"Whew."
A gentle breeze, carrying snowflakes, swept past. Lu Xing pulled himself out of the crater. Looking at the familiar figure in the distance, he now had two pieces of news, one good and one bad, to assess:
The good news was: the Shenzhou Tablet had arrived. The bad news was: Immortal Fu Hua was here.
Even if she wasn't one of the Thirteen Flame-Chasers yet, even if she hadn't obtained a Key of God, she wasn't even a Fusion Soldier—Lu Xing's [Spiritual Perception] gleaned no information from Hua—but as a member of a Fire Moth squad fighting on the front lines against the Honkai, and a martial artist who had rigorously trained in fist techniques since childhood, Hua's combat prowess, for a "human," was already terrifyingly formidable.
His eyes couldn't see it, but the feedback from his body was undeniable: the [Inch Force—Sky-Cleaving] just now had left a deep palm print embedded in Lu Xing's back. The armor of his shell had been caved in by half from that single palm strike! If the force had been just a bit stronger… this blow could have threatened Lu Xing's core.
Of course, before becoming a Fusion Soldier, no matter how strong one's physical body was, it was impossible to shatter a Honkai Beast's armor bare-handed (with certain exceptions). The reason Hua's strike achieved such an effect was thanks to the gauntlets on her hands.
They were black and white, with faintly drawn patterns of gold, red, and blue. Like Hua herself, because this item wasn't driven by Honkai energy, Lu Xing couldn't discern its specific grade or effects.
However, there was no doubt. Whatever this weapon was, it could inflict sufficient damage on Lu Xing.
The battle, where he previously held a slight advantage, had suddenly become unpredictable due to Hua's intervention.
This constituted the bad news.
As for why Hua's appearance also contained an element of good news… this related to Lu Xing's main mission. After killing 100 Armed Dolls, the System, as always, had directly issued the next stage's objective:
————
Mission: Kill a Plot Character.
Reward: All attributes +3, Level +1, Unlock Skill [Aura Domain: Ice]
————
The reward was excellent, even dream-worthy.
The problem was… when Lu Xing first saw this mission, he didn't even understand what a "Plot Character" actually referred to.
Until… beneath the mission description, an extra annotation, one he hadn't seen in a long time, appeared, which was also the list of mission targets:
Elysia, Kevin, Hua, Eden, Sakura, Destobier, Trace, Aponia, Mobius, Imer, Himeko.
"..."
Lu Xing looked at the eleven names, some familiar, some strange. After long contemplation, he finally extracted a somewhat useful piece of information from the plot details he knew weren't entirely comprehensive.
"The characters on the System's list…"
"...all seem to be important characters with plot relevance who appeared between the Seventh and Eighth Honkai Eruptions."
This list was outrageous. After examining it very carefully again and again, Lu Xing finally realized that the characters he dared to target (characters he might encounter and have a chance of defeating) seemed to be only Hua, Eden, and Himeko.
The others… he either had no chance of encountering them, or he wouldn't be able to defeat them even if he did.
However, this wasn't the most significant issue.
Regardless of whether it was Hua, Eden, or Himeko, whichever one of them Lu Xing killed would mean that the plot of the Pre-Honkai Era he was in would hurtle in a direction unfamiliar to him.
Not only that, if he managed to survive until the next Era, the world at that time would probably no longer be the one Lu Xing was familiar with. His advantage as a transmigrator… apart from the System, likely nothing else could be relied upon.
This wasn't a checkmate situation, but the choices it presented were truly difficult to decide upon.
When he first learned of the mission, Lu Xing was completely unable to make a choice. But… things were different now.
Leave fate to the heavens: fight whoever he encountered!
Returning to the present moment. Hua had appeared before Lu Xing. Class Rep, Shenzhou Tablet, Immortal Cinder, Chlorine Fluoride… a familiar face stood on the completely opposite side, with no room for even communication.
For Lu Xing, the meaning of this battle was different from any previous one.
What he could do—
"Pat."
He brushed the dust off his body. Lu Xing casually pulled out the longsword and knight lance that were crossed and embedded in the ground before him. Facing the five opponents, he once again assumed the opening stance for a thrust.
On the battlefield, the relationship between humans and Honkai Beasts… was simply kill or be killed. Nothing more.
————
"BOOM!!"
While Lu Xing confronted Hua and the Armed Dolls, the battlefield situation was undergoing drastic changes: the Legion's advance was accelerating. The human front line was likely less than ten minutes away from being breached.
The FT-70 "Phantom" tanks had threatened the existence of Temple-class Honkai Beasts. This caused "Frost Lightning," an entity usually known for its extreme composure, to completely erupt, displaying a formidable strength far exceeding its "colleagues." Frost Lightning was equally proficient in the long-range energy cannon skill mastered by both Cruiser-class and Chariot-class beasts.
The reason it had never used it before was simply because no opponent had been worthy of it unleashing this move.
Since its perception struggled to accurately lock onto the "Phantoms" on the battlefield, then it would simply plow through every possible location they might exist—after fully entering combat mode, the Temple-class's mindset had also become irritable.
[Disintegration Ray]
This move, whose name Lu Xing had only seen in his [Spiritual Perception], displayed its terrifying destructive power on the battlefield for the first time.
A blood-red light shone in its single eye. The mere wind-up for the skill triggered a hurricane no less intense than a Category 12 storm in front of the Temple-class beast; as deeper energies were mobilized, the hurricane became thoroughly crimson. A Honkai energy tornado, connecting heaven and earth, blazed across the sky, then, at its most extreme instant, surged entirely into its eye!
"VOOOOM!!"
A crimson pillar of light swept across the human formation.
The next instant—
"BOOOOM!!!"
Indescribable. The terrifying explosion even turned the air into a plasma state.
A colossal fireball rose into the sky, rampant lightning snaked ceaselessly, and the horrifying shockwave directly flattened several kilometers of land!
Frost Lightning. This Legion Leader and Variant Temple-class, with a single strike, had annihilated over one-tenth of the human forces, including 26 FT-70 "Phantom" tanks!
Unfortunately… Frost Lightning didn't know. This strike, while a rare opportunity for the Legion, was equally so for the humans.
Unleashing a [Disintegration Ray] of this magnitude had directly consumed a massive amount of the Temple-class's Honkai energy reserves. Even its own keen senses had dropped to their lowest point at this moment.
Less than a hundred meters away from it, a man, rising from amidst the corpses of his comrades, was raising a bright red long spear high, charging madly towards Frost Lightning!
If anyone else were still alive, they would surely see the abnormality of his arm—skin, muscle, and even bone were all beginning to flake off piece by piece like shattered glass. His right arm, along with half of his body, already looked no different from a Honkai Beast.
However, none of this could halt the man's steps. Compared to the deaths of his comrades, compared to the myriad of lights from the homes behind him… this bit of mutation and pain was simply nothing.
The instant the distance closed to 50 meters!
"Uraaaaaaagh!!!!!"
That crimson streak, with the man's forceful hurl, sliced straight through the sky—
"Pfft!"