Ashleia captured the scene through her lens. Ahead lay a battlefield bristling with dead iron weapons in the wake of the "fierce battle." While a great many Great Spikes still survived across the field, their formations had completely fallen apart, leaving them sluggish and dazed.
The terrifying swarm of Red Shoulders from moments before now lay sprawled at Major Qing's feet. Roughly half of them were already dead, while the rest still struggled.
Han Qingyu stood beside them with his back turned, his left hand holding his battleblade horizontally aloft.
Behind him stood the final 4,500 soldiers of Stream Blades, who had carved a bloody path all the way here.
With Major Qing as their arrowhead, they held a sharp wedge formation, still pointing straight toward the traction field.
According to intelligence from the Rejectors, this swarm had been the last large-scale interception mounted by the alien eastern defense network before Stream Blades could reach the traction field.
This meant the Eastern Front's Redemption Offensive was now, at least strategically, infinitely close to success.
Next, they would launch a direct assault on the traction field.
Next, the Red Shoulders across the entire mainland—and even vast numbers of blue-sheened Great Spikes—would accelerate their retreat to reinforce the core.
...Soon, the focus of the entire Antarctic battlefield, and of the human world itself, would converge upon the planet's true southern extremity: the South Pole.
As this realization set in, Ian let out a long, slow breath from behind the camera. He did not know whether he ought to feel joy or sorrow.
They had just welcomed Major Qing's return and won an earth-shattering victory right here, yet the prize for this great triumph was... permission to keep charging into hell.
"I will document an absolute victory. Of that I have no doubt. But..."
Ian knew with absolute certainty that once they went there, there would be no road back.
The swarms of Great Spikes rushing back from every corner would pin Stream Blades—including himself and Ashleia—in an inescapable siege beneath the traction field.
They could only press forward, hurtling straight into the traction field, and there—in victory or defeat—fulfill the destiny of their lives.
"Boss Dao has worked his miracle!" Major Qing's sudden shout rang across the battlefield.
Then came an answering roar: "Boss Dao has worked his miracle!"
The roar shook the ice plains as the soldiers vented everything within them. Broad, unrestrained grins broke out across their pain-ridden, exhausted faces, splitting the scabs of dried blood across their foreheads and cheeks.
Without hesitation, they charged toward the Pole.
It was time to move. Ashleia panned her lens away, hesitated for a second, and chose not to record what came next. Tugging Ian along, she sprinted after the marching column.
He Tangtang brought up the very rear of Stream Blades. With his current strength, catching up to the main force would be effortless, so he took his time.
"Heheheh."
His unhurried pace made him look very much like a scavenger emerging from the shadows only after watching a clash conclude.
Like a demon, he strode toward the Red Shoulders still thrashing in their death throes on the ground and began to count: "One, two, three... eight, nine of them! Ah!"
"Now your grandpa is gonna show you what cruelty really means. Heheheh!"
Since Ashleia had chosen not to record this exhilarating yet gruesome scene, no one in the world would ever see it...
Nine seconds later, He Tangtang—once the weakest combatant among Stream Blades' core team—officially advanced to the pinnacle of top-tier, separated from super combat power by only a paper-thin barrier.
Now, if anyone in the world still had the stomach to debate the strongest human combatant below the super level, they would have to give Tangtang his due respect.
That respect would have to stand on par with Second Lieutenant Shen Yixiu, the Living Iron Armor.
...
In the Rejectors' silent satellite feed, Stream Blades' black formation swept like an arrowhead smoothly across the battlefield ahead, slicing through the scattered, disarrayed Great Spikes lingering there.
The Pole and the Great Spike traction field were already tantalizingly close on the tactical map.
Far away in the City of Sin, Boss Dao stared fixedly at the silent feed on the screen. Suddenly, his tears broke free completely. "Boss Dao... has worked his miracle."
He knew what they were shouting.
Even without audio, and even though the Rejectors' camera angle could not capture fine ground details, Dao Dali could still tell—because beneath the aurora, a sea of glinting light was swaying across the battlefield.
Those bastards had to be raising their battleblades high and waving them in the air right now.
All along, that was the only time they ever did that—whenever they chanted "Boss Dao has worked his miracle"—as if waving goddamn soul-summoning banners in their hands.
