In front of the passage leading down to the building's underground entrance, Guan Shangjing was checking their casualties.
Earlier, Deputy Director Song Zicheng had led a team to seize the split sub-body, but he had failed to return, presumably having died out there.
This cost Guan a capable right-hand man.
Before the fighting began, the remaining twelve captains had accompanied him, but more than half were dead by now. Only five remained, and counting the men under them, their total headcount did not exceed fifty.
The elite garrison unit around him numbered only about twenty men, and these people constituted the building's final defense force.
While there were likely still many armed personnel launching counterattacks throughout the building, they stood almost no chance against the biological combat weapons.
From the sounds transmitting through his boundary credential, Guan could tell that casualties were steadily mounting. Every few moments, markers denoting various company departments on the credential's interface dimmed in several places, signaling that those positions had fallen. This trend was spreading at frightening speed; clearly, the survivors would not hold out much longer either.
There was still an intact thirty-man guard detail stationed with the board of directors, possessing decent combat capability, but they were tasked with protecting the directors and could not possibly be redeployed here.
Just as he was considering how to adjust his tactics and stall for more time, Director Takao's voice sounded through his boundary credential: "Director Guan, how much longer can you hold?"
Guan Shangjing answered truthfully, "Director Takao, even if my forces fall back and abandon key chokepoints, we can hold for half an hour at most. If those people join the fray... there is no telling how long we can last. Perhaps only a few minutes."
"Understood. Director Guan, the board requires you to keep them out at all costs. Ferris Wheel Company will not fall today."
Guan Shangjing's heart stirred. He roughly guessed what the company intended to do, and a glimmer of hope rekindled within him. "Understood, sir!" he said firmly.
At that moment, in a shaft-like chamber deep beneath Ferris Wheel Company, a colossal behemoth rested. Most of its body was draped in heavy curtains patterned with Gaotian Cult insignias. From its exposed limbs alone, one could see its bronze-colored surface, shimmering with a faint luminescence that waxed and waned in rhythm with its breathing.
Interfaces lined its body in neat rows, linked to vital conduits running in from the shaft walls and various surrounding structures.
Mist sprayed down from above as a greenish-yellow fluid coursed through the conduits and into its body—Ferris Wheel Company's reserve of high-energy nutrient broth being pumped into it.
With the steady infusion, the shriveled tentacles that had been drooping onto the floor swelled and plumped. The green luminescence across its body grew brighter and brighter. Ten or so minutes later, the tentacles suddenly whipped upward, wrapping securely around climbing rungs high in the shaft with a sharp snap, before hauling its massive frame slowly upward.
Inside the building, combat bio-creatures from the three departments had already secured the vast majority of the Ferris Wheel Building. Having located the underground entrance, they were launching a furious assault against it, while Guan Shangjing and his men fought desperately to hold them back.
Xu Chan stood in the lobby, observing the situation inside through the informational field. Had it not been for concerns over the cramped terrain and the possibility that the enemy had planted explosives, he would never have let them hold out for this long.
Yet what the enemy could use, his side could use as well. As wave after wave of biological weapons strapped with self-destruct explosives surged forward without pause, the opposing casualties steadily mounted. The defenders had no choice but to use the winding corners to yield ground bit by bit, clearly on the verge of collapse.
The modified creatures deployed here were simple to cultivate and devoid of intellect; they needed only to follow a single order: advance while carrying explosives. Fallen human personnel required pensions, whereas modified creatures needed none. No matter how many died, no one mourned.
After overseeing the assault for about twenty minutes, he saw the enemy retreat into an underground hall, evidently falling back to a vital position.
Just as he prepared to pause briefly and muster a final push to seize the position in one go, he felt the ground shudder violently—followed swiftly by another tremor.
Instantly on guard, he spoke through his boundary credential: "Attention, anomaly detected. Everyone, fall back!"
This served both as a warning to his teammates present and an order to the units to the rear.
The rapid-reaction forces were well-prepared and immediately pulled back.
Yet even with their swift response, it was still a step too late. From the base of the building, a tremendous surge of mental power suddenly erupted.
This mental power expanded outward like a physical shockwave, sweeping across their bodies in an instant before rushing farther afield.
The five of them present had braced themselves well in advance, yet even so, everyone except Xu Chan staggered involuntarily. A momentary dizziness struck their minds, forcing them several paces back before they could steady their feet.
At this moment, the nearest troops were two kilometers away from the Ferris Wheel Building. Even at that distance, a large swathe of personnel in front lost consciousness in an instant, toppling like dominos.
