Free Web NovelChapter 1187: Chapter 186: Virulent Poison
Like a meteor crashing to the earth,
the Obsidian Mecha holding the Heart Monkey Staff descended from the sky and struck the rocky shore of Yellowstone Lake.
Boom!!!
The rocks trembled violently, countless fragments scattered like bullets, tearing apart the military drones surrounding Yellowstone Lake in an instant,
The mighty impact stirred the radioactive dust-laden soil, causing it to rise once more skyward in massive waves.
The Bugman civilization once again lost control over the Yellowstone Volcano site,
Their high-altitude Unmanned Scout Drones captured one last image before being swallowed by the radioactive dust—a violent upheaval of soil at the edge of Yellowstone National Park, as if countless massive Dust World Pythons were burrowing underneath.
This is the Alchemy Array.
Li Ang used the rocky surface as a canvas, swamp god power-infused vines as ink, and the Heart Monkey Staff as a brush to finish the last point of this giant Alchemy Array.
Under the influence of the Alchemy Array,
The power of the Obsidian Mecha wielding the Heart Monkey Staff was transferred layer by layer, penetrating deep into the volcano via the rock strata.
An immeasurable magnitude of energy was accurately delivered eight kilometers underground, to the edge of the magma reservoir.
The heavy rock layers compressed and collided under the enormous force, like a chain reaction,
Finally—
Tssss!
A gray column of gas suddenly rose above the surface of Yellowstone Lake.
Then came the second, the third...
More and more columns of gas burst forth from beneath the lake surface, mixed with vast amounts of dust, spilling a dirty black shade into the already turbid waters.
Crack crack—
The lake bed and floor ripped and shattered under the pressure of the gas columns, and torrents of hot rock surged from the cracks.
Yellowstone Volcano doesn’t have distinct volcanic peaks; the eruption zone stretches 15 miles east-west and 50 miles north-south around Yellowstone Lake,
The entire Yellowstone National Park is a singular volcano.
And it’s gathering strength now.
"No..."
The American Bugman Soldiers observing from afar felt the ground violently trembling beneath their feet, shaking up dust and losing stones,
Trees around them shuddered, dropping endless leaves,
The forest’s birds, deer, bears, cattle, and other animals sensed impending doom and frantically fled the woods, away from Yellowstone Lake.
Even the seemingly invincible and fearsome Fenix Pit Beast retracted its chained hammer,
Its two powerful legs heavily bent, the body spring-like, leaping toward the direction of the volcanic vent.
It wasn’t recklessly diving into danger, but instinctively rushing toward safety—toward its master.
Rumble!
A massive noise exploded at the bottom of Yellowstone Lake,
Tens of cracks spread out from the lake’s center, reaching in all directions,
The dust storm rising from the fissures even obscured the lingering nuclear blast mushroom cloud.
"Run! Run fast!"
American Bugman Soldiers hiding at the forest’s edge shivered intensely; they ignored malfunctioning, buzzing communication devices and dove into the vehicles they arrived in.
"Go Go Go! Drop the weapons! Drive fast!"
The Bugman commander shouted hoarsely and desperately, as the ten armored cars at the forest edge reversed and turned, racing down the rocky road.
Riot tires spun and rolled over dirt and debris,
The armored cars accelerated, bypassing the panicking cattle herd, then the deer and brown bears,
The Bugman Soldiers in the vehicles watched through rearview mirrors, seeing the black columns of smoke rising higher behind them, with bits of debris constantly flung from the sky.
Crack crack crack.
Suddenly, dense sounds like hailstones pelting the ground echoed around the armored vehicles,
Making circular ripples on the dusty earth.
Is it raining?
One Bugman Soldier subconsciously poked his head out of the passenger seat,
The next second, his skull exploded,
Red and white brain matter was swept back into the car by the gale outside, strewing across half the windshield.
It was...volcanic floating rock.
Floating volcanic rock from the lava columns, swept up from the high-pressure magma chamber, with quantities reaching billions,
They fell from the sky like raindrops, showering every corner of Yellowstone National Park.
The ten armored vehicles resembled tiny boats in the ocean,
The floating rocks continually crushed the fleeing animal herds, dented vehicle roofs, broke through bulletproof glass, and claimed the lives of the Bugman Soldiers within.
