There was nothing he could do.
Fast—it had happened too fast!
As if drilled into his very marrow, that entire sequence of movements had been executed with seamless fluidity, devoid of the slightest stutter or flaw, long since refined into a standardized routine. In the mere few seconds Pacquiao had spent distracted by Old Tom, the Heart Pivot Celestial Chosen shielded at the very core of his fleet had been sliced and diced, sealed in mercury for freshness, chopped up, bagged... and as soon as the prep work was done, the courier was already on the scene to pick up the takeout!
Any later, and he wouldn't even have had time to leave a five-star review.
Witnessing this right before his eyes, Pacquiao felt as if his lungs were about to burst from rage.
It was unbelievable.
Where the hell did this trash teammate come from?!
Regeneration! Goddammit, man, you were at least a Regenerator! Even a pig at the Regeneration tier lying there waiting to be slaughtered would take someone half an hour to butcher, wouldn't it?!
On top of that, just how had you exposed yourself in the first place? And how had the enemy seen through the chaotic fog of war as if gifted with precognition, pinpointed the hidden position where the Heart Pivot was lurking, and wiped you out with a righteous strike from above?
A mole! There had to be a goddamn traitor!
Consuming fury seized Pacquiao, and he whipped around.
Three kilometers away, the low-flying Dragon Mountain armor blared with alarms. It had detected a spiritus lock, but there was no time left for tactical maneuvers.
Anticipate the Enemy!
It did not merely read an opponent's movements to provide advance warning and evasion; it could equally perceive and cut off every evasive route the enemy might take, turning it into a deadly strike!
Under such sensory lock, all escape and evasion were rendered utterly pointless.
"Die!"
Pacquiao drew the cracked dagger with a backhand grip. Bloodlight and savage malice converged once more as he lashed out in hatred, holding nothing back. The instant it left his hand, the crimson glow swelled and twisted, wrapping around the blade like a writhing, ferocious beast as it shot forward.
In a breath, it was already inches away.
The only thing Lu Feng had time to do was fire his reverse thrusters.
He plummeted!
Yet the baleful blade whipped through a sharp ninety-degree turn, pursuing him downward to plunge straight toward his skull.
And then...
Then, nothing happened.
Amid a deafening roar, the earth shuddered violently, and fissure after fissure tore through the mud.
The expected spectacle of armor and man shattered in a single blow never arrived.
The Dragon Mountain armor remained completely unscathed!
Immovable as a Mountain!
"Whew—"
Lu Feng let out a cocky whistle. Right before those blood-red eyes, he lowered his head, patted his own helmet, and shook his head at Pacquiao with mock regret.
*Still gotta practice more, little bro!*
Turning around, he tossed the mercury-sealed bundle into the automated delivery tricycle waiting to receive the goods. Then, flames erupting once more, the Dragon Mountain armor soared back into the sky, drawing various armaments from its back to harvest heads right under Pacquiao's nose.
The furious Blood Pennon stirred anew, drawing countless living corpses to swarm forward.
Yet not one could withstand a single blow.
Beneath the harvesting sweeps of Pan Ying, even the meager empowerment and blessings granted by the Lord of Scars were sliced through like melons and vegetables.
Besides, Pacquiao had no time to deal with Lu Feng's blatant taunting.
A chilling dread gripped the back of his neck!
Showing not a shred of grief over Old Tom being punted away like a stray dog, the next to arrive on the battlefield was Uncle Lin!
The graying, middle-aged man emerged abruptly from the smoke. At some point, a sickle had appeared in his hand—an eerie, jade-green, short-handled blade that lunged forward without a sound. It swept across in a head-on clash against Pacquiao's Blood Pennon, only to be knocked backward and dissolve into thin air once more.
Yet before Pacquiao could even pursue him, he heard that loathsome roar and holler once again.
Old Tom, that bastard, had actually rushed back.
Leaping right into his face once more, accompanied by his ancestors!
At the same time, the Dragon Mountain armor climbed high into the sky and dove down once more... repeating its previous trick as the Meteor Maneuver descended from above!
In the blink of an eye, beneath the coordinated assault, Pacquiao found himself surrounded and farmed by the three of them like a dungeon boss.
A rogue, a warrior, and a tank—entangling him relentlessly, clinging like gum stepped on by accident that couldn't be scraped off, lingering and inescapable like rot in the bone.
Until Pacquiao could endure it no longer and let out a furious roar!
The Blood Pennon, etched with scenes of countless corpses, unfurled once more. A shockwave erupted out of nowhere, sweeping outward to blow all three away. Immediately afterward, he abandoned all manual control over the living corpses and went all out!
Instantly, jade fire surged like a tidal wave, spreading with violent fury.
Unfortunately, before he could press his advantage, a deafening crash erupted from the heavens above.
At the far reaches of the squall and driving rain, across the churning ocean, an enormous mass tore through the sky. Hurled with colossal force, something crumpled into a grotesque, twisted ball arced through the air like a boulder launched from a catapult, hurtling from the sea straight toward Pacquiao's flagship.
Without hesitation, Pacquiao struck back. Raising his spear coiled with jade fire and crimson light, he thrust outward!
It impaled the object with effortless ease.
Boom!
