Uncle Shu, who had once cooked potato soup for him, was picked up and hurled back down by a monster. His body hit the ground hard, and his gaze froze while blood flowed from the rims of his eyes.
On the blood-covered ground, death was everywhere.
In his eyes, everything slowed down. An Zhe took another step forward.
"Don't…" Uncle Shu rasped, and he let out a few heart-wrenching coughs. "Don't kill yourself…"
A creature's instinct was to live, and a species' instinct was to perpetuate itself.
Humankind had never gone gentle into that good night.
Facing the Simpson cage, An Zhe also felt the terror of impending death at last. He looked at Uncle Shu and softly asked him—though it seemed like he was asking himself, "But will you all still be able to keep living?"
Uncle Shu's consciousness was already fading. He slowly shook his head, then looked toward the distant horizon.
His gaze suddenly became fixed in place. After two seconds of silence, he suddenly broke out into a few wheezing laughs, and an excited expression showed on his face.
A low droning that was different from the monsters' howls came from the sky, and An Zhe suddenly looked up.
Above the resplendent golden horizon, a neatly arranged group of distant black shadows were coming smoothly toward the research institute, leaving behind long and feathery trails as they flew through the clouds.
"Air… airplanes," An Zhe heard Uncle Shu say.
He knew those were airplanes. Looking up at the familiar shapes, An Zhe suddenly felt a wholehearted joy.
They hadn't sent any distress signal to the Northern Base, but the Northern Base's fighter fleet had come to aid the research institute. In a conversation with Tang Lan not long ago, Pauli had urged them to disregard old grievances and go help the base when the research institute no longer existed. But now, it was the base who had disregarded old grievances and come to help the research institute.
Right at the time when everything was destined to end.
Pauli's words were correct. His species was both contemptible yet noble. You could make conjectures about humans' actions using the greatest ill intent, or you could believe to the maximum extent in humans' kindness and leniency.
But the artificial magnetic pole had failed, so what would happen to the base?
What would happen to Lu Feng? Or did the base no longer exist? Where would he be? He knew that Lu Feng would give up everything for the base until the day the base no longer needed him.
A trickle of tears fell from An Zhe's eyes. In this vast Judgment Day, his love and hatred seemed all but worthless. Lu Feng had his own mission, and he himself had his own destiny.
He took another step.
“Boom.”
A micro nuclear bomb was released from the PL1109's bomb bay, and with a tremendous noise, it cut off the upward trajectory of the monsters below. The mountain peak—such a mountain peak was bound to become a target, but it was also bound to be easy to defend and difficult to attack.
"Open the cabin door," a cold and calm voice said.
"Prepare your hang gliders."
"There's a bit of an issue. Please wait a moment," the flight technician said.
The fighter plane was nosediving, and the cabin door creaked as it opened mechanically.
Lu Feng accepted the hang glider that a soldier handed over.
"You're going down?" Hubbard asked.
"Mm-hm," Lu Feng said.
"When aiding the Underground City, it was for humankind's interests." Hubbard looked at him. "What about now? Will the Trial Court come to help the xenogenics?"
Lu Feng only watched as this mercenary team captain also accepted a hang glider and started adjusting it. He asked flatly, "And why are you here?"
"I don't know." Hubbard murmured. "I just felt that I would regret it if I didn't come."
“Click.”
The cabin door sprang open.
"Good heavens." The flight technician backed up. "A fire? What is that?"
Fierce winds poured in from the outside, and Lu Feng looked down as he stood at the cabin exit.
Suddenly, he was stunned.
In front of the sea of flames, An Zhe lifted his head and looked at the visitors from the Northern Base.
At that moment, it seemed as if time had come to a standstill.
One looked at the other, and the other looked back.
An Zhe began to tremble violently as he directly met Lu Feng's eyes.
Their parting had been planned out long in advance, but their meeting was beyond all expectations.
But he hadn't expected to see Lu Feng here, and he knew that Lu Feng hadn't expected to see him here either.
The wind raised by the fighter plane clawed at the edges of his clothes. In a movement that seemed unconscious, he slowly reached out.
In that manner, those green eyes gazed at him. The Arbiter, whose mission was to exterminate xenogenics, had come to aid the Fusion Faction's base, and a monster was standing in the exact center of the humans' research institute.
The whole thing was absurd, but the glorious morning sunlight came pouring down, and they suddenly became brightly lit in each other's eyes.
Indeed, Lu Feng was this sort of person.
An Zhe's eyes curved as he smiled at Lu Feng. In his limited memory, he had never shown such an expression to Lu Feng before.
They were separated by such a long distance, but he saw those green eyes slowly become suffused with a smile as well—seemingly containing infinite tenderness.
A gunshot rang out as Hubbard fired at a monster in the air. The fighter planes dropped uranium shells in the vicinity of the research institute in a fierce bombardment, and the sounds of combat, explosions, and howling combined into a grand noise that merged with this symphony from the universe's depths.
But the monsters from the Abyss continually surged forth.
The sandstorms that followed the magnetic field's disappearance were almost here.
The last human territory was falling.
Humankind—was on the verge of extinction.
They locked eyes for a long time, seemingly erecting the deepest mutual hatred, yet also seemingly dispelling past grievances in an instant.
On this day, they would once again be together and once again, freely—
Freely—
An Zhe slowly closed his eyes and leaned forward.
Like a leaf fallen from its branch withering in late autumn.
In the raging blaze of the Simpson cage, at the moment when the morning sun was slowly rising and the setting sun of humankind was slowly sinking, his body turned into swirls of glittering dust that dispersed, fluttered in the air, and ended.
In the laboratory, on the screen that was covered with visual noise, those trembling and erratic dots suddenly gathered together and spun. The analysis program started up, and three seconds later, several slowly intertwining frequency curves appeared little by little on the screen.
As though it were destiny.
While looking at the parameters jumping on the screen, Pauli Jones switched the communication channel to the emergency channel connected to the Northern Base and Underground City Base. Without knowing if they could hear him, he suppressed the tremor in his voice and spoke.
"This is the Highland Research Institute."
"Please adjust the emission frequencies of the artificial magnetic poles."
"Channel A1, 2, 5, 2.7."
"Channel A2, 9.13, 5, 3, 1."
"Channel D3, 4, 0, 7."
"Runge wave, level 6."
"Adams property, lattice 3."
"Configuration complete, please activate."
"Repeat."
"Channel A1, 2, 5, 2.7."
"Channel A2, 9.13, 5, 3, 1."
"Channel D3…"
Behind him, Rum finished adjusting those parameters with near-trembling fingers and pressed the round button in the middle.
The tops of the white towers at either of the Highland Research Institute shone with glaring light.
Imperceptible silent waves radiated outward like ripples from between the two white towers.
In the east and west, the humans' two magnetic poles emitted grand waves.
Like the first bell toll of the new year.
Everything fell silent.