"Lord, incline Your ear to hear Your servant’s prayer, and delight in the prayers of Your humble and fearful servants, grant Your servant success this day, before the king’s grace. I am the king’s cupbearer..."
"For in the Gospel the righteousness of God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: The righteous will live by faith..."
A Bugman Soldier took out a cross and recited The Bible with bewildered fear,
If it were any other occasion, such behavior would definitely be mocked by fellow soldiers—Bugman civilization was built upon humanity’s corpses, and only a few ignorant Bugmen continued to believe myths created by humanity.
But now, there’s no laughter in the vehicle,
All Bugman Soldiers clung to whatever they could inside the car, feeling the vehicle’s bumps, silently watching him clutch the crucifix, listening to his chaotic prayers mixed with the sound of floating rocks striking the roof.
Would human gods truly have mercy on Bugmen?
The frequency of rock tremors grew faster, and the falling rocks grew larger and heavier, stained a red hue by magma.
Enormous trees, thick as several men could embrace, fell and broke amidst the land’s unrest.
The armored cars repeatedly failed to evade, collided with falling trees, lost control, only to be swallowed by scalding floating rocks and rolling earth from behind.
"Quickly, quickly!"
The Bugman soldier driving, shouted with a hoarse voice.
He desperately twisted the steering wheel, maneuvering the vehicle to avoid tree after tree, swiftly overtaking his comrade’s cars ahead, doing everything to prevent looking back at the increasingly close dust clouds in the rear mirror.
Exit,
They could already see a side exit of Yellowstone National Park,
Don’t stop,
If they could just reach that place...
Bang!
A massive floating rock, as tall as a person, struck the vehicle’s hood,
The car flipped into the air, spinning mid-flight.
Time seemed to freeze,
The driver shouting desperately, the other Bugman believer reciting The Bible with closed eyes, and the displaced and bewildered Bugman Soldiers,
captured one section of a disaster photo titled "Natural Disaster".
The next second,
The vehicle slammed into the ground, together with the Bugmen inside crushed into meat pulp, completely consumed by an overflowing wave of dust from behind.
————
"..."
In the underground top-secret bunkers of London, Berlin, Paris, Moscow, Tokyo, and Washington, there was a dead silence.
All the Bugmen were staring blankly at the screen displaying the majestic natural disaster.
The sky formed by black smoke connected with the clouds, pouring down towards the earthly realm.
The scorching hot volcanic ash, part of it like a sandstorm, pushed horizontally together with the lava,
while another part swept into the sky, continuing to spread.
"A super Plinian eruption..."
The volcanologist said bitterly, "The worst-case scenario has occurred. This eruption could spew out two thousand cubic kilometers of volcanic material. The 90,000 American Bugmen residents around Yellowstone will die instantly, and even if they hide in bunkers, it won’t help—
the magma and volcanic ash covering the surface could be over ten meters, even dozens or hundreds of meters high, enough to suffocate them in their cellars.
Immense volcanic ash will shroud the skies above Wyoming within hours,
and in the following dozen hours, it will drift to every corner of America with the monsoon.
The global climate will also be greatly affected; temperatures will drop, climate zones will change, old ocean currents will disappear, and new ones will form,
the number of extinct marine and terrestrial species will be calculated in ’tens of thousands’.
Regardless of which of the two higher-dimensional existences wins or loses,
the Bugman civilization and the entire Earth’s ecosystem will suffer greatly..."
The volcanologist’s eyes were vacant, muttering to himself as if in a dream, until a colleague beside him shook him heavily, gradually bringing him back to reality.
But the disaster was not over.
In the near-Earth orbit monitoring satellite, Li Ang’s image appeared.
He retracted the Heart Monkey Staff and the severely damaged Obsidian Mecha, stepping on an invisible staircase, floating over the ink-black volcanic smoke pillar, gazing up at the vast sky, as if confronting the monitoring satellite in space.
His eyes carried no intimidation, no contempt, only a serene calmness like the wind and clouds.
As if accidentally stepping on an ant by the roadside.
Swoosh—
Li Ang slowly raised his palm, casually slashing in the void, and took out a... strange object.
The object was indeed strange, overall spherical, with a diameter approaching twenty meters,
its surface colorful, with a lot of murky colors, like a painter’s abandoned palette.
