The massive column sword tore through the wind, trailing afterimages of radiant light. With the momentum to shatter cities and topple mountains, it pierced through more than a dozen Great Spikes ejecting from the sky across several hundred meters of flight, unleashing a torrential rain of foul, blue blood.
Yet its momentum did not diminish in the slightest. Howling through the air, it surged straight toward Puta'er, who was sprinting in the distance.
Seeing this, some reckless daredevil on the battlefield from the City of Injustice let out an exhilarated roar, cheering as if spectating a street brawl.
Opposite him, Puta'er knew full well the column sword was aimed at it, yet ignored it entirely.
In the air, a small diving Great Spike craft entered the trajectory of the column sword. Both hurtling at extreme speeds, an imminent collision was bound to happen in an instant...
Would it end here? By all common sense, Major Qing's column sword might shoot down this small craft with immense kinetic force, but his attack itself would terminate right there.
The world knew that dead iron possessed unmatched hardness. To ordinary human soldiers of the past, the difficulty in slaying Great Spikes lay largely not in their immense strength or high speed, but in the dead iron armor they wore. Blasting it open or piercing through was extraordinarily difficult, requiring repeated strikes targeted at the exact same spot.
It was precisely this factor that had historically crippled the combat efficiency of human soldiers, leading to the terrifying casualty rates among Azure squads.
And the hull plating of a starcraft was undeniably far thicker than the armor on any Great Spike.
Yet... in that split second, before anyone had time to think, a sharp, brief screech rang across the battlefield. The column sword hurled from Major Qing's hands had already cleaved into the hull of the Great Spike craft.
Immediately after came a deafening blast as a stream of blue light erupted from the rear of the ship.
The airborne Great Spike craft shuddered violently, shrapnel flying everywhere, before spiraling out of control and crashing down into its own ranks.
Yet the column sword never wavered from its path, continuing its direct thrust toward Puta'er.
In this head-on collision, the sword had breached the ship. The entry point was small, cut almost flush, while the exit wound was colossal, blowing open nearly the entire rear of the craft.
"Breaching a ship?!"
"Breaching a ship in a single strike," once regarded by humanity's source-weapon world as nothing more than a dream or fantasy, had actually unfolded right here on the Martian battlefield, where humanity stood on the brink of doom.
Judging by this, Major Qing seemed to have long possessed the capability to breach a ship by raw force; he hadn't done so before likely because it hadn't been necessary, or because the energy expenditure was simply too dear.
Many Azure soldiers across the chaotic battlefield witnessed this world-shaking strike, but other than sprinting with everything they had, they had no time to spare for extra thoughts or reactions. Every person present knew full well that Major Qing's sole reason for taking his gravely wounded body into battle against Puta'er was to buy time for the fleet's escape.
At this moment, aside from Wu Xu and the few elite combatants who were watching Han Qingyu's fight with rapt attention, only embedded correspondents Ian and Ashilia—along with the camera lenses in their hands that remained aloof from the chaos and despair—were still bravely, foolishly, and faithfully recording everything on the battlefield.
"How can Qingzi..." Rusty Sister stepped forward to Wu Xu's side, asking in a hesitant whisper.
To her eyes, for Qingzi, heavily injured as he was, to unleash an attack like this seemed far too fierce and overwhelmingly powerful.
Wu Xu tightened his grip on the Binggu Spear and answered simply and directly, "He's burning bone source."
He was fighting at the cost of his own life-force. After today's battle, even if he survived, even if they managed to escape with their lives, Major Qing—standing at the pinnacle of humanity—would likely never return to his peak condition again.
By now, He Tangtang had long since climbed down from the top of the mothership.
After coaxing Admiral Jiang Longchi onto a ship to prevent him from suddenly charging off and getting lost, more than half of the Expeditionary Force's elite combatants stood together at the edge of the position, watching Han Qingyu fight.
They did not need to scramble aboard like the other soldiers. With their prowess, boarding presented no challenge; as long as a ship successfully launched—even if it was already airborne—they had their own ways to board before it reached cruising speed.
And the reason they had not rushed to Qingzi's aid... was their longstanding trust in him.
It was an unquestioning trust accumulated over a long time, having almost become second nature.
They believed Qingzi most likely had a plan, and most likely could return on his own after holding the line this once. If they charged in rashly and ended up trapped, Qingzi might have to turn back to save them instead, dragging him down to his death.
Around this time,
Behind this group of top-tier fighters, the first ship among the human Expeditionary Force finally completed its start-up sequence and prepared to begin its ascent.
Then came the second...
Seeing this, at least a dozen small and medium-sized craft from the opposing Great Spike fleet surged ahead of their dreadnought, hurtling frantically toward the human lines.
...
At the same time.
Because of that ship-breaching strike, Puta'er, sprinting in the distance, finally glanced aside and came to a halt. Lifting its four-edged long sword, it took a closer look at the incoming column sword and the minuscule human warrior far away.
As a high-tier Great Spike, a supreme source energy warrior and intelligent being, Puta'er had already quickly discerned the true prowess and threat behind that blow.
*That wasn't merely the power infused into the column sword when it was thrown. He—that human—applied fresh power as the sword breached the craft. That means even after the sword left his hands, over a great distance, he can still exert influence, pour in immense energy, and manipulate it with precision.*
It was precisely this judgment that led it to stop and intercept this sword—and sparked its interest to do so.
At this point, the distance between them was still over a thousand meters; Puta'er could not even make out Han Qingyu's face clearly.
Yet the column sword had already arrived.
After traveling over two thousand meters, it was still swift as lightning, howling like thunder.
At the same time, a thousand meters away, Han Qingyu had unslung the small column sword from his back. His body surged forward once more, sprinting at top speed toward Puta'er.
*Whoosh...* Slow and ponderous, Puta'er finally swung its weapon, the sound resembling a colossal oar plunging into the deep sea, sluggishly churning the waters.
It was an exceedingly simple horizontal slash, sweeping from right to left across its front.
The four-edged greatsword, nearly a hundred meters long, did not appear rapid along its path.
However, the blue-light column sword shooting through the air was halted. Before it could touch Puta'er's giant sword, at least a hundred meters away, it was stopped dead by the energy radiating through the air.
In other words, this seemingly overwhelming strike ended before Han Qingyu could even make solid contact with Puta'er's weapon.
Then, *boom!*
The blue-light column sword frozen in midair shuddered violently.
It did not recoil.
It did not fall.
It simply shattered. Under Puta'er's swing, it detonated in midair, breaking into nearly a hundred fragments of varying sizes.
Then, *whir! Swish, swish, swish...* As Puta'er's swing finally concluded, those nearly one hundred fragments of the blue-light column sword finally began flying back through the air, shooting wildly in reverse.
And then, abruptly, *boom, boom, boom...*
Explosions erupted. The ten-plus small and medium-sized Great Spike craft hurtling toward the human lines were all struck from behind by the column sword fragments, pierced through, and brought crashing down in an instant.
Falling alongside these ships were the corpses of nearly a hundred Great Spikes from the ground and the air.
Puta'er: "..."
*Crafty human! He was still channeling energy to manipulate those fragments, turning my own power against me to stop and slaughter my servants.*
*Damn him!*
The damned had arrived.
Amidst the flying shrapnel, Han Qingyu, brandishing the small blue-light column sword, had already charged within two hundred meters of Puta'er.
Chapter 938