Earlier on the path of their breakout, when they discovered that the Red Shoulders had begun turning back to reinforce the Pole, many officers and soldiers in the Western Front forces had proposed dividing their strength to assault the Pole. By joining Stream Blades in a pincer attack on the traction field from east and west, they could relieve the pressure on the eastern front... General Hua had been the one who made the ultimate decision to refuse detaching forces for reinforcement.
Strategically and in terms of the outcome, that was undoubtedly as correct a decision as could be made.
Yet in General Hua's own conscience, it was he who had consigned Stream Blades to their current plight—marching to their deaths alone. It was he who had personally snuffed out that force's last ray of hope.
Now, the final line of defense had been breached. The route for the Western Front elites to return and relieve the Peninsula was completely clear. The situation on the Peninsula would swiftly be reversed, after which they would carry out a collective evacuation, regroup, and fight another day...
Hua Bixuan decided he would not go back with them. Leading his eight remaining personal guards, he intended to head beneath the traction field and join that force to see out their final battle to the death.
To General Hua, this was first and foremost an act of self-redemption.
This proud and narcissistic man had always seemed an anomaly among the supers of the Huaxia Front. His hands were stained with the most blood, and he specialized in the most ruthless and shadowy assassinations—targets that, beyond hostile factions, included former comrades who had betrayed Azure—yet he took a flower, the bird of paradise, as his personal emblem. These were the two contradictory facets of Hua Bixuan's life. The exacting demands such a man placed upon himself were far beyond what others could imagine; he would rather die than bear such remorse for the rest of his days.
Secondly, it was hard to say whether General Hua was still clinging to hope deep down.
Well, there probably was a sliver of hope, because the force out there was that very unit, that specific band of people. Hua Bixuan did not believe miracles had vanished entirely from the story. At the very least, he had to go stand with them and give it a try.
A decisive battlefield application was submitted...
Over at the Azure Headquarters Council, silence hung heavy for a moment without any reply.
"Azure Huaxia Front, Sole Witness Legion super combat power, Lü Moyi..." Another voice suddenly sounded over the channel.
"Get lost! You are not allowed to go," General Hua cut him off.
"On what grounds?!" God Lü snapped, irritated, thinking to himself that he was far closer to those kids than Hua was.
"On the grounds that you are still in one piece and kicking," General Hua said coldly. "You have to return to the Peninsula. What's more, the Huaxia Front will still need you in the days to come."
God Lü went silent: "..." Though his heart refused to accept it, he knew General Hua was right.
"Azure Mexico Front, super combat power, Diego Rodriguez..." Unexpectedly, another voice broke in—a Latino voice.
Then, another similar voice cut across him: "Shut your mouth, kid, and get your ass back here!"
Rodriguez was the sole super combat power of the Mexico Front, a top super who had advanced a little over three years ago and now held the rank of lieutenant general.
Yet the man who interrupted him was only a colonel: Danny White, captain of Mexico's elite Chichen Itza Squad.
Rodriguez hailed from this very squad—the fiercest and most renowned elite unit in the Mexico Front's history—and the captain's fatherly authority still held sway over him.
"Mexico elite Chichen Itza Squad, Captain Danny White, leading twenty-one remaining soldiers, requests permission to halt our relief march and head south to the Pole traction field to join the battle." Having silenced Rodriguez, Danny White spoke with a nostalgic smile. "As it happens, it has been too long since we last saw Major Qing. I imagine he might still remember us."
Over four years ago on Mount Xilang, the Chichen Itza Squad had been almost entirely wiped out... At the most critical juncture, a young Huaxia warrior had arrived before their position.
His name was Han Qingyu.
He was the one who later became Major Qing.
"Azure Venezuela Front, Mérida Squad, seventeen remaining members, requesting to halt our relief march and head south to the Pole traction field to join the battle. We are friends of Major Qing."
"Azure Huaxia Front, Ninth Army, elite White Eraser Squad remnants—there are still a few of us left—requesting to halt our relief march and head south to the Pole traction field to join the battle. Those fellows started out in the Ninth Army; they are the Ninth Army's soldiers," said Wei Jiang, captain of the White Eraser Squad, who had not been promoted in all these years.
"Azure Xiongzhanli Front, Red Square Honor Legion, requesting to halt our relief march and head south to the Pole traction field to join the battle."
"Major Qing will return, together with the fiery lava glow left by General Ivan. That rumored lava dragon... we truly want to see it with our own eyes..." the soldiers of Xiongzhanli thought and murmured.
"Azure..."
One application after another to march south and join the battle at the traction field came flooding in. Naturally, everyone understood that Azure could never allow so many to go; humanity could no longer bear such catastrophic losses. Following deliberations, the approved force was capped at around ten thousand, the majority of whom were wounded, and severely so.
Without exception, every single one of them was fully prepared never to return.
***
Azure Headquarters, the Council Hall.
Murmurs, debates, and clashes of conflicting opinions and shouts roiled below the floor.
Meanwhile, the rostrum had remained silent the entire time.
