Chapter 193: The Beast Tide Gathers in the Shadows
The chain reaction of losses of control in the old alley in the south city took a full two hours to barely stabilize.
Concentrated neutralizing agents were continuously poured into the underground pipe network, corroding the spore colonies at critical nodes and forcibly cutting off the pathways for the resonance chain to spread outward. Old Man Chen and the other two individuals who had lost control were jointly restrained by the military police and healing cultivators, and then sent to a temporary isolation station. His Sea of Consciousness had been deeply eroded by the spores; the calming field could only barely suppress the frenzy. Completely pacifying him would require a long period of continuous healing.
But the crisis did not stop there.
The composite synchronization field was like a massive net soaked into the rock strata, continuously applying pressure downward. Every so often, missed anchor points in different corners of the city were stirred, and red warning lights flickered endlessly on the city sand table in the command hall. An old drainage ditch in the east of the city, an abandoned warehouse basement in the west, and the shantytown near the outer defense line in the northern suburbs all experienced brief losses of control in succession.
The healing squads were torn to pieces, shuttling back and forth between the streets and alleys. After continuously handling two or three instances of restlessness, many cultivators overdrawn their Seas of Consciousness. Their fingertips trembled uncontrollably, forcing them to retreat to the rear to take agents and rest, while substitutes immediately took their places. The consumption rate of the agent reserves far exceeded the estimates. The outbound records in the warehouse were ticking rapidly, and Scholar Su had already ordered the activation of the Level 2 reserve plan, requesting emergency supplies from other bastions. However, the cross-district transport routes were too long, and the distant water could not quench the immediate thirst.
"We can suppress the sporadic losses of control, but we are always passively plugging leaks," a healing squad captain said wearily in the command hall. "The source of the synchronization field is deep in the rift. As long as the five ancient beings maintain their chorus, the missed anchor points will be triggered endlessly. We can't plug all the blind spots."
Everyone understood this principle, but there was no better choice at the moment. They could only grit their teeth and hold on, controlling the smoldering embers within the city while keeping a death grip on the movements at the wasteland rift.
Inside the rocky hill observation shed, Lin Yan's attention was split in two.
Half of it continuously received reports of out-of-control points from within the city, perceiving the lingering resonance waves that passed through the rock strata in continuous waves. The other half had the fine threads of his Sea of Consciousness firmly locked onto the five synchronized ancient beings in the cavern in the middle of the rift.
The Spiderweb Ancient Being was still focused on managing the spore links buried beneath the bastion, making minute adjustments to the signals in sync with every loss of control within the city. The Sharp-Sense Ancient Being's fluctuation was heavy and motionless, like a sharp knife sheathed, ready to unleash a large-scale psychic assault at any moment. The Illusion Ancient Being's aura remained elusive, continuously weaving illusion arrays in the shallow intersections, with more and more ambush points being concealed.
And that Beast Commander Ancient Being had finally moved.
Its consciousness stream, as heavy as a mountain, slowly dispersed and flowed outward through the crisscrossing branch rifts in the depths of the earth.
The scaled beast herds that had been scattered and resting in various rock cavities and dark caves in the deep layers, as if receiving a silent order, stood up one after another. The heavy sounds of crawling echoed back and forth in the deep rock strata. Countless scaled beasts moved silently along the channels, gathering toward the large buffer rock hall behind the shallow rift opening. They did not roar or run wildly; they strictly maintained silence, suppressed their own thermal signals, and used the shadows of the channels to conceal their movements.
The thermal imaging camera platform gradually captured the anomaly.
The massive number of heat sources, originally sparsely distributed in the deep channels, were converging toward the inside of the fissure along several main trunk channels, stacking up into a dense, oppressive mass in the buffer rock hall. The numbers far exceeded any previous small-scale beast tide. A rough estimate put it at over two hundred, mixed with quite a few high-tier scaled beasts of sturdy build.
"The Beast Commander is mobilizing troops," Lin Yan immediately reported to Scholar Su. "A large number of scaled beasts are assembling in the shallow rock hall. They haven't rushed out of the rift yet; they are still consolidating their formation."
