Chapter Sixty-Three: Clash of the Immortals

Chapter Sixty-Three: The Battle of the Immortals

In the distance, several colossal creatures were charging swiftly toward them.

Liu Shaoyu raised his binoculars for a closer look... They seemed strangely familiar...

Of course they were familiar—he'd just killed one of these things not long ago. They were those massive, flying beasts. Seeing them again, Liu Shaoyu felt a surprising pang of nostalgia.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five... By a rough count, there were at least ten of them!

"Why are there so many?" the deep-voiced man exclaimed, anxiety in his tone.

"Big brother! What do we do? Should we retreat?" another voice chimed in.

"Retreat? Retreat your damn legs! Shoot them down!"

Immediately, the starships, which had been firing at the barren creatures on the ground, swung their turrets around to target the unexpected arrivals.

"Don't hit them, don't hit them..." Liu Shaoyu muttered under his breath. He was practically hoping these monsters would wipe out the entire group. He gave no thought to how he'd escape if that actually happened.

Perhaps his prayers were answered. The laser cannons fired wildly, but their shots missed the behemoths by a hair, as if the guns were blind.

"This Huang Xuan kid is useless! Didn't he say only one escaped? Even if they couldn't be completely exterminated, how could there be ten?" The deep voice was now verging on fury.

Huang Xuan was here on this planet? The thought puzzled Liu Shaoyu.

Then the one he'd killed must have been the lone escapee...

"Hmph! That little bastard! He must be trying to screw us over! I've never liked that pretty boy," another voice agreed.

"He thinks that if we're dead, he'll have the place to himself and can kill all the monsters here? He's not that stupid. I bet he just doesn't want to put in the effort."

Whether it was true or just self-comfort, the man spoke in a low, grim tone.

"We've intercepted a communication attempt from the other side," Thomas suddenly interjected.

A communication? Could it be Huang Xuan?

"Patch it through."

"I need an explanation," said the deep-voiced man.

After a pause, Liu Shaoyu heard a familiar voice: "You know, a while ago, I was ambushed in the outer star region. It should have been foolproof, but somehow those things went crazy and flew this way."

That voice was unmistakably the scoundrel Huang Xuan. Liu Shaoyu nearly shouted in outrage—he was the one who ambushed Liu, but now he claimed he'd been ambushed himself. Truly despicable!

"Hmph! Cut the nonsense. You'd better take care of your responsibilities, or we'll all end up dead," the man replied coldly, sounding thoroughly fed up with Huang Xuan.

The call ended. In the distant sky, a dozen or so warships of varying sizes appeared. Liu Shaoyu estimated the longest was over a thousand meters.

"That bastard really went all out!"

Navigating between star regions was fraught with peril, not to mention the hefty tariffs imposed once a fleet reached a certain size. Each faction's warships differed, so if damage occurred, finding the right parts in a star system millions of light-years away was nearly impossible.

With these considerations, Liu Shaoyu hadn't brought his entire fleet.

Could it be that Huang Xuan still had remnants of power here in the barren star region? The thought crossed Liu Shaoyu's mind.

He switched back to the surveillance channel. Now, only a flurry of battle orders filled the air. With Huang Xuan's fleet joining the fray, chaos ensued.

At that moment, Thomas discovered something intriguing.

"If we treat these ten creatures as points, track their movements, and connect the dots..." Thomas explained his new find to Liu Shaoyu.

After visualizing the trajectories of these ten beasts, Liu Shaoyu gasped, "That looks eerily familiar!"

A sense of foreboding swept over him. Could it be...? He thought of something seemingly impossible.

And reality proved, once again, that impossibilities were the specialty of one particular person... Our Queen of the Fengtower, Miss Carter.

"Oh? What are you doing out here, little human cutie? Cooling off?" A woman's voice floated softly behind him.

At that moment, Liu Shaoyu felt as if three black lines appeared above his head...

"Shh!" He wished he could knock Carter out with a stick. But honestly... how had she found him when he'd hidden so well?

"Relax, they can't see us," Carter said with a laugh in her voice.

Liu Shaoyu, half-believing and half-doubting, turned to see Carter. She was no longer wearing the clothes she'd had on when they last parted, but now sported a tight-fitting purple-red leather outfit, covering only what needed to be covered.

The sight instantly reminded Liu Shaoyu of Miss Dong.

"Was this your doing?" he asked, gesturing toward the massive beasts.

Carter instantly understood what he meant. Instead of answering, she sat down beside Liu Shaoyu, then spoke slowly.

"I saw them getting bullied, so I helped them out," she said, blinking her large, bright eyes with an innocent expression.

He internally shouted, "My God!" She was wasting her talent not being an actress! But... it seemed her powers were returning. Liu Shaoyu thought to himself.

For some reason, Carter seemed subtly different this time... And worse yet, she was just sitting outside without any protective gear! This woman... was far too dangerous. Liu Shaoyu had resolved never to cross her—otherwise, he might die a terrible death.

Liu Shaoyu felt awkward—while the immortals battled in front of him, he, a mere mortal, could only watch. The only thing left was to cheer them on! But now, one of those immortals was right beside him... and their relationship was anything but clear.

"What are you doing here?" Liu Shaoyu couldn't help but ask, his curiosity getting the better of him.

Carter only glanced toward the cave behind the barren creatures' settlement, saying nothing.

"Ice mine?" Liu Shaoyu guessed.

"Ice mine? You could call it that," Carter replied, not denying it.

"What do you want with it?" Liu Shaoyu couldn't understand—what would a bug in a human body want with that?

"Evolution," the queen replied, as if it were only natural.

Evolution... Liu Shaoyu was speechless. She really was still just a bug... Evolution... That was something humans couldn't do.

"You could, too," the queen said lightly, sensing his intense gaze.

My God! Liu Shaoyu was stunned. He could, too? What did that mean? Could he become a bug? Imagining himself as a little crayfish, Liu Shaoyu firmly shook his head.

"But you're far from ready," Carter added, as if it were just a casual remark, not really chatting with Liu Shaoyu. Perhaps she was simply looking for a place to sit.

"Alright, I'm going in. Are you coming?" Carter suddenly stood and addressed Liu Shaoyu, who was still squatting.

"Huh?" Liu Shaoyu was baffled. What did she mean, "Alright"? What was alright?

He turned to look at the battlefield. The situation had shifted dramatically—the few hundred remaining barren creatures were now launching a fierce counterattack! The mechas that had surrounded them were now being pursued by twenty or thirty barren beasts.

As for the starships above... They were being utterly confounded by the leaping behemoths, unable to spare a moment for the mechas on the ground.

And Huang Xuan's dozen warships weren't alone—their arrival had brought new creatures, smaller in size, swarming around the remaining ships. Pieces of deck plating were visibly falling away.

On the ground... Liu Shaoyu spotted his old friends, the "groundhogs." Any mecha that escaped from the ships and landed disappeared without a trace.

"When did all this happen?" Liu Shaoyu was stunned. Was it...? No wonder Carter hadn't really been talking to him just now... She'd been summoning!

Such a massive swarm of creatures... Liu Shaoyu's gaze toward Carter changed.

Noticing his look, Miss Carter simply flashed a cute smile.

"Alright, alright~ If you look at me like that, I'll get shy! Let's go, let's go~" she said, grabbing Liu Shaoyu's arm and pulling him up from his crouch.

And they dashed off together...