Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

With the intrusion and destruction of the Giant God Soldiers, especially the destruction of the enemy’s defense array, the spiritual shields on the surface of the two supreme fortresses immediately dimmed, revealing shocking holes that looked like rotten black spots.

The storm-like attacks became sparse, too. One turret after another was demolished by the giant soldier gods mercilessly.

The giant soldier that Lu Qingchen took away did not show up in the battle. There was barely any force inside the two supreme fortresses that could stop Ding Lingdang and the other experts. They pierced through the plate armor and the cabin walls one after another as if they were tearing apart paper after paper.

“The two supreme fortresses have been completely suppressed by us! Ding Lingdang shouted in the communication channel, not entirely satisfied, “The combat ability of the enemy is much weaker than we imagined. So far, we haven’t found a single Giant God Soldier of the enemy, nor have we found enough crystal suits, just like Lu Qingchen took away 50% of the combat ability of the two supreme fortresses in advance!

“Careful.”

Li Yao reminded him, “I have a vague feeling that something is not right. There’s no reason for Lu Qingchen to push out the remaining two supreme fortresses for nothing after losing two of them in the collision of heaven and earth… Be careful that he turns the ‘Battle Fortress Phantom Sea’ and the ‘Sharpen Gold Fortress’ into powerful bombs and activates the self-destruction system of the supreme fortress, hoping to perish together with you!” “I know. I won’t let him.”

Ding Lingdang burst into laughter. “The Supreme Battle Fortress is not a real bomb after all. The so-called self-detonation system is not designed to kill the enemy on a large scale. Even if Lu Qingchen detonated all the fuel and ammunition of the two Supreme Battle Fortress, the blast would not have been able to travel far in the vacuum. The radiation and the high-energy particle streams alone would not have been enough to deal serious damage to the Giant God Soldier.

“Sacrificing two Supreme Battle fortresses for nothing just to cause the ‘skin injuries’ of dozens of Giant God Soldiers? Is Lu Qingchen that stupid?”

“Rest assured. We will not enter the core activities of the two supreme fortresses, especially their arsenals and fuel tanks. We will keep a safe distance from them. Whatever tricks Lu Qingchen has up his sleeve, we will cruise on the surface of the supreme fortress and knock out its firing points and defense arrays one by one. “When all the firepower points, turrets, defense arrays, and power units on the surface of the warship have been destroyed so that it is unable to attack, dodge, or run away, we will retreat immediately and let the warship concentrate its fire from a distance, slowly wearing down its defense. However thick its armor is, it won’t be able to resist for long.

“The only problem right now is that the battle between us has disrupted the balance of the spiritual energy. The torrents of meteoroids and the interference of the magnetic field seem to be even more furious and disordered, as if… an unprecedented thunderstorm is brewing. Is this Lu Qingchen’s purpose, not to rely on the two supreme fortresses but to annihilate us with the power of nature so that we will suffer the same fate as the ‘Fortress of Earth’ and the ‘Fortress of Fire’?

Li Yao thought of something. It was the only possibility.

Otherwise, with the incomplete combat system of the two supreme fortresses, which did not even carry any Giant God Soldiers, they would be no match for the hundreds of Giant God Soldiers in the exploration fleet.

Lu Qingchen was well aware of that.

Then, what if he borrowed the strength of ‘Ancient Thirteen’? For example, he could create another collision of the heaven and the earth on the ‘Ancient Thirteen’, which would crush the ‘Ancient Thirteen’, whose structure was very fragile in the first place, and set off a tide of matter, magnetic field, radiation, and high-energy particle streams.

Theoretically speaking, it was indeed a surging tide that could engulf the entire exploration fleet and all the Giant God Soldiers.

The real question was, how could Lu Qingchen blow up ‘Ancient Thirteen’, a satellite more than five thousand kilometers in diameter?

Unless Lu Qingchen had the ability to drill a hole in the crust of ‘Ancient Thirteenth’ in advance and fill it with an astronomical number of crystal bombs, it would be impossible for him to blow ‘Ancient Thirteenth’ into pieces during the explosion. It was impossible. Lu Qingchen had only arrived seven to ten days ago. He had neither the time nor the crystal bombs to carry out such an absurd strategy. Even so, with Li Yao’s reminder, Li Linghai still increased the surveillance between the battlefield and ‘Gu Thirteen’ to ensure that no anomalies were overlooked.

The astronomical parameters of the stone belts —the speed of the meteoroids, the density of the cosmic dust, the intensity of the electromagnetic interference, and so on-were all under high surveillance.

As of now, although the intensity of the interference and the density of the cosmic dust had caused significant damage to the spiritual shield and the power unit of the starship, it was still bearable.

Lu Qingchen’s two supreme fortresses, on the other hand, gradually slowed down and started spinning in an irregular pattern. It was obvious that Ding Lingdang and the other Giant God Soldiers had blown up the main power units, resulting in the imbalance of power output.

