Kieran stared at the scanner emitting a faint blue light, his pupils shrinking behind his glasses.
Time waited for no one! Gary could discover the anomaly on mining planet K9 at any moment and turn back.
He reached back, pulled the high-frequency particle gun from his belt, and pushed its power to the limit. Pressing the muzzle against the control panel, he pulled the trigger without hesitation.
The beam pierced through the glowing blue scanner, and a burnt smell filled the air. As the metal melted, red lights erupted all across the A1 core zone. Alarms blared down the corridors, and the emergency indicator lights on the walls flashed wildly.
The patrolling guards stopped in their tracks, looking at each other in dismay. The communication channels descended into chaos.
"Alarm in the A1 core zone! Highest level!"
"Team One, Team Two, go check the situation immediately!"
The orders were given, but none of the guard squads at the end of the corridor dared to take a single step forward.
Most of them only had A-rank or B-rank spiritual power. Normally, they had to take a detour just to get near the A1 zone, let alone now. That was the radiation zone of a 3S-rank on the verge of going berserk; to them, it was a deadly poison.
"Sir..." A young B-rank soldier swallowed hard, his hand trembling as he gripped his gun. "That's the Commander-in-Chief's isolation room. With the current radiation levels... getting closer is just suicide!"
The leading officer's face turned livid. He cursed, "Call Adjutant Gary! Hurry! Tell him to come back immediately!"
The elevator forced itself open amidst sparks and a pungent burnt smell.
Kieran dropped the depleted particle gun at his feet, straightened his messy cuffs, and stepped into the cabin.
The elevator descended rapidly. The moment the doors opened, Kieran stepped out impatiently.
Suddenly, a crushing weight poured down from all directions, mercilessly smashing onto his back.
His eardrums bulged, his temples throbbed violently, and his kneecaps let out a groan of unbearable strain.
He crashed face-first onto the metal grid floor with a dull thud, a strong metallic taste of blood welling up deep in his throat.
He spat out a mouthful of blood, its redness glaring.
It is over.
Kieran lay in the pool of blood, his mind entirely consumed by those words.
Baal was fine! This monster was staring right at him!
Cold sweat soaked his shirt as he waited for his execution. One second, two seconds, half a minute passed. Other than the bone-crushing gravity, no actual attack came.
Gritting his teeth, Kieran forced himself to look up, his gaze locking onto the fully transparent isolation wall straight ahead.
Baal was collapsed on the bed. The once lofty Commander-in-Chief of the Federation was now in a wretched state. His black hair was a mess, and his golden pupils were unfocused and dull.
The massive body of the giant python was also rolling around in agony beside him.
The drug's effect had reached its peak.
To suppress this berserk energy capable of destroying half a planet, Baal had mobilized all of his spiritual power. He could not spare even the slightest bit of strength to deal with an external enemy.
Even the heavens were helping him. So what if the particle gun was out of energy? All he needed to do now was crawl back to the elevator, go up to the surface, and connect to the military's highest frequency communication channel.
He had even prepared his speech.
"Adjutant Gary concealed the Commander-in-Chief's true condition with the intent to rebel. I noticed the anomaly, ventured deep into the underground isolation room, and found that Commander-in-Chief Baal has gone completely berserk and lost his mind."
According to Federation military regulations, once a 3S-rank male went completely berserk, heavy mechas must be deployed to forcibly drag him into outer space for exile in order to protect the base.
Gary would face a court-martial, and Baal would become space junk.
As for Jiang Lijin...
That stupid woman was nothing more than a shield pushed out by Gary. Once he took control of the situation, he just needed to show her a little tenderness and promise to clear her name. Then she would obediently kneel at his feet just like before, devotedly acting as his accessory.
Thinking of this, Kieran felt the pain in his bones lessen significantly.
Using both his hands and feet, he struggled to drag himself across the floor. Every meter he crawled felt like moving forward with a mountain on his back. Cold sweat drenched his shirt, and the expensive fabric was covered in dust and blood, but he did not care.
Victory was right before his eyes!
His fingertips finally touched the edge of the elevator cabin. Just as he was about to roll inside...
"Ding—"
Another hidden elevator made a soft sound, and its doors opened.
Kieran had miscalculated again. He had not expected Jiang Lijin to come, but he did not panic at all.
Following the pair of shoes upward with his gaze, he saw Jiang Lijin with one hand in her pocket and the other holding a half-finished canned drink.
Under this terrifying oppressive force, she was merely a little pale.
Kieran's pupils shrank violently. Was this the strength of a 3S-rank female?
He had to have her. This thought was stronger than ever before.
"Oh," Jiang Lijin spoke, her tone carrying undisguised mockery. "They do say our Major General Kieran is hardworking. Did you come all the way down here to mop the floor?"
"Ali..." Kieran swallowed a mouthful of bloody froth, trying his best to make his voice sound gentle. "Stop messing around. Baal is beyond saving. He is going to completely detonate soon, and everyone here will die."