The orbit monitoring satellite zoomed in, the clear image revealing that the sphere’s edge seemed to have protruding limbs like those of a reptile,
and then, Li Ang took out a rather ordinary-looking short dagger from the void.
[Virulent Poison]
This weapon, acquired by Li Ang long ago, reappeared in the world of dust once more.
"I do wonder, what will this world finally become..."
Li Ang murmured lightly to himself, slashing a deep cut into the spherical object with the Virulent Poison.
Bang!
As if a balloon full of air suddenly deflated,
the twenty-meter diameter unknown sphere released a large amount of yellow-green thick smoke, merging with the rapidly spreading volcanic ash below, drifting afar with the wind.
AIM guessed right, Li Ang indeed has multiple plans for world annihilation,
besides the Pale World, there is also the sphere in his hands named the World’s Evil.
Over a long period, this sphere had been scratched countless times by the Virulent Dagger,
its interior harboring thousands upon thousands of known human viruses, which, in mutual warfare and competition, constantly mutated and transformed, evolving into bizarre existences even Li Ang couldn’t fully comprehend.
The virus culture vessel sphere named the World’s Evil, could only maintain its activity under the effect of the Origin of Life, and now, it was the first time it was truly unleashing its power.
Sizzle, sizzle—
The thick smoke transformed from its initial yellow-green to a peach hue, then to a pink, seeming inexhaustible, inexhaustibly consuming.
Li Ang, holding the World’s Evil that constantly released unknown toxins in his left hand, retracted the Virulent Short Sword with his right, looking up again at the scout satellite in the sky, snapping his fingers.
Vines extended from his sleeve, forming giant texts beside him for the monitoring satellite to capture.
[Now, I give you one last opportunity]
[Fire intercontinental missiles at your major cities, eradicate fifty million Bugmen, and I will leave on my own]
[Countdown, 120 seconds]
The vine-formed texts continuously changed, finally turning into a numerical countdown.
119,
118,
...
The Bugman decision-makers fell into collective panic, not knowing what the sphere releasing the colored gas was, but their intuition told them,
The Bugman civilization was riding the train to extinction.
"What do we do? Is what he said true? Will he really leave?"
"What exactly is that sphere? Why does it look so much like... a, a person?"
"Should we fire nukes? Where is AIM? Where is he exactly?"
The sounds of discussion and arguments rose and fell,
A leader yelled harshly, ordering all Bugmen to quiet down, picked up the phone, and dialed the encrypted numbers of several other nuclear-armed state leaders.
"...Is AIM still silent?"
"So, do we compromise?"
"I understand. I support it."
The leader hung up, looking at his subordinates in the underground facility, sighed deeply, and said softly: "Prepare.
Launch missiles towards Africa and South America.
There are no nukes or dead-hand systems there, it’s enough."
The conference room once again fell into a dead silence, as if several seconds had passed, or perhaps a century, finally, a Bugman snapped out of it, each pounced on the phone, sending top-secret orders to overseas nuclear submarines.
The Bugman civilization cannot perish, at least, not entirely.
————
"Ah..."
At the bottom of the Atlantic, a moss-covered rock slowly opened its eyes.
It was AIM.
The rock contracted, transforming into the shape of a man in a suit,
he slowly exhaled a turbid breath, the bubble slowly rising in the sea to the surface.
"It seems, I’ve lost after all..."
AIM shook his head and sighed, during these few hours, he dared not release any energy to the outside world, nor did he dare to perform any manipulations on the electronic information network, which he had mastered most,
even now, when Li Ang obviously released some massive consuming skills, he still dared not seek out the opponent for an opportunity to attack.
"It’s time to end this."
AIM pushed off the sea bottom, his form shot out from the surface, floating mid-air, once again activating Electron Ghost mode, linking to the World Wide Web.
The next second, the nuclear missile silos on standby in Europe and America came to a halt, their launches canceled,
while at the edge of Yellowstone National Park, a high-speed scout drone was also commandeered by AIM, silently vanishing within the US military network.
That high-speed unmanned scout drone entered the scalding volcanic ash, AIM remotely empowering it, allowing it to disregard the scorching, highly radioactive ash-filled sky, slowly heading towards Li Ang’s position and pausing a hundred meters ahead of him.
"Finally, we meet, Mr. Li Ang."