The towering mass, large as a multistory building, disintegrated in an instant, shattering into countless fragments that scattered like a meteor shower. They slammed into the other pirate vessels caught off guard, triggering a relentless succession of explosions.
After being shattered by Pacquiao, the remaining kinetic force and momentum caused little actual damage, but shocked cries and terrified shrieks soon echoed across ship after ship.
Amid the chaos, someone finally recognized what the wreckage had once been.
Broken masts, sails scarred with burns, splintered hulls encrusted with barnacles and eerie talismans, mangled flesh and corpses mixed within, and even the familiar, ferocious figurehead of a mermaid devouring a serpent...
"Wichaya!"
"That's Wichaya's ship!"
"Where's Wichaya?"
Someone screamed in terror, "Wichaya is dead!"
The ghost ship that had used phantoms to confound the enemy and draw fire on the sea not half an hour ago had been utterly pulverized.
Crushed into a crumpled ball like scrap paper, it had been delivered back to Pacquiao in such a horrific state.
Mangled beyond recognition!
Now, accompanied by rumblings beneath the water, a roar like the tide parted the sea to both sides.
A flash of lightning cut across the sky, illuminating a terrifying silhouette scores of meters tall. Like a giant emerging from the sea to launch a counterattack, it dragged a massive lance forged from the welded, melted drive shaft of a ship. Wading through waist-deep water, it marched step by step along the estuary of the Longjiang River toward them.
Like a colossus striding forth from the ocean depths!
With every step it took, thunderous booms erupted from the boiling, churning waters and torrential currents!
Then, completely ignoring their pathetic, fragile firepower, the ferocious colossus raised the hundreds-of-meters-long drive shaft spear and drove it straight into the ship at the very rear of the formation!
Boom!
In an instant, hundreds of tons of mass punched through the deck and tore out through the hull. Then, as if lifting a skewer from a grill, the giant swung it upward!
And hurled it straight at the water ghosts scrambling in terror!
Towering waves roiled and spread.
Under workshop-grade spiritus output and Isis's precise control, the massive cargo ship Prosperity had completed its transformation through the power of Deus Ex Machina.
Revitalized from inanimate matter, it had become a bona fide iron giant, freely unleashing this tempestuous might.
At this moment, it was the turn of these water ghosts who had delivered themselves to the slaughter to become fish on the chopping block!
At the same time, the gates of Xinquan swung wide with a thunderous crash. Amid the clatter of iron hooves, blood-red flames surged forth like a river!
"By the Red Lord's witness!"
Spear in one hand and the relic banner raised in the other, Slan led the spearhead formation in a thunderous charge.
A full assault!
After silently enduring for so long, they finally bared their fangs, unleashing a sweeping counteroffensive right then and there.
With their retreat blocked by Prosperity, the water ghosts fell into utter disarray. In their panic, many ship captains could no longer care about the constraints of their blood pacts and tried to force their way upstream against the rushing Longjiang River to find another way out.
Unfortunately, it was already too late.
The gift from upstream had finally drifted down with the surging currents, arriving right before them.
Amid deafening detonations, the torrents roiled and boiled. Pillars of flame and countless shards of shrapnel shot into the sky, tearing open jagged fissures across the reinforced hulls.
Under the detonation of massive fields of naval mines, the leading ships were riddled with holes in the blink of an eye. Shattered and sinking, their hulls wedged against the riverbed, inadvertently shielding the ships behind them from much of the drifting ordnance.
Yet in doing so, they also sealed off the escape route.
It was like catching turtles in a jar.
The vast Longjiang River, which they had originally counted on as their greatest advantage, had now turned into a trap with no way out. Wailing and weeping echoed ceaselessly.
Driven to desperation, people began leaping overboard to swim for their lives. Even if they miraculously survived crossing the turbulent currents of the rainy season and dragged themselves ashore, they were already spent of all strength—only to have their heads picked off by firepower from watchtowers and hidden bunkers.
They were driven to a total dead end!
Pacquiao whipped his head around, looking toward Xinquan once more.
A chill ran through his bones.
On the highest rooftop stood the young man who had looked down from afar under an umbrella the entire time. A mocking smile played across his lips as they parted silently.
From dozens of li away, he asked with curious amusement:
*What are you still waiting for?*
Immediately after, subordinates stepped out from behind him into the pouring rain, dragging heavy body bags. Lowering ropes, they hung one mangled corpse after another over the edge of the roof.
Putting them on full display before Pacquiao's eyes.
Those savage, ferocious pupils shrank abruptly, trembling violently.
Eleven corpses. Eleven Celestial Chosen he had dispatched—the hounds and falcons he had painstakingly trained, entrusted with great hope and critical duty by the General, infiltrated into Haizhou days ago and scattered across various locations.
According to the original plan, the moment the signal came, they were supposed to breach and detonate the upstream dam, unleashing a colossal torrent to submerge all of Xinquan!
When that happened, all resistance would have been a joke.
Yet the battle had raged for so long, and the dam remained as solid as ever. Amid the raging tempest, not a single drop of the expected deluge had appeared.
There were only corpses, strung up along the Haian Industries building.
Like dead dogs.
Swaying in the wind!
Chapter 421