Chapter 224: The Explosive Choice
Thud!
Another heavy blow slammed fiercely into the backup blast-proof door. The second retaining latch snapped in response, and metal debris fell in a continuous shower onto the passage floor through the ever-widening gap. The door panel bulged inward with a terrifying arc, having completely deviated from its original flat plane. Just one more full-force ram, and the remaining latches would tear apart completely. This final rear barrier would collapse entirely.
The squad leader guarding the back door gripped the safety lock of the detonator tightly, his knuckles turning white. He knew the consequences of pressing this button—the pre-planted explosives would detonate the rock layer around the door frame, completely sealing off this escape tunnel. Rubble and rebar would fill the entire external passage, once and for all eliminating the possibility of the scaled beasts breaking in from here. But the price was equally heavy: from then on, all personnel in the shelter pod would have no second way out. Once the main gate fell, there would be nowhere left for anyone to evacuate.
"Are we still holding?" a team member beside him asked, his voice trembling. His gaze was fixed on the gap in the deforming door panel. Through the gap, the dark red vertical pupil of the third-tier scaled beast was already faintly visible. Puffs of hot, foul-smelling air, carrying a thin scent of spores, poured in continuously.
The squad leader did not answer immediately. Scholar Su's calm voice came through the communicator: "Report status."
"Two latches on the door panel have broken. The remaining latches can withstand at most one more impact. The scaled beast is right outside the door, gathering momentum. Once the explosives are detonated, the backup passage will be permanently sealed," the squad leader replied in a deep voice.
The communication channel fell into a brief silence.
Scholar Su raised his eyes to look at Lin Yan's terminal screen. On the screen, the third-tier scaled beast had already stepped back, its muscles tensed, its head lowered, and its bone spurs aimed directly at the crack in the door panel. It was brewing the final, life-or-death ram. The other peripheral scaled beasts also became restless in unison. The ramming sounds from the direction of the main gate suddenly grew dense. The Beast Commander was coordinating with this strike at the back door, using the frontal pounding to distract the defenders inside the cabin.
Deep within the cavern, the consciousness of the five ancient beings quietly focused on this node at the back door.
The Beast Commander was in no hurry to order the behemoth to charge. It was waiting for humanity to make a choice. It predicted that humans would hesitate, be reluctant to destroy this sole remaining way out, and cling to a sliver of faint hope, keeping the back door in the illusion that they might still have a chance to break out from here in the future. As long as the defenders delayed detonating, the moment the door panel broke, the behemoth would rush into the passage and strike directly at the undefended civilian area in the rear.
Seizing this critical moment of decision, the Illusion Ancient Being unleashed illusions on a massive scale.
Several civilians near the rear passage lost their focus simultaneously. They saw the back door wide open, sunlight spilling onto the wasteland outside, and a convoy of reinforcements approaching from afar. All they had to do was push open this door to escape this suffocating iron box. Two civilians who had been sitting in the corner involuntarily stood up, their eyes empty, and walked step by step toward the entrance of the rear maintenance passage. The military police guarding the entrance hurried forward to block them, repeatedly shouting wake-up code words. It took a great deal of effort to pull the two of them back from the illusion.
"They are using illusions to force us to soften our resolve," Lin Yan said in a low voice, the exhaustion in his eyes heavy. The prolonged overuse of his Sea of Consciousness caused his head to throb in waves. "The supreme ruler is watching our choices."
Scholar Su took a deep breath and made his decision: "Detonate."
These two short words fell heavily in the channel.
"Received." The back door squad leader hesitated no longer. He flipped open the safety cover of the detonator and pressed the switch forcefully with his thumb.
A muffled explosion erupted between the rock layers outside the door panel. No blinding firelight rushed into the cabin. The vast majority of the shockwave was vented outward. The scorching airflow, carrying pulverized rocks and twisted rebar, instantly filled the narrow natural tunnel outside the door. The deafening roar conducted through the rock layer into the shelter pod. The entire cabin trembled violently, the overhead pipelines swayed, the emergency lights flashed frantically, and large areas instantly plunged into darkness.
The third-tier scaled beast, which had been poised to ram, took the brunt of the force. It was fiercely blown away by the wild shockwave, its body crashing into the rock wall behind it. Its scales shattered, and its flesh tore, letting out a凄厉 (piercing) and agonizing roar. Layers of rubble stacked up, firmly sealing off the escape tunnel. The thick pile of rocks sealed the deformed blast-proof door securely inside, leaving no passable gaps.
