Dozens of large transport helicopters landed at the edge of the Antu rainforest, and thousands of fully armed Beixing soldiers with camouflage paint on their faces assembled in formation.
Meanwhile, multifunctional combat vehicles kept arriving, loaded with spider-type drones designed for reconnaissance in complex terrain. The total force had reached regimental scale.
The on-site commander was none other than Dragon Soul. He ordered the assembled soldiers: "Drones will conduct reconnaissance first. Once enemy movement traces are found, all personnel will enter the rainforest."
Suroma had teleported so many large war mechs into the rainforest that when they walked from inside to outside, they would inevitably trample down countless trees and carve out a road wide enough for an entire army to march through.
Now, all the Beixing military had to do was find that road, then trace it backward to locate the giant teleportation gate.
Dragon Soul said in a deep voice: "The enemy must have units stationed to guard the teleportation gate. If you detect any hostile movement from the enemy, you are authorized to open fire. I repeat, authorized to open fire!"
The soldiers' spirits lifted, and their grips on their weapons tightened.
The Beixing military had always been cautious in handling foreign forces and would basically never initiate fire first.
But this time, with the higher-ups enraged, the restrictions had undoubtedly been lifted. There was no need to wait for the enemy to fire first. As long as they judged that the enemy showed any hostile intent, even just raising a gun barrel half an inch, they could open fire directly.
"Begin the operation."
At Dragon Soul's command, drone operators deployed over a thousand spider-type drones into the rainforest, scattering to search for the trail left by the Suroma army.
The rainforest was vast, but the road carved out by the large mechs was extremely wide. Combined with the sheer number of drones, it only took a few minutes before one of them found something.
"Found it!" The operator immediately reported to Dragon Soul. "The location has been synced to the positioning system."
"Good."
Dragon Soul glanced at the location, then immediately dispatched soldiers and combat vehicles to rush to that area and enter the rainforest, aiming to reach the end of the trail at the fastest possible speed and find that giant teleportation gate.
Before entering the rainforest, Dragon Soul glanced toward the northwest.
Bandzhen was in that direction. At this moment, the sky over that distant land had turned into an extraordinarily strange deep black.
Dragon Soul had received war training and was intimately familiar with the power of various weapons and the consequences they produced.
He knew that the deep black sky above Bandzhen was caused by radioactive dust generated by the nuclear explosion, and that this dust cloud would turn into black rain.
Silver Fox and the others...
Dragon Soul knew that Silver Fox's team's mission was to go to the nuclear explosion site to find Guan Tong, and that they weren't taking transport planes but were moving using teleportation-type items.
That meant they should have already arrived there for a while now... Being in such an extreme and harsh environment, coupled with the fact that Suroma's main force this time was also deployed in Bandzhen, undoubtedly made him somewhat worried.
But he quickly withdrew his gaze and turned to enter the rainforest.
He was a soldier whose duty was to obey orders. Since his superiors had given him the order to seize control of the teleportation gate, he had to execute it resolutely.
...
Before the teleportation completed, Silver Fox and the others appeared at the city's edge.
The moment they stepped onto that land, a violent sense of discomfort spread through their entire bodies.
Dense white rain was falling from the sky, pattering loudly against everyone.
They knew this was no ordinary rain. It was "radiation rain" formed by the combination of low-temperature air currents and radioactive particles from before the nuclear explosion, carrying extreme harm to the human body.
Silver Fox and the others all looked at Bai Xuewu with concern. The rest of them were all wearing full radiation-resistant suits, but Bai Xuewu wasn't wearing one.
Surprisingly, however, it seemed as if there was an invisible energy shield surrounding Shi Jingyi. The black rain was blocked and deflected by the shield the moment it touched her skin, never actually reaching her.
No wonder she told Zhang Minglu she didn't need a radiation-resistant suit...
They marveled at Shi Jingyi's defensive capabilities, but when it came to themselves, they found that even wearing radiation-resistant suits couldn't completely eliminate the effects of the environment.
Especially when they looked out and saw nothing but ruins and scorched earth everywhere, with Sakura Prayer bodies covered in festering blisters scattered all around, the sheer visual impact alone was something ordinary people couldn't handle.
Even though Silver Fox and the others had been on many missions and seen many corpses, at this moment they still felt an uncontrollable panic.
"This... are they all dead... the whole city..." Yang Ran spoke with difficulty, her voice trembling uncontrollably.
At this moment, Shi Jingyi looked toward the east. With a light tap of her toes, her body shot forward at high speed.
