On Mars, beneath the twin moons, the black iron wall merged with the circular formation of Great Spikes, resembling the fortress of a demon king—majestic, terrifying, and grim with slaughter.
*Skreee-ch—boom!*
Suddenly, the citadel roared, in a single instant completely shattering the quiet night of this dead planet.
Matters having come to this, the Red Shoulders naturally understood that this alien-world clash—a decisive battle bound to the fates of two civilizations—was about to unfold. At their command, over ten thousand Great Spikes beneath the towering iron wall howled in unison, drawing their swords and hoisting them high into the air.
A hideous sight: a forest of ten thousand colossal column swords.
They were stoking their morale, waiting in full battle array.
Waiting for the assault of a single human warrior.
In truth, up until this point, nearly every large-scale conflict between humanity and the Great Spike civilization had seen the human side outnumbering the enemy—vastly outnumbering them—and even then, humans were often cut down and outmatched.
Thus, the spectacle unfolding here was very likely the first of its kind: the first time a human stood within such a staggering disparity of numbers, marching alone into an existential battle to the death.
"Damn. That really is a few too many."
"And these idiots have even learned how to holler and flex before a fight."
Pegmont remained where he stood, watching and listening to all of this in an exceptionally rare state of calm.
Then, amid the lingering echoes of ten thousand howling Great Spikes, he raised his arm. *Clang-hummmm—*
A single ringing sound. The sonic reverberation stretched long and steady.
The human legion drew his blade.
Human source energy armament. Non-standard issue. A 1.6-meter straight dead iron long blade. Its broad, heavy edge hissed sharply as it cleared the six hooks across his back, came over his right shoulder, and swung down beside his hip... held horizontally in his right hand alone.
"Howl, howl my ass."
"Come on!"
"Cut me down if you've got the guts, or by god I'm wiping out every last one of you bastards today!"
Pegmont spoke with immense calm, his voice not particularly loud. After all, those stupid pieces of shit wouldn't understand him anyway.
Yet—*Clang! Hummm...*
Even without understanding, the horde of Great Spikes gave an immediate reply.
Several thousand column swords struck against the iron wall at the same time. The reverberating roar rolled like thunder; centered around the tractor field, tons of sand and gravel across the surrounding terrain were swept up like a crashing tidal wave, surging straight into the air.
This was not an attack, of course. Yet the shockwave generated purely by that clatter would have been enough to slaughter every ordinary human and beast within a radius of several kilometers.
"So if the day ever comes when they truly conquer Blue Star and start purging humanity... it'd probably happen in the blink of an eye."
"Which is why..."
In truth, when it came to that Azure slogan, Pegmont had never been someone who shouted it with any real passion or enthusiasm during past pre-battle ceremonies. Most of the time, he simply hadn't thought those battles were truly dangerous or frightening enough to warrant such monumental willpower, determination, and grandiose justification.
Nor did he often experience the mindset of standing shoulder to shoulder with everyone in a desperate fight to the death. He was a peerless genius; most of the time, he was far more accustomed to roaming the edges of the battlefield, fighting alone, steeped in deep-seated personal heroism.
On a few occasions, Pegmont had even found the slogan somewhat laughable. What did "for everything that breathes" even mean?
The punks he used to scrap with on the streets back then—was he supposed to lay down his life fighting for them too? And if breathing was the only requirement, what about the mice scurrying in the house? What about the ant that crawled onto your arm on a park bench and bit you?
Was he supposed to fight for pigs and dogs?
"Yeah. If there were an ant from Blue Star here right now besides me, or a dog—a husky, a golden retriever, a bulldog, whatever breed—I, Pegmont, would fight to protect them."
"To the death."
***
*Rumble, rattle...* Beneath the Martian moonlit night, across the desolate plain, sand, stone, and dirt rained down endlessly like a downpour mixed with heavy hail.
Visibility was blurred.
Ahead, the area guarded behind the circular Great Spike formation and the iron wall was not particularly vast, yet neither was it small. The precise location of the tractor field within remained unconfirmed.
In a battle of this scale and tempo, facing such a massive disparity in numbers, and especially with his remaining source energy blocks far from enough to sustain an extended fight—
Whether Pegmont could "charge straight in and strike directly at it" or had to "charge in, search for it, and then turn toward it"... the difference between the two was enormous. So vast that it would very likely decide the final outcome of this decisive engagement.
