Forge a path to success.

Chapter 142 Rampage
Extremely high threat... Extremely high threat... Extremely high threat!
Remnants of historical fog have been detected, making it impossible to fully analyze intelligence. It is predicted that the combat capabilities of the opposing individual exceed the current processing capacity of the machine. Therefore, we request centralized computing resources for an upgrade!

The field of vision was covered by dense data, and red lights, indicating danger, flashed back and forth between the characters. I wanted to control the rampaging machine, but I no longer had the strength. Uncontrollable "information" rose from my back and surged into the sky, only to be obscured by the dark moonlight.

Warning. Signal jamming... First Abyss...

Black Moon, it seems, can do some good. A stroke of luck amidst misfortune. The higher-ranking beings are outside, so the Empire's signals didn't get through. Is that right? I suppose so.

Amidst the crackling, crackling sounds of imagined electricity, Chu Hengkong's thoughts drifted intermittently as he reached out. Was he trying to warn his opponent to retreat, or perhaps to push away the nearby banshee? His motives were impossible to discern. As the crackling faded, his weakened thoughts subsided, and an iron will took over his body.

He lowered his head, then raised it again, his eyes devoid of any human emotion. With the movements of a wild beast, he leaped up, his hand aimed at Qingxia's abdomen!
Qingxia deflected the thrust with her right hand, then aimed her left pistol butt at Chu Hengkong's head. Chu Hengkong turned to dodge, the butt of the pistol grazing his hair, a seemingly effortless strike sending a long, blank line through the air. The concentrated force tore through the air, pierced through buildings, turning the space 50 meters in front of the point of impact into blank ground.

Chu Hengkong was thrown off balance by the aftershock of the attack. Without hesitation, he fell to the ground and hooked his leg at Qingxia's foreleg. This strike was concise yet extremely effective. The enemy's physique was naturally suited for battlefield charges but not for one-on-one duels. Once his balance was disrupted, he was like a warhorse that had fallen into a trap, and it would take time for him to get up again.

Qingxia dodged the hook kick with a raised hoof, and thrust her spear at Chu Hengkong's abdomen with her left hand. Chu Hengkong swayed his legs, slapped the ground with one palm, and kicked out with a side kick that struck Qingxia's leg joint squarely!
Qingxia's forelegs trembled slightly. She suddenly raised her upper body and stomped her feet towards Chu Hengkong's torso. Chu Hengkong rolled on the ground to avoid the direct attack, but his body was sent flying high into the air by the shockwave.

"It hurts a bit." Qingxia felt the soreness and numbness in her legs and laughed with a hint of surprise. "Don't force me to get serious."

"Please, sister, have mercy!!" Vande screamed desperately, utterly pathetic. "We have elderly parents to support, young children to raise, and a bunch of idiots in the town to care for. Losing my life isn't worth it!!"

Blown away, Chu Hengkong landed vertically as if dragged, sprawling on his hands and feet among the rubble like a wild beast with red eyes. The machine's self-check completed upon awakening, streams of information flashing through his eyes.

The current machine's integrity is 12.7%, and its energy reserves are 5.8%. Determine the available attack modes.

Kinetic reflective armor: Deployable in 8 seconds, covering less than 50% of the area.

Ghostly Annihilation Field - Wide-Range Attack: Energy Insufficient.

Material splitting rays: No emitting structure.

Energy reserves are too low. Pure Imperial technology is unusable in actual combat. Loading Dragon's Home Fist Technique information: Regular techniques loading progress 87%, Secret techniques loading progress 34%...

Calculation complete. Temporary information is being pieced together based on the secret "Immortal and Indestructible Technique". Mechanization modification to begin.

The multitasking approach transformed complex calculations into a fleeting moment in reality. As Chu Hengkong landed, he opened his mouth, unleashing a hurricane-like roar. Metal, soil, plants, gases—everything within reach—was sucked into his mouth. His esophagus and blood vessels were modified and connected for easier energy replenishment, and his blood, fueled by his inner energy, rapidly heated up, acting as a furnace within his body.

Trace elements beneficial to combat are absorbed and integrated into the bones in an almost corrosive manner; nutrients that can serve as energy are absorbed on the spot; and substances that the low-energy body cannot utilize are expelled as smoke and dust. The primary task at present is to replenish energy, and no usable material can be allowed to be wasted.

He grabbed the Eye Demon from his pocket with one hand, and Vander trembled like a leaf: "Brother, don't eat me..."

Chu Hengkong's eyes held only a cold, bloodthirsty light. He bit down, and at the last second, the bone-white chains lashed out, tearing out the eye demon about to be devoured. Qingxia casually tossed it onto her back.

“Look closely, little thing.” She squinted. “He’s no longer human.”

Vande stared blankly at the thing blocking their path. Crimson smoke billowed from his pores, his hand had been transformed into a blade-like limb, his tentacles, influenced by bone armor, had become thorny spears, and four more bones burst forth, forming needle-like auxiliary legs for movement. The thing was indeed no longer human; no human could appear so grotesque and ferocious. It was the form of a monster, a monster capable of fighting Qingxia!

Qingxia wielded her spear like a meteor hammer, the bone locks at its end crisscrossing and forming an iron chain barrier sealing off an area of ​​three hundred meters. Chu Hengkong, now a resource-collecting machine, needed to prevent it from hunting in densely populated areas. Chu Hengkong crouched low, exerted its strength, and like a green ghost, grazed past Qingxia's side. His blade-like right arm lashed out during the charge, aiming straight for Qingxia's lower abdomen.