To say nothing of the biological weapons—almost all within that radius were wiped out, while the insects swarming in the air rained down from the sky, soon carpeting the ground in a thick layer.
Xu Chan wore a grave expression. Sensing the ongoing tremors in the earth, knowing something below was ascending toward the surface at astonishing speed, he repeated, "Everyone, get ready."
Not long after he spoke, cracks webbed across the center of the lobby floor, right where the Ferris Wheel emblem was painted. Then, with a deafening boom, stone and masonry shattered and burst outward.
In place of the floor was an octagonal shaft, its pitch-black depths obscuring where it led.
A greenish, vine-like tentacle whipped out from within, then struck down with a loud clang as its hooked claw clamped onto the hard floor.
Immediately following came the rustling scrape of friction and a low, guttural hiss echoing from the bottomless, shaft-like passage.
The sounds drew nearer and nearer. In barely half a minute, a monstrous titan crawled out, emerging fully onto the surface.
It resembled an upright armored insect, towering over a dozen meters tall. Its overall physique was streamlined, tapering slightly toward a pointed tail.
Its head and shoulders were encased in white exoskeleton reminiscent of an ancient warrior's jingasa helmet. A pair of antennae several meters long extended from the crown of its head, flexible and seemingly retractable, blossoming into floral flares at the tips.
Its skull was somewhat flattened with sharply defined edges, capable of pivoting with fluid ease. From its face down to its chest ran rows of insectoid compound eyes, now glowing with an eerie green light.
Its broad shoulders flared outward, with a pair of long, whip-like forelimbs dangling all the way to the floor—the very limbs it had used to haul itself up just moments before.
Its waist was relatively narrow, connecting two pairs of robust legs fore and aft, flanked by tactile tendril structures that assisted with balance and sensory perception. Each leg had multiple joints, terminating in thick footpads equipped with gripping claws and adhesive structures, reinforced by slender exoskeletal struts—clearly built to navigate all manner of terrain.
Ferris Wheel Company's active conscious entity: Wu Qi.
Xu Chan looked up, gazing steadily at the creature. The four men behind him could not help stepping back several paces, their faces etched with wary vigilance; it was an instinctive defensive reaction, for none could simply look upon this behemoth and remain unperturbed.
Xu Chan, however, stood rooted in place. At that moment, a faint glimmer began to flicker over his fists.
Though his stature paled into insignificance beside such a creature, he could clearly sense that while this active conscious entity was strong, it had not exceeded their current limit.
This was because the entity was too young, having been cultivated for only ten years—perhaps a little longer, but certainly no more than fifteen.
Furthermore, active conscious entities demanded immense amounts of energy and specialized substances to sustain. Ferris Wheel Company lacked the strength and channels to provide them, though had it successfully joined the Corporate United Syndicate, none of that would have remained an obstacle.
Given enough time, the company truly could have propelled this active conscious entity to an even higher level. As it stood, while difficult to deal with, it was by no means insurmountable—in fact, this was the easiest window to defeat it.
Now, he repeated those words for the third time: "Everyone, get ready!"
Inside the Defense Department's combat operations command center, the light screens—which had dimmed for a long while under the shockwave—finally flickered back to life, restoring visuals of the scenes both outside and inside the Ferris Wheel Building.
Even so, the displayed images flickered in waves, seemingly subjected to intense interference.
Commissioner Liang first glanced at the swathes of troops collapsed around the building, then turned his gaze to the grotesque form of Wu Qi, his expression dark and solemn.
A colossal size naturally conferred massive mental power, and field information was typically transmitted and maintained via active consciousness, often covering a range of dozens of kilometers. Thus, a mental power shockwave of this scale was not entirely beyond reason.
However, aside from combat-oriented active conscious entities like Hongfu, other entities had to emerge in their physical forms if they wished to unleash their combat power.
This thing was the true hurdle they had to overcome. Only by destroying it could Ferris Wheel Company be utterly crushed.
Although the liaisons and staff present had heard of active conscious entities before and frequently dealt with them indirectly, none had ever seen one with their own eyes. Seeing its true appearance now struck them momentarily speechless, their hearts deeply shaken by the creature's bizarre morphology and sheer mass.
Just then, Watchtower's voice chimed in: "Commissioner, an incoming signal on an external encrypted channel."
Surprised to hear this, Commissioner Liang immediately replied, "Patch it through."
Once the channel connected, he said in a deep voice, "This is Liang Guanghai."
After listening to the speaker on the other end for a moment, his expression turned grave. "Can you be certain?"
A moment later, he responded, "Thank you for your department's assistance. Understood. I will review the schedule your side drafted shortly. Our objectives are aligned."
Chapter 583