Unfortunately, this tractor field had not been erected above ground. Even now, Pegmont had been unable to locate it...
No! Pegmont finally spotted it.
Precisely because visibility was poor, any stray gleam became exceptionally conspicuous. Between the gaps in the Great Spikes' circular formation and the iron wall, Pegmont suddenly caught a glimmer near the ground.
Tonight, dazzling stars hung in the Martian sky.
There, where that light had just flashed, had to be the underground spire of the Great Spike tractor field.
"Target: Great Spike Martian tractor field."
"Ready."
"Humanity, Azure Mars Expeditionary Force, Pegmont Legion... all forces, attack!"
*Whoooosh!* A magnificent burst of blue light erupted from the sand and dirt that blotted out the moons and sky, blossoming dazzlingly like a diamond bursting from mud.
Within the blue glow, faint traces of human crimson were subtly woven.
*Rustle, rustle, rustle!* In the kilometer spanning between the two armies, the airborne dirt and rock suddenly froze midair, trapped in place as if bound, trembling and quivering violently at high frequency.
Viewed as a whole, it resembled a colossal, porous wall of earth hovering in midair. Yet in detail, every single grain of sand, stone, and clod of dirt within that wall, large and small alike, was vibrating with fierce, intense force.
This scene lasted for barely a second.
A second later.
*Whoosh—BOOM!* As though swept by a super gale, the suspended earthen wall shot forward horizontally in a straight line toward the circular Great Spike formation and the fortress iron wall, every dense speck of gravel hurtling like a razor blade.
*Clang, clang, clang, clang, clang!* The barrage of flying stone slammed into alien armor and battered against the towering iron wall, producing an endless, frenzied din.
And from within the approaching dust storm, a dead iron long blade seemed to part rivers and seas. Carrying immense power through the resistance, it cleaved deliberately forward.
It was an entire "human source energy legion," bursting with maximum energy, charging in like lightning.
"For everything that breathes, no retreat in battle... our bodies bar the sky!" *BOOM!*
The impact sounded like a nuclear detonation. With this single cleave, the energy that had been gathering along the length of the blade was finally unleashed.
The scene abruptly shifted:
The storm of hurtling sand and stone—that "massive porous earthen wall"—suddenly transformed, solidifying into an indivisible, extraordinarily dense pillar whose colossal head slammed head-on into the horde of Great Spikes and the iron wall!
At the same time, across the ground, a gargantuan rift over two meters wide and three meters deep ripped forward like an earthquake fault line, tearing rapidly toward the circular Great Spike formation and the base of the iron wall.
Weakened, in poor physical condition, and critically low on remaining source energy blocks, Pegmont had no room for probing attacks tonight. From the very first strike, he went all out in a lethal clash to the death.
*Thud, thud, thud, thud!* Beneath the impact of the massive pillar, the black-armored and blue-sheened Great Spikes at the front rank of the circular formation were hammered backward row by row, sent flying to crash against the iron wall.
Sand and dirt could not conduct source energy. But they didn't need to. The raw, non-elemental force stirred up by Pegmont's source energy detonation was more than enough to upend ordinary Great Spikes.
"Roar!" Several thousand Great Spikes on the front line, including nearly two hundred Red Shoulders, roared together to meet the foe. Gripping their hoisted column swords with both hands turned reverse-grip, they thrust down in unison.
This was one of the Great Spike combat maneuvers that humans knew best. Throughout the long history of war when small Great Spike craft landed sporadically and Azure squads conducted scattered interception missions, this was the nearly invariable first-wave area-of-effect attack unleashed whenever Great Spikes ejected from their pods... and Azure squads had almost always chosen to evade its brunt.
*BOOM!*
In an instant, several thousand column swords plunged straight into the ground simultaneously. A vast area of concentrated energy detonated all at once, crashing forward like a sky-toppling tidal wave.
This attack was essentially a type of source energy field, though unlike Wu Xu's concentrated gravity field, it was an eruptive explosion field.
With the blast of this energy, the massive pillar hurtling through the air froze for a fraction of a second, then shattered as if blown apart... Sand, gravel, and dirt exploded outward, scattering and raining down like a torrential storm.
Amid the chaos, *crack!* A solitary fracture rang out, crisp and distinct.
Arching into a full-bodied slash, Pegmont's silhouette burst through the shock field, cleaving out from the storm of falling earth and rock.
Chapter 879