If there was still food in the pot, why eat from one's own bowl? Especially when the pot belonged to the Great Spikes and could disappear at any second.
At present, a full reserve of liquid source energy for Han Qingyu amounted to dozens of blue crystal blocks at once.
Such an enormous consumption—force him to eat into his own stash? He would be holding back tears with every bite. Truly, it pained his heart too much. For someone accustomed to hoarding, so long as there was even the slightest alternative, he could never bring himself to be so extravagant.
He still clearly remembered how his liquid source energy had been topped off last time. The Great Spike mothership at the peak was essentially an ultra-large source energy field. Butt heads with it once, and he was full. At most, it just cost him a few mouthfuls of blood.
As a member of Squad 1777, blood was naturally far less precious than source energy—it was a bargain. Han Qingyu's simple, honest thought was merely to save a little.
And so, under the bewildered yet expectant gazes behind him, Han Qingyu hunched low and slipped out of the glacier field, pressing forward through the wind and snow for a short distance... and then decisively dropped flat onto his stomach.
Days of heavy snowfall had left a deep blanket of snow on the ground; he could easily crawl up from beneath it.
A clacking sound came from behind him.
Han Qingyu turned his head. "Rusty Sister, what are you doing here?"
"I'm coming with you. You looked like that just a moment ago—I'm worried," Shen Yixiu said, dropping flat as well to copy him. "Wu Xu doesn't know yet. He's standing outside; I didn't tell him."
"No good. You make too much noise when you move," Han Qingyu made up an excuse to turn her down.
"Then I'll just go silent." Blue light rippled across the iron armor, and her movements became completely soundless. In truth, Rusty Sister had always been able to move silently; it just consumed source energy, which she was normally reluctant to spend.
"Well, all right then." Han Qingyu recalled sharing the small source energy field left behind by Ne at Research Institute 2 with Rusty Sister. She had been able to absorb from that one, though whether she could do so here remained unknown for now.
Thinking it over, the danger shouldn't be too great at least.
If the remaining Great Spike horde really chased after them... that would be even better. Han Qingyu figured if he could lure them away, the mothership's defenses would be weakened.
With that thought, Han Qingyu lowered his head and began digging into the snow.
Rusty Sister watched, then started digging as well.
Suddenly, the two heard a sound nearby. Backing out and turning to look, they discovered that Wu Xu's snow tunnel was already quite deep. Seeing them look at him, Wu Xu didn't say a word, just buried his head and kept digging, though the backward glance he shot them held a hint of discontent.
Seeing this, there was no helping it. Han Qingyu thought for a moment and gave advance warning: "If I suddenly go flying backward later, or whatever happens, don't worry. Just stay lying down."
With that, he plunged under the snow, crawling forward toward the mothership at the mountain peak.
He knew the approximate range of the mothership's source energy field, but there was no clear boundary, and he didn't know when he would suddenly clash with it.
Because of that uncertainty, the feeling was rather terrifying. It was like fumbling in the dark, knowing with certainty you were going to be stabbed, but having no idea when the blade would strike.
Yet such a trifling concern was nothing against a man's sheer poverty and stinginess.
Besides, where were those shuttle craft? Where had they all gone?!
Of the eleven metal blocks he had started the battle with, Han Qingyu had only three left. However, that included the larger, purer one dropped by the blue-light craft earlier.
"Where's The Qing?!"
"...Gone in a flash."
"He was just there a second ago."
"That's why he's so incredible."
The wounded in the glacier field supported one another as they stood, peering upward from behind pillars of ice.
The stretch of snow slope between the perimeter position and the Great Spike mothership remained relatively peaceful for now—no Great Spike swarms charging down, and no offensive mounted by Azure.
There was only a thick blanket of ice and snow over the ground, bathed in the blue light of the night.
Along with knife-sharp wind and snow howling chaotically through the air.
Above and below the perimeter position were two different worlds: one comparatively calm, the other a bloody battlefield.
By now, however, the sounds of slaughter below had grown much sparser. Azure's predetermined Great Wall of Flesh and Blood strategy had largely achieved its objective. By the final wrap-up, roughly a thousand Great Spikes would be stopped and slain below the perimeter position.
Over four thousand Azure warriors had used their blood and sacrifice to forge strategic conditions, earning a chance to launch a direct assault on the mothership.
Due to battlefield communication issues, many of Azure's formidable commanders had chosen to fight on the front lines in person to ensure direct command.
Now, these frontline commanders finally gathered to confer and prepare their next assault against the mothership.
The Red Shoulder had been successfully slain—the very one whose column sword had been snatched away by that man. The commanders felt just as thrilled and excited as the ordinary soldiers, but...
When they cast their eyes toward the Great Spike mothership.
It seemed far too composed throughout.
The danger hidden beneath such calm was all the more chilling.
"This final stretch will probably be brutally difficult," the wounded nearby and far watched and thought.
"We can only send super combat powers to probe it first," the commanders discussed among themselves as they watched.
"Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle..." An eerie sound suddenly rose in the air, sending a wave of panic through the crowd.
It felt like low voltage at home, the sputtering sizzle accompanying a light bulb flickering just before burning out.
Indeed, at this moment, the blue light of the Great Spike mothership was flickering and trembling, as though on the verge of short-circuiting.
And then—boom!
The ice and snow on the ground suddenly blasted open, swirling into the sky.
A figure was blown out from beneath the snow, paddling his limbs in the air like a backstroker.
Obscured by the snow, he wasn't clearly visible, but he seemed to be vomiting blood.
"Fuck!" Mid-air, Han Qingyu spat a mouthful of blood and cursed internally: *Haven't seen it for a few days, how the hell did the source energy field get so much fiercer?!*
He had just slammed right into it, clashing head-on with the source energy field. This time, it didn't feel like getting hit by a heavy truck... it felt like colliding with a fighter jet at top speed. The immense impact blasted him completely out from under the snow.
"What's going on?" The wounded below froze in shock, tense and perplexed.
"What's happening?!" The Azure commanders were equally tense and bewildered by the sudden turn of events.
Only Wu Xu and Rusty Sister remained prone in the deep snow crater blasted open by the shockwave. After recovering from their daze, they exchanged a look: *No wonder Qingzi warned he might suddenly go flying...*
Should they go check on him? But Qingzi had instructed them beforehand—told them not to worry, just keep lying there.
Rusty Sister began to feel the surge of source energy. The internal circulation system of her iron armor was enveloped in dense ambient source energy; her entire body was nourished within the exceptionally pure energy, continuously elevating until she could absorb no more.
Almost at the exact same moment, in the command chamber of the Great Spike mothership, strange syllables sounded in chaotic agitation: "What... He's here. He's here again. That weak yet maddening source-energy-devouring beast."
Xin Yaoqiao's deduction had been correct: in their concepts, they viewed Han Qingyu as a monster that devoured source energy.
The disturbance of the traction device at this crucial moment infuriated the Great Spike commander.
To their senses, Han Qingyu was feeble. In that collision, he was the one blasted away, and the source energy he consumed was only a tiny fraction relative to the total volume.
Yet he was like a bird crashing head-on into the cockpit windshield of a fighter jet in mid-flight—his disruptive power was extraordinarily vast. He had nearly caused the entire source energy field to short-circuit.
Hunt him down? No, the Great Spikes had already seen the result of chasing him last time, and at this juncture, the mothership's defensive forces could not afford to be divided.
Thus, they reasoned: "If nothing unexpected happens, that infuriating pest will carry off our secondary craft next..."
*Smack... hiss, shhhhk. Bam!* Han Qingyu slammed heavily onto the ground, sliding over the snow and ice until he knocked over two ice boulders before finally coming to a halt.
It hurt, but he was full—his liquid source energy was full. No, wait. What had felt like a completely packed capacity only moments ago felt like it had room again when he checked carefully.
It was as though his capacity had been stretched open.
*Then I have to go back. In a situation like this, I should have brought up a few hundred empty blue crystal blocks, so I could absorb while filling them up...*
Thinking this, Han Qingyu struggled to his feet and scrambled forward.
*Crackle, crackle... screech, screech.* Suddenly, a barrage of noises echoed from beneath the snow and ice above.
The noise itself was grating enough to set teeth on edge, but to Azure's warriors, it had always sounded wonderful. Han Qingyu was intimately familiar with it.
It was the sound of shuttle craft self-destructing and shattering.
Only, he had never heard such a concentrated barrage before... so many shuttle craft self-destructing and breaking apart all at once.
"Metal blocks! So many metal blocks! Mine..."
Han Qingyu scrambled upward on all fours.
Locking onto one, he lunged forward fiercely and seized it in his hand.
*Boom!*
He was blasted flying by the source energy field once more.
Glancing down at the metal block in his palm, he shoved it into his pocket, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and charged back up. This time, he targeted two pieces, lunging and grabbing one in each hand.
*Boom!*
*Boom!*
*Boom...*
Amidst the swirling snow, for the fifth time, a figure flew out and crashed onto the ground.
The wounded and Azure commanders below were completely dumbfounded.
Han Qingyu now had four more metal blocks in his pockets. On one of the attempts, he had come up empty because most of the metal blocks were buried beneath the snow and he didn't have the chance to dig around for them.
*Again...*
*Hum!*
Just as Han Qingyu was about to lunge forward once more.
The blue light across the entire Great Spike mothership suddenly went completely dark.
Then, with a *whoosh*, it lit up again. But the coverage of the mothership's blue light had contracted by a full circle; across most of the snowy mountain, moonlight began to overpower the blue glow.
His lips smeared with blood, Han Qingyu stood there, wiping his mouth casually with the back of his hand. His expression was wooden yet resolute; in the eyes of the warriors dispatched from behind to rescue him, he looked like a fearless hero fighting to the death.
*What's happening? Did I beat back the source energy field?*
*Looks like it. I finally bullied it into fear.*
Chapter 269