171: Chapter 171 One shot pierces through the fifth-order giant eye

"Don't scare her."

Jiang Yanxue's voice cut in, accompanied by the dull thud of a blade entering flesh.

"The altar lines are almost cleared. What's left is just moving trash."

Chen Chen pressed his headset.

"Jiang Jiuyou, what's the situation on the sea surface?"

There was a burst of static on the other end of the communication, followed by Jiang Jiuyou's voice, strained and panting.

"The second wave of Mental Power shock just passed. The secondary command console went dark for three seconds."

"Commander Jiang, you're bleeding from your mouth!"

"Shut up."

Jiang Jiuyou's voice steadied again.

"All abandoned gunboats are connected. There are twenty-seven remnant shrine ships, and sixteen can be ignited."

Chen Chen gave only two words.

"Fire."

On the sea surface, Jiang Jiuyou bit her tongue, the taste of blood forcing her to stay awake.

At the secondary command console, she dragged the cursors of the sixteen remnant ships and five abandoned gunboats into the Fleet Link.

Mechanical Empress: Starport Resonance was pushed to the limit.

A half-sunken wreck raised its cannons first.

Then the second.

Then the third.

The shrine remnant forces had just charged out from behind the sea mist, and before they could form a formation, they were met with a volley of artillery fire.

Boom, boom, boom!

The dilapidated ship cannons roared in unison.

A wall of water was blasted up from the sea, and three speedboats were snapped in two on the spot.

Jiang Jiuyou wiped the blood from her lips, her icy blue pupils scanning the panel.

"Press the left flank."

"Number Nine remnant ship, ram it."

Iron Wall felt his scalp tingle.

"Ram?"

The next second, a nearly falling-apart shrine remnant ship was forcibly steered, trailing black smoke as it rammed into the enemy reinforcement fleet.

Fire erupted.

"Damn, that's a hell of a ram..."

"As long as it explodes, it's fine."

...

In the deepest part of the restricted altar room, Shen Wanbing and the High Priestess stood before a circular array.

In the center of the array, dozens of black-red cables were inserted into the wall.

At the other end of each cable was a suspended sacrifice.

Huaxia survivors.

Sakurajima locals.

There were even a few low-ranking shrine priestesses.

They were still alive, but their bodies were tethered by Spirit chains, their faces devoid of color.

The High Priestess gripped her bronze bell tightly.

"These beasts..."

After examining the array, Shen Wanbing furrowed her brows.

"We can't force a shutdown."

The High Priestess turned her head.

"What do you mean?"

"The sacrificial array is bound to their Spirit. If you shut it down now, the array core will backlash, and the Spirit of everyone tied to it will collapse."

The High Priestess's hand froze.

The dock outside shook again.

"Then what if we don't shut it down?"

"That Tier 5 Limb Projection will keep consuming energy."

The High Priestess's expression turned grim.

"So we only have two choices?"

Shen Wanbing raised her hand and pulled up the remote synchronization interface for the faith deprivation tower.

"There is a third option."

She quickly entered the frequency band.

"The faith deprivation tower will suppress the signal between the sacrificial array and the Sea God egg. I will cut the transmission channel, and you use the bronze bell to lock the array core."

The High Priestess stared at her.

"Are you sure you can cut it accurately? If you're off by even a little, these people will all die."

Shen Wanbing didn't even look at her.

"I never perform calculations I'm not certain about."

For the first time, the High Priestess didn't talk back.

Watching Shen Wanbing's fingers moving so fast on the panel that they left afterimages, she finally spoke in a low voice.

"Are the people around Chen Chen all this outrageous?"

Shen Wanbing's tone was steady.

"You'll get used to it."

A purple-black Mental Power field descended remotely.

The black-red patterns above the altar room began to distort.

Shen Wanbing seized that half-second window and pressed down sharply with her fingertip.

"Lock!"

The High Priestess shook the bronze bell.

No sound came from the bell, but a crisp cracking sound came from the center of the array.

Dozens of sacrifices fell down simultaneously; although unconscious, their chests were still rising and falling.

The High Priestess stared at the extinguished red light on the array core, her fingers tightening.

"It's broken."

Shen Wanbing immediately switched back to communication.

"Chen Chen, the sacrificial line is broken. The Tier 5 Limb Projection has lost its continuous power supply."

"Good."

Chen Chen's voice was steady.

"Get ready to watch the cannon fire."

...

The outer circle of the altar had been smashed into a mess.

Jiang Yanxue stood on the broken locking rack, her dark red pupils suppressing killing intent.

She twisted her wrist, and tangible killing intent spread out.

The shrine warriors rushing up all froze in their tracks.

A mere second.

That was enough.

The blade flashed horizontally, and three heads rolled into the sea.

Su Xiaoqi carried the entire whale bone pillar, running faster than a normal person without anything in their hands.

"Sister Xue! Move aside!"

Jiang Yanxue immediately stepped aside.

Su Xiaoqi swung the whale bone pillar, and with a loud bang, smashed the last sacrificial platform on the outer circle of the altar into pieces.

"Done!"

Blood Rose stood at a high vantage point, pressing pink poisonous mist into the ranks of the believers.

Several believers suddenly clutched their stomachs and screamed.

Black flesh eggs crawled out of their throats, but before they could crawl far, they were scorched and rolling from the poisonous mist.

Blood Rose looked down at the pile of things and clicked her tongue in disgust.

"So disgusting."

Behind the ruins of a tower in the distance, an old man wearing a gold-patterned shrine robe quietly raised his hand.

A small blood-red sun emerged in his palm.

Qin Hongye lay on the edge of a broken tower, her scope already locked on.