Old Zhou leaned toward the screen, watching the clusters of heat sources continuously pouring into the rock hall, his brow furrowed: "Multiple losses of control within the city are used to tie down our healing forces, while they secretly assemble a beast tide. This is a classic two-pronged coordination. Once our manpower is stretched to the limit by the chaos within the city, the beast tide will crash against the blockade barrier."
"Exactly," Lin Yan nodded, his fingertips gently rubbing his brow. The fissure was still throbbing with a dull pain. "Their division of labor in this coordinated tactic is very clear. The Spiderweb Ancient Being is responsible for creating chaos within the city and draining our healing power; the Beast Commander is gathering the beast soldiers to prepare for a frontal assault; the Sharp-Sense Ancient Being holds the heavy-strike methods, ready to stack psychic assaults when the barrier is under the most pressure, amplifying the risk of the defense line collapsing; the Illusion Ancient Being has set up traps in advance, waiting to ambush us halfway when we send out scouts or reinforcement squads. The supreme ruler sits at the center, coordinating the overall rhythm and controlling when to escalate and when to hold back."
Scholar Su quickly adjusted the deployment, issuing a series of orders in succession:
Within the city: Maintain the minimum number of healing patrol squads to handle sporadic anchor point restlessness. All other Sea of Consciousness cultivators above Level 4 are to withdraw from the city and return to defend the blockade array, joining the barrier's psychic defense group. The military police will take over street maintenance, prioritizing the evacuation of residents in high-risk areas to prevent a massive outbreak of chaos within the city simultaneously after the beast tide impacts the barrier, which would leave them unable to cope with both ends.
Defense line: All oscillation cannons are to be recalibrated to aim at the main fissure opening, with near and long-range firepower deployed in layers. Engineers will be fully on duty, continuously monitoring pillar loads, and all backup energy modules will be pre-heated and on standby. Garrison infantry will redeploy behind the barrier's trenches, setting up heavy piercing weapons to form a multi-layered interception line.
Observation post: Lin Yan will continue to track the signal changes of the five ancient beings, focusing closely on the Beast Commander's command fluctuations to predict the time the beast tide will launch its assault. The long-range thermal imaging and spectrum arrays will lock onto the buffer rock hall throughout the process to record the progress of the beast herd's assembly.
When the news reached the frontline trenches, soldiers who were originally on rotation rest urgently returned to their posts, and armor and weapons were quickly distributed. The wind on the wasteland grew colder, and the gray fog churned, wrapping the massive rift opening tightly. No one could see how many lethal traps were being hoarded in the shadows.
The wounded high-tier priest in the rock cavity was still curled up in the corner, the faint light on its bone crown barely visible. It no longer participated in core coordination, serving only as the outermost alert sensor. It raised its twisted head, looking toward the rear cavern, as if it too was waiting for the moment its kin would launch the offensive.
Lin Yan closed his eyes and released an extremely short perception tentacle once again.
The Beast Commander's consciousness was still continuously summoning. More scaled beasts were rushing from the deeper earth, endlessly pouring into the buffer rock hall. The crowded beasts pressed against each other, their heavy breathing converging into a low tremor that was isolated by the rock strata and could not reach the surface of the wasteland. They lined up patiently, waiting for the central command to give the signal to charge.
Meanwhile, within the bastion, sporadic anchor point restlessness continued to break out from time to time. The healing squads had already been stretched to their absolute limit, with only a minimal number of personnel left to desperately hold the line.
This was a lethal trap jointly laid by the five ancient beings: first, use the continuous smoldering embers within the city to slowly drain humanity's mental power; then, once the psychic defense of the defense line showed weaknesses, the silently assembled beast tide would pour out from the rift and strike the resonance barrier head-on.
Lin Yan opened his eyes and looked at the dense, ever-increasing heat sources on the screen.
"They are still accumulating, not in a rush to charge," Lin Yan said in a low voice. "They are waiting for our energy to be continuously consumed by the city's chaos until we reach the critical point."
The night remained thick and viscous, with both battlefields stretched taut simultaneously. The smoldering embers within the city had not been extinguished, and in the shadows of the rift, a massive beast tide had quietly taken shape, sharpening its blades and waiting.