The lights slowly stabilized.
From the direction of the back door, the ramming sounds disappeared.
The guard squad stood in place, staring at the door panel sealed by the rock layer. Everyone knew in their hearts that the way back had been buried by their own hands. From now on, the entire shelter pod had only one main gate to rely on. There were no backups, no flanking routes.
"The back door passage is sealed. The scaled beasts are temporarily isolated outside. That third-tier scaled beast is wounded, and its thermal signature is retreating, returning to the main encirclement," Lin Yan reported loudly, staring at the refreshed thermal map on the terminal. "The Beast Commander's plan has failed. Now, the outer beast herd is regrouping, pressing entirely toward the main gate."
Inside the cavern, the consciousness of the ancient beings rippled with a faint fluctuation.
The supreme ruler had seen humanity's choice. They had not been ensnared by the illusion of escape. They had resolutely abandoned their last retreat and severed this ambush planted by the ancient beings. This outcome had exceeded some of its predictions, but only just so. It felt no anger, maintaining that indifferent scrutiny. The disappearance of the retreat route might drive some to absolute despair, but it might also force out a desperate, all-or-nothing will to resist. It was willing to quietly wait for either outcome.
The Beast Commander adjusted its deployment, abandoning multi-point probing. It concentrated all surviving third-tier scaled beasts outside the main gate, with ordinary scaled beasts layered densely behind them. They no longer dispersed to search for weak points.
The Sharp-Sense Ancient Being still maintained a constant erosion of the Sea of Consciousness, neither escalating nor weakening. It understood that there was no need to suddenly increase the impact now; continuous consumption was the sharpest blade. The Sea of Consciousness of everyone inside the cabin was already scarred. Exhaustion accumulated day by day. For every extra hour they endured, their will loosened by a fraction.
The Illusion Ancient Being changed its direction. No longer rendering dreams of escaping through the back door, it projected scenes of despair. When resting with their eyes closed, many saw the main gate collapsing inward, a black tide of scaled beasts flooding in, and the shelter pod turning into a sea of blood. Some saw the radio falling silent forever, the six bastions falling across the board, and no human strongholds remaining on the wasteland. These oppressive scenes flowed silently, continuously crushing already fragile minds.
The Spiderweb Ancient Being continued to scatter spores in the micro-crevices of the rock layer. The tiny spore clusters, like an undercurrent underground, seeped slowly. It did not seek to break into the cabin immediately; it merely continued to pollute the geology of this mountain, burying a long-term hazard.
Inside the shelter pod, the atmosphere was more oppressive than before.
Everyone had vaguely heard the explosion from the rear and slowly realized—the last escape route was gone. Despair poured over the crowd like cold water. A few suppressed whimpers sounded, but no large-scale riot broke out. After cutting off their own retreat, some people actually shed those unrealistic illusions of luck. They understood that the only thing they could do now was to hold this iron box and hold onto each other.
The numbers on the material table continued to slide.
The drinking water ration was compressed to three sips a day. The rations were merely the size of a fingernail of compressed dry food. The situation in the wounded area continued to deteriorate. Another severely wounded soldier quietly passed away in the dead of night, unable to endure the infection and excruciating pain. The military doctor silently covered the body with canvas. There was no space for burial now; the body could only be temporarily placed in an empty storage compartment near the outer wall. The smell of medicine and blood in the air grew even heavier.
The radio watch personnel still insisted on sending long-wave distress messages every two hours.
But on the screen, there was only dead silence. No response signals were ever transmitted back.
Scholar Su walked to the inside of the main gate, reaching out to touch the cold, thick alloy surface. Outside the door, the scaled beasts had reassembled. A new round of ramming sounds slowly began. Thud, thud, thud. The rhythm was steady, one after another, transmitted through the thick steel plate.
This time, all the pressure was concentrated on this single gate.
The retreat was cut off, surrounded on all sides, reinforcements were unlikely, and supplies were nearly exhausted. The long war of attrition had reached its most isolated and desperate stage.
Lin Yan leaned against the bracket, raising his hand to rub his throbbing temples. His Sea of Consciousness remained connected to the dark underground, tracking the unmoving consciousness of the five ancient beings. He knew the supreme ruler was still waiting, waiting for the people inside the cabin to slowly reach their limit amidst hunger, pain, and mental torment.
The siege was far from over.