He reached out his bloodstained hand, wanting her to pull him up.
Jiang Lijin did not speak. She tilted her head, her gaze passing over him to look at Baal inside the isolation wall.
The situation was terrible. The gold in the giant python's snake eyes was almost entirely swallowed by crimson, leaving only a tiny, faint glimmer in the deepest part still resisting.
"Help me up," Kieran softened his tone. "Come with me. I will take you out of here. I will report to the military and call in mechas to deal with him. As long as you cooperate with me, I promise you will not be implicated."
His voice was very gentle, his words perfectly chosen.
Jiang Lijin accurately tossed the empty can into the trash chute next to the elevator and clapped her hands.
"Move aside." She lifted her leg, preparing to step over him.
Kieran gritted his teeth, lunged forward with all his might, and hugged her calf tightly.
The force was immense. It was as if he had used the last bit of strength in his body.
"You can not go! You will die!"
"Let go." Jiang Lijin struggled for a moment but could not break free. Although Kieran was half-crushed to death, the skeletal strength of an S-rank male was still there, gripping her like an iron vice.
"Ali, wake up! He is a monster now! Only I can protect you!" Kieran roared. His glasses had fallen off somewhere during his crawl, and his eyes were now filled with insane possessiveness.
Jiang Lijin lost her patience.
She reached into her pocket and pulled out the miniature particle gun Gary had stuffed into her hand before leaving.
The metal barrel was pressed directly against the center of Kieran's forehead.
The temperature of the muzzle transferred through his skin into his brain, and Kieran's voice came to an abrupt halt.
He finally saw clearly that the look in Jiang Lijin's eyes was nothing but the cold indifference of looking at a dead object.
He suddenly realized that he was truly going to die here, and fear wrapped around his heart like a venomous snake.
"Lijin... you can not kill me." Kieran babbled incoherently, trying to grasp the last straw of hope. "We were married... You loved me so much before, you said you would stay with me forever... Have you forgotten?"
He dug up those stale, old accounts, attempting to use the original owner's lingering feelings to sway her.
Jiang Lijin's hand holding the gun paused.
During the original owner's three years of absolute darkness, Kieran was indeed the most normal one among her three ex-husbands.
He wasn't like the other two who would scold or even hurl insults at her. He just watched coldly from the sidelines, occasionally dispensing a tiny bit of insignificant kindness when he was in a good mood.
But for the original owner of this body, who was deeply trapped in a quagmire, that little bit of kindness was her only light.
In the original owner's mind, Kieran was the only one who hadn't actually bullied her, and the only one who could potentially become her true husband in a real sense.
This surge of emotion came too fiercely. Jiang Lijin could even feel her eyes growing hot and her nose stinging; her fingers were so stiff that she couldn't even pull the trigger.
The lingering obsession of the original owner had leaped out to cause trouble at this life-and-death moment. It tried to manipulate Jiang Lijin's body, forcing her to put down the gun and spare the man who had once given her a tiny bit of warmth.
Jiang Lijin instinctively repelled this feeling. Treating someone else's charity as love and their emotional abuse as gentleness was simply ridiculous to the extreme!
Kieran keenly caught Jiang Lijin's hesitation. Seeing hope, he hugged her tighter.
"Ah Li, I knew you wouldn't be so heartless. We still have feelings for each other, right? You used to listen to me the most. As long as you put the gun down, we can start over. I swear, I will absolutely never let you suffer any grievances again..."
Kieran chattered on endlessly, his voice revealing the ecstasy of surviving a disaster.
Inside the quarantine wall. Amidst intense pain, Baal briefly regained a sliver of clarity.
He opened those golden, slit-like pupils, staring fixedly through the glass at the scene by the elevator.
That piece of trash was touching her!
Tyrannical killing intent almost completely burned away his rationality. He wanted to tear that man apart, wanted to crush the hands that had touched her into powder inch by inch.
But the violent spiritual energy was raging inside his body, making it completely impossible to condense it into a form to attack the outside.
He could only watch helplessly, watching her hold the gun while her hands trembled.
She couldn't bear to do it! Baal closed his eyes, a painful, heavy pant escaping from his throat.
It made sense. After all, he was the ex-husband she had loved so deeply... how could she really bring herself to do it.
In her mind, Xiao Yi was rolling around anxiously in the system space: Host! What are you spacing out for! Shoot quickly! He's just stalling for time! Once Baal self-destructs, it will be too late for everything!
Idiot. Jiang Lijin roared in her mind.
Xiao Yi was shocked into instant silence, shrinking aggrievedly into a corner.
This word idiot was Jiang Lijin cursing Jiang Lijin.
Taking these charitable scraps as love, and even being so deeply moved by them?
Just as Baal struggled to get up, pulling out the particle gun from under him, preparing to take matters into his own hands.
"Bang—"