End of Chapter.
Concentrated neutralizing agents were continuously poured into the underground pipe network, corroding the spore colonies at critical nodes and forcibly cutting off the pathways for the resonance chain to spread outward. Old Man Chen and the other two individuals who had lost control were jointly restrained by the military police and healing cultivators, and then sent to a temporary isolation station. His Sea of Consciousness had been deeply eroded by the spores; the calming field could only barely suppress the frenzy. Completely pacifying him would require a long period of continuous healing.
But the crisis did not stop there.
The composite synchronization field was like a massive net soaked into the rock strata, continuously applying pressure downward. Every so often, missed anchor points in different corners of the city were stirred, and red warning lights flickered endlessly on the city sand table in the command hall. An old drainage ditch in the east of the city, an abandoned warehouse basement in the west, and the shantytown near the outer defense line in the northern suburbs all experienced brief losses of control in succession.
The healing squads were torn to pieces, shuttling back and forth between the streets and alleys. After continuously handling two or three instances of restlessness, many cultivators overdrawn their Seas of Consciousness. Their fingertips trembled uncontrollably, forcing them to retreat to the rear to take agents and rest, while substitutes immediately took their places. The consumption rate of the agent reserves far exceeded the estimates. The outbound records in the warehouse were ticking rapidly, and Scholar Su had already ordered the activation of the Level 2 reserve plan, requesting emergency supplies from other bastions. However, the cross-district transport routes were too long, and the distant water could not quench the immediate thirst.
"We can suppress the sporadic losses of control, but we are always passively plugging leaks," a healing squad captain said wearily in the command hall. "The source of the synchronization field is deep in the rift. As long as the five ancient beings maintain their chorus, the missed anchor points will be triggered endlessly. We can't plug all the blind spots."
Everyone understood this principle, but there was no better choice at the moment. They could only grit their teeth and hold on, controlling the smoldering embers within the city while keeping a death grip on the movements at the wasteland rift.
Inside the rocky hill observation shed, Lin Yan's attention was split in two.
Half of it continuously received reports of out-of-control points from within the city, perceiving the lingering resonance waves that passed through the rock strata in continuous waves. The other half had the fine threads of his Sea of Consciousness firmly locked onto the five synchronized ancient beings in the cavern in the middle of the rift.
The Spiderweb Ancient Being was still focused on managing the spore links buried beneath the bastion, making minute adjustments to the signals in sync with every loss of control within the city. The Sharp-Sense Ancient Being's fluctuation was heavy and motionless, like a sharp knife sheathed, ready to unleash a large-scale psychic assault at any moment. The Illusion Ancient Being's aura remained elusive, continuously weaving illusion arrays in the shallow intersections, with more and more ambush points being concealed.
And that Beast Commander Ancient Being had finally moved.
Its consciousness stream, as heavy as a mountain, slowly dispersed and flowed outward through the crisscrossing branch rifts in the depths of the earth.
The scaled beast herds that had been scattered and resting in various rock cavities and dark caves in the deep layers, as if receiving a silent order, stood up one after another. The heavy sounds of crawling echoed back and forth in the deep rock strata. Countless scaled beasts moved silently along the channels, gathering toward the large buffer rock hall behind the shallow rift opening. They did not roar or run wildly; they strictly maintained silence, suppressed their own thermal signals, and used the shadows of the channels to conceal their movements.
The thermal imaging camera platform gradually captured the anomaly.
The massive number of heat sources, originally sparsely distributed in the deep channels, were converging toward the inside of the fissure along several main trunk channels, stacking up into a dense, oppressive mass in the buffer rock hall. The numbers far exceeded any previous small-scale beast tide. A rough estimate put it at over two hundred, mixed with quite a few high-tier scaled beasts of sturdy build.
"The Beast Commander is mobilizing troops," Lin Yan immediately reported to Scholar Su. "A large number of scaled beasts are assembling in the shallow rock hall. They haven't rushed out of the rift yet; they are still consolidating their formation."