"Dean Shi!"
Silver Fox didn't expect Shi Jingyi to leave the group and cried out in surprise.
Zhao Ming quickly said, "She might have a way to know Guan Tong's exact location. Let's catch up!"
"Alright!"
Silver Fox agreed, and the group immediately gave chase.
As a result, apart from Silver Fox who could keep up with Shi Jingyi thanks to her Godspeed ability, the other three were left far behind within two seconds.
"You two, stand on my hand." After Bai Xuewu spoke, a flash of electric light appeared before her eyes, and the "Snow Traces" mech descended from the sky in an instant.
Zhao Ming and Yang Ran immediately stepped onto the mech's palm together.
Bai Xuewu manipulated the mech to activate its jet thrusters. With a thunderous roar and a long tail of flames, the mech surged forward in a high-speed dive.
What shocked Zhao Ming and Yang Ran the most was that even though the mech they were riding was already extremely fast, it was still slightly inferior to Silver Fox and Shi Jingyi.
They both knew about Silver Fox's Godspeed ability. In terms of pure speed, she was unquestionably the "number one" among all Ascendants at the base.
But the fact that Shi Jingyi also possessed such terrifying speed, so fast that even Bai Xuewu's mech couldn't catch up, was simply absurd.
The five of them moved at extreme speed and arrived at their target location before long.
In that instant, all five froze in place. The scene before them was utterly staggering.
Over a hundred war mechs as tall as skyscrapers, and tens of thousands of armed robots, had all been sliced apart into stripped cables and metal fragments, almost covering the entire landscape. Many were still flashing with electric sparks.
And mixed in among them were thousands of human corpses.
The corpses were all Suroma's modified Ascendants. Almost every face was frozen in an expression of wide-open mouth and bulging eyes, undoubtedly having died in extreme terror and agony.
The black rain poured down on these corpses and metal remains. The pattering sound was like a requiem, telling of the brutality of this war graveyard.
The five of them were all struck speechless by the sight before them, their bodies stiff.
They couldn't imagine what kind of horrifying battle had taken place here before their arrival.
Shi Jingyi was the first to snap out of it. She clenched her teeth slightly, dashed into the graveyard in a single bound, and looked around for that figure.
The other four also came to their senses. Silver Fox's voice trembled as she said, "Quick, find where Guan Tong is..."
Before she even finished speaking, she saw Shi Jingyi rush to a spot where a figure covered in bloodstains was kneeling on one knee amid the wreckage of a mech, both hands covering their eyes.
It's him!
"Little Tong!"
Shi Jingyi arrived beside Guan Tong in an instant and called out to him.
Hearing her voice, Guan Tong's entire body shuddered. His hands slowly lowered, but then immediately pressed tightly against his eyes again. His voice was hoarse: "Don't come closer! Jingyi, stay away from me!"
"Little Tong, you..."
Shi Jingyi's expression changed drastically. In that brief moment when Guan Tong's palms had slowly lowered, she caught a glimpse of a red light refracting from his eyes.
Before she could ask, Silver Fox and the others also rushed over.
Seeing Guan Tong covered in bloodstains and oddly covering his eyes, they were all shocked and confused.
Silver Fox carefully asked, "Guan Tong? We're here to help you. How are you doing right now?"
"All of you, leave... immediately!"
Guan Tong's suppressed roar came out, and everyone felt something was very wrong.
At this moment, Shi Jingyi turned to the others and said, "Listen to him. Immediately keep your distance!"
"Dean Shi, do you know what's going on?" Silver Fox asked quickly.
Bai Xuewu and the other two also looked at her with curiosity and solemnity. They could tell Guan Tong's condition was very wrong, but they didn't know what was happening. Even if they wanted to help, they had no idea where to start.
Shi Jingyi's expression was grave: "There might be something wrong with his eyes. I need to talk to him alone. Don't ask any more questions for now!"
Shi Jingyi rarely displayed such an authoritative side. When Silver Fox and the others heard that something was wrong with Guan Tong's eyes, they knew it was a serious matter and immediately retreated some distance to watch from afar.
Once the others had withdrawn, Shi Jingyi crouched beside Guan Tong, gently patted his back, and suppressed her heartache as she said softly, "Little Tong, it's alright. I'm here. What exactly happened to your eyes?"
"Jingyi..."
Guan Tong's voice was hoarse and bitter.
"I can't control it anymore... the power of Scarlet Fear. I can't get my eyes back to normal..."