The atmosphere inside the submarine felt suffocating. With so many people crowded together, the air had turned foul, but no one had the luxury of paying it any mind. Most of the time they stayed silent, or spoke only in hushed murmurs.
Only the coffee in the cups gradually lowered, accompanied by the endless scratching of pen tips across paper.
*Scratch, scratch...*
The sound droned on in the cramped compartment like a tedious, monotonous melody.
Then, after perhaps more than an hour, a sudden *clatter!*
A chair back crashed against the floor.
The noise was loud, and the researchers looked up one after another.
They saw Major Xin Yaoqiao standing on her feet. The chair overturned on the floor was hers.
She stood there looking utterly terrified and lost.
"What happened?"
"Are you too exhausted?"
"Or is it..."
A wave of profound unease washed over them. The researchers struggled not to imagine the worst, absurd as that effort was.
At that moment, on the desk before Xin Yaoqiao, words had been pieced together one by one on the intelligence report she had just deduced and decoded, ultimately forming a complete message:
[You seem to understand our speech, don't you? You are eavesdropping and trying to deceive me, human. This is unacceptable. I will kill you. In the end, none of you will escape.]
They were compromised.
Perhaps this was the result of Daie analyzing developments in reverse; perhaps it was due to some unforeseen accident; perhaps they possessed some hidden, specialized means...
None of that mattered for now.
Xin Yaoqiao's panic and helplessness were not because Daie had threatened to kill her, but because this sentence meant Daie already knew its communications were intercepted and that it was being played... Reasoned in reverse, everything Azure was currently doing had naturally been seen through as well.
"Quick! Alert everyone, we're exposed!" Xin Yaoqiao turned, speaking frantically. "Tell command that all our plans have likely been discovered! Next..."
Next, Azure needed to change strategy immediately and brace for the battlefield... but it was already too late.
Even as Xin Yaoqiao spoke, every communications band on the other submarine belonging to the Rejectors was already open. From officers to enlisted soldiers, everyone had turned into a communications operator.
With tense faces and urgent voices, they broadcast two pieces of news across all available languages to the entire Azure army deployed in the Oceania theater... though in truth, they amounted to the same thing:
"At least sixty percent of the remaining Great Spike forces above Melbourne have suddenly mobilized en masse! Descending toward the ground in units of at least thirty craft, they appear fully committed to cutting off the human evacuation!"
"Furthermore, the Great Spike forces from Antarctica are on their way!"
The Antarctic Great Spike host, which had previously shown little movement, had abruptly abandoned the final Azure detachment tasked with trailing, shadowing, and pinning them down.
Nor had they opted to attack the evacuation vessels withdrawing from Antarctica that were deliberately creeping across the sea to lure and disperse their forces.
Instead, piloting their craft, they were heading straight for Oceania.
In truth, the Great Spikes were bound to arrive eventually, whether descending from above or sweeping in from Antarctica; that was the decisive battle Azure had planned for.
Yet it had come far too soon.
At least a third of the civilian evacuation remained unfinished.
To ensure protective coverage for the retreating masses, the Azure forces that had already pushed deep into the theater were also stretched thin and severely dispersed.
"What about the other areas? Any movement from the Great Spike clusters above the cities?" On the primary flagship, Admiral Siglo, supreme commander of Azure's primary command system, asked in a deep voice.
"None for now," an officer beside him replied.
"Maintain close surveillance. And then..." Admiral Siglo paused, turning his head to sweep his gaze over the front commanders flanking him, reading their expressions.
A strategic plan could never unfold with flawless precision according to human desires; command had made that clear to itself from the very beginning. For that reason, they maintained a touch more calm and composure than the subordinate divisions below.
Yet that was all it amounted to, for the contingencies and options Azure had prepared for such a scenario could not alter reality by much.
Some problems could not be resolved by thought and calculation. All that remained to rely on were the blades in the soldiers' hands.
"Should we abandon the operational plan for now, order the troops to protect the civilians in a swift withdrawal, and seek to counterattack later?" an officer suggested.
"...No, it's too late." Admiral Siglo turned back. How could civilian evacuation columns ever outrun Great Spikes? Even the Azure units inside the theater could not.
He said, "Even if they reach the coast, they will still come under attack. Furthermore, if we fail to put up an effective resistance on land, they might even overtake all the vessels that have already departed..."
At this moment, a choice had to be made regarding the lives of twenty million people.
A choice had to be made regarding the fate of the Azure soldiers inside the theater.
Victory and defeat demanded a choice all the same.
"Then...?!" the officer asked tentatively, eyes focused.
"Commence." Three simple words, yet as Siglo rose to his feet, he seemed weighed down by unimaginable pressure. He said, "Order the units in the theater to hold their ground, protect the civilians, and conduct a fighting retreat... At the same time, commit all follow-up forces into the battlefield."
This meant the decisive battle for Oceania would begin ahead of schedule.
While forces within the theater were scattered and had not yet regrouped, while the civilians of Oceania were far from finishing their evacuation, and while the transport ships were still sailing across the open water.