Old Zhou leaned toward the screen, watching the clusters of heat sources continuously pouring into the rock hall, his brow furrowed: "Multiple losses of control within the city are used to tie down our healing forces, while they secretly assemble a beast tide. This is a classic two-pronged coordination. Once our manpower is stretched to the limit by the chaos within the city, the beast tide will crash against the blockade barrier."
"Exactly," Lin Yan nodded, his fingertips gently rubbing his brow. The fissure was still throbbing with a dull pain. "Their division of labor in this coordinated tactic is very clear. The Spiderweb Ancient Being is responsible for creating chaos within the city and draining our healing power; the Beast Commander is gathering the beast soldiers to prepare for a frontal assault; the Sharp-Sense Ancient Being holds the heavy-strike methods, ready to stack psychic assaults when the barrier is under the most pressure, amplifying the risk of the defense line collapsing; the Illusion Ancient Being has set up traps in advance, waiting to ambush us halfway when we send out scouts or reinforcement squads. The supreme ruler sits at the center, coordinating the overall rhythm and controlling when to escalate and when to hold back."
Scholar Su quickly adjusted the deployment, issuing a series of orders in succession:
Within the city: Maintain the minimum number of healing patrol squads to handle sporadic anchor point restlessness. All other Sea of Consciousness cultivators above Level 4 are to withdraw from the city and return to defend the blockade array, joining the barrier's psychic defense group. The military police will take over street maintenance, prioritizing the evacuation of residents in high-risk areas to prevent a massive outbreak of chaos within the city simultaneously after the beast tide impacts the barrier, which would leave them unable to cope with both ends.
Defense line: All oscillation cannons are to be recalibrated to aim at the main fissure opening, with near and long-range firepower deployed in layers. Engineers will be fully on duty, continuously monitoring pillar loads, and all backup energy modules will be pre-heated and on standby. Garrison infantry will redeploy behind the barrier's trenches, setting up heavy piercing weapons to form a multi-layered interception line.
Observation post: Lin Yan will continue to track the signal changes of the five ancient beings, focusing closely on the Beast Commander's command fluctuations to predict the time the beast tide will launch its assault. The long-range thermal imaging and spectrum arrays will lock onto the buffer rock hall throughout the process to record the progress of the beast herd's assembly.
When the news reached the frontline trenches, soldiers who were originally on rotation rest urgently returned to their posts, and armor and weapons were quickly distributed. The wind on the wasteland grew colder, and the gray fog churned, wrapping the massive rift opening tightly. No one could see how many lethal traps were being hoarded in the shadows.
The wounded high-tier priest in the rock cavity was still curled up in the corner, the faint light on its bone crown barely visible. It no longer participated in core coordination, serving only as the outermost alert sensor. It raised its twisted head, looking toward the rear cavern, as if it too was waiting for the moment its kin would launch the offensive.
Lin Yan closed his eyes and released an extremely short perception tentacle once again.
The Beast Commander's consciousness was still continuously summoning. More scaled beasts were rushing from the deeper earth, endlessly pouring into the buffer rock hall. The crowded beasts pressed against each other, their heavy breathing converging into a low tremor that was isolated by the rock strata and could not reach the surface of the wasteland. They lined up patiently, waiting for the central command to give the signal to charge.
Meanwhile, within the bastion, sporadic anchor point restlessness continued to break out from time to time. The healing squads had already been stretched to their absolute limit, with only a minimal number of personnel left to desperately hold the line.
This was a lethal trap jointly laid by the five ancient beings: first, use the continuous smoldering embers within the city to slowly drain humanity's mental power; then, once the psychic defense of the defense line showed weaknesses, the silently assembled beast tide would pour out from the rift and strike the resonance barrier head-on.
Lin Yan opened his eyes and looked at the dense, ever-increasing heat sources on the screen.
"They are still accumulating, not in a rush to charge," Lin Yan said in a low voice. "They are waiting for our energy to be continuously consumed by the city's chaos until we reach the critical point."
The night remained thick and viscous, with both battlefields stretched taut simultaneously. The smoldering embers within the city had not been extinguished, and in the shadows of the rift, a massive beast tide had quietly taken shape, sharpening its blades and waiting.
End of Chapter.