"This... fuck, I can't take this! Who the hell could take this?!" Facing the room full of big bosses, Boss Dao wiped at his tears with his sleeve, casting all shame aside as he began to wail.
After all these years, Dao Dali was still a boss without scheming depths or brains. He was also still the boss who cared for his boys more than anyone else in the entire City of Sin—whether his boys were those destitute brats from back then, or today's Stream Blades, the armed force with humanity's highest average combat prowess.
At this moment, Boss Dao desperately wanted to yell at them to get their asses back home.
...
"All of you... hurry up and prepare to evacuate! The personnel on the Peninsula, and those returning from the Western Front—get out, all of you. Don't cling to illusions, and under no circumstances get bogged down in battle."
Ever since the start of the Redemption Offensive, this was the very first time the Azure frontline and rear command centers had heard Second Lieutenant Wen Jifei's voice.
His voice sounded somewhat hoarse.
"...Major Qing's condition isn't as good as you think." Without waiting for Azure to ask any questions, Wen Jifei gave the explanation himself, then curtly cut off the transmission.
Meanwhile, in the public broadcasts sent out from Antarctica:
"Report: On the Antarctic Eastern Front, Stream Blades has claimed another victory, successfully piercing the ninth line of interception. Their spearhead points directly at the Great Spike traction field at the Pole."
"Report: Along the corridor connecting the Peninsula and the mainland, our Western Front relief forces are assaulting the final Great Spike defensive line with everything they have. Once through, they will rush back to reinforce the Peninsula at top speed."
"Report: Beyond the interception lines, Great Spike forces on both the Central and Western Fronts are showing widespread signs of falling back to reinforce the Pole."
"Report..."
The Rejector broadcaster seemed to have been replaced; no matter how rousing the news was, he delivered it in a tone of quiet, steady resolve.
One could even discern the unmistakable gravity and grief running underneath it.
Stream Blades was charging with everything they had toward the South Pole...
At the same time, in the Rejectors' high-altitude footage, an alien structure shaped like a colossal super-fortress—composed entirely of dead iron craft—along with the dense, black swarm of Great Spikes encircling it, was unveiled to all of humanity for the very first time.
The entire fortress was enclosed within a dome of blue light—the vibrant blue of surging source energy that everyone knew all too well.
"How tall... how gigantic is that thing?!"
People could not tell from the footage alone; they could only guess that it might stand thousands of meters high and span the area of hundreds of football fields.
In the comparative view, the 4,500 warriors of Stream Blades looked unimaginably miniscule—as if they were truly moths, a lone swarm of moths plunging toward a stadium ablaze with lights for tens of thousands.
...
Bang! Bang!
After endless searching, Makarov had finally found Pegmont. He had chased and shouted after him repeatedly, until he was forced to fire his sniper rifle at him just to grab his attention.
On the reverse slope of a snow peak, Pegmont stood on high ground, looking down.
"Where's Daie?!" Makarov yelled at the top of his lungs.
"Gone. We were fighting, and then it ran off again. I'm looking for it right now," Pegmont replied, scanning the surroundings. The Great Spike swarms across the battlefield were somewhat scattered now, but their numbers remained vast.
"...Wait, that's not right!" A sudden jolt of realization struck Makarov's mind. He cried out, "Peg!"
Why was he suddenly shouting his name? Pegmont looked back down at him in confusion. "Yeah?"
"Head to the Eastern Front—no, go straight to the traction field! Go help them! Hurry, go! They need you..." Makarov stamped his feet impatiently, tossing a communicator into the air while pointing Pegmont toward the South Pole.
As a confidential operative specially dispatched by Azure to remain by Pegmont's side and die for him at a moment's notice, Makarov actually possessed a very high clearance level. He could listen in on the most classified battlefield intelligence at any time and establish contact with the rear command whenever necessary.
Yet this time, Makarov did not seek authorization from anyone. Acting entirely on his own volition, he offered Pegmont direct tactical advice.
Once he had done all of this, Makarov fell silent and looked up toward the snow peak. There, Pegmont's figure was already blazing away at full throttle, a tuft of pink hair fluttering in the gale...
Makarov did not know whether what he had done was right or wrong. But he knew that if he had asked for orders, those old fogies would never have allowed Pegmont to head to the Pole today.
Am I sending Peg to his death?
Could my misguided choice cause humanity's two greatest hopes for the future to both end up buried there?
Chapter 815