It was a choice born of having no choice at all.
"...Yes, sir!" The commanders acknowledged the order and filed out of the conference cabin.
At that very moment, across the land of Oceania, rumbles echoed endlessly. Squadrons of Great Spike shuttle craft scattered through the sky, crashing down in clusters across thousands of locations.
***
From noon, when the situation abruptly deteriorated, until dusk, the entire CA Formation had long since been scattered.
Escorting nearly five thousand civilians—a number that continued to grow—the 3rd Battalion spent the entire journey fighting while falling back.
"Where are we right now?" With the immediate surroundings temporarily secure, the officers huddled over a map.
"Here. Called Moorabool or something, right nearby." Li Wangqiang had always been skilled at reading maps and terrain. Under ordinary circumstances, he would have followed up with a bit of boasting.
Not this time. After speaking, Regimental Commander Li turned, his eyes bloodshot, watching the trailing troops all the way to the rear before shouting, "Where's 1777?"
"Why hasn't 1777 caught up yet?!"
The surrounding officers and soldiers, including the various squads that had just arrived, all turned their heads together.
Earlier, it had been Squad 1777 and Squad 1426, acting as the main force alongside an Armenian Azure squad, who had received orders to lure away the Great Spike cluster closing in from behind.
A considerable amount of time had passed... yet they still had not caught up.
"Comms! Get me 1777 on the line!" Li Wangqiang roared into the communicator.
"Yes, right away, don't worry." The Rejectors hurriedly searched and reconnected the regional channel that had cut out unnoticed moments earlier.
*Beep, beep...* After several attempts, the line finally connected. Li Wangqiang bellowed immediately, "Lao Jian! Lao Jian, how are you guys doing?! Where are you?!"
"We're... fine." Lao Jian's voice sounded low and heavy. As he spoke, he looked back in silence.
None of the three squads holding the rear had suffered catastrophic losses, but Zhao Erzhu was trapped amid the Great Spikes.
Both reason and Zhao Erzhu's own parting words told Lao Jian they should not go back for him. With a top-tier warrior's speed, if Erzhu could cut his way out, his chances of escaping were high, and he might even shake the Great Spikes off.
Yet if the people here went back, almost none of them would make it out alive.
Even so, knowing they couldn't turn back, the memory of that scene—Erzhu cut off by so many Great Spikes—made any hope of his return feel agonizingly slim.
This was the very first time Lao Jian had brought that foolish, honest brute onto a massive battlefield. Barely two days ago, he had told Zhao Erzhu to stick close to him, yet now...
When Zhao Erzhu took it upon himself to hold back the Great Spikes, Lao Jian, as squad leader, hadn't stopped him. He hadn't... The torment and self-reproach wrought by that choice weighed on him so heavily he could barely stand it.
The veteran soldiers understood him and maintained a somber silence.
Yet the younger soldiers, their eyes rimmed red, kept asking, "Why hasn't Erzhu shown up yet?" "What do we do about Erzhu, Captain Lao?" "Let's go back and look for him, Captain Lao."
Right then, a thunderous roar erupted.
All three squads concealed themselves at once... for not far ahead, another thirty to forty Great Spike craft had suddenly plunged into the valley.
Mixed into the din, a faint, distant *whistling* crack—the sharp sound of a bullet slicing through the air—was swallowed up by the noise, muffled to barely a whisper.
Lao Jian vaguely caught it. He froze for a second, then excitement flared in his eyes.
More than four years ago, on the high plains of Xilang Peak, in the depths of despair, they had heard the roar of the Milla 11 autocannon.
This time, it was the crack of a sniper rifle.
"Did... did any of you hear a bullet?" he asked, trembling with hopeful anticipation.
Yet everyone looked back at him and shook their heads.
"A bullet! A sniper rifle—the kind of sniper shot that sounds just like Plague Chicken's rifle!" Lao Jian gestured wildly with his hands, his neck stiff with agitation.
"Captain Lao..." Qi Rourou tried to comfort him, but after uttering his name, she had no idea how to go on.
Perhaps he was clinging to hope out of sheer guilt and helplessness?
Or perhaps local residents had fired blindly in self-defense, and no one else had heard it.
Such were the thoughts running through their minds.
In truth, Qingzi was severely wounded, and if Han Qingyu wasn't here, how could Plague Chicken possibly appear on this battlefield?!
"...I'm going back to check." Qin Guowen braced his blade against the ground and struggled to his feet. "I'll go bring Erzhu back, Captain Lao."
"Wait," Hu Biaomao said, slowly standing up beside him. "I'll go with you, Captain Qin. I..."
Before he could finish.
*Whoosh!*
Drenched in blood—both the Great Spikes' and his own—Zhao Erzhu came sprinting around a distant mountain pass. Grinning to reveal a mouthful of white teeth, he waved and shouted at the top of his lungs:
"I fought my way out! Damn, I'm too fierce! Haha, fierce or what?! Impressive, huh?!"
Chapter 667