Distance, 13,000 meters.

The sea wind was chaotic.

The smoke and dust were chaotic.

She held her breath for half a beat and pulled the trigger.

The Gauss projectile passed through a gap in the broken tower and pierced the center of the High Priest's forehead.

The small blood-red sun hadn't even risen before it was extinguished.

Qin Hongye reloaded and said indifferently,

"The last Spirit center is gone."

In the public channel, the shrine remnant forces were in total chaos.

Some dropped their swords and jumped into the sea.

Others knelt and begged for mercy.

Su Xiaoqi turned back, carrying the whale bone pillar.

"Do we hit those who surrender?"

Jiang Yanxue wiped the blood off her blade.

"Tie them up first. We'll let Chen Chen pick later."

Blood Rose smiled even more happily.

"Give me the ones he doesn't pick to test my poison on."

A group of shrine believers who had just knelt down immediately started crawling backwards.

...

Sea Scale core area.

Mio connected the purification core to the No. 3 reaction ring.

Blue-white light lit up along the main cannon pipeline.

However, outside the main cannon energy well, there was a layer of sticky, polluted flesh.

Seeing that thing, Shen Wanxing's whole little face scrunched up.

"I have to touch it again?"

Chen Chen looked down at her.

"Yes."

"I feel like a little kitten that specializes in touching dirty things now."

"Wash your hands after you touch it."

"You said that last time, too."

"I'll wash them twice for you this time."

Shen Wanxing squatted down aggrievedly, carefully extending her fingers.

"Then you aren't allowed to think I'm dirty."

Chen Chen pressed her hand directly onto the interface.

"Stop stalling."

"Eek!"

Hum—

A golden-purple beam of light exploded in the core area.

The pollution layer on the main cannon energy well was dispersed by the light, and the originally fluctuating energy curve suddenly straightened.

[Lucky Critical triggered!]

[Main cannon energy well temporary transition: stable overload state!]

Mio looked at the screen, her electronic pupils shining like two light bulbs.

"This works too?!"

She turned her head sharply to look at Shen Wanxing.

"What are your hands made of?"

Shen Wanxing shrank back behind Chen Chen.

"I don't know either..."

Mio took a breath, forcing herself to return to the main console.

"The main cannon can fire."

"But there's a problem."

Chen Chen sat in the captain's chair.

"Speak."

"Recoil."

Mio pointed to the ship's structural diagram.

"Sea Scale has been broken before; the bow and the main hull are connected by a temporary framework.

Once the Deep Sea Fission Spear fires, the recoil will tear the ship in two."

"Solution."

"We need someone with extremely high Spirit attributes to manually suppress the recoil, replacing half of the shipboard AI stabilizer."

Mio looked at Chen Chen, her tone very heavy.

"This isn't as simple as pressing a button.

You have to connect your Mental Power into the nuclear reaction pipeline; if you can't hold it, your brain will explode first."

Shen Wanxing panicked.

"Then don't fire!"

Chen Chen didn't get up.

He pressed both hands onto the interfaces on either side of the captain's chair.

176 points of Mental Power roared into the main control system.

Silver Spirit tentacles spread along the bridge, pipelines, and reaction rings, forcibly wrapping around the main cannon's nuclear energy pulse.

Mio froze in place.

"You... you actually connected?"

Shen Wanbing's voice came over the communication.

"Chen Chen, the Tier 5 Limb Projection is closing in on the dock's outer wall."

On the screen, that black-red giant eye almost filled the entire frame.

It pressed against the outer layer of the dock, and blood-red patterns rotated in circles.

A Spirit roar charged directly into the channel.

"Door thief."

"Return the divine seed."

"Return your life."

Chen Chen raised his head, his finger landing on the main cannon activation key.

"Return your mom."

He pressed it.

[Deep Sea Fission Spear, activated.]

The broken bow of the Sea Scale expanded violently.

Three main weapon wells lit up simultaneously with blue-white nuclear light.

Chen Chen's Mental Power suppressed all recoil nodes like chains, and the hull emitted a teeth-grinding sound of distortion, but it did not break.

Mio stared at the panel, her voice rising.

"Charging 60 percent!"

"70!"

"90!"

"Fire!"

Boom—

A fission beam with a diameter of ten meters blasted out from the bow wreckage.

The seawater was torn apart.

The beam pierced directly into the black-red giant eye.

That Tier 5 Limb Projection let out a true shriek for the first time.

Half of its eyeball was pierced, and black-red blood sprayed from the rupture, staining the entire deep sea.

The tentacles wrapped around the outer wall of the dock broke off in patches.

A system prompt popped up.

[Obtained: Tier 5 Limb Pollution Sample x 1]

[Deep Sea Court hatred value significantly increased]

Just as Chen Chen released the interface, a low roar suddenly came from behind the seabed rift.

The sound did not come through the communication, but it caused the entire sea surface to sink a notch.

Jiang Jiuyou spoke urgently in the channel above.

"Chen Chen, the sea level in the Sakurajima Sea-Splitting War Zone is dropping!"

At the same time, an alarm came from Shen Wanbing's side.

"It's not a Limb Projection."

"The main body is reacting."

Mio suddenly rushed to the lowest level of the main console.

That shot just now had activated the Sea Scale's deep-layer black box.

An ancient coordinate popped up.

[Deep Sea Court main gate has opened.]

[Spatial frequency band matching...]

Shen Wanbing saw the frequency band, and her expression changed instantly.

"Chen Chen."

Chen Chen turned his head.

Shen Wanbing said word by word.

"That gate is not in Sakurajima."

"It is aimed at our cross-regional teleportation array frequency band."