End of Chapter.
Another heavy blow slammed fiercely into the backup blast-proof door. The second retaining latch snapped in response, and metal debris fell in a continuous shower onto the passage floor through the ever-widening gap. The door panel bulged inward with a terrifying arc, having completely deviated from its original flat plane. Just one more full-force ram, and the remaining latches would tear apart completely. This final rear barrier would collapse entirely.
The squad leader guarding the back door gripped the safety lock of the detonator tightly, his knuckles turning white. He knew the consequences of pressing this button—the pre-planted explosives would detonate the rock layer around the door frame, completely sealing off this escape tunnel. Rubble and rebar would fill the entire external passage, once and for all eliminating the possibility of the scaled beasts breaking in from here. But the price was equally heavy: from then on, all personnel in the shelter pod would have no second way out. Once the main gate fell, there would be nowhere left for anyone to evacuate.
"Are we still holding?" a team member beside him asked, his voice trembling. His gaze was fixed on the gap in the deforming door panel. Through the gap, the dark red vertical pupil of the third-tier scaled beast was already faintly visible. Puffs of hot, foul-smelling air, carrying a thin scent of spores, poured in continuously.
The squad leader did not answer immediately. Scholar Su's calm voice came through the communicator: "Report status."
"Two latches on the door panel have broken. The remaining latches can withstand at most one more impact. The scaled beast is right outside the door, gathering momentum. Once the explosives are detonated, the backup passage will be permanently sealed," the squad leader replied in a deep voice.
The communication channel fell into a brief silence.
Scholar Su raised his eyes to look at Lin Yan's terminal screen. On the screen, the third-tier scaled beast had already stepped back, its muscles tensed, its head lowered, and its bone spurs aimed directly at the crack in the door panel. It was brewing the final, life-or-death ram. The other peripheral scaled beasts also became restless in unison. The ramming sounds from the direction of the main gate suddenly grew dense. The Beast Commander was coordinating with this strike at the back door, using the frontal pounding to distract the defenders inside the cabin.
Deep within the cavern, the consciousness of the five ancient beings quietly focused on this node at the back door.
The Beast Commander was in no hurry to order the behemoth to charge. It was waiting for humanity to make a choice. It predicted that humans would hesitate, be reluctant to destroy this sole remaining way out, and cling to a sliver of faint hope, keeping the back door in the illusion that they might still have a chance to break out from here in the future. As long as the defenders delayed detonating, the moment the door panel broke, the behemoth would rush into the passage and strike directly at the undefended civilian area in the rear.
Seizing this critical moment of decision, the Illusion Ancient Being unleashed illusions on a massive scale.
Several civilians near the rear passage lost their focus simultaneously. They saw the back door wide open, sunlight spilling onto the wasteland outside, and a convoy of reinforcements approaching from afar. All they had to do was push open this door to escape this suffocating iron box. Two civilians who had been sitting in the corner involuntarily stood up, their eyes empty, and walked step by step toward the entrance of the rear maintenance passage. The military police guarding the entrance hurried forward to block them, repeatedly shouting wake-up code words. It took a great deal of effort to pull the two of them back from the illusion.
"They are using illusions to force us to soften our resolve," Lin Yan said in a low voice, the exhaustion in his eyes heavy. The prolonged overuse of his Sea of Consciousness caused his head to throb in waves. "The supreme ruler is watching our choices."
Scholar Su took a deep breath and made his decision: "Detonate."
These two short words fell heavily in the channel.
"Received." The back door squad leader hesitated no longer. He flipped open the safety cover of the detonator and pressed the switch forcefully with his thumb.
A muffled explosion erupted between the rock layers outside the door panel. No blinding firelight rushed into the cabin. The vast majority of the shockwave was vented outward. The scorching airflow, carrying pulverized rocks and twisted rebar, instantly filled the narrow natural tunnel outside the door. The deafening roar conducted through the rock layer into the shelter pod. The entire cabin trembled violently, the overhead pipelines swayed, the emergency lights flashed frantically, and large areas instantly plunged into darkness.
The third-tier scaled beast, which had been poised to ram, took the brunt of the force. It was fiercely blown away by the wild shockwave, its body crashing into the rock wall behind it. Its scales shattered, and its flesh tore, letting out a凄厉 (piercing) and agonizing roar. Layers of rubble stacked up, firmly sealing off the escape tunnel. The thick pile of rocks sealed the deformed blast-proof door securely inside, leaving no passable gaps.