Amid the clamor, a sharp clatter sounded. The microphone was fitted to a heavy base, and the noise of it dragging across the tabletop was jarringly loud, as though the hand moving it were weighed down by overwhelming force.
Speaker Kemore pulled the microphone before him, gripping it tightly with one hand. His lips moved once without sound, then moved a second time. "Application approved."
Those words, spoken not very loudly, carried across the airwaves the moment they were uttered. The entire hall plunged into instant silence. The squabbling councilors froze in disbelief, turning their heads as one.
Speaker Kemore had given his approval. Without consulting anyone, without exchanging a word or holding any discussion with the councilors, he had directly granted the battlefield request of the Western Front forces.
For the second time that day, this frail, habitually timid old man had acted in such a manner, behaving like a dictator.
The councilors who supported the decision stood in solemn silence, uttering not a word.
Their support did not mean they felt optimistic about this reinforcement effort. They knew equally well the likely fate awaiting those ten thousand elites; they could hardly even articulate their own reasons for backing it.
In the next second, the opposing councilors erupted like an active volcano, roaring with indignation:
"Do you know what you are doing, Speaker Kemore?!"
"You are sending ten thousand elite human warriors to their deaths!"
"They could have come back! Humanity needs them—needs every single one of them!"
"Especially when our losses on the Antarctic battlefield are already this immense, and when the soldiers of Stream Blades are virtually certain to lose their lives! Your decision can salvage nothing! It will only cause more men to perish in vain, do you hear me?!"
"You did not even consult a single person! You bastard, you have no authority to do this!"
"Do you truly understand what you have done, Mr. Speaker?! Humanity cannot endure any more!"
"I understand." Speaker Kemore's reply was not aggressive, nor was his voice loud; it was as though he were simply stating a calm fact. "However, for the human race at such a historical juncture, there are some things that simply must be done. Such as what you call 'pointless sacrifice.'
"Some of us do not understand, because we are not warriors, and we are not on the battlefield. We are not even ordinary citizens watching in front of television sets," he said.
"Furthermore..." Without giving the councilors a chance to speak, Speaker Kemore raised his head, his gaze sweeping across the entire hall. "Furthermore, I wish to say that I have never truly lost hope."
When Speaker Kemore said this, the opposing councilors ceased their shouting. Instead, they stared at him in collective bewilderment, looking completely unable to comprehend or accept the word 'hope.'
"I have always maintained a glimmer of faith, believing they will return," Speaker Kemore concluded, earnest and sincere.
In truth, explanations no longer mattered. The moment Speaker Kemore had answered and approved the application, those ten thousand Azure elites on the Antarctic battlefield who were resolved to go south had already surged forward en masse, racing toward the Pole.
***
Antarctica, near the connecting line of the Peninsula, Azure Frontline Command Post, command room.
"...Well then, I leave the rest to you."
General Siglo, the supreme commander of Azure's frontline, embraced his deputy commander. At the same time, his gaze slowly swept over the faces of all the generals and staff officers in the command post.
The command work that remained for the Peninsula, including the fighting and the evacuation, had long been fully arranged; carrying it out was no longer difficult.
There were plenty of command personnel here who could see those tasks through. General Siglo was no longer essential.
Dressed in a combat suit, a war blade strapped to his back, General Siglo—who had not participated in frontline slaughter for a very long time—turned and walked toward the command post exit.
"General!" Behind him, the staff officers called out.
Yet his two deputy commanders—Siglo's best friends and closest comrades-in-arms over the years—did not make a sound. They merely stood there, watching, and offered their superior and friend a final, silent salute.
In this battle of Antarctica, the death toll stood at over six hundred thousand at the very least. The immense sacrifice, the fall of geniuses, the curtain calls of countless human heroes, Stream Blades' lethal redemption...
Regardless of the objective circumstances, as supreme commander of the frontline, General Siglo's guilt could never be absolved.
His character, too, meant he would never seek absolution, nor did he desire it.
Even if the Council did not hold him accountable, even if no one in the world ever brought him to trial, Siglo himself could never endure this nightmarish ordeal, nor the suffocating self-reproach and agony within his heart.
He had broken long ago. The only reason he had held on until now—waiting for the Western Front elites to return and relieve the Peninsula and completing all follow-up arrangements—was simply to fulfill his final duty.
At the entrance of the command post, General Siglo halted. He stood still for a second, then looked back over his shoulder.
"Please permit me to die on the battlefield. Preferably beneath the traction field, beside a soldier of Stream Blades. That will be the final and greatest honor of my life."
As he spoke, he raised his arm, waved, and clenched his hand into a fist. "Farewell, everyone. Please keep fighting, and always believe in the future. Believe that humanity will prevail."
"Farewell! For all that breathes..."
Amid the final responses of his staff officers, the figure of General Siglo—direct subordinate of Azure Headquarters, commander-in-chief of the Zenith War frontline, and supreme commander of the Lost Continent Expeditionary Frontline—vanished past the entrance of the command post and disappeared into the vast expanse of the ice plains.
Chapter 824