Qingxia drew her Qingkun Spear, using its repulsive force to deflect the thrust. Chu Hengkong, missing his attack, crashed into the iron chains hindering his movement. His auxiliary bone spikes gripped the chains first, using the recoil to spring into the air, and his spear pierced Qingxia's back. Sparks flew where the spear struck, and a layer of bone armor that appeared out of thin air protected the thrusting position, the second attack also being neutralized by the enemy. Chu Hengkong adjusted his position and attacked again. He used the bone lock barrier to jump around continuously, leaping dozens of times in a single breath, his spear, claws, and legs striking from different directions, his attacks ruthless yet extremely cunning. That speed created a green hurricane around Qingxia, everywhere was a crimson gaze, everywhere was a flurry of fists and palm shadows. Qingxia used the Qingkun Spear and bone armor to defend, and for a moment she did not attack. She was good at battlefield combat and hunting, but her strange body was not naturally suited to dealing with such tricky attacks.

Thirty strikes, seventy strikes, one hundred and forty strikes. In the blink of an eye, they clashed for the two hundred and tenth time. During the battle, the single blade, sharpened further, pierced Qingxia's bone armor. Qingxia silently clenched her fist, looked at the ground, and threw a punch with all her might, intending to end Chu Hengkong's guerrilla tactics with a wide-range strike. However, Chu Hengkong's speed suddenly increased at that moment. He floated in the air and unleashed all six arms at once, stabbing towards the back of Qingxia's head.

His stamina had miraculously recovered during the battle; his hastily modified predatory system absorbed surrounding matter, and his meticulously calculated combat expenditures ensured that the consumption was far less than the recovery. In terms of agility and speed, Chu Hengkong was superior to Qingxia; his surprise attack was even faster than a fist striking the ground.

A pale white flower bloomed in a small space, its petals slashing towards the swords, spears, and bone hands, successfully blocking Chu Hengkong's surprise attack!
The bone blade that once tore Wu He apart reappeared, parrying Chu Hengkong's attack with exquisite control. Six bone blades floated behind Qingxia defying gravity, their tips connected to her back by thin, almost transparent lines of blood. These floating bone blades, controlled by nerve bundles, were Qingxia's weapon of choice during her time in the second phase of the materialization era, and remain her preferred secondary weapon.

She twisted her upper body and threw a punch. The blood-fueled uppercut pierced through the defense and struck Chu Hengkong's face, with a force far greater than that of the punch to Wu Heshi, sending him flying into the sky.

Chu Hengkong's bone claws swirled behind him, using his injury as an opportunity to shatter the bone lock barrier. His face was covered in blood, but the emergency appearance of his protective aura armor saved him from having his head smashed by a single punch. His torso repaired itself while floating, and his bladed forelimbs melted and reformed, forming a giant hand forged from steel.

The current unit's integrity is 7.4%, and its energy reserves are 40.8%. The kinetic energy reflection armor is available for 30 seconds, and the ghost body annihilation field can be applied.

The cost of rapidly replenishing energy is the further depletion of Chu Hengkong's life force, which is considered his physical body. Once his integrity drops below 5%, he will never be able to return to human form, and his existence will be completely transformed into a machine composed of flesh and blood—the outward corruption of the Truth Empire. At that point, even a high-quality powerhouse could not save Chu Hengkong.

However, the Immortal Machine does not consider the "life" of the machine; it only cares about the death of the enemy.

It waved its giant hand in mid-air, its forced aura tinged with blood, forming a palm print a hundred meters wide, enveloping the hardened air. On the ground, Qingxia swung her Qingkun Spear, the giant lance accelerating with a piercing echo. She hurled the spear, its tip imbued with blood energy, forming a crimson dragon shape.

The forces of qi and blood collided in the air, and the repulsive force within the Qingkun Spear was unleashed, shattering Chu Hengkong's palm print in the sky!
The impact of the attack created a towering crimson column of energy, forcing Vande to tangle Qingxia's hair to prevent it from being blown away. Qingxia gazed at the monster in the distance, its form constantly shifting, the proportion of flesh decreasing while the metallic structure increased at a visible rate, like a giant metallic worm trapped inside a human body, tearing open its cocoon of flesh to reveal its true form.

That's so unfortunate.

How could something that was once so beautiful and captivating have become so ugly?

Cold, deformed, devoid of any vitality... standing there, burning with life force, fighting a battle that had nothing to do with him, so weak it was heartbreaking.

Vande sensed the murderous intent beside it and cried out urgently, its voice fading in the wind: "He's affected by misfortune... I can hypnotize him! Please... have mercy..."

Qingxia sighed.

"Yes, it's very unpleasant. I understand how you feel. The feeling of having your actions and decisions manipulated by self-righteous idiots is the same no matter how many times you experience it."

Vande's heart sank instantly; it understood Qingxia's unspoken meaning. It was unpleasant, unacceptable, but nothing could change the situation. A life beyond saving was beyond saving; even someone as powerful as Qingxia couldn't defy fate. Its best friend had become a heretic, and there was no turning back.

"—So, leave it to me."

However, it heard unbelievable words. Promises that defied common sense and logic. It looked up and saw the wind whipping through blood-red hair, and a confident, warrior-like smile on a stunning profile.

"I hate stories like this the most. People who fall into malice, souls who die in despair, I've seen the same tragedy so many times I'm sick of it."

"So I won't give up, I won't admit defeat. Keep your eyes wide open, I will definitely save him!"

(End of this chapter)