth, her throat so dry she couldn't make a sound. Reason told her she shouldn't do this, but Wang Jun's words, Zhang Jun's uncontrollable power, and that damned, inescapable possibility...

Her silence was the best answer.

Being distrusted by the one she needed to trust most, coupled with confusion and anger about her own power and origins...

All the pent-up feelings in Zhang Jun's heart exploded with a roar.

He abruptly turned around, no longer looking at Lin Xue, facing the thick rock layer blocking the end of the passage, which was also the final obstacle.

"Open it, damn it!"

The Primordial Bloodline within his body, as if sensing his master's raging fury and unwillingness, erupted in a posture never seen before.

This time, it was no longer the previous uncontrolled rampage.

But condensed into a pure, extremely violent purple energy torrent, fiercely striking forward!

The strength was far greater than any before!

"Crack—Boom!"

The rock, at the moment it touched that purple torrent, seemed to be completely erased, skipping the process of breaking apart and turning directly into powder.

Light, blinding light, poured in from ahead.

The passage...... has been opened.

Amid the swirling dust and smoke, Lin Xue looked at Zhang Jun's back, her lips moving, finally uttering only a few words, her voice so weak it was almost inaudible.

"The road... is open."