The two supreme fortresses were like hippos and rhinos whose legs had been broken. No matter how thick their leather armor was, how powerful their impact was, and how sharp their front teeth and horns were, they were doomed.

Bright fireballs were popping up on the surface of the two supreme fortresses at almost the same time. Even the last bit of their spiritual shield, which was as thin as a cicada’s wing, was gone, revealing their pale and twisted plate armor.

Cheers were echoing inside the communication channel. It turned out that Ding Lingdang and the other experts had successfully completed the task of breaking the main gun, the main defense array, and the main power unit.

In the next moment, although the exploration fleet was small in size, the agile, fast-firing attack starships could swarm forward like piranhas and tear apart the two paralyzed giants.

But Li Yao was frowning harder and harder. The ugly, malicious, deep, and crazy face of Lu Qingchen popped up in his head again.

“Loud thunder, small rain. Lu Qingchen, oh Lu Qingchen, did you spend so much time and effort to set up such a trap at the cost of two supreme fortresses and countless puppets just to buy us more time?” Li Yao felt that it was impossible.

Lu Qingchen was someone who would summon all his will and wisdom to fight to the end even when a wisp of his remaining soul had been captured by ‘Fuxi’. How could he declare his abandonment with such a suicidal, idiotic tactic?

Where was the Supreme Battle Fortress and the ‘Withering Wood Fortress’ hidden?

If Lu Qingchen had already entered the Tomb of the Supreme Emperor, there was no need for him to bring such a huge fortress with him. Therefore, was the fortress hiding somewhere to ambush them?

However, the Supreme Battle Fortress could not reverse the situation even if it joined the battlefield.

So, so—

Cold sweat was appearing on Li Yao’s forehead.

“Did you find any abnormal high-energy reactions between the battlefield and the ‘Ancient Thirteen’? I mean, traces of the ‘Withering Wood Fortress’?

He raised his voice and asked Li Linghai.

“No. We’ve sent out almost all the crystal cameras to monitor every inch of the space between the battlefield and the ‘Ancient Thirteenth’. Even if a starship is hiding somewhere, we will still find it, not to mention the enormous star fortress.

Li Linghai’s voice was full of confusion and uneasiness, too. “It was a weird battle. Lu Qingchen’s traps were too simple and weak. Was that all he could do about the five supreme fortresses, or…”

Right then, they both heard the earsplitting alarms.

Discovering the unusual super-high-energy reaction, the last fortress showed up, but it was not in the dense meteoroid belt in front and behind them, nor was it in the dark vacuum between the meteoroid belt and the ‘Ancient Thirteenth’. Instead, it was in the space between the ‘Ancient Thirteenth’ and the ancient star, which was closer to the gravitational ring of the ancient star.

In the fierce battle a few hours ago, everybody’s attention had been attracted by the ‘Fortress Phantom Sea’ and the ‘Fortress Sharp Gold’. Even Li Yao and Li Linghai, who could smell that something was not right in the battlefield, had spread all their attention between the stone belts and the ‘Ancient Thirteenth’. They were worried that Lu Qingchen was planning to make use of the ‘Ancient Thirteenth’, but none of them paid any attention to the side of the ancient giant.

It was not until this moment, when the ‘Withered Wood Fortress’ released its strongest spiritual energy and spurted out magnificent exhaust flames thousands of kilometers long, that its high-energy reaction was detected by the exploration fleet.

Shua! Shua! Shua! Shua!

Countless monitoring crystal cameras turned to the direction of the ancient star and captured thousands of pictures from various angles, assembling a soul-stirring and unbelievable scene.

The ‘Withering Wood Fortress’ was the weirdest of the five supreme fortresses in the first place. It did not seem to be made of metal. Instead, it seemed to have been refined by the Kuafu Clan in the primeval era with vines as thick as boas on the surface.

But right now, the ‘vines’ had been embedded into a giant meteoroid and tied the meteoroid to the fortress.

The distance was too far for him to analyze the diameter and mass of the meteoroid. But judging from the comparison between it and the Dry Wood Fortress, the ratio of the two was at least ten to one. The meteoroid was ten times larger than the Dry Wood Fortress. It was not a meteoroid at all but an asteroid!

Since the very beginning, the Dry Wood Fortress had been ‘bound’ to the planet. It had been floating in the periphery of the ancient star’s gravity circle quietly. It had even entered the ancient star’s gravity circle and was slowly falling toward it. Since the surface of the Dry Wood Fortress was covered in a lot of exotic materials that were neither metal nor iron, it was very difficult to be detected by metal probe magical equipment. Also, with such a large meteorite as cover, nobody had expected that it would be hiding in this place.

It was not until the ‘Sharpen Gold Fortress’ and the ‘Phantom Ocean Fortress’ jumped out of the darkness and attracted the attention of more than 90% of the firepower, computational ability, and probe magical equipment of the exploration fleet that the Dry Wood Fortress activated the main power unit and spurted out the strongest exhaust flames, pushing the meteorites ten times larger than itself to accelerate toward the ancient giant!