The lights slowly stabilized.
From the direction of the back door, the ramming sounds disappeared.
The guard squad stood in place, staring at the door panel sealed by the rock layer. Everyone knew in their hearts that the way back had been buried by their own hands. From now on, the entire shelter pod had only one main gate to rely on. There were no backups, no flanking routes.
"The back door passage is sealed. The scaled beasts are temporarily isolated outside. That third-tier scaled beast is wounded, and its thermal signature is retreating, returning to the main encirclement," Lin Yan reported loudly, staring at the refreshed thermal map on the terminal. "The Beast Commander's plan has failed. Now, the outer beast herd is regrouping, pressing entirely toward the main gate."
Inside the cavern, the consciousness of the ancient beings rippled with a faint fluctuation.
The supreme ruler had seen humanity's choice. They had not been ensnared by the illusion of escape. They had resolutely abandoned their last retreat and severed this ambush planted by the ancient beings. This outcome had exceeded some of its predictions, but only just so. It felt no anger, maintaining that indifferent scrutiny. The disappearance of the retreat route might drive some to absolute despair, but it might also force out a desperate, all-or-nothing will to resist. It was willing to quietly wait for either outcome.
The Beast Commander adjusted its deployment, abandoning multi-point probing. It concentrated all surviving third-tier scaled beasts outside the main gate, with ordinary scaled beasts layered densely behind them. They no longer dispersed to search for weak points.
The Sharp-Sense Ancient Being still maintained a constant erosion of the Sea of Consciousness, neither escalating nor weakening. It understood that there was no need to suddenly increase the impact now; continuous consumption was the sharpest blade. The Sea of Consciousness of everyone inside the cabin was already scarred. Exhaustion accumulated day by day. For every extra hour they endured, their will loosened by a fraction.
The Illusion Ancient Being changed its direction. No longer rendering dreams of escaping through the back door, it projected scenes of despair. When resting with their eyes closed, many saw the main gate collapsing inward, a black tide of scaled beasts flooding in, and the shelter pod turning into a sea of blood. Some saw the radio falling silent forever, the six bastions falling across the board, and no human strongholds remaining on the wasteland. These oppressive scenes flowed silently, continuously crushing already fragile minds.
The Spiderweb Ancient Being continued to scatter spores in the micro-crevices of the rock layer. The tiny spore clusters, like an undercurrent underground, seeped slowly. It did not seek to break into the cabin immediately; it merely continued to pollute the geology of this mountain, burying a long-term hazard.
Inside the shelter pod, the atmosphere was more oppressive than before.
Everyone had vaguely heard the explosion from the rear and slowly realized—the last escape route was gone. Despair poured over the crowd like cold water. A few suppressed whimpers sounded, but no large-scale riot broke out. After cutting off their own retreat, some people actually shed those unrealistic illusions of luck. They understood that the only thing they could do now was to hold this iron box and hold onto each other.
The numbers on the material table continued to slide.
The drinking water ration was compressed to three sips a day. The rations were merely the size of a fingernail of compressed dry food. The situation in the wounded area continued to deteriorate. Another severely wounded soldier quietly passed away in the dead of night, unable to endure the infection and excruciating pain. The military doctor silently covered the body with canvas. There was no space for burial now; the body could only be temporarily placed in an empty storage compartment near the outer wall. The smell of medicine and blood in the air grew even heavier.
The radio watch personnel still insisted on sending long-wave distress messages every two hours.
But on the screen, there was only dead silence. No response signals were ever transmitted back.
Scholar Su walked to the inside of the main gate, reaching out to touch the cold, thick alloy surface. Outside the door, the scaled beasts had reassembled. A new round of ramming sounds slowly began. Thud, thud, thud. The rhythm was steady, one after another, transmitted through the thick steel plate.
This time, all the pressure was concentrated on this single gate.
The retreat was cut off, surrounded on all sides, reinforcements were unlikely, and supplies were nearly exhausted. The long war of attrition had reached its most isolated and desperate stage.
Lin Yan leaned against the bracket, raising his hand to rub his throbbing temples. His Sea of Consciousness remained connected to the dark underground, tracking the unmoving consciousness of the five ancient beings. He knew the supreme ruler was still waiting, waiting for the people inside the cabin to slowly reach their limit amidst hunger, pain, and mental torment.
The siege was far from over.
End of Chapter.